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I find this update to be extremely concerning This0Is0Fine. It sounds to me that you are on the verge of caving again.

That is not at all the case. I didn't say that what she wrote down was enough for me to withdraw the request for divorce. It was simply something that I specifically asked for because, as you have pointed out she has blown through every boundary that I have set.

You and she already agreed to things before, several times actually, and what ended up happening each and every time. She decided not to do the things she agreed upon after all, disrespecting you in the process, and you ended up swallowing that.

100% agree.

Things she is willing to do but not really happy about? Seriously? Before you can even be CONSIDERING R, your WW has to be willing to fight for the marriage much much harder than she is right now.

More hard agreement. She needs to have the path. She needs to find her way. She needs to maybe go back and re-read How to Help Your Spouse Heal from Your Affair (without me asking her to). More likely than not, she won't.

This shows she doesn't quite get it yet. It is still about her and her feelings.

Yeah, she seems continuously on the verge of getting it. On occasion she says and does all the right things and shows remorse and contrition. It's always been short lived and she rolls it back, then I get upset, ask for divorce and she flails her way out of the corner. We have already done this twice. I've tried to be extremely clear to her that we are not just going to come out of this confrontation the same way as before. This is not a bad mood that is going away, this is not at all my fault, and if she doesn't want to do the hard work for R, I'm not sticking around in limbo anymore.

Maybe everything I did was "the pick me dance writ large". I'm done.

Dude, I get it. I did pickme ballroom dancing for MONTHS after day. But when they tell you you can't nice them back, this is what they're talking about. All you will do is exhaust yourself trying.

And I don't give A F what HER boundaries are. She has proven at this point to have very poor capability at setting appropriate boundaries. WHAT ARE YOUR BOUNDARIES? That's the question you should be focusing on IMHO. You can't control her and whatever fuckery she decides to do. You CAN control whether or not you want to keep putting up with her continuing disrespect.

I am sorry thisisfine. I don't have a lot to add, but I am reading. She should want to set her own boundaries as well. I am in that same place in waiting for that to happen. It's like, if I am the thing to win, then you should then put all your effort into winning. Don't just do me favors by staying, show me you want this.

I am at a point, I think, that we may have to separate for preservation alone. I still don't really want a divorce. But, between him needing to fully get it, and me needing to stop feeling so angry and treating him poorly, that it might be a good temporary step to get us stable.

I just simply have the added knowledge that we did this before, I didn't get it either for a long time, and we were able to do a lot living together. In your case, you are much further out, and you don't have those kinds of things hanging around in your head. It will be interesting to see what you both get from the short period of separation. I would assume without you saying that you may have felt better than you had in the same house. I find I miss companionship sometimes, but am better to dodge much time with him.

The goal is to find a credible path to reconciliation by her setting boundaries. She did set hard and specific boundaries she was willing to follow, but was not really happy about it. She didn't get that she should WANT to stop hurting me and WANT to establish boundaries.

I told her to hold on to that and tell me again with a clear mind and genuinely mean it because she has always rolled things back. We'll just have to wait and see.

Um, wow.

Wait and see for what?

She did set hard and specific boundaries she was willing to follow, but was not really happy about it.

Can you say more about this? This seems stupefying. Was this like “okay fine I will do x,y, z if it’s so goddamn important to you?”

She sounds like a petulant child, I’m sorry. I can’t imagine you wanting to be daddy to a venomous little girl who resents you all the time.

[This message edited by Thumos at 1:40 PM, November 12th (Thursday)]

On occasion she says and does all the right things and shows remorse and contrition. It's always been short lived and she rolls it back, then I get upset, ask for divorce and she flails her way out of the corner.

Remorse is permanent. It doesn't come and go.

It sounds more as if,she tells you what you want to hear, she emotionally manipulates you,it works, then her mask slips and she is back to being who she is, doing what she wants. Then you get mad..lather,rinse, repeat.

IMO, the only thing that is going to break this cycle is for you to file for divorce. Then she might realize she can't play you anymore, and realize she actually might lose you,and it will suddenly become very real for her. And then she will find remorse.

It's always been short lived and she rolls it back, then I get upset, ask for divorce and she flails her way out of the corner. We have already done this twice.

I understand how tortuous this pattern must be for you. It's like you are the only adult in the relationship. I get it. I know what it's like. I've concluded I don't want to be a parent to anyone but my kids.

I think the short-lived nature of her "contrition" and her oaths to make it all up to you and then flaking out on you again are the firmest evidence you have for her REAL state of mind, which is that she not only doesn't get it but just doesn't care that much to get it. Maybe at some point in the future she'll get it.

I think you need to consider that you're wasting your own life energy on this woman and for your own health and sanity you need to be separate from her.

Yeah, she seems continuously on the verge of getting it.

I know you long for this, but this definitely seems like hopium to me.

[This message edited by Thumos at 5:08 PM, November 12th (Thursday)]

TiF, I'm glad to see you standing up for yourself and drawing a hard line in the sand. But - I'm also concerned that she is only a few well written broken promises away from successfully culling you back into miserable complacency.

Instead of focusing on her TELLING you what she will do, why not set the focus on something active can DO before you back off of D? Like there will be no talk of R until she has successfully resigned from her job and gone NC with the friend. Anything short of that is just allowing her to get comfortable and walk those promises back on you AGAIN. I don't understand what you're looking for by having her state good enough boundaries/reasons/game plan when historically this has never worked for you. It sounds like you're "dressing up" the same tired path to R that has been actually leading you closer to D.

She continues to disrespect you and leave YOU in limbo.

She does the bare minimum to get you to believe she “gets it”.

She’s continuing to play the game to do or say whatever she needs to — just to get what she wants.

It good signs in my opinion.

More hard agreement. She needs to have the path. She needs to find her way. She needs to maybe go back and re-read How to Help Your Spouse Heal from Your Affair (without me asking her to). More likely than not, she won't.

I agree This0Is0Fine, but I also think at this point you just need to proceed with the D. She is either willing to move heaven and earth for the marriage or she is not, and at this point she clearly is not, and no amount of talking will change that.

And by entertaining yet another discussion as you are, that's only going to make it more likely that you will end up caving in again.

Meanwhile, does your wife even want to be married? She even admitted herself that it is not her nature to be putting her husband ahead of her circles of friends. Even in this thread cataloguing some of her recent actions...She made it astoundingly clear that she has priorities more important than you. I must admit to being shocked when she said she wanted to take on another male friend--this when you are clearly hurting and your marriage was in such dire straits. Talk about throwing salt in the wound!

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 6:44 PM, November 12th (Thursday)]

Shockingly, she had something to say today rather than Friday. She said she has thought hard about it and she understands this is a betrayal trauma. That what she did could easily be unforgivable. She still doesn't quite get that she needs to do the heavy lifting. The separation will likely move to divorce if she doesn't have an actual and complete plan tomorrow.

If infidelity wasn’t a dealbreaker, we wouldn’t be here posting on a website trying to survive it

Infidelity dashes your innocent, naive hopes and dreams that you married for life

Cheaters eat cake, we BSs aren’t supposed to shine reality into the fantasy world where they can whore around, but enjoy the fruits of marriage to a faithful, supportive spouse.

So, the leftover marriage is one more realistic, with less romance and rose petals.

You get to a point you realize your life can be full, even without the love that exists between a husband and wife.

You learn to exist despite it.

So, you stop expecting to thrive despite it

Take my words with a grain of salt.

My WH still believes he can NICE me back.

I’d rather have no partner than a WS

Thisisfine,

Do you feel guilty about possibly pulling the plug on a marriage that your WW ended already? I worded it that way to remind you that you aren't the bad guy.

It's not fair that you have/had to endure the trauma of infidelity, and now you are left with the decision to legally end a marriage that no longer exists. IMO for some BSs that decision seems to be as traumatizing or painful as the infidelity.

How many people IRL know about what you are trying to deal with? I hope you aren't feeling pressured by people in your circle to just get past it, or "you've stayed this long, might as well just get over it".

Do you honestly already know she won't do the work? But just can't let go yet? I'm not critizing. I bet most BSs in false R can relate.

Thisisfine,

Do you feel guilty about possibly pulling the plug on a marriage that your WW ended already? I worded it that way to remind you that you aren't the bad guy.

It's not fair that you have/had to endure the trauma of infidelity, and now you are left with the decision to legally end a marriage that no longer exists. IMO for some BSs that decision seems to be as traumatizing or painful as the infidelity.

How many people IRL know about what you are trying to deal with? I hope you aren't feeling pressured by people in your circle to just get past it, or "you've stayed this long, might as well just get over it".

Do you honestly already know she won't do the work? But just can't let go yet? I'm not critizing. I bet most BSs in false R can relate.

I don't feel guilty. I wouldn't have asked for a D if I didn't think it was the least shitty option. I know I am not the bad guy.

My close friends (5 or so people) all know what I am going through. They understand my position and have sympathy. They do see the situation as tragic, and as my WW being at fault. No one says I should just get over it. My WW says things adjacent to that, but never quite that. "It's been a year and I've talked about it more than I ever talked to him." I'll take irrelevant bullshit for $1000...

I think she is capable of doing the work. I see her constantly on the precipice of getting it. She is just soooo close. She is stumbling over her own fears of feelings worthlessness and anxiety.

She does have one BW in her friend group. And she spent some time talking to her. I know I've brought this friend up before. But she seems to have helped give some more perspective.

That said. I specifically told my WW, I don't give a shit about how other people deal with it. I don't care if other people forgive LTAs, or sexts, or ONS, and that she did "less". I don't care if other people are more forgiving or resilient. I don't care if they are doing fine. I am not doing fine and it's because she keeps hurting me by being careless and selfish in her decision making.

Everyone feels differently about this but...

I only want to be married to someone who is enthusiastically monogomous (with me as if I should even have to say this).

Not attempting to marriage police a petulant sneaking cheater who is trying to make a jailbreak and has who has a bevy of people sending them files in cakes.

I want to be with someone who had my back. Not someone who is sticking a knife in it.

Someone who is dancing with me. Not someone who leaves me to do a pathetic solo rendition of the age-old pick me dance.

Someone who is doing their own heavy lifting in being a safe and supportive partner. Not someone I am dragging kicking and screaming back to a shamjoke of a marriage due to their lies, manipulations, cheating, blame deflecting and generally poisonous behavior.

"Lie down with adders and never wake up"

TIF

"I don't care if other people are more forgiving or resilient. I don't care if they are doing fine. I am not doing fine and it's because she keeps hurting me by being careless and selfish in her decision making."

How on earth can you call REFUSING to stop interacting right in front of you with a guy she wanted to fuck her brains out as CARELESS. The reason you cannot pull the plug is because you cannot seem to get out of denial that she is still emotionally involved enough with OM that there is not boundary she will honor. Temporarily maybe, but you are in a sense in denial.

What kind of plan can she give you that does not enthusiastically involve getting this guy out of your and her life.

If I were you I would have no more conversation with her until she answers that one to your satisfaction which will not happen.

[This message edited by BeyondRage at 11:06 AM, November 13th (Friday)]

I only want to be married to someone who is enthusiastically monogomous (with me as if I should even have to say this).

I want to be with someone who had my back. Not someone who is sticking a knife in it.

These are some of the most intelligent comments I've read on this site, they are axioms, yet SO MANY PEOPLE accept for SO MUCH LESS.

If your spouse cannot provide this minimum base level of commitment, then they are NOT A SPOUSE, they are a threat/problem and a future catastrophe.

Shockingly, she had something to say today rather than Friday.

As someone who has followed your story since Day 1, no, it's not shocking in the slightest. She always does this. She pushes you to the edge of D by walking back previous agreements and showing an alarming lack of compassion, social awareness, and care for relationship milestones/holidays/things that matter to you. You blow up. And then about a day later, she comes back with a whole bunch of thoughtful, pretty little words and new promises that she never keeps. This isn't anything new. This is the exact same crap you've been dealing with for a year and the exact same dog and pony show she's been selling you on. Nothing's different this time just because she does a slightly better job at sounding contrite and committed compared to the other times.

She said she has thought hard about it and she understands this is a betrayal trauma. That what she did could easily be unforgivable.

That it COULD be unforgivable? What's unforgivable is that she has repeatedly told you she will resign and then has refused at the last minute. What's unforgivable is that she has attempted to have a relationship (friendship, pleasant working relationship, whatever the hell she's called it) with OM post DDay. What's unacceptable is that she wants to keep a friendship with a mutual friend of OM. What's unforgivable is that she repeatedly does things that hurt and trigger you, knows this, but keeps it up. The A itself is far from the only think that "could" be unforgivable about her deplorable behavior over the last year.

She still doesn't quite get that she needs to do the heavy lifting. The separation will likely move to divorce if she doesn't have an actual and complete plan tomorrow.

Why are you hinging D upon whether or not she gives you a plan? A plan means nothing if she doesn't follow through. She can write out a detailed plan going above and beyond and then two weeks later, when you ask her why she hasn't put the plan into action, she can say, "Well, I'm not doing that," and give you another excuse as to why. Where does that leave you? Will you actually file for D or will you give her another chance to dupe you all over again? This whole situation is quickly devolving into watching Lucy keep pulling the football away from Charlie Brown. Stop the games and start bargaining with ACTIONS over WORDS. Otherwise, we'll see you here a year from now doing the same song and dance as today.

I think she is capable of doing the work. I see her constantly on the precipice of getting it. She is just soooo close.

TiF, respectfully, this is a delusion. This is hopium. Someone who is hurting their BS a year out by keeping OM hanging around on the backburner like this is NO WHERE CLOSE to getting it. She's about 100 steps out from getting it. Even if she resigns, cuts out the mutual friend, and fully commits to IC/MC/R, she still won't be close until at absolute minimum she acknowledges how beyond terrible her behavior has been the last year and that any attempt at R is a gift of mercy that she has not yet earned. Then she will be close. Whatever closeness you think you're seeing is just a step towards progress you want to see in order to convince yourself that this isn't a losing battle of stagnation like we've all been seeing looking in on the outside.

She is stumbling over her own fears of feelings worthlessness and anxiety.

I don't find this believable at all. All of the issues surrounding any anxiety or negative feelings about cutting off the mutual friend or disturbing her work environment have one very simple solution - getting a new job. And it completely defies logic why she would choose to enmesh herself further in OM's immediate circle by making friends with his close friend unless she WANTED to stay close to him. That has nothing to do with anxiety, fear, or self esteem. It has everything to do with the OM and creating ways to keep him in her life with no regard to you, her marriage, or her home life.

She needs to be held accountable even if fears and anxieties are hindering her decision making. She's still an adult and she's still responsible for any and all fall out for her actions.

@This0Is0Fine:

I think she is capable of doing the work.

I see her constantly on the precipice of getting it. She is just soooo close. She is stumbling over her own fears of feelings worthlessness and anxiety.

I think she is quite capable of doing the work too. I think she has been quite capable of doing the work all this time infact. And that is part of the problem--that means the reason why she hasn't done the work is because **she simply doesn't really want to**. Not her feelings of worthlessness or anxiety or whatever.

1. She knew how important it was for her to get a new job and stop contact with OM a long long time ago. Why hasn't she done this yet, after all these months? Even after agreeing with you to do this at least a couple of instances? It is simple--she doesn't really want to. I mean, she knows how much her staying where she is now bothers you, but that doesn't concern her enough to actually change.

2. She had to have known that disrespecting you--her husband--by comparing you to a lost puppy in contrast to OM, in a conversation with one of her friends, is wrong, but she did it anyway. This, after all you did what you could to save her Mother's life! What messed-up priorities she seems to have!

3. She is also aware that staying so close to all these other WWs is unsafe for her and you and your marriage, but she decided to keep them as her circle anyway.

4. She probably also knew that taking on another male friend at this time is a horrible idea, but she has decided to do it anyway.

5. She probably also knows why you are still so upset almost a year out. Not only is it her affair but it is also her lack of doing what you have told her you needed to do in the meanwhile.

I can tell that deep down you are still in 'save this marriage' mode. And I get that! BUT, you have to see reality for what it is, and you still do not seem to be doing this frankly. It sounds to me that you are still trying to find the way to help her 'get it', another way to 'reason' with her. And that isn't going to work. The problem isn't her understanding, it instead about her not really being willing.

And until you change your thinking, you are going to keep on getting walked all over.

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 1:26 PM, November 13th (Friday)]

With all due respect to everyone's experiences and advice, I can tell you all I know my WW better than you do. I know that cheaters follow a sickeningly similar pattern of behavior during and after affairs. I know my wife is not "special" in that regard.

The individual circumstances, which are by no means excuses, are things that you as outside commenters are as unwilling to grasp as the my wife is the depth of the hurt she caused. She has diagnosed mental issues. She had a suicidal mother and grandmother. I know FOO isn't an excuse, but it is a legitimate barrier to her understanding. While she isn't some special delicate flower, she is not a narcissistic serial cheater that is intentionally stringing me along having an underground affair. I know this to be 100% true.

Fundamentally, her largest problem this whole time has been minimization. Not rug-sweeping. Not blame shifting. Her cake eating is issue #2 that absolutely follows from a result of the minimization. She thinks it's reasonable to stay in work contact because she refuses to get the depth of the damage done. She thinks she knows better than the experts and the books. She is wrong, and she has to figure that out herself.

My caving, and attempts to "be comfortable without reconciliation", has ultimately played into her ability to minimize. My desire to have positive interactions has clouded understanding. That's on me. Yes she should also be trying to get it, but because I'm prone to political language (as correctly accused here), I'm prone to make repair attempts even when she is at fault, this is a fault in my communication to her.

The reason she gets it when she is against the wall and I'm asking for a D is because that's when she realizes how much harm she has caused. It's not because I'm a utility that gives her some cushy life she doesn't want to let go. It's because when it's not in front of her she is otherwise able to hide from it, and compartmentalize.

This has always been my struggle, because I wasn't really willing to D and as I've said again and again, "what other consequences can there be?" I'm now willing to D. I feel no need to cave, compromise, or start positive interactions. Simply put. I'm done carrying the load.

I don't know This0Is0Fine. Affair or no affair, your wife has not shown you much respect as a wife should her husband, nevermind as someone trying to make up damage she caused. And yet you seem able to spin this away....

[This message edited by WontBeFooledAgai at 3:26 PM, November 13th (Friday)]