Wife told me in text she is getting her own apartment. She's been living with her mom for almost 3 months now sleeping on the couch. It still about killed me when i read this even though I knew it was coming. She says she wants to talk today but I haven't responded to her text as of yet. It's starting to look more and more like its the end. Can't imagine my life without her. I thought things would be easier by now but they aren't. Any words of encouragement or advice is appreciated, this is a first for me and I never seen this coming.
Havehope,
I know you don't want to hear this but you may just have to accept it. I am in the exact same position. I don't want the marriage to end but sometimes there is nothing you can do. When this all started for me a woman I know told me that most women are completely out the door when they make the decision. It sucks. Trust me I know but you have to focus on you and getting better. Sometimes hope is the most painful thing you can have. I still have hope but it gets weaker everyday. Just be good to yourself. You deserve it. Keep posting. We are all here to help. Posted via Mobile Device
I've got to agree with dante. I'm in the exact same spot. Have been for 4 months. There is nothing you can do but learn to live for yourself. I had a lot of hope at first, thinking things were temporary or 'trial' if you will. Not the case. I've been completely abandoned by her...like she's written me out of her life. I have only a shred of hope left. Maybe not even that. But it gets better as days pass. Trust me.
I know this is the last thing you want to hear. But it's reality. And it's happening right in front of you. Don't take this as anything mean-spirited or brash. It's just the way it seems to happen.
In my sitch, she checked out long ago without caring about who she was giving up on.
It is a sad fact that many of us men don't see what is coming until it is already too late. The even more sad fact is that the changes that they wanted to see start to happen almost immediately after they tell us. I was not happy with my life before she left, but I was happy with her. She made my world bearable and now that she is gone it is tough to keep facing the life I have even though it is better in many ways since she left, not because she is gone but because I started working on myself.
Havehope, you just have to keep going forward. My therapist says that there is always hope that they will turn around and see what they have been missing, but in my case I don't think that will happen. It is scary as hell! You just have to look at what you have instead of what you don't. If the marriage is truly over, you will find someone else when you are ready. It's tough to see, I know because I can't see it myself. I have been separated for three months and it has gotten easier, not easy, just easier.
Take care of yourself and lean on all of us. I don't know what I would have done without my friends, family, therapist and this board. Sometimes it just helps to talk with other people and get your feelings out in a place where no one will judge you. It will get better, for you and all of us.
__________________
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction
I have to agree, hope is painful. If you wake up everyday with hope you risk going to bed every night disappointed. Accepting that she's gone for good sucks but trust me when I tell you it's easier to live with day to day.
I does get better, once you reach the acceptance phase and feel ready to date then you will be shocked about how happy you‘ll feel.
I had gotten to that point myself and I was actually eager to finalize my divorce by the time the waiting period was up. My W filed and I was fighting for the marriage but I eventually gave up and started dating then realized I was going to be fine without her after all. Of course that’s when my W decided she wanted me back and begged me to take her back which I broke down and did (reluctantly). It took me about a year and a half (with a couple of false Rs) before I got to that place though. It doesn’t happen overnight. Today if my wife left I wouldn’t blink an eye, I know I will be alright and will find someone else.
One of my friends went through the same thing but his wife finalized the D. It ended up being the best thing that happened to him and he is much happier single than he ever was married. If I would had told him was going to happen within the first year of his separation he probably would have hit me in the face.
I don't think any of us saw this coming.
Sorry for your loss.
Like Dante, lost, and lostdad said there's nothing you can do but keep going forward. Get up in the morning, and go to bed at night. Let yourself grieve, but keep taking care of yourself.
It's all you can really do.
I texted back to her after a couple of hours and asked her when we would talk and she said she didn't care that she just wanted me to know what she was doing. I told her I thought I deserved to be told face to face not through a text while at work. She agreed but said she was scared to tell me.
I think what hurts the worst is that I have changed everything she said was wrong with me. We seemed to be getting along good and thought there was a lot of good signs from her. My therapist thought I was progressing well and things with the relationship were moving along ( too slowly for me, which he said was good) and I was feeling alot better about us. Now it feels like I'm back to square one again. Oh well, I have therapy tomorrow we'll see what he says.
Just try to look for some positives in your life havehope. That's what has really worked for me. Now that I don't have a relationship with my wife I have more time for the things I enjoy. I can go hiking more now, this is a positive for me. I know it sounds cliched but you have to make the best of this situation. You can't change her mind only she can do that, all you can do is find ways to enjoy your life again. Maybe spend some more time with your friends, that's another thing that's really helped me. I've got more time for "guy time" now so to speak, and it's good times.
I think what hurts the worst is that I have changed everything she said was wrong with me. We seemed to be getting along good and thought there was a lot of good signs from her.
Again, I can relate exactly. What you can't do is have any sort of expectation that she will genuinely appreciate your efforts. See, my wife could never talk about what she was feeling emotionally. Hence, she verbally exploded everything at once in a complete meltdown. From that point I did everything I could to fix who I became. Read, studied, researched, MC, therapy...all to find out that none of it registered with her. She put on a show for me to make me believe that she recognized positive changes in me. 'You're perfect' is what she said when I asked if she noticed those changes. But she was mentally & emotionally gone for almost a year before that. She'd made her decision, formed her plan and was just waiting for the right time to implement it. So a month after her explosion, she walked out. We never even had the chance to talk about it. She said it, packed, and an hour later she was gone.
But what I've done since then (and it's a good point that you should too, regardless of where you are in the separation) has been to only focus on myself. I started with the immediate changes like you did...went into depth through journal writing and therapy, etc. It helped tremendously and allowed me to move forward to my next step. Once you get there, it pushes you forward to the next, and the next, and so forth.
Once you come to a point of understanding of your own shortcomings, her contributions and where you both went wrong, then you can pull together a full scope of how everything unfolded and find the real reasons why the separation happened in the first place. Yes, there may be a time she may reconsider her decisions. But there also may never be. You'll have to take the latter and embed that into your brain. Make it a part of you and realize that there is nothing left at the moment. You can only build up from that point.
And once you start that build, you will begin to feel yourself coming back to life. Slowly, steadily, and WITH some setbacks or regressions, but you become more able to work through them and enhance your emotional stability. This is where I'm at right now. My wife's explosion occurred in February and it's taken me this long to reach where I'm at. The worst part is that we have not spoken in 2.5 months. I went into a no contact period to work solely on myself, and she has no desire to even say hello anymore. A couple letters, a couple emails were sent, but that's it. That shows me where she is at mentally with our situation. And b/c of what I've been able to uncover about us, I've learned that I was not the overall problem. But she has so many things within her that she refuses to acknowledge and work through for herself. I can't tell her what they are. It's something to be left for her own discovery and self healing.
I'm not trying to hijack your thread with my own story, but wanted you to see that it's a struggle that seems to have no end. You just have to throw what you think SHE wants you to be into the wind and look at yourself to figure out what YOU want to be.
In summary, change for yourself. Not for her. It may work out in the end, it may not...but whichever way it turns out, learn from the past and grow stronger within yourself so that you will be able to start again from a place of greater understanding and emotional compassion. You'll be better for someone, and only you will know who that is after you've gone through and conquered all the hell that this has put you through.
Well w just came home and we had a talk. I asked if she told the kids about the apartment and she said yes and they had a long talk but seemed to take it ok. I told her that I scewed up and should not have told them so she could see their true reaction to it. I asked her if she was going to file for divorce and she said probably. She told me that I never trusted her and there was nothing she could have done differently to get me to trust her. I read her my apology letter which included apologizing for not trusting her and why I was this way. She cried while I was reading it and unfortunatly I did to. I wish she would change her mind. On my way to see therapist.
So during our talk yesterday I started accusing her of cheating and sneaking around and basically doing the same things that got me where i'm at and she became very upset. She said I never trusted her and she had done everything she could to get me to trust her so how would i ever be able to trust her now. I know why i have trust issues and its do to low self esteem. I never thought I was good enough for her. She said she knew that and she had told me that many times that I was the only one for her. Why can't she see that I'm trying to fix these things about myself? I asked her if she is planning on filing for divorce and she said probably. She said she has not talked to a lawyer yet. Is this a sign that there is still hope that she is waiting to see if i am going to straighten out. I asked her how long of a lease she had to sign and she didn't have to sign one, she can leave anytime. My therapist is still convinced I have a chance if I could just stop accusing her and try to show some trust but without her here I cannot stop wondering what she is doing. Has anyone overcome their low self esteem and was able to trust their spouse again? I want to more than anything and think this would improve my chances of getting her back. Please hep i appreciate the feedback even the ones i may not want to hear.
I'm sorry you are going through this. I know what kind of pain you are in when you are working on your issues and your W won't seem to come back and see that you have started to change. I know how you feel. I too have low self esteem and thought that my wife was going to cheat on my, although I never voiced it to her. It came out in other ways for me. Mostly trying to control her in different ways. My W has also moved out and in the beginning said that we were probably getting a divorce although she never filed (because she didn't have the money necessary to do it).
Here is what I discovered in the last three months since my W left. When they say probably, it usually means yes. The people who leave tend to have more guilt and using that kind of soft language is a way for them to assuage some of their guilt for leaving. It sucks because you think there is a chance. I am not saying that there isn't a chance, but you have to be prepared for the fact that this is over.
Some people are already checked out of the relationship a long time before they leave and many women have made their choice and will not change no matter what happens.
I would say that you need to work on your issues, not for her, but for you. If she comes around, great, if not, you are still a better person and will be more prepared for another relationship later on.
One of the saddest facts about divorce is that many people including you and me are only really motivated to change our behaviors when we are smacked in the head by circumstance. When my W left I made many of the changes that she wanted to see a long time ago, but it was already too late. You will torture yourself over this, I did and still am, but you need to realize that sometimes it is just over and you have to move on and do what is best for you and your children. Make the changes that need to be made, but realize that you need to do it for you, not her. If she comes back, great! If not, you are still in a better place than before.
I guess my final words are that you need to do this for you and your children and no one else. That was a tough lesson for me to learn. It caused a lot of heartache and misery. I am wishing only the best for you and your marriage. You might also read "Mars and Venus: Starting Over" which was recommended to me on this site. I think the first few chapters will resonate with you. I have not finished it, but it is a very good book and has many of the things that I felt and am still feeling in this situation.
Take care of yourself and make sure you feel the feelings that you are having. It will be the only way you get through this.
__________________
Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction
She's getting her own place 
