Confused on next steps.

AD2005 · 12-25-2011, 10:34 PM

Hi everyone.

It has almost been a month since my wife told me that she could no longer be in a marriage with me. I am so crushed! This is by far the hardest thing I have ever experienced. I asked her if we could go to a marriage counselor right away; she agreed and we went to one within few days of her telling me. We only went to one session together. During that session she told the counselor that she was not 100% out of the marriage but rocking on leaving. She said she wanted to go to a separate session with the counselor and when she did, was the day she moved out of our house. She has moved into an apartment downtown that is fully furnished 3 weeks ago. She says there is no other man and I do trust her. She says that she loves me as a friend but "is not in love with me." We have no kids and have been married for almost 3 years. I did the typical beg, plead, cry, promise the world to her for the last 3 weeks. I know, it is the wrong thing to do, but I was hurt and trying to say how I was truly feeling. I love that girl!

I am not an abusive husband, I did not cheat on her, my problem is that I started working a lot more and putting priorities with work above our life, above her priorities. Which is insane to me now. I would have never done that if I knew if could end my marriage. I had a couple of slipups on being an ass but for 99.9% of the time I am very caring and loving.

She told me that she needs her space and that I have not given that to her during this seperation she said that I have not even gave her her space for a week since she has moved out. So I told her I would do as she asked and give her the space for a week and would talk to her again. Today is Christmas, I did not send her a text but she sent me one wishing me a happy christmas. I responded and told her the same and followed up with some news story that would interest her. She replied back and we talked about that and nothing about us. This brings up my hope!

I have been reading a lot of different books and talking to other counselors and everyone has mixed opinions on what do do. I have been focusing on myself a ton and exercising and trying to keep to the 180 degree rules.

So I am supposed to be calling her soon to talk to her. The last call that we had, I told her that I really wanted to do more marriage counseling because I truly feel we can work on this together. She said she would think about it. So my question is should I mention the marriage counseling again or just leave it alone? I would love nothing more than to have a drink with her and not mention the past and to just focus on making her happy. Do you think that marriage counseling could be bad or good at this point?

Thanks everyone. I will keep you up to date.

EleGirl · 12-26-2011, 02:59 AM

Leave it alone. She does not expect you to do this so it will get her attention.

I'm sorry to say but there is a high probability that there is another man in the picture.

accept · 12-26-2011, 07:35 AM

You dont tell us much about your life with her, or why she is leaving. Does she also work. Your MC must have given some kind of opinion.

insomnia255 · 12-26-2011, 07:46 AM

my wife seperated from me a month ago as well. she will just need some space and as hard as it is, you need to give her space. My wife has told me to contact her after new years. I am going to a MC as well on my own to sort out my issues which may have casued the marriage breakdown.

There are alot of thoughts people have when people fall out of love and what to do etc. My wife kinda said the same thing to me but as i was working all the time and not paying any attention to her and being really stressed i sort of was verbally abusive which you could say killed the love she had for me. I have used the time i have alone constructively by sorting myself out and improving my bad habits so if i meet her for a date or coffee or something she will see the apprent changes.

i am going to Marriage counselling at the moment on my own as i feel it does help you cope with the loss of your replationship. i remember someone gave me this advice.

No one wants to feed a hungry Dog (if a hungry dog comes knocking at your door with its unhealthy looks and skinny body where you can see its ribs, your not gonna feed it) if a nice healthy dog knocks on your door nice shiney coat, looks good etc you dont mind feeding it.

Thats what you need to become a nice healthy dog. you need to sort out yourself first, build yourself up. The marriage counsellor (psychothrapist) i went to see told me about bad things i was doing with out me knowing it. sometimes when someone leaves you its only then you realise your faults etc. i felt that by seeing a MC it helped me identify my faults and i can now help improve on them. I am going on my own at the moment but my wife who is hurt and needs to clear her head said she will go with me at some point in the future. But i have to admit i have a problem first in order to find a solution.

i have a pdf that i got online which is some help send me a PM of your email address and i will send it to you.

I know where your coming from as im currently in the same boat as you.

Take care and be strong

This is me · 12-26-2011, 08:21 AM

I agree that you should leave it alone. Why are you calling her too? Let her contact you. As hard as it is, you need to let her go.

I always hated the saying ..."let it go and if it comes back to you"... but there is alot of truth behind it.

Did the counselor ask her about another person?

AD2005 · 12-26-2011, 12:05 PM

Thank you everyone for the replies.

The MC did ask about another guy and she said that there was no one else, she said for once in her life she wants to be selfish. She wants to focus on herself. She has always had some guy in her life right after the next. I have as well. This is the first time that both of us have been without a significant other since we were teenagers.

Now that being said she said to me the last day that we talked about "us", that some friend of a friend told her that he wanted to date her when all of this was done. She point blank told me he was interesting. That hurt so bad to hear. She said that she wants to be truthful and tell me everything. I thought that was a very hurtful thing to say to someone going through what I am going through.

Someone said I didn't say much about our life above so it is. My wife and I since we got married have both been very busy at work. She just got promoted at her job as did I. We bought a new house a year after being married and had to paint it and buy new furniture. We went from debt free to now having a huge mortgage payment, 2 new car payments, and furniture payments. We used to do a lot of fun stuff and go out to eat but now because of the added debt we wanted to start paying it off as soon as possible, so we stopped doing those fun things as much as we both would like. I started to do more sidejobs. She started to work 6 days a week sometimes. I wish I would have paid more attention to her for the last year than trying to look into the future to paying off debt. We never really fight at all. We did get it a huge fight 6 months before she left me and we started to work on it. She wrote me a card back in August telling me that she was happy again and that we could get through this. A week before she left me, she went on a business trip with her co-workers (all girls) and she said she would call me in a few minutes and she didn't call me back for 6 hours and when she did I was hurt and *****ed at her. No idea why I did that, When she got back I apologized about it. I really think that is what drove her to wanting the divorce. She has said occasionally that she wants the divorce to happen immediately so that she can move on and focus on herself than worrying about this situation. I do not want the divorce right now as it has only been a month!

The reason I keep talking to her is that, I feel like if I don't, that the longer this goes on, the longer she will move on. Right now I have a chance to go to a new MC with her and hopefully sort out our issues and be able to hang out again. But since everyone thinks I should wait for her to make the next move makes me afraid that maybe that "guy she thinks is interesting" will step in and make her happy.

I also have been talking to a different MC by myself and he was telling me to keep contact every once in a while but when I do make sure I am not begging and not saying how I can change, or how we can be in love again. He told me to be happy and to do stuff that I havent done before which I am and it feels great but it is hard to focus on anything right now because all I can think about is that I should call her and see if she wants to go on a walk or to go get some coffee or breakfast. I havent done that right now but I feel like it is inevitable.

My wife is pretty independent and when she makes up her mind, she usually runs with it. That is why I fell in love with her. I loved that and now it is totally working against me int his situation.

The more and more I think and talk about this, the more I want to call her. I am normally a man that can talk through it and make compromises but in this situation she has blocked me out all the way, she is in a concrete box so to speak and not opening her heart to me. This is so rough. I love her more than anything and know that we can make things better again.

Again, thank everyone for your replies!

accept · 12-26-2011, 12:21 PM

If I understand correctly the reason you are in debt is because of the mortgage payments. Why you both must have brand new cars baffles me. If you were to divorce have you thought about the mortgage payments. You dont say what your fight was about and I still cant work out what is wrong in your marriage. You say you wanted to pay off as soon as possible. I dont approve of this. Its not a good idea to take on debt and change your lifestyle unless its really necessary like to buy a house. And even then take your time on repaying it. Since you mention your debt is there some difference between you and your wife over this.
A wife doesnt usually leave a marriage without a solid reason and not just to be more independent.

827Aug · 12-26-2011, 12:39 PM

Your wife's behavior strongly suggest she is seeing someone else. In the absence of tremendous strife--plus you get the "I love you but I'm not in love with you" spill--there is usually another person in the picture. I've been on the receiving side of this also. My estranged husband denied having affairs for 3 years. He even lied to the marriage counselor. Cheaters are liars! If your spouse is cheating, forget getting the truth out of her.

Since you really don't have all the answers to your wife's behavior, it will probably be best to cease communicating with her. I know it's hard, but that's the only way she's going to miss you. Begging, pleading, and crying will only push her further away.

AD2005 · 12-26-2011, 01:16 PM

Well.... After writing my reply above I got a text from her that asked what day I wanted to meet up. I told her whenever she wants to as I am giving her the space she wanted. She replied back that she is going to talk to her Mom today at 4:00 and then she could meet me after at 5:30 to talk to me. That does not sound good! Especially because her mom was confused why she wasn't trying to save the marriage and giving up so easily. Why else would she be going to talk to her mom and then me? To tell the both of us it is final. Crap!

Any recommendations if she does say that she cant keep this going on?

I will write back on here what happens. The next 6 hours are going to be HELL!

insomnia255 · 12-26-2011, 01:21 PM

Read the pdf i have sent you it should suggest what you should do if certain situations arise. I hate to say it be prepare yourself for the worst. You may just have to give her space and then see how it goes ? and again as hard as it maybe you need to repair and sort yourself out, be strong

AD2005 · 12-26-2011, 11:01 PM

Ok. The story continues....

So she was originally supposed to meet me at our house and she sent me a text that she needed a drink and to meet at the local bar. I went there to meet her and we had 10 minutes of good laughing conversation and then she brought up the situation and that she wanted to discuss the divorce. I responded back with Insomnia's PDF help, "I don't want to talk about the past… that is the past…. lets talk about something fun…. Like Costa Rica.
I know you and I both have feelings that are unresolved. I am not saying that we shouldn't talk about them in the future. I just don't think we should do that right now. "
She kept persisting and saying that I am not listening. She says if I truly love her that I will let her get a divorce. I came back with, "That I respect that but I truly love you and want to work on this marriage" I asked if she could give me a month to think about it and she said no that she needed to find herself and getting a divorce would help her get to that next point.

An hour and half goes by of the "same old...same old
' talk (which I really was still positive) and trying to make sense of it all. As she was leaving I asked her again that I really think we need a month of separated space and she responded "I will think about it" she gave me a hug and left.