When her heart is neither for you or against you

I appreciate your sentiments .. I really do, so don't take this the wrong way .... but don't be sad for me. My wife has endured the far greater injustice over the past 20 years. My acute pain the last 7 months pales in comparison to her 20 years stuck in a marriage that lacked any emotional depth and was poisoned by my secret online porn addiction.

 

This evening, at home with my wife and kids was very peaceful....just quiet and chill. My wife was cooking up a bunch of food (part of her new job..preparing food sometimes for a client lunch tomorrow) -- we had some red wine ... I fed the kids ... put the little kids to bed.

It was just very mellow .... not a lot of talking, but some....and just being.

..

People have mentioned wooing -- there was some talk of a PA not romancing his SO enough. Here's the thing about that regarding me and my wife -- I have always been the romantic one in the relationship....my wife has mentioned multiple times over the years that her friends have always been jokingly jealous --- flowers .. candles, I love candles ... taking my wife out on dates / surprising her.

I am NOT trying to say I was a great husband --- I always failed when it came to connecting emotionally-deeply and to practical stuff helping around the house .... My point is I consider myself "good" at wooing / romancing. But I cannot do that now ..... it isn't wanted by my wife -- like @Qnb42078 was saying.

Now, I can still be kind .. helpful .. sacrificial in how I serve my wife. For example, she loves it when I surprise her and fill up her gas tank, especially in this super cold weather. So I am trying to do those little things...and I am.

But actual wooing / pursuing my wife --- even playful flirting feels awkward, only because my wife is so pulled back / reserved / guarded....and doesn't want to flirt. It would be like trying to flirt with a nun in a church aisle (i'm not Catholic)

..

I think this is a good place to recall some of the things my wife has said about me, to me .. over the last couple weeks, we have had a good number of talks, usually over dinner -- or just sitting on the couch. Below are certain things she has said specifically about me / about what she thinks of me:

[speaking from my wife's perspective]
* I don't hate you .. I actually like you .. deep down I love you
* we are so good at being friends
* the romance part is just so hard for me right now

We've talked in the past-- about 5 months ago now, which was 2 months aftee DDay--about when I say "I Love You" to my wife .. it makes her feel uncomfortable because she is not sure how to react/respond in that moment. So, I have stopped saying it as often as I used to over our 20 year marriage. (we were always a very touchy/feely couple)

So with all of that reality -- I am honestly not sure what wooing looks like .. Or what having her fall in love with me again looks like. I think back to when we met when we were 19 years old (we are 42 now) --- we met, we flirted, we liked each other, I wrote her letters, we fell in love. Everything I describes above sounds like the dreaded "friend zone"!

Don't get me wrong.....I am not giving up. I do feel some connected moments with my wife still...today at lunch was great; this evening...I felt she wasn't repulsed by me.

One day at a time.

 

I probably should have included one more bullet item in my list above:
* we have a strict no touch boundary..I can't give her a hug / I can't put my hand on her shoulder / I can't put my on the small of her back when talking to her
*** we've had this touch boundary in place since August
*** the purpose of this boundary is to give my wife space ... and if things work out, she will be the one to initiate touch / initiate even thr beginning stages of physical intimacy

So, I can't hold her hand in the car .. or I will get a really strange look.

 

@Sadgirl, It was really, really tough in the beginning. We have always been a pretty touchy, feely couple .... lots of public display of affections -- hugging and kissing so the kids could see mom and dad "loving" on each other. So when it went into effect, I was just instinctively touching, hugging my wife. I got reminded after a few mess-up's. (yes, the kids have noticed that mom and dad don't hug and kiss as much---part of the sad collateral damage)

But, the no touch boundary is what my wife needed ... to get space / to get distance ..... to get control.

..

This is getting a bit personal--I don't mind..I hope you don't--I remember, I think it was April timeframe..maybe early May? (a little before DDay on June 1st)....I can't remember exactly the details, but something about our love life was especially off -- I remember one evening (or maybe it was the next morning) .. I asked my wife very sepcifically, but also very cautiously because I didn't quite know how to ask this: "Do you ever feel like I am raping you?"

She quickly answered saying "No..what are you talking about." But, I'm thinking that was just my wife's normal way of deflecting/denying that we had problems ... her instinctive covering for problems / keeping the peace / etc.

But I obviously was feeling something .. where I was asking if I was pushing my wife when she didn't want to or whatever. I think what I was probably feeling was my wife who had emotionally separated (many, many months or possibly years before that April/May 2017 timeframe)

I share all of that to say: once DDay hit .... that immediately gave my wife the license to stop pretending / to be free and real with how bad the marriage was. And I wonder if some sort of feelings of "being raped" came over her ..... and that is why she needed to enact this strict no touch boundary -- as well as to control if/when touching would ever come back into the relationshiop.


(the reason it came into play August 1: June 1st was our DDay; the month of June, I was falling quickly into a pit of despair...we had stopped all intimacy, but there were days when she literally had to hold me when I melted down [which I now realize only added more burden to my uzi-shot-up wife]; the month of July she was back in the States and I was in Europe with the kids; August 1st she came back to Europe and the no touch boundary was enacted first thing)

 

@jrbcoug11: thanks...I appreciate you saying those things. Of course it always hasn't been this way....I wish I would have woken up from my porn-induced craziness many years ago.

What you said here:
"a part of me has died with my husbands betrayal. The exhuberance and excitement i felt for my husband and our marriage has disappeared"

That is so my wife....she has even said on one occassion the past couple weeks that she wonders if there is another woman out there who can love me ... where I would be happy -- I heard her real care for me in that she feels badly that she is not able to show me love right now (it also likely was an "easy"-escape-mental thing for my wife).

Anyway, thanks again for taking the time to write that.

 

I went to see our new CSAT again today (second time in three days) .. it's the last time I will be able to see her until I get back from Europe on February 2nd. I got to update her on my recent interactions with my wife -- which was good to do. The main reason I went was to get started in some "addiction worksheets" ... stuff I can do in Europe over the next 3.5 weeks.

She ended up giving me a book to read:
Don't Call It Love: Recovery from Sexual Addition by Patrick Carnes

It's about 400 pages long -- good size to keep me busy and occupied for the rest of January. Just glancing over page 1 .. it looks like it's going to be a very real book -- I am looking forward to reading and learning.

 

Thanks for your thoughts @A new day ... It is always good to hear other SO perspectives.

I am sure that my wife has often felt like "nearly impossible to resist desire to flee" since our DDay 7 months ago.

One thing my wife said early on--can't remember if it was June or August--she said essentially that she is so hurt, so crushed, so broken .. that she doesn't trust herself to make any major life decisions (like whether to end the marriage right there and now and get a divorce).

..

I was just amazed (and still am) that she had enough sense and enough control to think that clearly..even though she was experiencing so much pain and anguish and betrayal trauma.