Marriage separation after deployment

Sophiesmom, you seem to have a lot of resentment

Open, thank you for the Link

I'm sorry, I can't imagine how much you're hurting, but at least you now know where you stand, and no longer have to play this guessing / waiting game.

If that's ok

Don't be surprised if, a week from now, she says that she might not file for divorce.

Probably most people whose marriages fall apart would like to be able to say, "I didn't leave my spouse. My spouse left me." (My boyfriend was divorced when I met him, and that distinction was very important to him. He didn't want the divorce, but his wife did.) Also, individuals generally want to say that the marriage failed because the other party just made it impossible to continue in the marriage. Your wife, like anyone in her position, is sensitive to being seen as having two failed marriages.

I believe she had decided to end this marriage long ago and has been acting undecided to try and manipulate you into bad behavior that she could point to and say, "See what a louse my husband is. How can anyone expect me to stay with him?" She wants to be the victim. But you haven't gone bererk and behaved badly. You haven't precipitated any major drama that she could get all indignant about. So, I think she's gotten bored with waiting to see what you were going to do. So she makes this announcement, and she's watching to see the effect.

Doing the 180 and not overly responding to anything - and even being nonresponsive - is probably very sensible. You give her nothing to make hay out of.

Any suggestion that her behavior can all be explained by the past incident of you texting another woman is beyond what I can swallow. But, of course, it doesn't make you look good, so she'll use it.

Your idea, expressed repeatedly in this thread, that you could have held onto your wife, if only you were a better man, rings false to me also. Far worse men than you have women who are utterly devoted to them. Hitler had Eva. I'ld say few men are alone in this world because they just couldn't find a woman who'ld put up with them. What women will put up with is quite astonishing. So, yeah, be the best person you can be and improve yourself however you can. We should all be doing that. But consider that, for your future happiness, you may need to be wiser and smarter about how you select a woman to be with. Stay away from women who are too much in need of a man to take them out of a situation they want to get out of. For women like that, you'll only be a stepping stone. I don't know your wife's history, but I suspect it might reflect a narrative like that.

I think both those links are really informative. Interesting how women think about affairs too and what affect that has on the brain. I bet your wife would actually benefit from reading that book so she can realize why she is feeling the way she is and how a lot of women experience this challenge.

It helps me understand how a woman can go through this challenge even if she gets divorced and married again. And it's interesting how the woman gets so emotionally confused without understanding "why" that is happening.

I think you will benefit from getting that book from the second link.

Resentment toward what or who?

I will refrain from offering any further opinion on your situation.

Good luck.

I meant to say disgruntled

Just to update y'all on everything....no change in the situation per day. I actually stayed the night at her house 3 times but no physical contact was made. I sleeper on the couch or slept in the bed and she slept vice Versa. She told me if we did get back together, she still is going to have friends, girls night out and ect. There is a lot more stipulations now then There was before. I don't mind if she has friends but hanging out with men isn't right. I wouldn't hang around females like that. Not sure what to think about that. It's almost like she wants to live the single life and be married.

Yeah, that's what it sounds like to me.

Wow,this thing has played out almost exactly as I imagined, right down to her inviting you back to be the live in babysitter. This lady has skills, I will give her that.

However my opinion doesn't matter, if your happy to be home regardless of her feelings toward you, then I wish you all the best.
I will say growing up in a household where one parent deeply resents the other, sucks. So keep things super easy going around the kids, cos they will learn how to be in a Relationship from how you two interact with each other.
Take Care and I hope it works out for you I really do.

We don't live together. I still have my place and she still has hers. I'm starting to feel that the love we once had is exactly that...in the past. I put my foot down and told her if she wanted to live as if she is single, she just needs to divorce me. She then stated "Now I can't have friends?" She then stated that it's not healthy not too and that she didn't want to be in a bubble under me.

What if you said that you mean no male friends? What if you also said that you are fine with her having female friends and also with her having a reasonable number of girls nights out?

Boy, she is one cool cucumber. And she is driving hard for the most self-serving deal she can get: you home watching the kids, putting your whole week's pay into her domestic budget . . . and her out "having friends." Make no mistake: that will include male friends . . . and you won't be invited to hang out with her and her friends.

She takes conniving to the level of a professional con-artist. She's not cutting you loose via divorce, until she first finds out how much she can milk you for by keeping you around.

I believe her definition of not being in a bubble would mean you question absolutely nothing she does. And she'll do plenty to make you have questions. She's figuring you may be so hang dog desperate to hold on to her that, in exchange for the privilege of living with her, you'll put up with anything. She wouldn't be the first woman to want to see just how thoroughly a man could be made a fool of. Since you want to assume nothing and will only find fault with her, if you get hard evidence of the smoking gun type, she can be in all kinds of compromising situations and just claim it's all innocent.

My thoughts may seem like conjecture. In life, you have to read between the lines . . . or you'll figure out nothing. You're gone for months. You come home, and months later, this woman hasn't wanted any physical connection to you. There's no tears testifying to a truly wounded heart. I'm sorry Dad, but, to my mind, this is not the behavior of a woman in love. Before you take it personally, consider that she may be incapable of truly being in love . . . IDK. Her behavior seems so cold, controlled and calculating.

You seem to need irrefutable evidence of adultery before you'll find real fault with her. That's fine. at some point, though, this relationship can't survive without you being given some evidence that you are loved. You described her as being a "good woman." You need to examine how you conclude the character of another person. Some people do choose to believe the best of others and figure that they will believe a person is good, unless they give hard evidence otherwise. I think that's a silly approach to life. Think back and ask yourself what real evidence your wife has given you as to her character. There must be some. You've known her like 10 years. Let go of wishful thinking, and ask yourself what you actually know - going way back - and what the things you know indicate. Think about her family . . . what they were like and how she fit in with them. What was she brought up to believe. You seem to be rather naiive about people. That can lead to a lot of heart ache. You have to know people for who they really are. That means paying attention and thinking over the implications of what you observe and learn.

I agree Rose and Bill, maybe I am Naieve to everything. I'm leaning on moving on with my life without her. I think I have it plenty of time. She tells me that "Just cause I'm ready to compromise and reconcile doesn't mean she has to be right away". Do you think a Divorce busting 180 with her will work? We have kids so it's hard not to communicate. I told her I'm not interested in being just her "Friends" as she had mentioned before "Why can't we be friends and coparent". She tells me all the time to grow up and stop being immature when she is the one doing both. I told her I would file for divorce if she is cometely done. I just want the truth so I can say at the end I tried everything that's in my control to make my marriage work.

I told her I didn't mind female friends but she said "I'll be friends with whoever I want to"

I told you.

So sorry

It "is" hard when there are children to consider because even if your relationship fails you are still connected because of the children.

So what do you do with yourself until you get deployed again?

Intetire in a few years from the military. Now I have to figure out my life. All my dreams and aspirations where shattered. I wish her bad karma

My wife last night asked if I could move back home.......I'm really confused now

Well when she said recently that she would have any friends that she pleased, perhaps that was mainly out of resentment for "being told what to do", not because she fully intends to continue to have close male friends.

Remember also she first said it would be "too confusing" for the kids if you stayed over. Then, later on, she allowed you to stay over. Perhaps her feelings have been gradually changing.

Were you able to have a discussion with her about this request? How did it go?

Your wife is very confused too. Some of that is explained in the links I posted. I still think you should print those links and give them to her to read. What happened to both of you as a couple was how you stopped engaging each other and as you mentioned became "just" room mates. That is something that creates a need that made both of you vulnerable to engaging in some kind of outside relationship. That is something that happens in a lot of relationships.

If your wife "learns" about what she really experienced when she engaged in that relationship and how it gave her that high and how when that fell apart she hit a low that has confused her, it will help her understand WHAT really happened instead of how she is so confused about it.

It's not surprising that you are confused right now. Her suddenly suggesting you move back in probably has a lot to do with how she wants to find some way to feel "safe" again. Sometimes what that is really saying is more of moving towards what one knows, but, that doesn't mean it will actually provide the needed sense of "safety and security".

Your wife is genuinely suffering from "low" self esteem. She has been struggling with that for a while and then when she caught you engaging with another woman, it really "threatened" her. All these cold looks, rejections, indecision's, she has exhibited are all connected to how much she HATES the way you made her feel so completely vulnerable.

If I think back on my own challenge when it came to my own husband who did more than you because he actually did cheat on me. He hurt me deeply, and to this day, that is something I never stopped hating. I never stopped hating how I now have that life experience along with that hurt that is "part" of me. Truth is, we never forget the things or people that "hurt" us in our lives.

IMHO, all her actions have been expressing the depth of her "hurt". Her effort to spend time with her friends and that other man was all part of how much she needed that "hurt" validated. Her statements to you about "you can't tell me who I can be friends with", is really more about "you can't decide the degree of my hurt".

When someone is "hurt" how deeply that person is hurt has a lot to do with their personal history too. From what you have shared, it sounds like your wife was always some kind of "dependent". She never really had a chance to build her own self esteem. BE, her own person. What she has been doing "now" in her life is making up for that by going back to school, choosing to be a RN and even choosing to have different friends.

When she says to you, "you don't fit" for me now. What she is really saying in that statement is that when you make statements to her that are like "orders", that is something she no longer wants in her life. She is going through a stage that she should have gone through at a much younger age.
This is a stage where a person "wants" to have the control and make choices for themselves. Even if that means the person makes some wrong choices.

You talk about "your" hopes and dreams right? I think you have to sit and think about that and make sure this is not "all about YOU". Do you put her in a place where it's all about you? Unknowingly? Or, do you put her in a place where she is allowed to grow as a person too? I am suggesting this because a lot of people think about their future/goals in an all about me mindset without actually realizing they are doing this and how that can be unhealthy in a relationship.

She has made it a point to say, "I do not want to go back to how things were". Well, she was a mother and a wife, but she did not really have her OWN identity.

When you are in the room with her, it does remind her of that "hurt" she felt (I know exactly how this feels first hand) and if your relationship is EVER going to move forward, she has to "slowly" learn how to see you in a different way. Part of that includes her feeling she is free to develop her sense of self esteem and have a chance to become someone instead of feeling like someone will be right there to threaten that. A lot of this is "emotional" in her and that is something that she genuinely has not figured out how to articulate. No even to herself.

As far as that other guy, well, that was attractive in that it was "her" choice. That's really what she was fighting for when she kept replying to you that "she will be friends with whomever she chooses" while you wanted to control that in her. He listened to her in a way you don't, and that made her want more. And he got his ego fed because her wanting him fed "his" ego which is probably missing in his marriage.

What is important for this to go forward in any way is how you have to tell her that you genuinely want her to continue to move forward in her effort to gain her sense of "self" and that you are no longer interested in her life having to revolve around "you". IMO she is no longer interested in going back to that kind of relationship with you.

Open nice, thank you very much for your thought out answer and reply. I totally agree with a lot of points you made. I don't mind if she has friends but she needs to have respect for our marriage. I just can't continue living in limbo

I understand, living in limbo is not healthy, not for you or her and not for the children either.

She told me today that "Right now, I can't trust you or give you anything"...