Ask Andrew – 295
Dear Andrew,
I was hit with the ILYBINILWY line about a month ago after being married to my wife for ten years.
We have been fairly distant for most of that time due to my overworking and addiction problems. I have been in recovery for the last 5 and 1/2 years, but in that time I have focused on what it took to get me healthy . I thought I was being a good husband at the time, but in hind sight have been pretty non existent as a partner or sole mate for her. She developed an infatuation with a professor at her college(she is 35) ; they carried on a 6 months email “affair” in which he told her he only saw her as a friend, but she grew to really fall in love. She has since stopped writing him(4 weeks) but now says that she does not think she ever really had the feelings for me that he invokes in her. I know this is not true, but it tears me apart that we seem to be stuck in a state of me growing to be the husband I should have been & her throwing road blocks up at every point saying that I should have done this before if I loved her. She says she wants to give us a try, but I don’t feel her giving in to any change.
We have two boys, 8 and 10, that I don’t want to hurt thru all of this. We started seeing a marriage counselor, but even with that she said she would rather just meet the counselor by herself b/c she feels more able to open up. I am sad & despondent over the whole situation & regret that I did not make the effort in the past to connect with her. Am I fighting a lost battle here?
Andrew writes:
First of all congratulations for doing so well in your recovery programme, make certain that you keep focused over the coming months and don’t slip back. Unfortunately, with addictions, once life is on a reasonably even keel , the partner of the addict can let their breath out, stop worrying about day-to-day stresses caused by the addiction and start to think about themselves for a change. Unfortunately, they discover that they’ve been running on empty, have all sorts resentments and feel pretty angry about what’s been happening. So your wife’s response is not unusual – just incredibly painful.
Next, to answer your question, you are NOT fighting a losing battle. Read my book ‘How can I ever trust you again’ and you will discover that your wife’s ‘love’ for her professor has been pumped up by secrecy and the relationship being forbidden fruit. When the cold light of day hit this infatuation, it will wither and die.
It is disappointing that your wife wants to see the marriage counsellor alone but again not too surprising. The ideal arrangement for helping couples recover from addiction is a counsellor for the addict, one for the partner and a couple therapist. So your wife is just grabbing what she needs at the moment.
While she is making her mind-up about what she wants, you don’t need to be idle. Rather than feeling sad and despondent about what you haven’t done, start making right today. Forge a better relationship with yours sons, take them out and show them (and her) what the real you is like. Being a great father is really seductive to women and you will not only repair a damaged relationship with your children but offer concrete proof that you’re going to change.
Finally when you start to feel better about yourself, and have the courage to move forward without the reassurance that she wants the marriage to work, start acting ‘as if’ she’d made declaration of undying love. How would you behave? What would you do? Act on these impulses and if you don’t keep asking for recognition – which is turn off – she will slowly but surely remember why she fell in love with you.
So you have everything to gain, be patient, be strong and keep repairing those damaged ties with your family.
