Silent Treatment & Other Marriage Therapy Tips

“If you leave him now and he heals, look down the road in your imagination 5 years from now. Picture it with me. He finds some wonderful woman, marries her and is a fabulous, devoted husband. Your kids love her and build a close relationship with her and their happily married father who is healthy and now capable of being a great father and, in fact, ow has become one. You may never find another good marriage and live your life out alone, watching another woman living her life in the marriage that could have been yours. Can you feel the regret? You are 52. You really want to live your remaining years alone?”. Therapist said this on our first or second visit just a week after I found out about his secret double life. It penetrated so deeply that fear of regret still keeps me paralyzed from letting go. I kicked him out months ago and felt strong. Then remembereed the therapist’s words and reunited. He may be a faithful husband now. I didn’t know for 23 or more years that he wasn’t. Fear of moving on before I can confirm it has me living in a deserted village named, “Avoid Divorce Regret”. Who have I become??? Ugh.

Speechless.

Therapist is an idiot.

I think we can add this one to the months old thread about the dumbest things therapists said.

These people are why I still rant.

I actually wrote to the therapist that is seeing my H now, in questioning why he is doing “EFT couples therapy” with my H with his wife 5 states away. H has conveyed to me that the problem with our marriage, from the required reading that therapist has him doing in that therapy, is that our marriage is too loosely bonded.

Yah THINK!!!

With you keeping 3 hookers and god only knows how many other chat buddies on standby because you want to keep your options open?

And it’s my fault.

They determined this without the therapist ever speaking to me.

Yep, all my fault.

The most confusing advice I get is that it’s important to detach. And then be told that the marriage is a shambles because I learned to detach.

Absolutely no way to win.

and funny thing happens: you realize it is not about who wins or loses.
The way I look at this SA is like I look at any addiction through this analogy of broken ice: if you were to rescue someone who has fallen through the ice of a frozen lake, you would not jump in to boost them out. You better make sure you are on strong footing before attempting to rescue anyone.
After a loooong physical separation/divorce I am actually able to look at him more objectively and thus offer him better help. (And I am damn sure he don’t like it, at all.) I can do it whenever I feel like it, and I don’t have to manipulated on daily basis. I am much better off not knowing all the details; and there is no tug of war. I am not personally vested: If you fail in recovery, not my damn problem. You try to pull me in? I think not.
Except that I did tell him that if he failed to find regular therapy, I would expose and keep on exposing his problem to EVERYONE who would listen: his boss, his clients, coworkers. But that’s only to keep him from escalating to the point of incest/beastiality/rape… because that is where all this will end up if untreated. He wants to keep on whacking off while looking at paperdolls, more power to him. I just don’t want any part of it. And that is about as far as it is going to go as long as our children are little/innocent, and I have to protect them. He will not pull them in.
He may not be out of the ice but as long as he keeps calling for help… I know he is still alive and resisting the undertow. That is the ONLY thing I can do. Threaten him with public humiliation. There is nothing worse to a narcissist. Destroy their (and your own at the same time) public image. Crap on their “honkey-dorey”. I HATE THE HONKEY-DOREY: “Oh, everything is just peachy.”

They will never get better. Save yourself!

PS. Public humiliation, and shunning are seen as a cruel and unusual punishment is some American States. So please refer to your local/State laws before you attempt this at home.

U all know my favorite line. Stacy. I want u to hear me when I say this questioning is beginning to sound more like a cross examination filled a disdain…….. U think? Guarantee this dr is an sa.
I am not currently in any couples therapy. Have not been back since June 8. At this point I would be going thru the motions when I have not decided I want to be married to this man. If I do decide I want a marriage w him and he keeps his therapy and meetings and behavior respectable I will begin it again. Until then I live in this home co parent the kids and am cordial. I refuse to change my life and my kids life bc of his behavior and If he finds this unacceptable he can leave. I found his life unacceptable for 18 years so I figure I have some time.