Extended marriage separation

[BuryMe]

I have detailed my situation in my previous post. In short, my undiagnosed wife split me black and initiated a marriage separation several months ago. I'm doing everything I can to repair this while not pursuing her and focusing on my own growth and healing away from her. Over time, I have been split white again and she describes me and our former relationship in idealistic terms, she also texts and calls me regularly and is now moving nearby. It seems like the projection has stopped, she has recognized her own psychological issues and the hurt they have caused me, and she has been talking about the pragmatic aspects of us potentially having a future relationship.

However, there are two issues remaining. First, she is seeing someone else long distance. Even though she talks about him and their relationship in kind of disparaging terms, she says that this is what she needs due to her own issues. Second, she says she still has a fear of relationships, and is worried about losing her own growth and new sense of identity with me. I can understand how the fear of engulfment is triggered by the prospect of losing herself in our relationship again and how something different would be serving her right now, but this is also absolute hell for me.

Any advice on how to deal with these two issues other than walking away?

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[kells76]

Hi BuryMe;

Good to hear you've taken some of the "break time" to focus on yourself and your growth. Have you been seeing a therapist or counselor at all?

You mention that your W has had moments of recognizing her own issues. Any sign that your W may be seeing a T/C, doing DBT, engaging in treatment of some kind...?

It sounds very BPD for her to say she has a fear of relationships, while she's in two (of course, calling that out head-on likely won't be effective). In a weird way, her being in two relationships at once probably "feels logical" to her -- it meets her needs, because she's "diluting" the relationship intensity. She doesn't have to be "all in" with you or with him, so it may be that getting 50% of a relationship with one person, plus 50% of a relationship with another person, even though it equals 100%, "feels safer" because it's fulfilling her desire for 100% relationship without any potential for engulfment.

Yet even though it may "feel logical" to her (BPD logic), it sounds hurtful to you, and that's where it gets difficult.

This may come down to your core values. If you're someone for whom commitment and monogamy are "line in the sand" values, then what you'd want is for the two of you to find a path back to that. What's hard is that she may or may not want that, share that value, or be willing to take that journey on the timescale that you need for your own values and integrity.

If she's willing to work with you and a neutral, professional third party (marriage/relationship counselor, etc), then maybe in that setting you two can talk about your needs, your values, and what a path forward might look like where you can be in the relationship with integrity (no boyfriends/girlfriends) and she can be in the relationship while managing her fears of engulfment.

It may be important to find out if one of her "line in the sand" values is her keeping the ability to have a side relationship. If it is, then this is going to be a big hurdle to work through.

If not -- if she is able to connect her psychological issues to how she starts side relationships to cope, instead of working on her engulfment fears -- then you may have some common ground to work forward from.

How do you think she'd respond if you suggested that the two of you try some counseling in order to understand each other more, before moving forward? Do you think there is a way to bring it up while respecting her fear of engulfment (i.e., you are not suggesting counseling "to trap her" or "to make her do something" -- it's just to learn more about her values and for her to learn about your values, before seeing about moving forward)?

P.S. Can you remind me if you and your W have kids together?

[BuryMe]

Hi kells76,
Thanks so much for your reply!!
To answer your questions, we don’t have kids. I have been seeing a therapist and I don’t know how I would have gotten through this without their help. She was also seeing a therapist for a while and she has talked about us seeing a therapist together soon, but I think almost all of her progress so far has come from self-reflection.
I think your description of how she sees these relationships is exactly right. By being caught between two, she isn’t being consumed by one, and she also isn’t becoming completely isolated. As painful as it is for me, it does feel like this constellation has been productive to her growth because she is learning about herself through each relationship, and I can admit that I have learned things through experiences with other people as well.
We have both said that we eventually want traditional, monogamous relationships. She hasn’t cheated or tried to have two romantic relationships at the same time – ours has been platonic since the separation but there has been an ongoing dialogue about the future. But you identify the issue well, is she willing to take the journey back to a traditional relationship with me, and is she willing to do that on a timeframe that fits with my needs?
It sounds like I should continue to encourage the idea of us seeing a professional together? To look at practical ways we can address that fear of engulfment without having to sacrifice what we have built and the kind of traditional relationship that we both want?