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March 4, 2019 7:05 pm  #11


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

Late hopping onto this post. Seems to me that he should be the one leaving the home. He's the one causing the chaos.  I separated from my spouse a few years ago and I left because....variety of reasons. Recently, issues have recurred-this time I decided I did not deserve to be the one who moved out, set some boundaries including him moving out if he wanted to indulge in certain behaviors. Surprisingly, he said okay to the boundaries.  Not too sure if I'd rather he said no...?

 

March 4, 2019 7:09 pm  #12


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

....continued for Ruth

RuthA57 wrote:

...... I am thinking that we need a set of rules to live by. Am I being too unrealistic?

 
You may have jumped a few steps ahead of where you should start... because first (I think) you have to give yourself time to decide if this is really what you want, and what being accepting of his need to explore his feelings will do to YOU. Because once you set rules you may find it difficult to change them...

...to be continued...I was away for the weekend sans laptop. I'm back! 

Ruth...you say you did all your sexual exploration in your 20s-30s but your husband didn't. Ditto....me too. Not with women, it was purely heterosexual but it was natural and definitely before I met my current partner. He hadn't (or he said he hadn't anyway) had any experience with anybody but me. So I see our r'ship and subsequent partnership/children/bond/lives...as allowing him to *put a lid on* all the feelings he may have unknowingly had....that gradually came out with his suggestion of an open r'ship/exploration with others....and developed (unknowlingly by me!!) into a secret side of desire for more contact with men. All the hard work had been done. Children raised, careers solidified....but where I'm ready for life together, just him and I....he's wanting to fulfill the *stuff* he should have done when younger

We all get there via a different path but ultimately we all reach the same destination. And that destination is Deciding what we want and how we want our lives to be.
I'm still in the biggest quandary of my life! I've told him it's monogamy or nothing. That's MY rule. But I have mistrust and sadness that now surrounds that rule, 
and it's not a good place to be



 

Last edited by Ellexoh_nz (March 5, 2019 1:47 pm)


KIA KAHA                       
 

March 5, 2019 11:08 am  #13


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

You may have jumped a few steps ahead of where you should start... because first (I think) you have to give yourself time to decide if this is really what you want, and what being accepting of his need to explore his feelings will do to YOU. Because once you set rules you may find it difficult to change them...

I actually kind of feel this way too.  Maybe I moved too fast.  Maybe I should have tried to fight more before I brought the divorce conversation.  I suggested that I would leave teh house because it s a house we rent and I can't afford it by myself.  Other than that I can rent an apartment, I have a job and the resources to sustain myself and the kids but it will not be the same.  I guess I should have prepare myself better before telling him that I don t wanted to continue.  In fact It s not that I want to leave but I don t want to stay in this dark place called denial.  So I feel like I m forced to do something I don t want because he s not ready to give me what I need.  It s already hard because I don t even know If I can deal with a MOM.  But If I had to it would need to be a monogamous one anyways.  I am not willing to accept my husband going elsewhere to satisfy his needs.  

     Thread Starter
 

March 5, 2019 2:23 pm  #14


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

Haven wrote:

Late hopping onto this post. Seems to me that he should be the one leaving the home. He's the one causing the chaos.  I separated from my spouse a few years ago and I left because....variety of reasons. Recently, issues have recurred-this time I decided I did not deserve to be the one who moved out, set some boundaries including him moving out if he wanted to indulge in certain behaviors. Surprisingly, he said okay to the boundaries.  Not too sure if I'd rather he said no...?

 

I think our partners would agree the sky was rainbow-colour if it meant the status quo of their lives would stay as it was. The thing is...any agreement on their part comes, for us, with an ever-present cloud of caution & mistrust.

I too have often wanted him to be totally honest....and just go! But can't bring myself to do the same.....
 


KIA KAHA                       
 

May 22, 2019 5:59 am  #15


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

Hi all,

Its been a while since I did not post here.  Not a lot happened actually.  Anyways just to keep you updated my husband and I are separated now.  He decided to move out.  Our kids spend the week end with him for now.  At some point at tried to ask him to just take some time to think about what we should do but he keep saying that he feels so broken by the way I rejected him that he could not find the strength to stay.  

One thing I wanted to share here is that I found that there is not enough here in term of advice to. bring the MOM discussion on the table.  Like in the support area there is this first aid kit that I found very useful but it does not include anything that suggest the possibility for a MOM.  I realize that the forum seems to be more oriented to separation or divorce discussions.  The section on MOM remains really poor and I guess an update on the first aid kit in the support section and adding a more specific first aid for MOM could help.

     Thread Starter
 

May 22, 2019 9:17 am  #16


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

    On the main pages under the various menus for resources, etc, there is information about joining groups other than this forum that are specifically designed for navigating long term MMOWs.  Perhaps those might have helped you more.
    I understand that you are upset that your husband has decided to separate from you. However, he is engaged in blameshifting, by saying it's not what he did (or is), it's your reaction to it that's the problem.  He's displacing onto some imagined failure of yours his decision to leave. ( I wouldn't be at all surprised if he's relieved to have the pretext.)  So don't let him blame YOU for what is his decision and his action. And in your hurt neither should you try to subtly shift the blame onto the forum, either, by saying that you didn't receive enough or the right kind of help on this forum, especially when the main site supplies links for other forums.  
If you have concrete suggestions for the way the site could be redesigned to support what you suggest, I'm sure either Kel or Phoenix would welcome them.

 

May 22, 2019 2:47 pm  #17


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

lolita17 wrote:

Hi all,

Its been a while since I did not post here.  Not a lot happened actually.  Anyways just to keep you updated my husband and I are separated now.  He decided to move out.  Our kids spend the week end with him for now.  At some point at tried to ask him to just take some time to think about what we should do but he keep saying that he feels so broken by the way I rejected him that he could not find the strength to stay.  

One thing I wanted to share here is that I found that there is not enough here in term of advice to. bring the MOM discussion on the table.  Like in the support area there is this first aid kit that I found very useful but it does not include anything that suggest the possibility for a MOM.  I realize that the forum seems to be more oriented to separation or divorce discussions.  The section on MOM remains really poor and I guess an update on the first aid kit in the support section and adding a more specific first aid for MOM could help.

Lolita...hello! Wow....what a change for you. He moved out! ....but he feels broken and rejected?...what!!! So now you must learn to co-parent but focus on yourself and this next, new phase of your life. Are you confiding in family, friends, a counselor?

Yes....the MOM section is under-used because, I think, members here who are undecided, in turmoil about their r'ships don't feel they should post in a forum where so many do not want to stay in theirs. I very rarely post here because not many do, and as I've progressed I've found it's best to read, use myself as counsel and continue working this out myself. 

Once again Lolita....I'm so happy you are moving (however slowly)....forward.
 


KIA KAHA                       
 

May 23, 2019 7:08 am  #18


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

Lolita17, All,

I feel I lived the MOM  for 2 years..   I could not do physically do it...  I would physically shake with trauma  and anxiety  ( is she going out shopping  or having sex?).  Once I accepted the betrayal and disloyalty  (ok she is having sex) I was not in any mindset or shape to explore seeing people on my part.     I, thus, can give no support or advice  short of ways to stay in the same house with them.

I admire the strength of people that  can make  a MOM work... I could not.    


"For we walk by faith, not by sight .."  2Corinthians 5:7
 

May 23, 2019 6:49 pm  #19


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

OutofHisCloset wrote:

  And in your hurt neither should you try to subtly shift the blame onto the forum, either, by saying that you didn't receive enough or the right kind of help on this forum, especially when the main site supplies links for other forums. .

I just made my comment because I tried to connect to these groups but I was not successful.  This forum is actually the best resources I ve found were I could connect with people wo had similar experience and I believe others might have had the same experience the same.  I think at some point any straight spouse is questioning whether they want to work it out or not.  Of course it s just an informative forum, I don t think anyone here take decision based on what they find here only. 
 

     Thread Starter
 

May 24, 2019 3:31 pm  #20


Re: New here and looking for some orientation

Just a few thoughts on that journey. I did consider a MOM, but it would have taken a lot of trust and reciprocity. My ex was only interested in an open MOM and had no interest in meeting my intimacy needs. So if it was open, I wasn’t interested in a sex partner only, I was interested in an intimate partner. Someone to cook with, to dance with, to sleep beside, to share a life and a home with, not some fragmented life away from home.  It  absolutely broke my heart  to even consider extracting my children from an intact home (ie divorce) that I had invested so much in providing.  So what would reciprocity look like? Would the wife leave, while my partner was there? How would running a household work? Could I find someone interested in this arrangement? And even if I could get all those logistics agreed, could I trust my ex to honor our verbal agreements on the calendar arrangements and other items? No. There were so many times she didn’t deliver on other promises.  So I had to leave, and accept the fact that the impact on the kids was the cost of maintaining my integrity and sanity. It was a decision I took very seriously.

Anyone that can pull off a MOM and keep their own sense of self, I have enormous respect for. It would have killed  my soul, I knew that, so I had to leave and endure other grief.

 

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