1. I've been very selfish in this process. It's very, very hard right now, yes, and I believe it's okay to say that of course but I have been selfish in making this about me more than my wife.
It’s one thing to see it, another to change it. Right now it still looks more like self-victimization than a true breakthrough that leads to revelation and profound behavior change. I don’t doubt you want to save your marriage, but you’re still operating from your place of me.
2. I have asked God to break me before him. I need to have a brokenness like David did when he sinned with Bathsheba. It's hard to gauge this since I'm in the middle of it but I know that my heart aches in all of this. But, why? Do I just not want to lose my wife or is it deeper in that I have sinned against God? I'm asking God about the latter.
3. I have also asked God to break me for the hurt that I have caused my wife. Similar to number 2 I'm asking him to truly allow me to feel the pain that I have caused.
4. I still have work to do on my flesh; I'm not a monster but I feel like this is portrayed and my flesh wants to rise up against this. I need prayer here.
5. God IS in this!
Have you ever heard the phrase “trust in God but lock your car?” It means you should always have faith in God, but you should also do your part too. You are working on you-focused counseling, you focused revelations, now asking God to do the heavy lifting on you to to just make things right, asking God to fix her, her friends and family... All of this just feels like busywork that is avoiding the true issues and confronting what you need to do for her benefit to answer her concerns. There does come a point where you have to do the work on all the stuff you just don’t want to deal with.
Praying is easy and passive. Working on the stuff you want to work on is easy and self serving. Diving in and getting dirty is hard but it’s what it takes to get things done.
6. Sure, she may not really want to be with me right now and I know that. I can't do anything about it other than to love her from afar and be genuine and cordial when I see her three nights a week when I go see the kids.
There is a ton more you can do...
You can ask to see the kids more than three nights a week.
You can ask to see more than just the one child 3 nights a week.
You can ask her what she feels she needs to see more secure in the changes you are making.
You can ask her what changes she needs you to make.
You can start working on those things.
You can go to individual counseling.
You can encourage her to go to individual counseling because it will help you know what you need to do to be producticely handling your plan to heal.
You can seek out joint counselors and reinforce that you feel you need it.
You can focus on other endeavors to show you aren’t fixated to the point of obsession on her and the marriage.
You can start dealing with what was swept under the rug in terms of your actions in the marriage... IE, the affair you kind of glossed over having.
You can give her space by stopping going to the house when she’s not there for lunch and such.
You can prepare for what life may look like if/when you don’t move back in and you’re on the road to divorce.
I did receive what I felt to be an encouraging text from her childhood friend she recently spoke to...
"We are praying for restoration. I think keep doing what your doing is a great idea (counseling). Me and my husband have been here before and I just needed him to show me that he was willing to put in the work no matter how long it took me to come around. We love you guys and are standing together in prayer for you, your wife and the boys."
1. Stop. Spying. On. Your. Wife. Via. Her. Friends.
2. My first husband and I were the worst matched couple in the world and everybody saw it but us. When we separated, we didn’t get a single “we are pulling for you guys to divorce!” text. Most people don’t. Polite “thinking of you and hope you come through” texts all over the place, but no “get divorced already” texts.
3. That was her marriage, not yours. You don’t know of their issues, she doesn’t know the specifics of yours. Your problems may be significantly greater than what she faced. There’s a big gulf between “we had a rough go of it but he did what he needed to prove he was hearing my concerns and changed” and you having an affair that never really was addressed and working kind of hard for just a month on the things you have selected to work on and still being asked to move out.