Forgiveness

Hi Mate, Well done on 8 months gf thats some going you should be proud of yourself ,sorry to hear that your wife still refuses to talk to you but you seem to have turned your life around and i am sure she will come to see that one day soon, just starting my latest recovery after yet another relapse but people like yourself give me hope that it can be done... keep fighting to get your wife back and pleas dont let it be an excuse to go back to gambling again..... good luck

Hi dommy I'm assuming you've put your post on family and friends because you want to hear what we think? I'm wife of cg. He didn't used to be a cg, he will always be a cg whether he gambles or not. It's not in the past, it's just for today. Don't be complacent you could slip anytime. You ask for forgiveness and say you wife blames you. What do you want her to forgive? Who did the gambling? Who is the addict? Communication is vital she needs to talk to someone regardless of whether you and her reconcile. It's a devastating event in anyone's marriage which some may not recover from.

You knew what was going on for three years and lied to her to cover it up yet you now seem to want her to move on because you've told her gambling is behind you. Eight months isn't likely to be nearly enough to convince her I'm afraid. I have just about brought myself to allow Mr L potential access to a limited amount of savings after three and a half years and even then it's in accounts I check daily.

My advice would be to keep showing her what you're doing to make sure you can't gamble and don't put pressure on her to move on. The lies and deceit are a massive thing for us f&f to absorb and process and it takes time. Give her all she needs.

In what way are you (not your finances, but you) different to eight months ago? What personality change has taken place in you during those eight months so that your wife would be safe to trust you in financial and emotional terms because you are no longer the same person who gambled with all addict behaviour involved? What do you do now that you didn't before to maintain your recovery?

The best advice would be to encourage her to go to GamAnon and get help for her and for you to focus on doing what you need to do to fix you. Because as we f&f have all found to our cost, no one can control another person or fix another person or control the outcomes and we need to learn to stop trying.

Why do you want her back? Neither of you can recover for each other but only for yourselves. And if you do get back together, what will you both do differently to change the previous patterns of behaviour that didn't work and how will you make those changes?

CW