Sorry to do a selfie. My wife and I had a long talk this morning. We decided to continue with the marriage. We've had years of counseling, our core values are similar, but church will always divide us. As you all know, no one can hurt you as much as someone you love.

We also talked about the concept that most long-term marriages have irreconcilable differences (heard that a lot in counseling). It's what couples do to NOT push the nuclear button.

The Meet the Mormons invitation pushed mine, my sarcastic comment pushed my wife's...the results were predictable.

Thanks to all of you for your empathy! I'm going to bake cookies for the grandkids and spend some quality family time. Boner.

♫❤♫

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Wine Country Girl --- you always know the right words!

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Cold Up North Wrote:
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> Wine Country Girl --- you always know the right
> words!
>
> +
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Okay, I'll bite...
WCG,where'd ya get them cool lil symbols?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unicode_characters

Then cut-and-paste!

♙♙♙♙♙♙♙♙
♖♘♗♕♔♗♘♖

Come on you guys, please don't hijack byuboner's thread. This is important. He is important.

You're right... sorry boner.

No worries you folks are great! Boner.

I know your grandchildren must adore you! Your baking cookies is an action of "Families are Forever" that your grandchildren will remember long after all the hollow church platitudes echo away. Have a wonderful time with the grandkids today!

Right on Boner... very happy for you. I hope you enjoy your family time today :)

Glad you were able to work it out!

Keep that solid foundation of what you do share together, strong.

You both need to try your best and respect each other, not to push those buttons.

So glad that you both seem to have that concept.

Good job, Boner! I think you've got a thing or two that your TBM wife can't live without. Keep it cool and enjoy the good times whenever they come your way. Cookies today!

I'm glad that it's working out. Next time your wife tells you that she's going to a Mormon activity, just say, "Have a nice time. I'll see you when you get back." ;)

I agree, that's a good way to say it.

That's how it works in my marriage, we just don't talk religion or take shots when it would be so easy to do so. We got a call between GC sessions, my husband answered it. I didn't know who was calling or what they wanted. When my husband hung up he said it was a ward missionary wondering if we could have the missionaries in for dinner sometime during the week. He simply said no, he didn't ask me, he just said no. I told him I appreciated him doing that, that I was sorry he sometimes didn't get to do something he would like to do and that he could take the missionaries out to eat if he would like to. He said he hadn't missed anything important and that he might take the missionaries to dinner next time. It isn't always easy biting my tongue but my marriage is so much more important to me than trying to prove my point. By the way, my husband is a former bishop, they aren't all bad.

thanks for the update, boner, stay cool, peace to you and yours.

Sorry to hear about your difficult discussions with your spouse.

But grandkids? For some reason I always pictured you as in your 20s.

It could be that in some important ways he's still reliving his twenties, wishing he had made different decisions back then. I know that's the case with me.

However, returning to the present, I respect Boner for being married, having children and grandchildren, and trying to keep the peace with his wife.

"For some reason I always pictured you as in your 20s."

I know right? so when he said "wife and grand-kids", my first thought was huh? "Boner is married and he is a grandpa?"

LOL, I know I don't always agree with all of his posts, well, mostly when he go off with his F-bombs. But he has very interesting things to say! So, for that I have lots of respect for him!

Have fun baking cookies Boner, glad you're working things out with your wife!

I've always pictured boner as some grizzly old dude who has zero fucks left to give. He's the guy who stands on his lawn in his skivvies, scratching his balls while making eye contact with you because he cares not. You can not look if you don't like it. When boner's balls itch, he scratches them.

:>)

Good for you, pal. Every marriage requires compromise....more than one can ever imagine at the start. Hoping your wife can gain the knowledge that your commitment to each other trumps everything else. Robert Kirby's (Salt Lake Tribune/Mormon humorist) wife left the church....and they make it work.
You're in my thoughts.

Ron Burr



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2014 08:40PM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

SO glad to hear that things are looking better. Keep up the good work!!

The most successful thing we did in our long marriage was to: agree to disagree. That also meant that I respected his rights to his beliefs and refrained from being negative about Mormonism.
He probably never understand the real reasons I could not believe the religion anymore, but when he asked what I needed from him I said: Live the 11th Article of Faith. And he did.

We didn't have anymore discussions about the religion. I left it alone. I lived by the adage that love is something you do and in this case, not do! :-)

My view is to show by my example of how I live that I am a good person, the same personality, do the same things for the relationship, marriage, and home.And now about my attitude. I had to do my own attitude adjustment from my initial one. No sarcasm, no arguing, just be nice and kind. It's amazingly powerful!!

I made up my mind to be respectful. Don't pick at the religion. Leave it alone. Let it go. It's no longer about me anyhow.
I was not going to inflict anything on him. Why would I? It was not worth the results.

So it boils down to playing nice. Getting along. Respecting my spouses rights to his choices -- and this included almost everything, actually.
No: grudges, regrets, negativity, nastiness, sarcasm, resentments, bitterness, angry outbursts, etc.
Be an emotionally healthy adult; a classy, refined woman and set the example. And what did I get in return: Total love and devotion and loyalty, respect and honor !!



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/12/2014 08:56PM by SusieQ#1.

Just wondering, SuzieQ, if you allowed your husband to pay tithing on YOUR income? Were you able to keep that separate, too?--A major problem for many who play the "go along to get along" game.

I don't know.

Spouse and I left LDS Inc. together and I've tried to imagine what life would be like had spouse stayed LDS.
I can't get myself to imagine (in such a situation) of living together with no church related problems.

I can't imagine a truly TBM spouse compromising on anything.

Delila

When we both worked we both paid tithing, but I wrote the checks (rounded off) on our net income as I was the "Secretary/Treasurer" of the family.
When I left the church we were both retired. I said: we did your way for 30 years, it's my turn now. He agreed. Our income at that point had all ready been tithed once.
We did not pay tithing on anything anymore except once when he broke the agreement. He didn't do that again.

Adults compromise, marriages require compromise. We knew what we needed to do after some initial messiness and he never lost his faith and I knew that was his right. He had some health issues and did not attend much, then we moved and later he passed away.

Sounds a lot like spouse & I. Thanks for putting your story out there. Makes me think marriage might be possible with this big, annoying obstacle sitting right in the middle of it.

Best wishes to you & your family.

I am so, so glad for you and your wife!

So happy for you that the cult did not break up another marriage.

Aha!

Congratulations on your discovery that the real battle is you controlling your own emotional reactions.

It's just not your spouse's fault that

(fill in the blank with any/all of the deceits of Mormonism)

S/he believes it and so did you once. Sh/e may one day reject it like you did.

Like so many posters have said, focusing on being kind is the most powerful (and I simply must add this)

BECAUSE IT MAKES THEM LIARS ABOUT WHAT AN APOSTATE IS LIKE

and when someone runs you down to them, they will stand up for you...and that may be the first chink in the armor.


Best

Kathleen Waters

"focusing on being kind is the most powerful"

Boner and KW, Appreciate what you share here!

Kindest regards ;o)

good for you guys, boner. so sorry to hear that such a big thing divides you two (no pun intended there.... all seriousness here).
ive recently gone through sort of the same thing with my boyfriend.
relationships are hard! and people are hard. kudos to you both for being able to talk about things and decide to keep on keepin on. good luck!!