Dear Jeff:

I read your posts in the three threads you started on this forum. What a fast paced story you told, no wonder it is hitting you hard. It was all so very fast, from becoming aware that there was something wrong in your marriage to being six months post divorce, all very fast. You are adjusting, and you feel lonely.

You wrote: ” I had a mini-breakdown and suddenly realized three things.
First, I still love and miss my ex-wife”- my comment: when we are distressed, our thinking is far from accurate. You are lonely and you need more time to adjust, adapt to the new situation. I would relax first, take it very easy, before getting too attached to your realizations as The Truth.

“Second, my stoic tendency to suppress emotion and general emotional unavailability were probably root causes of the failure of our marriage”- doesn’t ring true to me. I read your other posts carefully. This self blame has to do, I believe, with your distressed thinking. I am highly suspicious of it being the objective truth.

“Third, I am now completely and utterly alone in this world”- yes, not the best thinking under distress, I say. Here is the all-or-nothing distorted thinking, “utterly alone”.

As a matter of fact, three kinds of distorted thinking (term used in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, CBT):

Emotional Reasoning is the first distorted thinking, it is in your “realization” that you love your wife. You felt it when lonely and desperate. Doesn’t mean you would love her if and when you date another woman, for example, having a new relationship.

Self Blame is the second distorted thinking, that is in your second “realization” and All-or-Nothing/ Black-and-White thinking is in your last.

anita