Hi Jeff,

I don’t think it is foolish to want to work on your marriage. From what you have written it seems that you still love your wife and want to be married to her, so wanting to save your relationship isn’t foolish at all.

I seems to me that if you want to do this, you’ll have to do it before your trust for her is up to a level that you are comfortable with. Trust at this kind of depth is earned and I think you can only build it back up by spending more time together. I think it will be years in the making.

It’s possible this could all go wrong and your wife will leave you again, but none of us can say if that will or will not happen. What I wonder is whether or not you will be happy if you don’t give this a chance. Will you always be wondering ‘what if I’d tried’? Or do you consider it too painful to go forward. Only you can decide that obviously.

I think it is great that you are in mediation together, but I do wonder if now that you are on the reconciliation path some other form of counseling is needed for both of you? Maybe, maybe not.

I also think it’s great that you see communication as being so important. If I were you, I would want to be clear what she means by being more supportive but pulling back when you are too emotionally intense for example. It seems to me that there could be some overlap there and you need to be clear what she is getting at.

I wish you all the best Jeff.