I have a question about bomb drop. Other web sites state that it is at the beginning of replay. My wife gave me the drop on Jan 17, 2014. Her actions now that I have been through a lot of counseling is that she could have been in replay months before bomb drop. Is this possible? Nothing I’ve read is clear cut on when during replay bomb drop can occur. I just know that with a lot of prayer and sites like this and help from God that I am a stronger more independent person that has strengthened my commitment to our lord and savior. Many thanks for your articles.
Hi Scott, 🙂
As a general rule of thumb, and we are talking about the unwanted emotional bomb that alerts the left-behind spouse in a direct way that something is seriously wrong within the marriage, this bomb is usually dropped at the beginning of Replay. However, it CAN ALSO be dropped halfway through Replay, and even 3/4 of the way through Replay, depending on what the mid-life spouse is facing within themselves in the way of emotional issues. This is because the increasing emotional pressure within the mid-life spouse is what actually dictates the timing of when it will be dropped.
Since every person is different, every mid-life crisis is different–what one mid-life spouse will do, another will not.
Each mid-life spouse carries unique emotional aspects within themselves. While some left-behind spouses, for example, will see their mid-life spouses have affairs, some will NOT have affairs. While some left-behind spouses will see their mid-life spouses show a multitude of signs that point to seriously overt replay/running behaviors, some will NOT show any signs or not show very many signs.
Keep in mind that each person is different in how they’ll choose to approach various aspects of the transition/crisis as a whole.
If you read the stage of anger that comes just before replay, you will see that some running behaviors, as well as overtly shown rebellious behaviors that closely resemble replay, would already be showing, because when they become angry at what they perceive has begun to happen to them, they begin to try to “fix” their perceived miserable and extremely angry feelings by beginning to search for outside solutions for what is honestly inside problems.
Their anger is used as an emotional “shield” to help them avoid seeking for answers within themselves, every answer they seek on the outside, is actually contained WITHIN themselves. However, at that point of their emotional transition/crisis, they are unable to confront themselves, as taking this honest look is too much for them, so they do look in an outward fashion for solutions that won’t be found, regardless of where they may seek.
This doesn’t stop the pressure from building on the inside, as they’re literally in “pieces”, and each piece is very painful–always poking, prodding, pushing, pressuring them–and they often feel like they are turning “inside out” as the pain continues increasing like a pressure cooker that gets ready to “whistle” when it gets ready to “blow off” the intense amount of pressure that has gathered within the cooker.
This is the basis for the angry, confused spewing often seen–and this same aspect, also pushes them at times into “Jekyll and Hyde” type behavior; only you see “Mr. Hyde” when they’re blowing the emotional pressure outward. When the mid-life spouse comes to a point of dropping the emotional bomb, their inner pressure has reached critical mass, so to speak, and it MUST blow outward, because it can no longer be contained.
Make no mistake, the mid-life spouse knows they’re wrong, and that’s why they try to hold these feelings back, but at the same time, they’re driven by forces they cannot seem to control–that’s why they also appear so emotionally out of control..because their emotional control is on a “hair-trigger” at all times…and after that first emotional bomb, it becomes much easier for them to blow outward each time the inward pressure increases again, within themselves.
Sometimes the left-behind spouse triggers some, or most of these episodes, because at certain points of time, early after the emotional bomb drop, they still aren’t at a place of understanding that in order to emotionally survive these onslaughts, they would need to handle the often raging mid-life spouse with an aura of calm detachment, which usually takes away the emotional ammunition that would normally “feed” the mid-life spouse’s justifications for their bad treatment of the left-behind spouse.
But, I digress..however my digression may help your understanding a little more. 🙂
To continue the discussion:
In fact, the actual “beginnings” or “in process” aspects, like already being friends with the person they will eventually cross the line with into the mid-life affair, or drug usage, or heavy drinking, that points toward clear avoidance behaviors will already be showing, but the left-behind spouse won’t be aware of it, nor really see this clearly, until they look back in hindsight.
These are examples of the various “seeds” of the next phase that are sown during the phase before, if that makes sense. So, from what little you’re describing, your wife was beginning to show signs (actually the “seeds” of replay that were planted in preparation, while still within the Anger phase/stage) of replay behavior before she ever reached replay.
However, once she began to cross over into replay, her anger increased to the point that the emotional “door” opened, the “children of her issues” spilled outward, the most painful issue in her life was presented to her, one that she could NOT FACE because of all of the pain that spilled out with this, and the emotional pressure plus the greater pain, was more than she could take.
In desperation, because she could not look within at that time, (at this time, she is still NOT looking within herself), she, instead, looked directly at you, her spouse, as the one to blame for all this increased emotional pain she was beginning to suffer.
So, in order to try and “fix” this increased pain that she wrongly perceived was caused by you, she then “bombed” you, in an effort to “annihilate” you emotionally—to some extent it worked, because you got hurt, but what the mid-life spouse “hopes” might happen, because of their skewed perception, the removal of what they think (wrongly perceive) is the direct source of their pain, doesn’t happen, because the left-behind spouse still loves the mid-life spouse.
The left-behind spouse also knows that none of this is “normal” behavior on the part of the mid-life spouse, so they do the complete opposite of what the mid-life spouse expects them to do; the left-behind spouse stays right there instead of allowing themselves to be chased away.
Now, obviously, again, owing to the differences in people as a whole, not every left-behind spouse has a “knee-jerk” emotional response, and not all of them immediately kick the mid-life spouse from the home. However, I have dealt with people who have done just that and regretted doing that, because they found the mid-life spouse wouldn’t let it go, for what seemed the longest of times, using that one mistake to justify why they won’t return home.
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To be fair, the LBS is a human being who was hurting beyond belief, but the mid-life spouse doesn’t care about that, they only care about what was done to THEM, but don’t seem to want to see why–that’s because they don’t WANT to see why. This is true **avoidance** behavior
Sadly, they’re seeking to twist an already deep emotional knife even deeper within the left-behind spouses back and heart, because mid-life spouses are also very vindictive, with or without provocation.
However, that’s another story..so I will stop there. 🙂 I hope that helped answer your question, Scott. 🙂
((hugs))