Hey Brew3x.
You asked a few questions and I thought I might chime in an provide my answers in case they help at all.
1) 180 - seems like opposite of R
2) Doesn’t the BS have to put in work too?
3) What does R look like?
So, here goes:
1) The 180.
The 180 is not about D or R. It’s not walking away from the marriage and it’s not a tool to manipulate your WS. The 180 is all about the BS’s emotional health. In the wake of a DDay, there’s way too much drama and emotional garbage going on to make any kind of informed decision about R, D, or anything related to your marriage. The idea of the 180 is to disassociate yourself from your WS. You focus on your health, both physical and emotional, on what matters to you. You don’t engage with your spouse and get your life in order. You basically remove the codependency many of us have in our lives by extricating ourselves from our spouses. What it does is it shows the BS that if they D, they will be okay. They are strong on their own and they will be fine. Then, when mentally healthy, the BS can determine R or D from a position of strength. Not power over the other. But internal strength without fear of the unknown. There’s clarity and calm about life outside of your marriage. So if the answer is R, it’s not because your scared, it’s because that’s what you want (and it goes without saying that it’s dependent on your W and the work they put in, remorse, etc.). A side effect of the 180 is the impact it has on the other spouse and as a result they get a bucket of water dumped on their head and in many cases it serves as a wake up call. But it’s not meant as a manipulative tool. It’s about you. Not about the other person.
2) The BS putting in work:
The unfortunate and unfair reality is that the cannot simply just sit back and have the WS put effort into the marriage or R without any work from the BS. It’s a marriage. And despite the BS being the wronged party, if you are interested in R, it’s going to require some heavy lifting from the BS. That doesn’t mean the WS gets a free pass or anything of the sort. It means that the BS can assess their WS but they need to be involved in the marriage and engage with their WS (after the 180 is over and you’ve decided to R, obviously). Everyone goes at a different pace, but whether it’s IC and then eventually MC, discussing the affair, etc., the BS needs to put in effort toward R as well. Again, this doesn’t absolve the WS and the onus is on them, but the BS has to play a role too. Not fair, but that’s the reality.
3) What does R look like?
This is a tough one and I’d presume it’s different for everyone. But maybe there are a few constants. A remorseful WS. Complete honesty and transparency about everything. Empathy. Being attentive to the BS’s emotional needs and triggers and proactively addressing them or mitigating them when possible (i.e., a willingness to discuss the affair as often as the BS needs/wants to). Massive amounts of IC/work to identify personal issues and fix them. A slow rebuilding of trust. Consistent selflessness over time.
Notice, I didn’t say NC, or giving up passwords, ownership of the affair, and not going to certain places, etc. Those are, in my book, prerequisites for R. Not indicators of a successful R.
How the above list manifests itself and how the WS exhibits those things will be different for everyone. But if they’re doing that and there’s love between the two of you and a desire for the marriage to work, R is possible. It will still be tremendously difficult, but you have the ingredients for a successful R. I’m not going to get into my personal sitch too much, but I have all of the above and it’s still a not so easy ride. I believe our R is successful but we are not fully there. There are ebbs and flows and ups and downs. There’s a reason many people D after infidelity. And even for those who don’t, that doesn’t mean they are in R. It just means they’re still married.
Anyway, my $0.02. Hope that helps.