Going straight forward...antlers 6th thread.

[antlers]

antlers,
Please go visit Gypsy.

OK.

[antlers]

My son has been sick and I was letting his mom know that I was keeping him home from school today. There was some back and forth texting, and she attacked me, which is pretty normal for her. I then said that I was the only one who had 'owned' anything and accepted responsibility for the things I'd done but that didn't change the fact that she was also responsible for the things that she's done/doing.

She sent this..."the only thing I did wrong was stay in the God awful marriage for as long as I did. I allowed the kids and myself to go through hell which has and will have an everlasting effect on us. That's what I own up to and accept responsibility for. Done."

I thought about things for a while...the marriage, the separation, the divorce.

And I responded simply with this..."You're right, we didn't work , it wouldn't have worked. You're right, divorce is the right thing to do. You didn't care about me or trust my changes, and I couldn't trust you...and this is all for the best. I'll continue to be a good father to our kids, but I won't be a weekend dad. I want joint physical and legal custody of our kids. Honestly, I've begun to feel differently about the situation. I've had different thoughts about you and being married to you. I didn't feel like I could believe you or trust you. And so much stuff has happened. I should have told you sooner, but I was afraid of your reaction."



ps - wonder what robx would think about that?!?

[orangedog]

I would have said:

"You're right, we didn't work , it wouldn't have worked. You're right, divorce is the right thing to do. You didn't care about me or trust my changes, and I couldn't trust you...and this is all for the best. I'll continue to be a good father to our kids, but I won't be a weekend dad. I want joint physical and legal custody of our kids. Honestly, I've begun to feel differently about the situation. I've had different thoughts about you and being married to you. I didn't feel like I could believe you or trust you. And so much stuff has happened. I should have told you sooner, but I was afraid of your reaction."

[antlers]

Why? I'm really interested in hearing your opinion and reasoning on this!

[orangedog]

The response has too much emotion.

Too much emotion means she's hit an artery.

When you're confident and detached you don't need to get emotional. Facts and strong, positive actions will do the work.

__

But this is just my view. The Dog doesn't like to waste emotional energy arguing with the she. I just do my thing. If she makes a bunch of noise I ignore it.

And you know what? There's been less of that lately.

(Robx may have other opinions)

[Startingover2]

Although I would be guilty of writing something that Antlers did...I would have to agree that less emotion is better. Makes you seem so much stronger and indifferent to her crap.

[antlers]

The response has too much emotion.

Too much emotion means she's hit an artery.

When you're confident and detached you don't need to get emotional. Facts and strong, positive actions will do the work.

__

But this is just my view. The Dog doesn't like to waste emotional energy arguing with the she. I just do my thing. If she makes a bunch of noise I ignore it.

And you know what? There's been less of that lately.

(Robx may have other opinions)

It's the first time since she left that I've had a response like this. It feels counterintuitive...I agreed with what she said, instead of bantering back and forth with her. I'm not arguing with her, I'm not contesting her feelings, I'm agreeing with her...and she has nothing to fight against.

Arguing with her and trying to get her to change her mind by countering everything she said about me and the relationship, disagreeing with her, and disagreeing with reality (pursuit)...did nothing but push her further away.

Now I show her that I agree with her, and I agree with reality, and I'm moving on without her...I'm not pursuing. There's no fighting or arguing, no pursuit, and no pressure. The goal is to move on with my life and when she finally gets that I'm not pursuing her anymore and that I agree with the divorce and moving in that direction, her feelings will have nothing to fight against.

Will it make a difference? Damned if I know! I do know it can't hurt anything! Sure can't make anything any worse than it is. But doing what I've been doing all along, as far as trying to get her to see things differently, has done NOTHING helpful for me...at all!

[antlers]

Although I would be guilty of writing something that Antlers did...I would have to agree that less emotion is better. Makes you seem so much stronger and indifferent to her crap.

I've been doing what I 'felt' I should be doing instead of observing reality. It might have shocked her, and I don't think she expected it out of me. Maybe it shook something up...I don't know. But it didn't hurt.

Do you think it's 'not' strong to accept reality, choke it down, and move on?

[Startingover2]

Do you think it's 'not' strong to accept reality, choke it down, and move on?

No I think its strong...I was just saying that I am guilty of writing too many words trying to get my point across. Less words would be like shrugging your shoulders and saying 'yeah, yeah, whatever'. That her quacking didn't phase you one way or the other.

[antlers]

She texted me this later on yesterday in response to my text that I posted here earlier...

"It's not that I didn't "trust your changes" but by the time you decided to "change" you had already pushed me over the edge. And I did "care about you" or I wouldn't have put myself through hell for 15 years trying to make things work. Remember I was the one who always put the forth the effort first whenever we had a disagreement and I was the only one who apologized (even when it wasn't my doing) and I was the one who always said "I love you". I bet you didn't tell me that first 2 times the entire time we were together."