UPSIDE DOWN - still struggling, trying to detach

[TooLateForMe]

...I don't know if it's truth or the MLC speaking. He says that we should never have gotten married - that he realised very early on that he was still in love with his old gf (they were NEVER an item, I have since learned from his friend)! He says that over the years he has enjoyed our life together and he has totally loved me but the past few years have been wrong and he was telling me so but I was just not listening. (You know, all the usual rewriting of history, leaving all the good parts out and concentrating on the negative stuff).
...

Now, he says that he has had enough. He wants to love, be loved, have a life and be happy - all the things that he thinks he can't have with me. He says that we have gone down ever widening parallel paths and there is no turning back - not ever. He seems to be having his needs fulfilled by ow and his only sadness is that the tramp lives interstate and he can't be there or vice versa due to 'barriers' whatever that means ... that's the only sadness I ever see coming from him - NOTHING to do with us or our situation. He has left me in his head and in his heart.

...

... he's not playing and I believe that this is for real. It's why I feel so desperate and that I am not going to win him back, whatever I do.

My W is in her own MLC, but I went through my own and it's probably not even completely over. But when reality smacked me in the face I came to my senses. I realized I couldn't recapture my youth and I'm learning to appreciate my age. It caused a lot of damage that my family and I are going to suffer through for a long time.

I don't know if my W or your H will get to that point. At least not without doing more permanent damage. And maybe never fully. I waver at times but the real way through this for me is to remember how my W dealt w/ me. She suffered but was strong and supportive. She got a life, took care of our kids and herself. I have to keep remembering that.

Take it from someone who was willing to give it all up, that MLC illusion makes people stupid. History is rewritten, love is thrown under the bus. But I know now that real, deep and vital love is so much more worth it than trying to turn yourself into the teenager/20-something again.

Besides not being able to go back, those times really were harder than we want to believe. I was lonely back then, wishing I would find that person who could "get me." I did and screwed it up.

Take some comfort in that and try not to fall into the regression trap yourself. It's seductive, but very false.

[Eskimo Nell]

Thanks LR, Cas and Oz
Oh I hear the advice alright and I know that you think that I am blocking it but truly, H is so done that it's difficult to even get him to have more than one cup of tea whilst he is here, never mind a picnic! (He knows how much I love picnics and it was our last trip out, so he would avoid it just to be awkward anyhow). I can't get him to meet me out for coffee - I tried three or four times and he kept refusing, with excuses.

No community activities here yet as it's a new suburb and nothing established.

I've managed to hold off texting H all day. I'm not sure that nc is the way to go, as I have explained before but I am doing it out of the lack of imagination to do anything else. The temptation is to ask him to meet me, at a weekend, so that we can discuss the finances - this time with boundaries in regard to him flouncing out - and then ask if I can use his car to go get some stuff from that I need for the garden (he has a tow hitch and I do not). He may offer to drive me, if the going is good!

OK - so today's conundrum is, do I let him know that there are some electoral papers here for him? This could be a way to introduce the discussion as above or is this pursuit wrapped up (not meaning to be)?

H has still not emailed me, as he said he would, over the weekend. I want to book the day off work for the tribunal but am still waiting on his confirmation that he will be coming along - as it's important, I don't that that it would be pursuing if I approached him (again) in that regard or, as I have already asked him once and he has not responded, would that be 'nagging'? Oh, this is all so difficult to dance around a man who I could say ANYTHING to a few months ago.

In C last night, C asked me to do some homework and write a list of what makes me angry with H - I came home and wrote two pages, straight off! It has made me start to think .... perhaps I am more lonely than just missing him. Perhaps I am more in love with myself than I am with him, perhaps I trust myself more than I do him .... perhaps I deserve more than him. Perhaps I don't NEED him ... I just want him. And I do. I very much do.

[Eskimo Nell]

Thank you Mark - I hear the message, as well as your pain.

I want to be strong and stick this out in the hope that H will come to his senses. At this time, I don't see that I have much option as my isolation dictates. However, given time - and if H does what he is threatening, to move away - I won't see the point of hanging around here and will look to find a new life for myself elsewhere - though where is the big question.

I am so fearful of my future if it is to be alone.

[Buttercup37]

Hi Nell,

Wish I could loan you some of my new detachment which I seem to have in spades right now! I'm really to the point of keeping up my changes for myself with no expectations of saving the marriage but I see how you are struggling to implement the perception of loving detachment. I don't blame you for wanting to pursue and think up excuses to see or talk to him...but it's not fixing things with H, right? You really are not going to make the situation any worse by trying the NC or very limited NC for awhile, right?

We're all afraid of being alone...but you're right that sometimes we look back and see that it can be so lonely even being in a marriage (if it is broken.) Do you have also some spiritual faith or support to turn to? Although I don't discuss it much with anyone (either here or in my 'real' life) I find that my faith has been my rock through all these horrible times. It's kept me from going crazy in a crazy-making situation! LOL

[Eskimo Nell]

So, I think that I have just worked something out. I know that we shouldn't second guess and all that but we are talking here about a couple who used to buy the exact same cards for one another and could finish one another's sentences.

So, this is what I think:

H is interstate with ow - and that's why I haven't heard a pip from him. I reckon that he has taken two weeks leave and has gone over there ... we have had no leave since last October (save a week at Christmas) and he must have accumulated some which he now has to use. This makes sense to me in that, as my recent 'find' from the tribunal, he told them that he had 'work commitments' until 6 October so to delay the hearing until after that. All makes sense now.

Therefore, I shall not contact him. It would only upset me further to have my suspicions confirmed but I KNOW in my heart that I am right. It's why he has not responded to my email of last week in which I suggested that we should meet up prior to the tribunal. He knew that he wouldn't be here and he probably hasn't got the backbone to admit it.

What puzzles me though, is when I challenged him on this previously, he just said that he DID have work commitments and 'stuff' going on. Why would he do that? If he considers that he is saving my feelings, why would he bother?

Oh, I am so ready to rail at him BIG TIME but I am trying to think of how I communicate that I know this, whilst at the same time, continue to DB. Anyone got any bright ideas? I don't want him to think that I am a fool and don't know what he's doing but I want some answers to my questions.

Part of me thinks that, if I am right, this may be a testing time - the longest time with ow and the tramps baggage may wake him up to the reality of the grass not being greener .... who knows? Perhaps it will be a blessing in disguise.

When I thought that he had come back West, I was happ(ier) but now, with this new thought, I am paranoid and filled with rage again. Why can't I just let go and be at peace with myself????

[Lost Rabbit]

Well you might be right on this one but I'd see it as a bonus, two whole weeks of her and did I hear you right she has kids too! Well she wont have been able to keep it together for a whole fortnight so may have done some serious damage who knows!

But bearing in mind that we all last week kept saying to Oz dont panic it could be a good thing, just keep telling yourself that too.

Working on the IC on your rage symptoms seem a very good idea, as certainly this is something which irrates your H and you need to nail for yourself more than anyone to stop it eating away at you.

As for me Happy Rabbit became Silly Rabbit and made a faux pas which hopefully Mr Rabbit wont use as a pull back, so angry with myself as it was easily remedied.

[Eskimo Nell]

Thanks Buttercup. I appreciate your kind words and empathy.

I have tried nc before and it took 3 weeks to flush H out. It's almost two weeks now, save for my emergency phone call to him at the weekend. I am trying again though, knowing that, failing all else, I shall see him at our home builders tribunal mid-October when we go for our compensation hearing.

Yes, it's lonely. With no friends and family here, it's the pits being totally on my own when I beat myself up knowing that others are all with someone - even if it's not the person that they want with all their heart. I envy the lights in my neighbours windows, knowing that their family units are all intact and cosy. Meanwhile, I'm like an old spinster and take my 2 cats off to bed with me each night, no later than 8pm. How sad is that?

I am afraid that I don't have any spiritual faith to keep me warm and to park my lonely boat against. I do have some personal beliefs but not to the extent that some here will find comfort in. I like to say that I 'hedge my bets' but talk to 'God' and 'pray' for all the sorrowful souls that are on this board - including myself.

I wish that you could send me some of your new detachment too!! Good luck with yours - seems like you are getting through this in your own time and working with your own rules. I shall keep checking in on you ... !

[Buttercup37]

My lights are on but plenty of people would not guess what is really going on. Bet there are other lonely souls on your block.

[Eskimo Nell]

Who knows Rabbit but it's eating me up. Last week I thought that he wasn't at work as he had't answered an email but a few hours later, a response. I know that it's just so easy to let your brain run away with you but I know him and with the date having been set down a few weeks back, it all becomes clear now. It also makes me realise that the saying of "believe half of what you see and none of what you hear" is true. He is cheating and he did lie - he could have told me that he was going away and he chose not to. Then he tells me that I am the liar for not declaring my earnings to him?!! Helloooooo.

If he is interstate, I hope that the true colours come out and he has lots of time left there to consider what's going on.

Yes, this particular IC exercise has helped a little, just as I was giving up on it all.

Have posted on your thread re your faux pas!

Woke up this morning and felt that there was not much purpose to the day. I don't know what I am getting up and carrying on for any more. I work hard toward the weekend and then, when it arrives, I realise how I'm better off in work. There's nothing to give me purpose at the moment, excepting for the furries. I'm fed up of moaning and whinging and looking in the mirror to an unhappy soul. I have been on my own for four lonely months now and I am starting to bleed out of all that I have in me. I don't feel like I have many reserves left and I don't even get some of the little crumbs that H used to throw at me when this all first kicked off.

I don't know what to do next. I don't think nc is the way but I'm so petrified of doing anything else until at least 6 October. I know it doesn't sound like it's long away but it may as well be years ahead the way that I currently feel.

[Eskimo Nell]

There surely must be another lonely soul Buttercup - it would be nice to find them and at least we could share a coffee or two!

That's the thing isn't it - no-one knows what goes on behind closed doors and sometimes that's just as well.

I asked my C if there were other people in my situation who might like to meet for a coffee and she said that she would look in to it. They have to be careful evidently due to confidentiality but I suggested that we sign disclaimers which would allow C to pass along phone numbers to those who expressed an interest only. The rest would be up to us. Nothing happened on that yet but it would be good if it did.

I'm thinking that it may be an idea to start up a group on meetup.com for just this purpose. There doesn't seem to be anything interesting for me on that website and it could do me and others some good. Must think more on that as we head toward the weekend.