So last night I had a pretty intense dream about H - in which he moved away and we had a lengthy discussion about his affairs (which we have not had in real life - still have no idea who OW is).
In the dream I said "Are you sure there's only two? Just this one and the girl from Iowa?" and H replied "Well, and the circus clown".
So last night I had a pretty intense dream about H - in which he moved away and we had a lengthy discussion about his affairs (which we have not had in real life - still have no idea who OW is).
In the dream I said "Are you sure there's only two? Just this one and the girl from Iowa?" and H replied "Well, and the circus clown".
And then I woke up.....
Ha! We are all living in a circus right now. But I like the phrase "not my circus, not my monkeys." I'm trying to stay out of H's circus and let him deal with his own monkeys!
It's that time of the week again.....H came over to get the girls ready for school this morning. I didn't do the "friendly" as well as I should have. I think I managed "pleasant" but no further. It didn't help that I woke up at 4:00 am cycling through "I can't believe this is actually happening" and "I can't believe H did all of this", etc. I will have to be more prepared next week to be in a positive frame of mind. I made eye contact and my tone was ok - but I wasn't super smiley.
On the plus side, I had to come back into the house after I left because I forgot my work badge and H was still petting the dogs. This may not sound like much - but since he dropped the bomb, H has done everything possible to detach from our household - he immediately "returned" keys, gate openers,etc, he does everything possible to see the girls AWAY from the house, and whisks them away ASAP whenever he has them, and he has barely shown any attention to what used to be beloved family pets (except when he pets them to avoid making eye contact with me). So, I know its just a tiny positive, but the fact that he was willing to show a little more affection to the pooches (who have been starving for it) pleases me.
Won't see him again until he drops the girls off at D6's soccer practice tomorrow. He will watch D3 while I coach. I will be interested to see if he actually watches any of the practice or if he just hides with D3 on the playground.
I really need to figure out a way to do some "thought stopping" in the middle of the night. I seem to be in a continuous loop where I wake up at 2 or 3 in the morning, and my mind goes straight to negative thoughts about H (which is weird for me- because pre-BD, if I woke up at that time I would have been incredibly groggy and incapable of coherent thought). During the day, I don't seem to find it so difficult to focus on me, and all the positive changes I need to make instead - but there's something about the wee hours of the morning that brings out all the dark thoughts.
Today as I stared at the "2:25 am" on the clock, I kept thinking:
Does he really have any idea about the pain he is causing to me and the kids? When I was a kid, my worst nightmare was that my parents would divorce - and now we are doing that to our two daughters who are so incredibly precious to us. Will I ever be able to trust anyone again? It's hard to imagine, when the person I trusted most, admitted to two affairs, left me via note and basically went into hiding all within 24 hours. Blah, Blah, Blah.... It seems impossible that any human being could do this if they had any conception of the pain they are causing... Blah, Blah Blah.
Then in the morning I get up, start my day and realize that of course he doesn't realize any of this, there is abundant evidence that he is not remotely rational right now.
I lost of few posts on my threads where I was given excellent advice regarding my sleeping problems. Thanks again to all who helped! I really made some improvements with the zzzzzs over the weekend.
Today I need to go back to "Detachment 101". This morning I saw that H had deposited his monthly payment much earlier than usual and immediately started to try and read into such a mundane thing. "He's trying to be nice! He's trying to initiate some contact!" Reality check - it was probably a slow morning on patrol, and he just plain got it done early.
Then I got called by D3s daycare for the 2nd time in a week because she was running a fever. I texted him as a courtesy to let him know and also to say I was taking her to the dr. He responded "ok". I immediately started to fume, thinking it was unbelievable he couldn't even say he hoped she was ok or show a little appreciation for the fact that its always me who leaves my job to take care of these things, etc. Just when I had worked myself into a mini-fury, he texted again, offering to watch D6 this evening if it would help out.
I guess sometimes I think I'm doing a good job on detachment because I never feel any urge to text, call or email him. Clearly these minor interactions, and my out-of-scope reactions to them indicate otherwise. I know its early on and I'm human, I'll just take it as a win that I didn't lash out during the texting incident (although truthfully, lashing out really isn't my style).
D3 just had a secondary ear infection from the crud she had two weeks ago. Didn't take H up on his offer because we already had a big evening planned with grandparents. I'm out of town all day tomorrow because the program that I work on was awarded top performer in the state and I get to go pick up the award in LA. Glad career is at least still moving along.
So yesterday while I was out of town for work, I actually got a text from H asking how D3 was. I was bowled over, since in the last month he has only initiated contact to briefly confim logistical stuff around kid pickup and drop off. I was so pleased and then it hit me that I'm actually delighted that H sent a three word text to check on the health of his own child- wow- my bar has gotten pretty low. How sad is that?
On a slightly humorous note.... like many on this board, my thoughts occasionally turn to what life would be like if we can't fix this and end up divorced. And its been absolutely impossible for me to envision myself in another relationship, or being with another man, that part of me just feels dead right now. I live about 10 miles away from the big wildfire in California. Monday morning I had to stop at the grocery store and there were hundreds of firefighters milling around in the parking lot which is being used as a staging area, and all of the sudden I didn't feel so dead inside anymore..........
Hold the 2X4s please - I know we are supposed to be working on ourselves (and I am fully appreciate the wisdom of that and am doing my best), I've just been feeling reflective about this recently (since I've pieced some details together)and I feel the need to share. Oh- and I'm sure this will be long and boring - feel free to move on to another thread!
My H was never a ladies man. On our first date, he spent the entire movie nervously wiping sweat from his palms onto his pant legs. I had to make all the first moves and he let out a massive sigh of relief when we finally kissed and then sweetly asked if he could please hold my hand. So what's happened since then, to turn him into a guy who leaves his wife and young kids for the sake of a 2 week old affair?
We went through a rough patch when our youngest was a baby. For some reason she always cried when he held her, and she was a vigorous and needy nurser. So, I ended up with a disproportionate amount of baby care, and honestly, I think H felt rejected. At the time, I just felt gross... exhausted, grumpy and physically just gross. I do remember telling my husband that if he wanted to have sex, he should just tell me and I would do so, but I didn't feel remotely sexy at that point in time. I know now that this really hurt his feelings. About a month later, we made the decision to make a long discussed move to live closer to my family in California. My husband came up with the plan, which was to cash in some investments- I would move out immediately and he would follow once the house sold (I now have a dark suspicion he did this to get me out of the way). He was by himself in Iowa from mid July 2012 to Thanksgiving of that year and during that time he started an affair with a parole officer he worked with(he's a cop). She had been putting her Dr. husband through med school, and after graduation he told her he was in love with someone else and wanted a divorce. So, while I'm not excusing their behavior, I do get that they were both vulnerable and needy.
After my husband joined us- he was a different person. I know that he continued in contact with his AP (he actually had a PO box set up for his private mail - and told me he was concerned with the security of our community style mail box). Now that I've read up on how people handle the guilt of an affair, it's like reading a checklist where every box is marked: Blaming the spouse (me), hostility, irritability, finding fault with everything I said. I knew something was wrong, but I thought it had to do with the move itself (he loved his job in Iowa). But he did seem to be getting better and really seemed cheerful (and passionate) around the holidays.
Then, in January of this year, I found a love note from her in his truck. It didn't actually scream "affair" (it was written in different color inks and really seemed kind of adolescent) but it was strange enough that I asked him about it. He, of course was adamant that it was just from his good friend, and "it wasn't like that" and he was very convincing. Coincidentally, D3 had pneumonia and I ended up taking her to the hospital that night, so in all the hustle and bustle, I actually didn't think about it again until much later. Now when I look back, I realize that after that he seemed to slide into being blue again.
Between then and July, we had ups and downs but definitely more downs than ups. He didn't like the agency he worked for, and kept being disappointed every time he tried to get on somewhere else. Then on July 22nd, he got into a motorcycle accident, confessed he had been leaving another woman's house, had been in the relationship for 2 weeks, said he wanted a divorce (via note) and just left, all in one day. I know nothing at all about this current OW. He works 45 minutes away, so its not like anyone I know would see them together. When he told me, I did ask if he worked with her and he said no - but who knows if he is telling the truth.
So here we are. When I look back at all of this, I feel a little overwhelmed because I think my H has been brewing in a toxic stew of guilt, anxiety and depression for over two years. I know he's been blaming me and vilifying me (I can feel that). I know that an affair is a potent treatment for depression and he's right in the middle of that. I don't know why he felt he had to leave when he did. Did the accident make him realize how miserable he was? Is he just super smitten with the latest OW? When I found the note from the first one, he wanted to keep his family together enough to lie about it, what changed now? Does he think that he just can't live without affairs? Who knows. I doubt my husband is self aware to really know right now. Truthfully, it probably doesn't matter to how I need to approach the situation. But it's easy to brood and reflect.
My husband became a cop after we married. It gave him a lot of new confidence, and now of course he is the proverbial "man in uniform" and women notice him a lot more. Is some of this just that he has opportunities that he didn't before?
I'm pretty sure my husband's use of porn has soared during this period as well. After he left, I cam across a stash of DVDs and our internet usage plummeted. The first week after he left, my IC asked me if this was one of his problems and I said nooooooooo..... but I'm not so sure anymore.
Finally, I should say, that I'm not stupid. I did in fact suspect infidelity multiple times in the last 2 years. Each time, I have completely talked myself out of it by saying "No way! It's H! He would never do that". Not only did I talk myself out of it, but I actually felt guilty for thinking such a thing of him. What a chump. I am embarrassed to look back now and realize that I must have been in complete denial. For a smart, confident woman, I really let this situation get away from me.
Small bit of advice needed please. So - before he left so dramatically, my husband was in the middle of building a treehouse for D6. Three days before the BD he bought a bunch of expensive lumber for this project and its been sitting in the garage ever since. I've studied the plans and I'm pretty sure I could finish it without cutting off an apendage. I was going to ask H to finish it, since obiovusly D6 has been asking. The problem is I really have no idea what is going through H's head, but I'm pretty sure that house repsponsibilities may have been at least a small piece of the pressure puzzle that contributed to the snap. When we first got together, H painted himself as a handy guy around the house, but truth be told, while he is willing to work hard he really doesn't know what he is doing on a lot of projects (with predictable mediocre results). So I feel a little stuck - put pressure on him to finish it (I did bring it up in our first meeting after BD and he has done nothing since)- possibly emasculate him by doing it myself- or disappoint D6 (which does not really feel like an option)
