I'm not going to speak much beyond about the boys, but I will say that you need to stop waffling between being a doormat and being a father/man. You need some stiff boundaries and to stop arguing with her. It's only making it worse. And don't send the flowers...
That being said, social worker (LCSW) chiming in about the boys. You REALLY REALLY REALLY need to consider the effect this is going to have on the boys. I'm assuming the oldest ones were around 3/4 when you adopted them? That is old enough for them to have experienced the trauma of leaving bio-parents/previous foster homes and moving to a new one. I have worked with many families with children that have gone through this. Now you're wanting to take them out of a place where they feel secure? Despite what is going on between you and your wife, those boys come first and foremost.
I'm going to give you an example from my own sitch. I filed against my W during our separation. It was to protect and fight for my son. He was 4/5 at the time, so younger than your oldest three are now. The effects he felt from being moved 2.5 hours away half of the week and being placed in front of an OM were tremendous. My entire family could see the change in my son. How deflated, frustrated, and confused he was. The things he said about up there.... He literally would just vent to us about being told to keep secrets, how much he doesn't like OM, how much OM doesn't like him. People downplay the insight young children have. I remember him telling me that he doesn't like when OM kisses mommy, because she is my wife. At 5 y/o! 6 months into reconciliation, with W and I working so very hard to ensure he feels safe and secure, and he still shows that he is processing through the experience. He acted out to us and at school for the first two months.
I'm not telling you what to do with your children. I am telling you to put them first regardless of the turmoil of your marriage, and seriously consider what is in the best interest of them.
M: 8.5 T:10 Me:37 W:34 S:6
Retrouvaille and W moves back- 7/31/15 Piecing - 7/4/15 to present
Thank you for the input. That is my worst fear is her moving on with OM. I know she has "friends" I would hate to put my boys through that. She says she would not but I don't trust anything she says at this time because she is all over the map.
H-46 XW-38 T-7 M-6 S-9,8,8,6,4 S 11/30/15, I filed 12/8/15 EA 2/1/16 D dismissed 3/24/16 PA 3/18/16 confirmed 4/22/16 XW files for D 4/1/16 - D final 11/17/16 Finally moving forward...
Thank you for providing the information about you and w and the boys. It is very personal information. You may want to notify Job or Cadet to remove the post. Just so we keep you and boys information safe.
I will do some reading and thinking and get back to you shortly.
I think Squiggy, has summed up rather well my exact thoughts about the situation for your boys. Children with your sons history have experienced significant trauma and their attachments to safe adults is complex and need to be nurtured and considered. The fact that you and your wife appear to making the care arrangements for the boys in isolation of expert assistance causes me real concern. Divorce and changing care and custody arrangements are not easy under the best of circumstances but your boys history makes this so much more delicate, and makes them so much more vulnerable.
Stability in attachments is an absolute need for your children. Anticipation and preparation for change is an equal need. This is moving far too fast, the whole process needs to be slowed down, until there is some certainty.
I am incredibly concerned about separating the older and younger children, after they have already lost their primary carer. There is significant attachments built between sibling groups and children gain significant amount of comfort from each other, when adult relationships have changed.
At the moment the way the situation is being described the children's needs are coming secondary to adult need.
I have some views about what I believe would be in your children's best interest, but it is only based on the presenting situation and may well not be the best pathway. But I would be recommending that the children remain with one primary caregiver right now, in a place where they know and have a history of stability. No change in care arrangement until you know exactly if you are moving or not. I would also continue to recommend you remaining the primary caregiver even if you did move to your wife's home town. At least until wife can demonstrate she is able to provide stability and until successful co-parenting is evidenced.
There is little about you wife's behaviour currently that leads me to believe that she has the emotional and physical stability required to meet the boys level of need at this time. Or that she gave any consideration to how their previous history of abuse and neglect would impact on their coping abilities and response to her leaving. I am also concerned that wife feels that separating the boys is an appropriate intervention.
The fact that you are already seeing some behavioural changes and some emotional indicators in the boys, tells me that the plan in place is not currently meeting there needs.
I am not generally an advocate for overly formalised processes for resolution of care and custody matters. I believe that parents are generally the best people to know what will work for them and their children. But your children are too vulnerable to not do get the right supports in place for them. You need professional supports to make the right decisions for your boys. This is going to upset your wife hugely. She will take this as a criticism and a loss of her role as mother.
To note Jim, I have worked with a number of couples who have experienced what you are going through. Your history as a couple dealing with infertility and then foster/adoption and then parenthood and then loss of a marriage are all significant to your current situation. Your wife's presentation is not unusual. However it is complex to unravel and requires significant time and patience. The grief and loss issues your wife is likely experiencing is likely overwhelming to her and you likely have no idea what she has been managing.
I have some more ideas about what might be occurring for your wife. My ideas are based on my experience and not what you have reported, and at the end of the day it would be speculation. My only advice is to expect wife to present as constantly confused about her ability or want to mother right now. While mothering is likely everything that she ever wanted, and thought that it would fulfill her every need and want. The actuality has fallen way short. Leaving her to question herself, her life and her wants and dreams. She is likely disappointed that the dream has not lived up to expectation. Somewhere in questioning her role as a woman, as mother, she has questioned your marriage and you as husband and father.
JIm I think you know what needs to be done, but you are torn between what you want to do in the best interest of your children and wanting to save your marriage. These should not have to be separated out. Ideally saving your marriage would be doing what is the best interest of your children. But unfortunately when this kind of crisis are concerned, the children come first. These children have been too vulnerable already. No more harm.
This is not a situation I would wish on anyone. I am sorry that you are in this position.
If you do nothing else, please get a psychologist recommendation related to what would be the best care and custody arrangement for your children. I am surprised your mediator has not recommended this given the complexity of your children's history.
Thank you for the kind words. Yes I have seen a therapist and they have stated that I should stay where I am with the boys since I am the stable one in the R. I have also considered that when a move happens for my job that the boys stay with me.
I want the boys to see their mother more often. Due to the distance this makes it difficult and she refuses to get a job or come down here to stay in the home.
I will do a better job of NC and only talk about the boys. Trial if an agreement is not worked out will be April 12th. It won't be pretty.
Since my family's sitch has changed, she now says that we should not move them in the middle of the school year and wait until June since I will not split them up. She is unsure of how she will feel by then and she also knows custody will go my way. Maybe that is the best solution that will give her access to them when she wants.
I don't want to know anything about what she does and with who. I just know my heart will be heavy as soon as she exposes them to her new "friends".
She tried to call me at 10:30pm last night but I did not answer. No need to discuss anything with her since the boys were sleeping.
H-46 XW-38 T-7 M-6 S-9,8,8,6,4 S 11/30/15, I filed 12/8/15 EA 2/1/16 D dismissed 3/24/16 PA 3/18/16 confirmed 4/22/16 XW files for D 4/1/16 - D final 11/17/16 Finally moving forward...
So I struggle with what my W tells me about what I need to change.
She said that I am not fiscally responsible. That I get angry a lot and that I don't do what she asks in a quick timeframe. All these items are true. She hates that I smoke and that I drag my feet on making decisions (especially with the custody change and writing her an email back on how visitation and asset splitting with be defined for the D). All these can be 180s.
She dislikes that we are spending money on Ls and that I am spending money on daycare. She keeps saying no action by me is still an action and I feel the same way about her. The difference is when she says she is going to do something she just does it no matter what the outcome. I am more reserved and analytical prior to making decisions. I never took charge. A friend also told me that W does not like it when I cry.
The problem is now, she tells me the 180s need to be giving her the boys which now changed from splitting them to giving them to her at the end of the school year. She says she will also go through with the D even if I un-file.
I feel it would be easier to do my 180s and focus on myself if she has the boys, but I also worry about how they will be with her. I know she will be a good mom, what scares me is her saying that when they get older if they want to come live with me she won't stop them. I take responsibility for my actions and can't change the past. She continues to bring up the past in conversations and stating my actions created this and yes, in part they did. How long does it take a WAW to realize that she played a role in this also? She has said a couple of times that it takes two tango and has in the recent conversations apologized for getting angry and arguing with me and then goes back to arguing. This never happened in the past (apologies). I have heard it more in the past two months than I have in almost 5 years.
Anyway today I will be taking the boys to the gym and I will workout while they play at the child center. We will go grocery shopping and have lunch and nap and play board games after dinner. All things that make me feel good to be a dad.
I wish she would see that one of my 180s now is spending more time with the family. She does not talk to any of our friends and does not share much information with her family other than her mother. She does not get along with her father. She has run back to her family for the 3rd time in her life. The first two were broken engagements.
H-46 XW-38 T-7 M-6 S-9,8,8,6,4 S 11/30/15, I filed 12/8/15 EA 2/1/16 D dismissed 3/24/16 PA 3/18/16 confirmed 4/22/16 XW files for D 4/1/16 - D final 11/17/16 Finally moving forward...
So L says if I unfile then I will do more harm to protect myself than good. Guess I have to accept my action and deal with the consequnces of the R.
H-46 XW-38 T-7 M-6 S-9,8,8,6,4 S 11/30/15, I filed 12/8/15 EA 2/1/16 D dismissed 3/24/16 PA 3/18/16 confirmed 4/22/16 XW files for D 4/1/16 - D final 11/17/16 Finally moving forward...
So L says if I unfile then I will do more harm to protect myself than good. Guess I have to accept my action and deal with the consequnces of the R.
Jim, you want to start distancing yourself from conversations about custody with W. That is why a psychologist or court recommended decision on what is the right custody and care arrangement is important. My impression Jim from how you are writing is that the custody arrangement is becoming a tool or a place of power between you and wife. It isn't and if you keep going down this path. Your children will be hurt.
You cannot save your marriage until your save your children and that requires you to be the Lion King of daddy's. Time to step up my friend. Change happens where energy follows. The children need your focus. Not your wife who is a grown adult and made her own choices.
Please don't mistake my straight talking for not having empathy for you or wife or for your desire to save your marriage and family. This is not the case. I think we just might have two different ways of getting there. If W is WAW or WW, it doesn't not matter right now. What matters is you standing for your children. W will follow or not.
The interesting thing about the things that your wife is complaining about (and I agree with sandi here, your wife's descriptions- IMHO are fickle- she is reaching), the things you didn't do,ARE all the things that you need to right now to address your children's well being. And oh look W doesn't like how you are doing it. W doesn't like it. Jim that should give you some indication of her level of confusion. When you actually start being a full time and involved father, when you are watching the finances, when you are actually attending to her wants and wishes. Guess what W is still not at home being a wife and mother.
Your wife has a number of things she needs to work through. Cadet and the vets always talk about the Gift of time. Well my friend you and wife certainly need it. Look the action to file was done in haste and emotion. You have the opportunity now to fully consider your next steps. Take this time you need to reinvent yourself, reinvent and reinvest in your relationship with your children.
There is much in the tone and what you write about W's complaints, you feelings and responses that is reminiscent of the pain all new comers experience. There is an angst and desperation, furtive attempts to make things right and fix everything. The pain flows onto the page about the way we feel and describe our reflections of what is happening to us, and between us and our beloved. The posts will look and sound the same for months, we process back and forwards what they doing and not doing. The moment we have a glimmer of hope and good feeling for it only to be dashed. New comer posts are hard to read because the pain is so real.
I have yet to see a new person to this sitch and this board not to cycle through this grief process nor take the advice up front from vets. Us oldies all wish we could save you from the pain and the mistakes we made. We reiterate, detach, and GAL, NC, LRT and breathe through this.
Jim you will ultimately do what you believe is right for you, wife, marriage and children. My advice for you for now though is to treat wife like a business partner who cooked the books and left you hanging. FOR NOW, your investment needs to be in you and your children first.
