I'm writing off myself as "bitter" right now. I don't know what's going on. I don't know if now that my outlook on the R has changed so drastically, I've gone apathetic... I just keep picturing my IC's face, her eyes, when she responded to me as I answered a few questions for her... "I'm sorry".
It's like, she knew she'd found a way to get me to see what I'd been blinded by for so long... the real eye-opener for me... and that saying of "truth hurts," can't be argued against when it's self-realized.
I thought getting back to the office today would help take my mind off this loop I'm stuck in. It's not... I feel like I've reached, yet another phase of grieving. I'm not happy, I'm not suffering, I'm not in pain, I'm just feeling what is real. Yet, feels so surreal.
I was just getting ready to head of out the office for the day when I stumbled upon this article... I'm posting here, and I'll probably reflect a little later. If I don't hear from you, have a nice weekend, everyone.
"Just because divorce is caused by unhappiness, that doesn’t mean that divorce should be an unhappy event.” --- Let us frame the suffering of divorce into the Four Noble Truths of Divorce: - 1. Marriage is a type of suffering. Many of us enter in marriages totally ignorant of what a marriage is. Our expectations for what marriage life would be like were wrong. Our motivations for getting married were wrong or, at least, naive. Our images and fantasies of who our mates were eventually fade and we are left with the reality that marriage requires acceptance, energy and mindfulness.
2. There is a cause for divorce. One day one of you realizes that you are unhappy, and that happiness was the reason for getting married. Smart couples realize that they had false expectations and fantasies, and that their happiness could not be found in ignorance.
3. There is happiness in divorce. While many people see divorce as betrayal, hurtful, demoralizing, etc.; the truth is that divorce offers opportunity. The first opportunity is to re-evaluate. Are you staying married to someone that wants a divorce because you are afraid, angry, delusional, or jealous? Did you fall into the trap of thinking that everything would remain the same forever and never change? Did you have a false definition and set of expectations for our spouse? Did you have a false reality created for yourself?
4. How Divorce ends in happiness. Divorce is traumatic because it is such a big change, but change is a part of life. Accepting and embracing change reorients us to see that all things are impermanent. Seeing the impermanence in all things gives some salve to divorce and acceptance that the spouse that left us was not the spouse we married. Neither one has betrayed any trust, because they are two different people. We are also free to see the true causes of suffering and the end of suffering (through the Middle Path of developing wisdom, compassion, giving, mindfulness and skillfulness).
--- We cannot be perfect every moment of every day. Especially during the challenges of divorce, but we can start orienting ourselves to see the benefits of accepting life as it comes and dealing with it positively.
So this weekend was quite interesting. Apparently, my W has told just about everyone that she know about our sitch, yet she still acts dumbfounded when she finds out that someone's brother's co-worker's sister-in-law's husband asked me if I'm doing okay because of the divorce... we live in a small suburban town, everyone knows because of her and her friends loud mouths...
Friday night there were several texts exchanged with my W - all initiated by her. She was in high gear to get things moving with the D, "we need to divide assets, how would you like to do it?", "what should we do about my car loan?", "do you still want to keep the house?" etc etc... I just was very vague in my responses and told her I was out with friends so couldn't talk much about it, she was fine with that and texted me a few more times through the night, mostly about the anxiety of the baby shower / diaper party the next day, telling me to call her if I need anything, and that we'd reconnect 'tomorrow or sunday' to talk about things.
On Saturday I went to a Daddy Diaper Party for a guy that I would consider a friend, but would probably never have hung out with if it wasn't for my W's best friend marrying him. I actually saw a lot of guys from that group that I do enjoy hanging out with, but don't anymore since our "connection" was each other's wives. They all wanted to exchange numbers so we can be friends and hangout without the women doing the organizing, so I found that nice, I like them, I'll make a point to set something up in the near future.
I also saw my W's bestie (the pregnant one) later that day and she gave me a big hug and started crying and said she still loves me and wanted me to know that "her group" doesn't think of me as "the bad guy"... which was weird, but also, nice to hear - considering my W ran a full blown SMEAR campaign against me for about 2 months before filing. (rally the troops much?)
All in all, Saturday was a good day, I feared throwing myself in the middle of that whole group again, I didn't want to deal with all the questioning and all that nonsense. But I really enjoyed myself, and that group was great to hang with for the day...
Then Sunday came... It was about 2PM or so and hadn't heard anything from my W, so I thought she'd probably drank too much and decided not to have any interaction with me, which was great with me. When she gets in these 'determined' moods, she tries to be this "in-charge" attitude and when I'm just super calm, chill and care-free on my end, it usually ends up in some kind of confusion based anger by her(confusion-anger... is that a thing? haha). HOWEVER, she comes in just as I'm heading out to cut the grass and immediately says, "Hey, I'm staying here tonight, is that okay?" and I said "Yeah, Sounds good!" with a smile, and off I went to cut the grass.
Not really sure what happened next, but I saw her leave about 20 minutes later, and return again about 15 minutes after that. I had just got stung by a wasp, so was upstairs washing it out. I went back downstairs on my way out to finish the lawn, and she just blew up. "This isn't working. You need to share this house. I just want to be alone and if I was alone I might not even decide to go through with the D, but you want give me any time alone to think." I just validated her best I could, and stated that this is "our house" and we both have the right to be here until this is over. I said, "we were just smiling together 30 minutes ago, now you come yelling and cussing at me, what happened?" (i know what happened, she got in a fight with her mom, like she always does, and she's tired of living there now).
This was followed with (summarized and tons and tons of cursing removed) "I'm going to get the lawyers involved, I just want to be here alone and you won't let me.", I said, "there is only 3 weeks left until we can make this final, by the time anything goes through the court/judge, it'll be over anyways." She said, "Thank God, but I still want some time in this house to myself. I don't care what I have to do. I'll call the cops and tell them you beat me."
...This was a first. A Threat to have me falsely thrown in jail for abusing her. I wasn't really sure what to do, so I just said "if that's what you want to do, then do it" and I fired up the weedeater and walked off. She left about 20 minutes later again. Then followed a group of about 6 texts, all stating how she hates me, hates her life and it's all my fault, hates living at her parents, hates this and that, and this whole things is my fault... I never responded. About an hour after that, came an "I'm sorry" text, "I'm sorry, I don't mean to talk nasty to you, I'm just so mad sometimes I can't control it. I just wanted to apologize, don't respond."
Then another hour or so later, "I hate when we fight like this (ah hem, WE fight?), anyways, "we've always had such solid friendship, I want to continue that and end this on a good note." I said, "I thought I'd been nothing but friendly and calm and kind to you this entire time, I will continue doing so." and she said "you have, and I really appreciate that because I have not return the favor". (Wow, I couldn't believe what I was hearing!) Then hours of nothing, she texted back around 10PM talking about HGTV Marathons and some other random crap, 3-4 texts later from her and I just said, "I appreciate the small talk, but I'm tired and going to bed. I'll talk to you tomorrow."
So, that's my weekend. I really still don't know what to do about the threat of calling the cops. I emailed my lawyer just for documentation purposes, and said "do not act on this, this is only for documentation."
My W is a directionless, swinging out of control wrecking ball. She has no control of what she's saying, doing, anything... I wish there was something I could do, but she's on her own here, she hates me, doesn't trust me, yada yada yada. She's going to have to snap out of this with the power within. Sorry.
On a more positive note. The consistent dog training is paying off. We were just out for my pre-workout stroll around the neighborhood and a lil growling yapper pug looking thing snuck up on us and ran right up to the 200lb St Bernard, I about poo'd my pants. Luckily, our Bear-Dog was calm and just turned away from the jumping, yapping leashless dog that was all up in his face... I couldn't believe it. A month ago, that lil dog would've been a pre-dinner snack for him. No growling, no barking, no nothing, just turned away and kept looking at me like "will you get this thing away from me? and can we please get the h3ll out of here?" - I'm a very proud doggie-daddy right now. Woof!
M 55 W 52 MR 32 T 34+ D29 BD May 8, 2016 - She moved out ILYBNILWY May 15 (Through email) No EA/PA August 23 - DB used against me in every way Divorce July 18, 2017 - Life is getting better every day
betterm, your W is all over the place! Dealing with her mood swings must be such a challenge. That said, you are handling her perfectly. And great job with the 'party behind enemy lines' - I don't even know how I'd handle a similar situation.
Me-45, W-37, T-10 yrs, M-9 yrs D -7 yrs, S-5 yrs BD-5/3/16, D filed 6/8/16
We love you too. Sometimes I think I post way too much on here, other times, not enough. This forum has become somewhat of a blog, journal, livetweet, and progress outlet for me to probably use it in ways it wasn't necessarily created for. But I'm glad you enjoy my posts... Hearing feedback is encouraging to post more for others.
Originally Posted By: qt4x11
betterm, your W is all over the place! Dealing with her mood swings must be such a challenge. That said, you are handling her perfectly. And great job with the 'party behind enemy lines' - I don't even know how I'd handle a similar situation.
Yes, My W is bouncing all over the place. I haven't really let her words bother me much lately, but something about the threat to call the cops on my and falsely accuse of physical abuse, stuck with me for a bit. I wasn't really worried she'd do it, but on the other hand, the woman I'm dealing with right now, is not the W I knew so well and married years ago. So who knows... if it happens, nothing I can do to stop it.
The "behind enemy lines" party was ummmm. I won't lie, it started at 2 PM, and I spent all of 1PM - 2PM pacing back and forth in my living room and kitchen, thinking about how badly I did not want to go. I finally decided "EFF it, I'm not going", right around 2PM... I sat down, got my laptop out, and maybe 30 seconds later, thought. H3ll no, I'm going, and I'm going to have fun! (and I did).
I think this actually threw my W for a loop, because I'm sure she'd expected that I wouldn't go (this would've been my approach in the past - not feeling it? just don't go). But I went, and when she started asking me about it, I told her about how nice it was to see all them again. And how I talked "these people" about my life now, and our situation, and how things are changing so quickly, etc etc. I could tell it bothered her with the positivity ringing through my story. The weird thing is, I wasn't even doing it as a "technique", i was just really enthused with the way it went.
I don't think her day went so well, I asked about the girl's baby shower, told her I wished ours was somewhere with a pool like theirs was, etc etc. Turns out, she hated their party. didn't have fun, didn't enjoy talking to her friends, was constantly reminded of "us" and our "d"... I kinda felt bad for her, but then again, this is what she wanted.
I work for what 'was' a small, growing company. I started when there was less than 25 people. We now, 3 years later, have almost 250 employees and hiring at +30% rate each year. I say this, because our director of HR started the same week as me. We became good office buds, and today... she visited my office with an envelope, and the words out of her mouth were "What the F**k! Who does this BEACH think she is anyways? And to think, I actually liked her the few times we did hang out. EFF HER!"
yep, that's the now, VP of HR at my company. She'd received two subpoenas from "The Petitioner", my W, and thought she'd come down to share her opinion on it. HAHA. I couldn't help but laugh at the irony of the person in charge of HR in the office, was so blatantly outspoken about this, using the verbiage she chose.
She said, "we don't typically do this, but since you're well liked and respected around here... if you'd like, we can move these requests to our lawyers and refuse/fight them so she can't gather the data requested." I smiled and told her it's all okay, I knew they were coming, and I'm okay with providing the information requested, as I have nothing to hide... Her response was "no sh1t you're not hiding anything, you're like, one of the best dudes I know, what the h3ll is she thinking?"
It was nice end to my workday. good for a smile and a laugh. Just thought I'd share that.
It seems that my situation with W is now... dun,dun,dunnnnn: Facebook Official! Got a text tonight from a mutual friend asking why I'm not listed as married to my W on her facebook page anymore and asking if we were getting a D... Sheesh... people need to GAL!
If I had to guess, this probably happened over the weekend around the time she went mad-crazy and threatened to call the cops on me and lie to them about me NOT physically abusing her. Whenever she has these big blowouts is usually when she makes a drastic change in the situation on her part (the last "huge fight" was when she stopped wearing her ring)...
When I heard this it bothered me more than I'd thought it would've... Maybe it's the announcement to the world of "hey, I'm out here and not married"... but I knew it was coming. I do still have feelings though, and they do still swing over the wrong side of the fence sometimes... Oh well. What bothers me just as much, is I don't have facebook because of all the stupid nonsense and gossiping that comes from it... I don't have it, and somehow, I still get drug into social media junkie hell.
Make your own facebook page and announce your bachelor status to the world?
Me31 W31 M11yrs S6yrs 23Mar16-BD 9Apr16-W admitted EA w boss. 27Jun16-W Changed job and promised NC w OM. 14Jul16-Continued contact w OM.Start of Separation. 24May17-Divorced.
