A WW? (4)

[fade]

I know this may sound mean

Yes, because she is trying to be mean. This is where I normally would hit delete.

Ignore that nonsense from your WW. Dont respond at all. You can not allow her to sit in the middle of your relationship with your own D. And Im sure its 99% BS and 1% whatever your D is parroting back to her.

Planning to give them both some space this weekend and see how W reacts to that.

No, dont give your D space. And dont watch WW for reactions. Find awesome things to do that she will WANT to participate in. Sounds like your WW is her gatekeeper, and you are allowing her to schedule your D out of your life.

Frustrating, but I'm going to try the space and see what happens.

Backfiring is what will happen.

I asked W at the conclusion of this weekend's chat around custody if i should go ahead and retain my L and she said yes.

This is like the US asking the Japanese if we should gas up the planes at pearl harbor in 41. Why on earth would you ASK her anything about this?

We also agreed her L would work on the S agreement bc they are cheaper by the hour.

This is very, very stupid.

If she offers MC and we don't do it, it shows I'm not willing to work on things. If we do MC and she's not putting the effort in then she can say she's tried. It seems a bit like a catch 22. Should i not start the MC and see what her attitude is prior to trying to hammer home a S agreement w/ her? I'm kind of stuck on this and am open to any thoughts here.

My thoughts are that you say you would welcome any counseling AFTER she unequivocally ends her affair. And you proceed as fast as you can getting agreements in place. If you can do separate financial and custody agreements in your area, get the financial one done now. Custody is going to be a fight, and might never be settled. But your best bet is to get orders in place now and then she has to fight to take away time from you.

[lt0402]

Rose, I agree but I don't get any of that feedback direct from my D. It's all from my W who says that my D is too afraid to tell me this type of stuff bc i "will stop playing w/ her". It could be true that D is hesitant to tell me this stuff, but I'm not seeing it to this degree. Going to look into family therapy as I haven't touched on that in any detail yet.

I'm going to send my W details around our MC appointment, as well as the bio of the MC. Unsure of the feedback i'll get from W on it. I think I'm too paranoid that one misstep will scare her away from this whole MC thing. If that's the case, I'd assume the MC approach isn't the right one anyway. We'll see.

[mvgfwd2]

When you talk again to your WW about the MC session you could say that the MC thinks the session is only worth the time if:

a: the A has ended
and
b: both parties are willing to do the work to fix the M

just an idea to deflect the conditions to the MC instead of you.

[lt0402]

Fade, I've got to tell you, you are an awesome ally in this thing. You've got a way of helping me regain balance and not slip too far into "rose colored glasses" territory. Going to respond back to these, but know that I'm biased somewhat in not killing this idea of MC w/ the W.

I know this may sound mean

Yes, because she is trying to be mean. This is where I normally would hit delete.

Ignore that nonsense from your WW. Dont respond at all. You can not allow her to sit in the middle of your relationship with your own D. And Im sure its 99% BS and 1% whatever your D is parroting back to her.

Agree 100% with all of this. It's her way of getting me off balance. she's had success with it in making me feel like a bad father and H previously and she continues to use it, though i continue to discount it more and more.

[quote=lt0402]Planning to give them both some space this weekend and see how W reacts to that.

No, dont give your D space. And dont watch WW for reactions. Find awesome things to do that she will WANT to participate in. Sounds like your WW is her gatekeeper, and you are allowing her to schedule your D out of your life.

Ok, thinking about it more, i agree w/ you here. WW is absolutely her gatekeeper. I'll grab more time w/ D this weekend. Only thing is that all of this time she has scheduled is w/ Ds friends and W won't be there either. She's almost scheduling her out of both our lives.

[quote=lt0402]Frustrating, but I'm going to try the space and see what happens.

Backfiring is what will happen.

Again, agree after thinking it through. I'll give W space this weekend and focus on doing fun stuff w/ D when she's not w/ friends.

[quote=lt0402]I asked W at the conclusion of this weekend's chat around custody if i should go ahead and retain my L and she said yes.

This is like the US asking the Japanese if we should gas up the planes at pearl harbor in 41. Why on earth would you ASK her anything about this?

Ok, i'll admit, this one had me laughing on this end. You're right. I framed the question to her in the context of "I won't proactively push this D forward. If you are pushing it forward, let me know if i should go ahead and retain an L". It was me trying to get a feel for how serious she was in going fwd. After she answered yes, i assumed she was and was going to retain my own L until i got that msg tues.

[quote=lt0402]We also agreed her L would work on the S agreement bc they are cheaper by the hour.

This is very, very stupid.

fade, can you expound on this one? from talking to Ls they seem to think it's not important who writes the initial S agreement as there will be back and forth in the mediation process. Curious to get your thoughts.

[

If she offers MC and we don't do it, it shows I'm not willing to work on things. If we do MC and she's not putting the effort in then she can say she's tried. It seems a bit like a catch 22. Should i not start the MC and see what her attitude is prior to trying to hammer home a S agreement w/ her? I'm kind of stuck on this and am open to any thoughts here.

My thoughts are that you say you would welcome any counseling AFTER she unequivocally ends her affair. And you proceed as fast as you can getting agreements in place. If you can do separate financial and custody agreements in your area, get the financial one done now. Custody is going to be a fight, and might never be settled. But your best bet is to get orders in place now and then she has to fight to take away time from you.

Fade, i hear you advocating to pursue MC (so long as the A is ended) as well as the S agreement process at the same time? I agree that custody will be a mess if we get to that. My fear is that by introducing the S agreement process into this I'm killing the chance of the MC work getting done. Thoughts?

Appreciate you brother! You and others are a perfect counterpoint to my biased thoughts. Please keep your thoughts and ideas coming. THANK YOU!

[lt0402]

Trying this again as i did a horrible job quoting above:

Fade, I've got to tell you, you are an awesome ally in this thing. You've got a way of helping me regain balance and not slip too far into "rose colored glasses" territory. Going to respond back to these, but know that I'm biased somewhat in not killing this idea of MC w/ the W.

I know this may sound mean

Yes, because she is trying to be mean. This is where I normally would hit delete.

Ignore that nonsense from your WW. Dont respond at all. You can not allow her to sit in the middle of your relationship with your own D. And Im sure its 99% BS and 1% whatever your D is parroting back to her.

Agree 100% with all of this. It's her way of getting me off balance. she's had success with it in making me feel like a bad father and H previously and she continues to use it, though i continue to discount it more and more.

Planning to give them both some space this weekend and see how W reacts to that.

No, dont give your D space. And dont watch WW for reactions. Find awesome things to do that she will WANT to participate in. Sounds like your WW is her gatekeeper, and you are allowing her to schedule your D out of your life.

Ok, thinking about it more, i agree w/ you here. WW is absolutely her gatekeeper. I'll grab more time w/ D this weekend. Only thing is that all of this time she has scheduled is w/ Ds friends and W won't be there either. She's almost scheduling her out of both our lives.

Frustrating, but I'm going to try the space and see what happens.

Backfiring is what will happen.

Again, agree after thinking it through. I'll give W space this weekend and focus on doing fun stuff w/ D when she's not w/ friends.

I asked W at the conclusion of this weekend's chat around custody if i should go ahead and retain my L and she said yes.

This is like the US asking the Japanese if we should gas up the planes at pearl harbor in 41. Why on earth would you ASK her anything about this?

Ok, i'll admit, this one had me laughing on this end. You're right. I framed the question to her in the context of "I won't proactively push this D forward. If you are pushing it forward, let me know if i should go ahead and retain an L". It was me trying to get a feel for how serious she was in going fwd. After she answered yes, i assumed she was and was going to retain my own L until i got that msg tues.

We also agreed her L would work on the S agreement bc they are cheaper by the hour.

This is very, very stupid.

fade, can you expound on this one? from talking to Ls they seem to think it's not important who writes the initial S agreement as there will be back and forth in the mediation process. Curious to get your thoughts.

[

If she offers MC and we don't do it, it shows I'm not willing to work on things. If we do MC and she's not putting the effort in then she can say she's tried. It seems a bit like a catch 22. Should i not start the MC and see what her attitude is prior to trying to hammer home a S agreement w/ her? I'm kind of stuck on this and am open to any thoughts here.

My thoughts are that you say you would welcome any counseling AFTER she unequivocally ends her affair. And you proceed as fast as you can getting agreements in place. If you can do separate financial and custody agreements in your area, get the financial one done now. Custody is going to be a fight, and might never be settled. But your best bet is to get orders in place now and then she has to fight to take away time from you.

Fade, i hear you advocating to pursue MC (so long as the A is ended) as well as the S agreement process at the same time? I agree that custody will be a mess if we get to that. My fear is that by introducing the S agreement process into this I'm killing the chance of the MC work getting done. Thoughts?

Appreciate you brother! You and others are a perfect counterpoint to my biased thoughts. Please keep your thoughts and ideas coming. THANK YOU! [/quote]

[mvgfwd2]

One possible outcome of creating a S agreement is to show your W that the fantasy land she envisions is not going to happen. That type of S agreement can only come from your L, not hers. Her L will make it like she wants for an opener. So it all depends on where you want to start the negotiations and if you want to use for the shock value.

[Rose888]

Rose, I agree but I don't get any of that feedback direct from my D. It's all from my W who says that my D is too afraid to tell me this type of stuff bc i "will stop playing w/ her". It could be true that D is hesitant to tell me this stuff, but I'm not seeing it to this degree. Going to look into family therapy as I haven't touched on that in any detail yet.

I'm going to send my W details around our MC appointment, as well as the bio of the MC. Unsure of the feedback i'll get from W on it. I think I'm too paranoid that one misstep will scare her away from this whole MC thing. If that's the case, I'd assume the MC approach isn't the right one anyway. We'll see.

I get that.

Here's the thing. One of two things is happening, and they are both bad for you.

1. Your daughter really does think and feel this way and is too scared of you or disconnected from you to tell you. If this is the case, you need to get the two of you to family counseling pronto to work through these issues.

2. Your wife is trying to create drama and discord in your relationship with your daughter. If this is the case, your best defense is a good offense. You want rock solid communication with your daughter, and a counselor can help with that. Don't mess around with parental alienation. You need to get in front of it NOW.

It's going to be hard for you to tell by yourself which situation you are dealing with. A counselor can diagnose and treat.

Seriously, this is big. Don't ignore this out of fear that it will mess things up with your wife. If it does, they were going to break anyway.

[lt0402]

Ok. A whole lot of discussion the past 2 days for nothing. I went downstairs after we put D to bed. W got mad about me "hovering" over D tonight. So I told her I got that I'd been hovering a bit and I was cognizant and would work on it. (Probably the wrong thing)

W started into a conversation that began with "we probably shouldn't talk about this tonight...." The gist of it was that D has been telling her more and more that she needs space and she doesn't want to live with me. (Same as Ws message to me). W then said she thinks the best thing, and I should take some time to really think about it, is for us to not uproot D for the school year and she should sleep in one place. Therefore, it would be less stressful if I moved into an apartment and D and W stayed here. We would do the MC and "who knows" we might be in a much different spot where our M stuff is fixed in the spring. W says that's the best thing for D bc she's super stressed out bc of me. Me being out of the house allows me to rebuild the trust I do not have with my D.

I tell W that my feelings haven't changed since Saturday. I will not move out of the house. She is welcome to if she feels she needs to, but she can't take D with her. I tell her that i want both of us to be truly happy. I don't want us to stay in the same unhappy situation we have been in our M. I believe MC is the way to fix this and make us both truly happy, but it's not worth it unless we are both willing to put in the effort and hard work.

W says that her message the other day did not mean she wanted to go to a M counselor. It meant that she wanted to go to a co-parenting counselor and that our M is not, nor will it ever be fixable. She says she's been consistent on that since the beginning. She says it has nothing to do with OM. She's not talking to him. She would never bring him to our house. She would never go see him while we are married. (Huh....are we not seperated? What has changed?). I can check if I want to.

W says it has to do with how horribly I've treated her and D all these years. How they could never trust me. If I'd just run the sprinkler in the backyard for 5 minutes once a week, etc, etc, etc. same story. W gets progressively more angry, calls me selfish, tells me I am only thinking of myself. I tell her I'm thinking of what's best for us and her choices are not the best for our family. She jumps on that and says how dare I lecture her on choices that I've forced her into. If it were not for D, W would still be here (that's odd). W is doing what's best for D bc D is constantly asking for me to leave. I tell her I don't believe that D is the solution to our problems. She may go if she wants. D won't go with her. W takes that to mean I want full custody of D. I tell her no, that's not what I mean at all. W sarcastically says well we will just live this sh$tty life here again for another 10yrs and I'll continue to cry myself to sleep and D will continue to cry about how awful you treat her.

W tells me I'm out of chances. I'm one bad choice away from losing Ds trust forever. I haven't made any changes over the past 3 months to try to save my R with W. All my changes have been odd personal changes. W says I told her I haven't even worked on my M issues with IC. What I'd told her was we weren't focused on the M issues as much anymore and we're now focusing on me. W says even after she told me we were S I did nothing to try to save the M. (Ok....).

W says I really, really need to think about what's best and come back to her with a plan. I tell her I have not changed my mind. I won't leave the house, she may leave, but D is not going with her. W brings up how can I force D to be put in the awkward position of choosing. I tell her that's not how this works and it's her choice that's putting D in this position.

W spews. W curses and tells me f$ck you. W tells me I'm selfish. W tells me this is all about me not accepting blame. I tell her I accept the blame for my past faults. This has been a wake up call and I'm working to fix me. I also tell her that the faults of the past are not as black and white as she's making them out to be. She goes in bathroom, cries, comes out and she spews some more. I start to talk and she tells me we are done talking. I tell her I don't want her to be unhappy and these are her choices. She says we are done talking and is very angry. I go upstairs.

So.....it would appear that W may have been trying to entice me to move with promises of MC. Can't mind read but that's the first thing that pops in my head. W is rewriting stuff from 2 days ago now. So, I think I've got no choice but to retain an L. She mentioned multiple times in that convo a custody agreement. I'll go to the L tomorrow and write the check.

W was so furious by the end. We had a great evening with all of us getting along. Apparently that was a show I guess. I don't believe I misread Ws text, as it was pretty clear around the MC. Also, when I talked to her last night and said what do you want to get out of MC it seemed pretty clear she was aggravated, but would do it. This seems like a complete pivot away from that. Is this normal?

I came upstairs and had a quick cry around it afterwards. Had apparently put some hope into this. That's dashed though and now I'm back to level. If her plan was to get me to move out by promising MC, it's a horribly thought out one. I don't see any course of action but to retain my own L and have them work on a S agreement. W continues to tell me there is 0 chance we are ever together again. Sad that MC probably fixes things but she's unwilling to put in the effort. Going to need to decide what to do with that appointment. I did tell W to let me know what to do with it, but I didn't think it worthwhile unless we were committed to the work.

It's a shame. Throwing away a family and 11yrs of M bc of stupid sh$t. Not giving up on this, but damn, I don't see any way out right now. This seems so lowdown and dirty.

Thanks to everyone for your input today. Sorry it was for naught. I guess we will see where this goes, but definitely going to the L tomorrow. Bleh....

[lt0402]

One last thing. W said that she has no idea why I'm holding onto this so tight. She said it's probably bc I'm worried bc of what other people or my family will think if I divorce. She said it's obviously not bc I care about W and D.

That's pretty hurtful. Just wanted to get that down so I'd remember. A lot of spew tonight.

[mvgfwd2]

Just one observation from a few days ago. W is worried about a IC talking with D without either of you present and you are not. Pretty clear to me she knows her statements about D's feelings towards are all BS.