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Prior thread

http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2711943&page=1

There are lots and lots of other threads too - many of which have some great advice that I've been grateful for. Most of them have semi-incoherent ramblings from me as I try to mind-read, speculate and some days just plain weep with anger, sorrow, frustration and exhaustion. Feel free to follow the trail back and read but unless you are very keen on seeing how "not" to do things I wouldn't suggest bothering. Not all of the journey has been by bicycle but there have been many bumps and pot-holes along the way.

Most of my situation is described in my signature. The current status is that I believe that W is on her seemingly stationary bike in her apartment going nowhere but keeping our separation and her A quiet. I'm also keeping quiet but trying to move forward with limited success. I'm in our family home keeping a low profile but doing my best to grow, thrive and love myself.

I've made a bunch of mistakes but am largely non-contact with W. I have had a tendency which I'm trying to fix to beg her to come back home on the three instances since she left that I've contacted her. W rarely contacts me - the silence is deafening. W abandoned many important possessions in our home and appears to keep a close eye on me and my movements which I understand is common for some people in a MLC but not all. I try to treat this and other signposts as crumbs of hope.

I'm getting very tired of this ride through the seemingly unchanging countryside.

So - we're now on the 4th leg of our bicycle journey to who knows where. Pack a nice lunch, hitch up your trousers so that they don't get caught in the chain and let's watch the country side go by.

Trivial update BTW. I got a response back from SILX2 with the address of my nephew to send a card. She said that me sending them a card would be nice and that she hoped things worked out for me. She is a very kind person. I've not reached out to her since shortly after BD2. Other than sending her a Christmas card this year I probably won't contact her again unless W returns.


PS - Thank you job for your advice. As always it is considered, thoughtful and sound. I'll do my best to follow it wink


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
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Andrew, welcome to your new thread! I responded to you on my new thread and agree that our S's are very similar!

I am now trying to take my focus of H because anything I say will be mind reading anyway seeing as I haven't spoken/contacted him in six weeks. So my question to you is are you going to take the challenge and join me and Altair in taking the focus off our S's and just discuss topics that are helping us to move forward?

The gauntlet has been thrown down....


Me - 47
H - 45
D-16
M - 6 years
Separated - May 16

Don't leave me behind can't you see me I'm shining... (Years & Years - 'Shine')
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Again - welcome to your new thread...interested to see if you accept the gauntlet thrown down by the fair Coly.

So, I'm interested in what you said here..

'I'm also keeping quiet but trying to move forward with limited success.'

How do you think you can more successfully move forward Andrew? What's your plan of action here?

smile xx


T 13 M 7
Me 48 H 46
SS 15
BD 7.14 PA
D final 5.16 (H filed)

We receive & we lose, and must try to achieve gratitude & embrace with whole hearts whatever of life that remains after the losses - Dubus
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Sotto - Thanks for the visit and the usual insightful questions.

By "moving forward" I mean that I am going (was about to prevaricate there) to work on building my own life and taking care of myself leaving W on her own journey. If she pops her head out of the tunnel again I expect to struggle but knowing that in advance helps. The last time was somewhat of a surprise. I can almost picture every time I mess up job shaking her head sadly at me just like she might with a puppy who means well but doesn't always hit the newspaper when he gets excited wink

There are things I need to do around the house, I need to start building back up my cooking repertoire, bump up slightly and be consistent in regular communication with S22 / D24, get ready for Christmas and the list goes on. I will also keep up with the hikes, be friendly and pleasant to everyone I meet (I'm actually pretty good at that). I am going to improve my focus at work, becoming more productive and getting back to where I was pre BD. I'm also going to continue to make "me" time and pamper myself in small ways.

WRT to W - the key thing is "leave her alone". If she reaches out to me for misc things I will be polite and respectful. I will continue to be honest, trustworthy and transparent which are moral attributes I admire about myself. I can do that alone though and don't need validation from W on it and actually have never looked for it. To me those things are a statement of fact, not something I'm doing to please another.

I still have some significant decisions to make. I struggle with wanting to leave W behind and close the door. I wonder about trying to find a NG. In some ways those are decisions I find that I need to make fresh almost every day - but that's OK. I want to get to a place though where I have that on auto-pilot and can go an entire week or more without having to decide if today is the day I pack it in or keep standing. This one will be one of the toughest and one of the key things I need to do.


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
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But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
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Andrew, one way to think about how you want to move forward may be this. Let's imagine for a moment that your W is gone and she is never coming back - and you are all finished grieving for the loss of her and your M - let's also imagine that you haven't started dating and there is no new woman in your life.

Okay - so that is where we start. Given that set of circumstances, imagine the best possible life for you. What would you be doing? Where? With whom? Where would you work? How would you spend your leisure time? What would you do to bring you pleasure, peace, joy...?

A former valued poster 25yrsMLC used to suggest this approach. Once you have the vision in your mind, you can start to set some goals and work towards - that life...

I'm not saying to give up hope that your M will be restored. But keep that hope and love in a little box on a shelf for now, and start to move forward with your own hopes and dreams...

Hope this helps a little smile


T 13 M 7
Me 48 H 46
SS 15
BD 7.14 PA
D final 5.16 (H filed)

We receive & we lose, and must try to achieve gratitude & embrace with whole hearts whatever of life that remains after the losses - Dubus
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Sotto - Thanks so much. It helps a lot and is where my head is right now. My W "is" gone. I've been grieving that since March 9th. There is no new woman in my life and I'm not actively looking for one. Passively keeping my eyes open perhaps but not actively looking. I really don't know if my W ever will come back. She's been gone for a while and as per my bet with Colly and Altair I'm not going to speculate - out loud here at least.

I don't have the answers on this "best possible life", not even on a "life I would find fulfilling" which is perhaps more a suitable perspective for my personality. Certainly something to give some both focused and unfocused attention to. I don't have to decide right now and as time passes it will change.

I do still have my box of crumbs on the shelf and in small but consistent ways I feel that I am dropping the rope and walking off on my own.


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
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But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
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Andrew,

This is a tough mental journey. Sometimes the pace you process this stuff is so slow you feel like your going backwards. There was a phrase from a book I read which called it a "spiritual desert" which seemed appropriate.

I always tell people to give themselves a break. think about the things you need to process.

1) The loss of your partner(not there mentally
2) being a rock for those left behind(even when you don't feel it)
3) making a life for yourself
4) financial decisions
5) etc

All this while you still have hope a mlc'er will come back.

Understand, many of us have been there. We are really here for support because we can't walk this walk for you. All we can do is give advice we got when we were going through the "dark Woods"

Keep moving forward as best you can. We are all here for you when your head gets fuzzy.

You are doing well.

mirage

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mirage - Thank you for the visit and the kind words.

Hope is indeed a difficult thing. I've assembled my crumbs and pull them out of their box and catalogue them from time to time. In the early days hope would burn bright but then be crushed along with my spirits. I do indeed still have some hope that my W will come back but it is indeed so very foggy in these dark woods that I struggle to see how that can be. I try to see her path and I think that is where I stumble on my own. Any hope of her coming back these days that I can see only has a dull glow.

I do really appreciate the visitors I encounter on my journey such as yourself who assure me that light does exist and that helps me more than most people could imagine to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Without these encounters in the woods I would be terrified and probably rushing into the nearest gingerbread cottage.

The list you gave is indeed the one that I am working on, especially the first three items. I am much more fortunate than some in that the financial aspect for now is not a problem but am being incredibly prudent and cautious because the future holds many possible demands on this. The only addition I would suggest is at the very top of the list add "Learn to love yourself again". The last item - the "etc" is one that I need to be careful of because there may be distractions that could put me on other paths into even more unknown destinations. For right now, stability and healing are my key goals.

Thanks again for the visit.


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
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But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
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Originally Posted By: AndrewP
bump up slightly and be consistent in regular communication with S22 / D24


I am curious about this. You write about your communication with them fairly regularly. Im lucky in that I live pretty close to my parents. That said, I dont talk to them much more than, say, weekly. And even then it's fairly quick unless we are having dinner or something.

How much communication are you intending to have with them?

I might recommend you really putting together a solid list of goals for yourself between now and the end of the year. I know how you like to plan, so maybe now is a great time to get that sort of thing recorded for yourself.

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darknes - As with most Fathers my children are very important to me. I treasure their company but rarely see them in the flesh. It's been almost a year since I last saw D24. They are also my own lighthouse and rock that helps keep me anchored knowing that I am loved and that I am important to someone. With W gone I have been grateful for their kindness and love even more. Their love of me, their Father, while not the same as the love that W had for me is filling their spot in my heart to overflowing making the pain of the loss of W less than it would be otherwise.

Pre BD I had relied on W to do the regular phone calls with S22/D24 and chimed in if she had them on speaker phone (she usually did) and I happened by. I never realized that these calls were incredibly rare. I would go and have dinner with S22 about once a month or whenever I would be passing by his place on business and interact with D24 via Snapchat and Messenger messages regularly. I would also write them a letter once a month talking about what was going on here and in my life and asking about theirs. They never responded to the letter but they did tell me that they looked forward to them and when we would interact in other ways we would talk about the things in their lives.

Currently I call the kids about once every two or three weeks, still write them my monthly letter (to which they still don't respond wink ) and communicate with them via Messenger and Snapchat. D24 and I usually exchange at least one Snap every day. I get down to see S22 at least once a month for dinner. I want to get the phone calls on a more reliable and consistent schedule - every other week. The kids seem to like to talk for a couple of hours at a time when we call. I often am the one to call an end to the call having run out of things to say that don't involve W. The kids said that they would be very happy about regularly scheduled calls and they are both like me in that they like to plan etc. Right now we sometimes have trouble negotiating for a call because they are after-all adults with their own lives.

The reason I wrote that sentence you highlighted is that I want to make sure that in my journey that I make my children a priority and don't let them drift away while I am lost in the fog. It would be so easy to sit here in my own misery believing that I am alone and on BD2 that was how I felt my future would be. I reached out my hand to my children though and they have gripped it strongly. None of us are going to let go.


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good.
But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
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