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Coly,

Your h may or may not have forgotten to increase the amount of money that he was putting in the bank for you/daughter. The reason that I say this is that sometimes, they do things just to get us to contact them versus them contacting us. You contacted him and let him know that you aren't being needy and that's fine...but all you had to do is say thanks and let it go. Now, you need to let that little bit of contact go and continue on your way.

About things being left behind. Many of them leave the "stuff" that they had acquired over the years and only take what is necessary for them to use in their current situations. They don't want reminders of their past, so what better way to get rid of it...to leave in right where it is...in the old home place. If you haven't already packed his stuff up, then do so. Since he has an apartment, there is no excuse that he can't take the stuff to him new place. The next time you have contact w/him, advise him that you've packed his stuff up and want to know when he's going to pick it up. If he tells you that he'll be by sometime to get it, give him a drop dead date and advise him that if he doesn't want the stuff, then he needs to let you know so that you can have a charity come by and get the stuff. Trust me, he's already got new stuff to replace what he's left behind and I would be very surprised if he did, in fact, return to get the items.

Coly, it's time to shake up your situation just a wee bit and mentioning the belongings is one way to see where his head is at for the moment...but allow him to contact you first and then advise him of what needs to take place.


Sit quietly, the answers will reveal themselves when you least expect them to.
The past is gone, the present is a gift and you need to focus on today, allow the future to reveal itself when it is ready.
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Coly, the stuff is just the reason to keep coming back if everything else fails. It is like his skeleton key. Other than serving his purpose, it does not mean anything.

I had a guy tell me once that when someone says it isn't about the money, it is always about the money. When you tell him you aren't needy, you are in effect telling him you are. The best way to show your strength is not to contact him and learn to be ok with the silence.

You just keep reminding him that you are sitting there waiting, not so patiently.

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Originally Posted By: Coly23
I am now think that maybe he is using me for storage and is waiting until we he has the opportunity to suggest selling the house and then he will move his stuff.
Coly - I defer to Job on what she said about this and how they will leave behind reminders of their old lives. How / when / if they come for them is anyone's guess.

In my own case my STBX left lots of stuff for many many months that I eventually packed up and told her about. On the other hand, when she left she took some definite reminders of her old life, or perhaps the people who helped her strip the house did that. No way of knowing. I'm very likely in a rather different place than you and have largely come to terms that I will never understand why she did this one thing or didn't do some other thing. All of those crumbs we've talked about for the last year or more, well - I'm thinking that none of them were real.

I also don't know for sure why she actually came back to get her things that I packed (and a bunch of other stuff she grabbed while she was in the house). I could speculate and the prior AndrewP certainly would have but now I just try to shrug and move on.

I don't want to bring you down here and I know you aren't there yet, but our searches for the hidden meanings didn't do me any good at least. If I was then I'd be posting about the large stash of fingernail files I came across the other day laugh


On BD
H52, W50
T27, M26
S21, D23
BD-9-Mar-16
D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18
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(2*4 incoming)

Why H has left things behind:

1. He has not fully let go and may come back some day.
2. He is keeping his steak on the property.
3. He can't be bothered.
4. He doesn't plan on using it or wearing it anyhow.
5. He forgot about it entirely.

None of us can know why and he may not even know why. So I am sorry to say, but speculating gets you no where and may even hold you back. It is another form of mind reading, and as I say, that never works.

I agree with others that by contacting him at all, you are not showing him that you are fine without him, but you are showing him that he is still on your mind and that you want him to think you are fine. I am not criticizing you and I don't think you should be hard on yourself! This is hard stuff, but that is how I see it. I just see that you are still holding on and that you are trying to show us and him that you are not. (and BTW, I didn't let go for a long time either when my H was gone). This can take a very looonnnnggg time. You can also choose that enough is enough.

I think it may be time for a mental shift. Others here talk about letting go and maintaining hope or dropping the rope and loving them from a distance. I tend to think that those things come into conflict with one another. You are totally free to dismiss what I say :-) I also tend to think that the term MLC is used to offer us excuses for bad behavior or helps us (the LBS) forgive actions we otherwise wouldn't. I just don't like the term and would rather understand why individuals do what they do and not just stick them in one category. Then I read on here over and over "that's what MLC's do!" and I cringe. One could argue my H had a MLC, however he is still a grown up and he is still responsible for his actions (now more than ever).

So all that being said, I wonder if you could move forward more smoothly if you could allow yourself some anger? How would it feel to tell yourself that he left you and D, he is a selfish jerk (which he has been for never including his W in on his thoughts when he left her), and that he is never coming back? How about imagining him shacking up with some hot younger OW in a fancy new apartment? ... Would any of that help you detach?

I am sure we are quite different, but if I were in your position, I would be angry. I would not want his stuff around and I would not want these friendly casual exchanges. Why? because I didn't sign up for a friendship, I signed up for a real M. I would tell him to come and get all his crap. I would also tell him that his picking up and leaving without explanation is shallow. I would tell him that I am tired of being treated this way and living in limbo. I would also see a lawyer (solicitor) and be careful how I played my cards. And FYI, I did do all of this. It did not scare my H away (he was already gone) but I showed him how I expected to be treated.

I am not saying you should do what I would do. I am however suggesting that he is getting off easy. Your H knows he can leave you and D, leave his things in the house, and that everything will be fine. Better than fine, but you are friendly too. Just something to think about. .. Feel free to disagree everyone, but I take a very hard line approach.

Blu


“Forgiveness liberates the soul. It removes fear. That is why it is such a powerful weapon.” – Nelson Mandela
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Coly,

You need to remind yourself that you were fired from the position of his wife, companion and lover. Anger can be a very good thing and it could very well help to spur you on to pack up his stuff and give him a drop dead date to pick it up. His belongings are a constant reminder of him and you definitely need to make your home your space and not his.

Please try to refrain from contacting him. I know that you've been doing well w/the "no contact", but, in a way, you needed some excuse to contact him. He knows that you are out there and love him, but he's not ready to fix himself and the only way he may ever decide to do something about his situation is if he sees and senses that you are moving forward. Some do get their act together and want to make amends and try to come back and others don't. Time will tell on this one...but for now, just leave him alone...no more contacting him about not feeling needy. BluWave was correct in pointing out that even though you were saying you weren't needy...yes, you were because you needed that contact.

Time to put your entire focus on you and your daughter.


Sit quietly, the answers will reveal themselves when you least expect them to.
The past is gone, the present is a gift and you need to focus on today, allow the future to reveal itself when it is ready.
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Hello everyone! Thank you so much for your feedback. I must admit I cried when I read your comments frown. Not because I didn't agree with them but just out of pure frustration and disappointment with myself.

I am really trying hard to move forward without him, I really am. I just feel so confused with what I am supposed to be doing I just keep tying myself up in knots. My mind is like one big knot at the moment!! crazy

Blu I have got angry on occasions but I just can't let it consume me and I worry that it will and that won't be good for me or D. We have shown him on so many occasions that we aren't thinking of him and we are just getting on with our lives. For example Mother's Day H asked D if she wanted help with getting me a present and she said no. Instead we went out for afternoon tea and didn't invite H. Easter we didn't contact him at all and he turned up at our house in the evening with Easter eggs expecting us to be there but we weren't in. Father's Day D didn't want to celebrate it at all so we arranged to go away for the weekend, just the two of us. Then two days before H contacts us and asks if we want to go to lunch but I said we were not around. I am trying.

We have not seen H since D's prom at the end of June and the only reason why I asked him was for D. In all honesty I really didn't think he deserved to be there and me and D actually fell out about it. In the end I invited him through gritted teeth!

Maybe sending that text was a mistake but for some reason i feel a little freer, like another peace of string has been cut. I don't know why but I do. I feel like I have released him and in doing so I have released me. Sorry if that doesn't make sense but it's hard to explain.

As for his stuff. Well I can say hand on heart that he has only ever come by once to get anything. All the clothes he has with him I packed up and gave to him a few days afte BD in anger. When I see him he is not wearing new clothes he is wearing what I gave him last year.

I think I'm going to do what Job suggested and just wait for him to contact me, if he ever does, and then broach the subject of him coming to collect his things. The trouble is there is so much to sort through in the loft and garage, not to mention all his paperwork, maybe that is what is putting him off, I don't know. The funny thing is, at the start of the year he asked if I had a specific shoe box for a pair of limited edition trainers he was selling on eBay. He also had another pair of limited edition trainers he had left behind all boxed up and I took them down to give to him to take away and instead he asked if he could leave them in the house. I should have said no but at the time I was just so confused! When he had the chance to take his things, he doesn't. I just don't get it!

Job, Blu, Own, AP. Thank you all for your comments. I am working on myself but I also still want to save my marriage. That's what I came here for and that's what I'm trying to do but not very successfully! Keep hitting me with these 2x4's and pulling me back to reality, I really need that at the moment!

I'm really going to go back to NC now, I promise! whistle


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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Coly,

You are a work in progress. It's one step forward and two steps back. Go back to NC for now...but it's time to start going through some of that stuff and making decisions so that you can reclaim your home for you and your daughter w/o the ghosts walking the halls and greeting you all of the time.

Hang in there!


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Coly.....you have definitely gotten better advice from everyone else then I could give you, but I will tell you how I handled the same situation in regard to H and his things.

When I kicked H out, a few days later I gave him a small suitcase and a few other things. Everything else was still at the house....hanging in our master closet as a matter of fact. So everyday I had to see all of his clothes hanging there. A few weeks went by, I asked him when he would be coming to get his things and he never would. One evening about 3 months after BD, he came over to "talk" and I asked him again when he was going to take the rest of his things. That night he went and packed a few things, but for me that was not good enough. I started taking his things out to his truck. He asked what I was doing and I told him "you don't live here anymore, and I don't want your things here." What he said to me after all of his things were out of the house told me about his state of mind at that time.......he said:

"with all of my stuff out it makes things seem so final"

Seriously?!?!?! Now, I don't know what kind of mindset your H has, and I'm sure he really doesn't know either at this point in his life, but after hearing that from my H it definitely made me think he had no clue what he wanted, or what he was doing with his life. I know that after his things were out of the house, I could start to let other things go, and take the house back as mine. I also didn't have a reason to contact him anymore.

Coly, I'm sorry you are going through all of this, and I know it is so frustrating and it svcks. I read what Job, Blu and the others have said to you, and I remember hearing those exact same words. It took me a long time to finally realize that what I was being told to do was the right thing to do. Like you, I felt like I was doing everything I thought I was "supposed" to be doing.....leaving H alone, going NC, GAL and living my life, but really I was just going through the motions.......and he knew it.

I did get angry, and at times it did consume me, and when I did speak to H he heard my wrath. It made me feel better because that way he knew exactly how I was feeling........and trust me, there was no question about how I was feeling when I spoke to H. But, I finally did get tired of yelling and screaming at him. I guess I got it all out and there was no more left inside shocked

I'm not saying that yelling and screaming is what you should do, but maybe getting some of that anger out would help you wink

Remember Coly.....one day at a time.

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Thanks Job and SKM. Yes I definitely need to take this one day at a time...

So I've been MIA for a while on my thread but I have been reading along and posting when I feel I have something useful to say.

Journaling - The summer has been going okay although it has been very wet so far so not great for days out. D has been a bit down lately. I think she may be suffering from a bit of PTSD. She said that when H left she was in the throws of building up to her final exams so she had that to occupy her mind but now that she has been off for a couple of months it seems to have started to sink in, the enormity of it all. Because if this she became very distant with her boyfriend and girl friends and consequently has been falling out with them all resulting in her boyfriend telling her that she has been a bad girlfriend and they have now split up. She is understandably very upset with this because she was looking to him for support and he couldn't give it.

In the meantime H has been texting and phoning her at least two or three times a week and she has chosen to ignore him. I did suggest that if he asks how she is and at the same time asks to see her and if she doesn't want to see him then maybe to be polite she should just respond to say that she is okay but she declined to do that. I even suggested that I could drop H a text to ask him to back off a bit whilst she sorts herself out but she said that would imply that she will see him at some point in the future but she feels she has made her mind up that she doesn't want to see him anymore. That makes me feel really sad. I wonder how he would feel about it if he knew. The H I knew would be mortified and very sad about it but I don't know this new person so I can't speculate on how he is feeling. All I know is that both myself and D do not want the type of relationship he is offering. We would rather be on our own than have him pop up every now and again reminding us of how he rejected us all over again.

We've also been trying to find a little summer job for D to take her mind off everything and I am pleased to say that she starts a little admin job in my office on Monday! I am so excited for her! She has also started to come to the gym with me and I'm going to get her membership so she can go more regularly. We are doing a lot of things together at the moment and it seems to have brought us much closer.

In other news. This month is my seventh wedding anniversary and then two days later will be my birthday. This time last year I was a mess. I don't know how I am going to feel on those two days this year. I think there will obviously be some sadness but I don't think i will feel as emotional as last year. I would love to send a text to H to say happy anniversary but I assume that would not be a good idea!

Anyway, I hope everyone is good today/tonight. It's nearly the weekend - yippee!!


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

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Coly, resist the urge to contact him. Let D communicate as she sees fit. I'm having similar issues with my D. She says she is determined to get a scholarship next year so she doesn't have to deal with him again and plans to change her last name when she turns 18 in April. Just awesome that this is the place we have come.

I know it is hard, but you are doing great. As you can see from my messy thread, it can always be worse. Stay in the fight.

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