Originally Posted By: CSan00
Meghan,

I appreciate your message as I has so much anger and pain when I found out that the decree had come in the mail and how cold my XH sounded over his text messages about how my priorities where messed up. He seems up and down that it is confusing. To make matters worse, I drank that night at a bar with my friend and she and I ended up hanging out with the waiter. Nothing happened but my XH found out about it and was pi$$ed.

Is this your present XH or the first one? Either way, it's none of his business what you do when you are not around him or the kids. None of it is his business. HE FILED FOR DIVORCE from you so any rights he had to monitor or judge your private behavior was lost that day. Period. The end. Not negotiable.

Don't tolerate it from him. Tell him calmly that it's "wildly inappropriate for him to comment on what you do in your private time and you won't listen to it" and then leave the area if he continues. Follow thru with this boundary or you'll be hearing his spew for the rest of your life and he won't learn to respect you.

Respect is essential to love, so in a way you are teaching him NOT to love you, by listening to his rants. No more of that.


He knew about it that whole night and didn't say to me for 2 days. Apparently the waiter used to work for him and text my H to let him know and asked if it was okay to talk to me. I thought he was done with me


none of this^^^ matters. It's a NON issue for him and ought to be a non issue for you. Does not matter. Do you care what the homeless guy who lives on a street grill thinks of you? B/c that guy has the same right to comment upon and judge YOUR behavior, as your former h.


and on Friday night when he confronted me about that night, he asked for my wedding rings back. I brought them to him a

why on earth would you do that? They are yours. If the court awards them to him, THEN you give them back. Don't be a doormat...seriously. This is nuts. I don't get it at all.


nd he just went off on me about how irresponsible I was and stupid for going with a stranger. I apologized

I can barely read this. I'm slapping my forehead. WHY ARE YOU APOLOGIZING for what you did in private? What business is this of his?

Yes he's jealous and punitive and cruel and dramatic and way way out of line. And he's a control freak.

SO in his world, He gets to divorce you (making you a single woman) AND then berates you for acting like a single woman? No I don't think so.

But for you to apologize makes me really wonder where your self esteem is hiding. You need to go find it and start using it.


and said that I thought he was done with me and I wasn't thinking.


CS, this is too unhealthy for me to keep reading. Honey you need a good IC asap. This is so out of this world I can't even address it.

Sorry.


He then told me he knew about it and was testing me to see if I would come clean and us have a clean slate but I didn't and all I do is hurt him. He told me that I'm the reason why he failed his kids and that's one of the biggest reasons why he wanted the divorce. My XH then told me that I needed to spend more time with my boys and mom as she is getting sicker from the cancer and that I need to fix myself. He also said I hurt him so bad that he is numb and can't get things straight which is why he is leaving for 2 weeks after his kids leave and that this is too small of a town where he knows a lot of people and he wants to move out of town. I did all the wrong things - tried to justify my mistakes, asked for another chance and cried. I went home got little sleep and I sent him a text if he would meet me so I could talk to him. I just wanted to apologize in person and he agreed.

You are absolutely part of the problem in your situation. I guess that is good news -- b/c if you can do YOUR WORK ---you can improve your situation. That's potentially very empowering. But you do have a lot of work to do.

CS, You seem to lack any sense of boundaries and you are too eager to supplicate a person who boldly mistreats you. You're a prime candidate for being inside abusive relationships.

If you get a chance to attend a workshop I highly recommend it b/c I think weekly therapy, even when it's good, can be fragmented. That's b/c when you make a break thru, SOMETIMES you then have to pick up the kids or go back to work and then the next week, start all over again. If you attend a GOOD workshop for a long weekend, the continuity can help you identify and solve some problem areas and come up with an action plan and follow up support.

Check out "Essential Experience" (aka "EE") which is in Philadelphia, which is the best one I've been to. Believe me, they are not all alike.

"Landmark" is another workshop for personal growth but it is different and helps some folks a lot, but for ME, was too focussed on recruitment.

EST can also be great but for ME was a bit harsh. I LOVE "EE". I think it's by far the most profound experience in personal growth and insight that I have ever had.

I have heard that "Lifespring" is similar to EE, but I don't have direct experience with it.

ANyhow, EE would help you identify your issues and help you work thru them and NOT be crippled by insecurities. You'd learn that you are a good person and you DO deserve to be treated well and you'd learn this at a gut level, which I think is missing in your work.

You seem to THINK more clearly than you FEEL, and those feelings affect how you behave - and then you are stuck with some impulsive actions and their aftermath. That'a s troublesome pattern. But it IS solvable.

EE was so good for me that when I came home at the airport, my h said he could SEE a difference in me. A few months later HE went and then, we went together. Boy was that amazing. I had thought we had a good marriage before we went to EE but afterwards when we went together we got so much closer.

If not for that experience and the years of closeness it created for us, I would not have made the 2 year effort at DBIng and would not be married today...and for my h to attend a touchy feely workshop (it's more than that, but to our ears that is what it sounded like at the time)

says a lot for my h to go. He was an Army officer at the time, and sure enough when we both got back, a few people in our offices went. From the ARMY! It's even tax deductible!
Some DBers have attended it (autumn leaves, StubbornDyke, PowerOf Now, Lucky Luke, and some others who's names escape me at the moment)but ALL said it was "Life changing".

Think about that^^^...The folks there are well qualified. B'c it's "experiential" you cannot rehearse or edit your answers and you WILL discover things about yourself you did not know. Perhaps more importantly, they will help YOU SOLVE your problems, not just see them.

DO Check it out. It's key for you b/c a lot of your issues are not directly related to your marriage - but they affect the marriage.

Some of these issues are deeply engrained in you, they are yours alone to work on (however much they affect the rest of your life.)

While your h is not responsible for your self esteem, I can see how little he helps it.

Do you get what I'm saying?

We met up at Starbucks and he began by saying that he hates being angry with me. He then waited for me to say what I needed to say. I apologized for hurting him and making him feel humiliated and for behaving recklessly.

(SLAPS FOREHEAD!!!) mad sick cry cry crazy

You "made" him feel nothing! We do not "make" someone else feel anything and this is another example of you having no boundaries.

That's like saying you "made him feel bad about himself!" In fact it's exactly like that.

I cannot read your post anymore. Please forgive me - but this is too frustrating for me.

Sweetie, you need professional help and there is no shame in that. But do get it.
Most of us did! I did, thank God!

You need to take charge of your own life, for real, and maybe for the first time. You know, many people do not know how to do that.

Imagine your life were a novel. Okay? So your life Is a book. How do you like how THIS chapter has gone??

So either go to a workshop and get started being the author of the book of your life, (so YOU write the next chapter, and the next, & the rest, and don't let someone else write it unless you want someone else directing how YOUR life goes but it's your job to write your book, you know?) --

AND OR get a GOOD solution based therapist - and do it that way

(Not someone who sits there and merely lets you rehash your past, and all the problems you HAD, but rather, someone who shows you new behaviors to fix the problems, and gives you TOOLS for that).

Make sense?


He said he didn't want me to get hurt and affect my boys and he didn't want anything to happen to me. He said he was still fine seeing, texting and me like for coffee. H I apologized for ruining our chance for a new start and he said I'm not taking that off the table. He then said let's go for a short ride on his bike and he also said that I could hold him. The ride was nice and when we got off he pulled me in for a hug and then a kiss on the cheek which I went for his lips. I apologized and he said it was fine. We hugged again and this time he kissed me on my lips. We didn't text again till the following day. I just wished him and his kids a good day. Well while I was at the store with my S 12, he dropped off my mail at my apartment and saw that the name inside had my 1st XH last name and my XH sent me a text asking how long it was like that. I told him that it was labeled like that since my S 16 got his mail there first. He gets jealous I think but this is crazy all the moods my XH goes through and I can't read
him. A 2x4 is needed please


What is needed, is for you to change.


M: 57 H: 60
M: 35 yrs
S30,D28,D19
H off to Alaska 2006
Recon 7/07- 8/08
*2016*
X = "ALASKA 2.0"
GROUND HOG DAY
I File D 10/16
OW
DIV 2/26/2018
X marries OW 5/2016

= CLOSURE 4 ME
Embrace the Change