I agree with SS, NLW..great job not being sucked into his spew. He seems to be in much confusion and anger. Anger that is life is not all flowers and rainbows after the decisions he has made!
Continue doing what you are doing. It works for YOU and you need to only do what works for you and your kids. You are not confused. You are not angry. And you are not flailing!
TPS Me: 44 H: 42 M14 T17 S10 D7 10/10 H moves out after death of his father-same month 21/04/12 H is 'DONE' 04/05/12 OW/PA confirmed (rumors from 2010) July '14 H ends affair May '15 H moves back home
Thanks for the feedback - I have ALWAYS until now - been sucked in when he starts to spew like this.
He is so angry. Trying to point out that he's wrong will only make him angrier.
I used to tell myself that he wasn't just half-brained on this, but primarily trying to punish me with the things he said and did. But now, I can see this was really holding me back. Making it about me.
Better to see things from his POV - he's angry and suffering and so confused that he just lashes out to get what he wants in an unjust world.
Yes... you'd think having a separate bedroom for each of the kids would be pretty basic, wouldn't you?
But also, who would have thought that teenage kids would have a problem with moving right in with their dad's OW - the one he'd been having a secret affair with for the last 3 years on and off - before he actually left home to go live in her apartment?
His version to the kids is that he's "Just started seeing someone", and that he lived with a male friend of his until quite recently.
They saw straight through this of course.
He's so upset and confused, i don't think he knows what he's doing and saying to whom any more.
I agree with SS, NLW..great job not being sucked into his spew. He seems to be in much confusion and anger. Anger that is life is not all flowers and rainbows after the decisions he has made!
Continue doing what you are doing. It works for YOU and you need to only do what works for you and your kids. You are not confused. You are not angry. And you are not flailing!
Busting, Thanks for dropping by! I've been following you and sending positive thoughts to help you through your dark patch.
It helped me to hear from you that what I'm doing works for me - you're right, for once I'm not angry, not confused, not flailing.
Whoo hoo! You did it! You can just hear the confidence in your writing. There are tough days ahead but they will be much easier now that you are more detached.
Celebrate the small victories
---- M 39 H 35 D5,D4 M 4 T 9 ILYBNILWY 5/18/11 Left 7/11/11 Divorced 12/1/13
Hi guys, Just been reading Bklyn's thread and wanted to chime in with another post about how it is possible, with time, to feel better.
I know how hard it is at this time of year.
But it's the sense of achievement you feel, like Bklyn says, when you do things for yourself that you never thought you'd be able to do. Small things - like hooking up a DVD player or, in my case, fixing all the door handles that had fallen off around the house because the screw holes had gotten too big to hold the screws.
Like pruning all the fruit trees in our yard and now that it's summer, harvesting all the wonderful fruit that's coming in. Doing it myself, up a tall ladder and climbing up the trees. Getting much more fruit than we ever did when it was was stbx's job to pick it - he always picked a bucket or two half-heartedly and then told me there was no fruit left on the tree worth picking.
Putting up the 10-foot Xmas tree all by ourselves, and all the Xmas lights. Never realising we could do it until now...
All the stuff that I made 'his job' to do before. He didn't do it well, because it wasn't his choice to do it. I made things his job to do - because he was taller, stronger, the 'man'. And then I criticised when he didn't do things to my standards.
I must have orchestrated just about his whole life like this.
Important insight.
And, on another good note, last night, I passed the Love Actually test.
Watched the movie on TV. All the stuff about family, real love, unrequited love, betrayal, infidelity.
Last year, I sobbed my heart out and couldn't watch it through - too heart-breaking.
This year, just watched it in a sort of detached fashion and thought - yeah, know how she/he feels; that's a good portrayal of how you feel in that sort of situation (when your husband betrays you, when you lose the love of your life, when you love someone who prefers someone else, of the love you have for your kids/siblings, etc).
And I took solace from the message of the film. That we can survive, and that there is a life/love out there for us when we decide that it's time to take our 'wasted' hearts and go out and get it.
It's taken a long time for me to get there, but I think I'm ready to say, like the unrequited-love guy in the movie, "Enough... enough now".
A bit cheesy, I know - but hey, it's that time of year...
Just need to write this out to make sure I'm not going mad.
stbx and i attended mediation in the last week of November.
At the end of the session we went to the receptionist to organise our next session. We were offered 5 dates between then and Christmas.
I had my diary out and noted that i couldn't attend the first 2 times offered due to work commitments. Stbx dismissed the last 3 times offered (in the week before Xmas). At the time I (cynically, or so I thought) assumed he was probably going on another holiday with OW.
We agreed with the receptionist to a time in the New Year.
Later that night, stbx texted me with the same list of times and asked me to please make a selection from the dates on offer.
Next day, i replied that we had already discussed these times and had found that none suited us both.
stbx exploded and sent ranting emails indicting that i needed to understand how serious it was that we arrange a meeting before Xmas. He threatened to discontinue payments of support to the children.
I saw him face-to-face a day or two later and told him that the only time I could do was the last one offered - which was 4 days before Xmas. I said that my preference was not do this so close to Xmas, as I found it too hard/painful at that time of year.
He said "It's your choice when you go" (not nastily), and changed the subject.
Two days later he came back to me and spewed that he was not going to mediation again, that he was taking me to court, and that he had decided to fight me for 50/50 custody of the kids. All because I had 'refused' to attend mediation a few days before Xmas. He mimicked my voice: "Oh, it's all too painful for me so close to Xmas."
Today I found out that stbx is indeed on a holiday interstate on the days offered by the mediator in the lead-up to Xmas. It appears that there was never a possibility that he could have attended at these times any way.
D16 rang him to ask to see him (he had been NC all over the weekend and has only been in phone contact since school finished a week ago).
He said he couldn't see her because he was in another state and would be there for the next few days.
D16 was upset that he had gone away without telling her.
I feel like I've been purposely manipulated by some sort of ultimate control freak.
I'm just sitting back quite gob-smacked at the level of manipulation involved. How do they summon the energy, even, to orchestrate all of this?
Later that night, stbx texted me with the same list of times and asked me to please make a selection from the dates on offer.
Next day, i replied that we had already discussed these times and had found that none suited us both.
Why respond this way? Why not respond with which of the dates works for you? It's his decision to ask you for dates again (whatever his motivation), his decision to go or not go on the dates that work for you. He asked you again. Take that at face value. It can come across as patronizing to do otherwise. Why tell him what he agreed to previously? He just asked you again.
As you said in your previous message, you saw ways that you sort of micromanaged him in the past (which may have felt patronizing or controlling to him). Do you see how the way you responded to his question might have triggered him in the same way (note, I'm not at all excusing his motivation -- I don't have any way of knowing it).
Originally Posted By: NLW
Two days later he came back to me and spewed that he was not going to mediation again, that he was taking me to court, and that he had decided to fight me for 50/50 custody of the kids. All because I had 'refused' to attend mediation a few days before Xmas. He mimicked my voice: "Oh, it's all too painful for me so close to Xmas."
"WAS, I get that you are really upset. I can't let myself be mocked like this though. I need you to leave now (or if you are on phone, I am going to hang up now.). I am happy to talk with you about this later without the verbal abuse and disrespect."
Originally Posted By: NLW
I feel like I've been purposely manipulated by some sort of ultimate control freak.
I get that you feel that way. I can imagine you feel that way based on the beliefs you have about his motives or state of mind when he asks you. Please stop trying to deduce his motives or state of mind. Only he knows what he is thinking -- it may make perfect sense to him, it may be manipulative, who knows. It is a form of control in itself to attribute his actions to some mindset or motive. And it can have negative consequences then on how you feel. Take his actions at face value, or ask him what he is thinking/feeling.
When you cast aspersions/judgements or even try to "mindread" his state of mind or thinking, you are making what are known as "Disrespectful Judgements" in the Marriage Builders lingo. Google it. You have said in previous messages that you feel compelled to do this, but doing so can be a very damaging, patronizing form of control in relationships.
Communicate about it.
Me-53 W-49 D22,D18,D15 T-Since-12/2001 Married-9/2004 She Moved Out-5/28/2010 Piecing start-04/2011 Now-together Thread http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2079304
Thanks Busto - You're still hanging in there for me!
Your feedback really opened my eyes to things i had not thought about in my behaviour.
I went to the link and did a lot of reading and thinking.
Aside from anything else that i learnt about, I think that the basic advice to
"Take his actions at face value or ask him what he is thinking/feeling"
is going to be part of a big step forward for me.
Also, reading the MB material makes me think that stbx has been given a lot of this info by OW. I recognise a lot of key words that he's been using over the last few months. But there i go again trying to deduce his motives and state of mind!
