Hi Thanks for accepting me here. Ive read many posts here including Sandys rules, detaching and have started the DB book too and also tried to familiarise myself with some of the abbreviations. I am in the U.K. My wife dropped the Bomb Shell on Friday that she had filed for divorce, her having spent the last three weeks in a psychiatric hospital being treated for anxiety and depression. In fact she will be there for at least another week. Meanwhile I have been at home looking after our two young children (8 and 10) as well as my two teenagers from my first marriage (my first wife died tragically) My wife has had a massive alcohol problem for many years and following the passing of her mother two years ago, her drinking has got much worse. There have been incidents involving the police, rows with taxi drivers involving her use of foul language in the middle of the street in the early hours, as well as abusive behaviour to me in front of the children. Sadly she doesnt accept her drinking has any bearing on her behaviour, anxiety or depression.
She had a very difficult childhood with parents, who neglected her at 13, they moved to another part of the U.K. and my wife didnt want to come with them, so she was left in a huge house with lodgers acting as her guardian until the age of 18. On top of this her parents continued to be self absorbed and failed to show her any real love throughout her teens. Her mother passed two years ago which in turn made my wifes drinking get even worse.
There are a lot of issues from my wifes childhood that have damaged her and are too lengthy to go into now. When she was admitted to this private psychiatric hospital she put her brother down as next of kin and told her doctors to not divulge any information about her treatment to me. As far as I know she isnt having the alcohol problem dealt with there either. After three weeks of therapy and counselling we had a brief talk last week before she dropped the BS and she was dredging things up from the past and catastrophising things saying always xxx instead of sometimes xxx and you never xxxx rather than you sometimes etc. I had been trying to follow Sandys rules last week but stupidly succumbed and called my wife on Friday to see how she doing at the hospital and we had a huge row which ended with me losing my cool and swearing at her, the phone call followed two hours later that she had signed the divorce papers. Lesson 1 learnt I find it incredible that she can be making such a rash decision while still clearly mentally ill.
This is a complex situation as I really feel my wife isnt In a good mind state, I acknowledge that weve had our problems Ive had cancer three times in the last ten years which left me depressed and also in debt, but it really seems like my wife has put all of the blame for her depression on me since shes been in the psychiatric hospital. She has said she wont do couple counselling or mediation but still wants this to be an amicable divorce. That seems contradictory to me! Im going to try and finish the DB book today, I still love my wife and Im willing to do whatever I can to try and resolve this situation, despite having the divorce papers signed I remain an optimist a divorce will be so damaging to our young children and despite the current anger Im getting from my wife, I still believe that she loves me.
As there is an issue of mental stability here, Im not sure how much I should be trying to follow all of the 37 points in Sandys rules, clearly my wife doesnt want to hear me say I love you right now.
Id be so grateful for any contributions to my thread.
Thanks so much for listening
Herbie
Last edited by Cadet; 07/08/1805:06 AM. Reason: restored post
Me:48 W:43, Kids:S19, S17, S10, S8 M:10 years BD:06-18-2018
You may be on moderation now, post in small frequent replies and stay on this thread until you reach 100 posts (for your thread, you can also post on other peoples threads to give support). Especially on this Newcomers forum, where the posting activity is very active, and your posts can quickly fall to the bottom of the page or even several pages down. Keep journaling and asking questions - people will come! Most important - POST!
Get out and Get a Life (GAL). DETACH.
Believe none of what he or she says and half of what he/she does.
Have NO EXPECTATIONS.
Take care of yourself, breathe, eat, sleep, exercise.
Take the parts of this advice that you need and don't worry if I have repeated something that you have already done.
Here are a few links to threads that will help you immensely:
As there is an issue of mental stability here, Im not sure how much I should be trying to follow all of the 37 points in Sandys rules, clearly my wife doesnt want to hear me say I love you right now.
You need to be following ALL of them without exception. It may seem counterintuitive right now, but will make more sense to you as you get farther into this journey. And you're right. Your W doesn't want to her you say you love her. That's actually one of the rules. Read the rules several rimes and put some serious thought into them. When you read the threads on this board, a lot of them mention wishing they did a better job at following the rules in the beginning. Me included. Good luck...
Me: 38 W:31 Kids: S16(mine from previous R), D10, S9, S4 M: 10 years T:12 years BD:Jan 3, 2018 W moved out: Apr 13,2018 Filed for D: Jun 2018 D final: Sep 2019
Sorry to hear about your troubles. If I can clarify any particular "rule", I will do my best. These are guidelines to give a newcomer the sense of direction to take.
It is not about what you feel should work in your M. It is about doing the work that gets the right results. Do what works!
Herbie, sounds like you and your wife have both had difficult life circumstances. Losing your first wife and having cancer are major challenges for you and your wife's family troubles while growing up sound hard to overcome for her. All these things can make it hard to live a carefree happy married life. Your wife probably doesn't have the tools and resources she needs to learn how to deal with problems in healthy ways so she turned to drinking and probably blames you for everything because you're the one standing in front of her. I live in the USA so I don't know how long a divorce takes in the UK. If it takes a while then you can hope by practicing DB guidelines and giving your wife time to receive treatment for her conditions that she'll change her mind about getting a divorce. Even if it's fast then you can still try. I really don't know if the DB rules should be changed when someone is mentally ill. I've been visiting this forum for six or seven months and in many cases people here don't seem to be sure if their spouse is mentally ill, having an affair, or just fell out of love but the DB guidelines seem to be applicable to most circumstances. Perhaps if her brother is next of kin on her paperwork then at least you know she has someone looking after her. Plus in the hospital she's being treated by professionals, so you can somewhat let go of her and care for yourself and your kids. I'm sure that's easier said than done being a single dad to four kids while processing this devastating news. We can only hope if you can hold down the fort and give your wife time to recover then she'll change her mind. I hope you'll hear from others here and keep us posted on what's happening!
Im currently reading Coreys thread - Im only on the third page of ten (and hoping it gets better for Corey by page 10) As my wife has already signed the initial divorce petition paper, would you suggest that my best strategy is to go dark right now? I m still familiarising myself with all that is involved with going dark, and wondering how I can do that when we have children to take care of on a day to day basis, as well as the whole process we will need to go though via solicitors and mediation too?
Last edited by Cadet; 07/08/1811:36 AM. Reason: restored post
Me:48 W:43, Kids:S19, S17, S10, S8 M:10 years BD:06-18-2018
