Gerda Keeps Traveling North

[Gerda]

Gosh, sjohn, I never thought of that. I just came to see if anyone responded yet, so happy to see your kind note, thank you so much for the support and the lighthouse-ness.

You all are really are a lighthouse to me! sjohn these posts you have written lately are very comforting and thought-provoking.

I don't think he blamed himself but I never thought of it and it is something to think about. I generally think, because I was always very open about the fact that H was in a midlife crisis (once I realized it), and explaining it to my kids -- because it was such a shocking change at the time, five years ago -- he knows it's not his fault. I think I have just always protected them from the worry that a D would happen. They know I would never D and they don't know anything that H has done to me, they just know he changed and is never around and isn't nice to me and doesn't earn any money or help out. But they don't know about my illness or the OW or the fact that H has threatened to leave many times.

That combined with actually spending time with his dad, which he never gets to do -- I think it just made my S become vulnerable.

Your read of my post makes me wonder about how I am seeing things. I saw this as a huge horrible move on my H's part, to tell my son that he was going to leave "one day" and to say all these awful things about not wanting to be with me. Generally he has not told the kids this, though I guess since BD 2 it has happened a few times. I keep trying to show that we are still a family and NOT talk about the future, just that I hope our family can be restored, so to me it is so unbelievably selfish and awful to tell a kid that, especially my son who is already a school refuser, won't leave the house, has totally spiraled. He needs less stress and more comfort, not a monologue about a future divorce!

My uncle was just here and my H came home, and they talked. My uncle said my H is so incredibly different from before-- he has not seen him in years-- and seems very haunted and crazy.

[Gerda]

Also I forgot a really important part of last night's story!

when I was making the hot water bottle, my H woke up (he sleeps on couch by kitchen in our small apartment) and started telling me that he had had this amazing day with S and that S is pathologically worried about loving him and likewise about loving me, and that it was all because of the narrative I feed our kids and which confuses them. I tried not to answer but did say that I don't talk about him to the kids. He went on for a while about how he had "cured" S13's pathological worry and that he told him how it was, and that the outcome might not be what I wanted, "It might not make you happy," but that he had fixed things with S. Meanwhile S was upstairs having a total panic attack and begging me to make things okay again!

I mostly did not answer at all, just the line about not talking about him and then said at the end, "I think kids want their family to be together, they don't care about any of the rest." But that was it, then I said that S was waiting for the hot water bottle and went back upstairs.

It was so awful! Writing about it now, I remember that feeling of being crucified as he was again blaming me for everything, even our son's anxiety. I am trying to put it all in God's hands, just have that awful post BD feeling of anxiety and fear. Off to Mass and I know God will help me get peace back! Looking forward to seeing all of your takes, and thanks again, sjohn, for already weighing in.

[sjohns6]

Wow...your H is a real piece of work. I can't even imagine living with that. I've told you that you are a pillar of strength before and you downplayed it due to how you felt, but did you read what you just wrote?? Your H said some REALLY nasty things and then was proud of himself for it. And how did you reply, you just listened. You've been taking lessons from Gordie and DNJ, haven't you? You did good not to engage in all that. Despite him trying to make you crazy, you know the real story and he can't talk you in to his line of crazy.

I'm glad I'm able to help a little. Truth is, it's only been recently that I've felt strong enough to offer any advice to anyone about anything. I get on here and read what people like Gordi, DNJ, Mach, and many others write and I just don't feel like I have quite the clarity and experience to offer what they do. But, now that W has moved out and my head has cleared a little I've wanted to engage a little more with you guys instead of just taking support from what everyone writes. Its a work in progress.

Again, I don't know how you do it. Living with someone spewing that kind of crap for 5 years. your H truly doesn't deserve you, but hopefully some day he will again...if thats what you still want when that happens.

You did NOT cause any of this...give it up to God, its in his hands.

[sjohns6]

Ohh...wanted to ask, what manga is your son in to? My D has me in to a bunch with her. Curious if we've watched/read any of the same ones.

[Gerda]

Hi, sjohn and all you folks out there in MLC land. Thanks for checking in on me, sjohn.

First things first -- the manga was the one with a character called Norotu, I think? I love the values of honor and love in it, it's a great antidote to the 12 hours per day of fortnite.

About the rest -- I still don't think I am a pillar of strength. I am generally not joyful or thankful at all. I often feel like I hate my life and don't want to do this anymore. I find my H repulsive most of the time.

A pillar of strength trusts God. I feel that God has put a conviction in me to stand, I am certain of that because it's the only thing I am sure I have to do and am generally confused about every other aspect of this whole MLC and parenting situation. HOW to do it, that's a total mystery. But since I am sure God asked me to do it, then why do I not trust Him along the way? Why do I keep questioning everything, especially how long this is taking, how it doesn't seem that my H will ever change, how it often seems to be getting worse?

I battle these feelings a lot. But always I return to standing for this M and to trying to find my way back to walking in the light, no matter what H does.

I am reading this book called He Leadeth Me, by Walter Ciszek. This guy was a priest who spent 5 years, mostly in solitary and being interrogated by Soviet police, before entering 18 years of hard labor in Siberia. He struggled deeply with anxiety, fear, confusion until he realized in year 5 of the prison that he had not been trusting God. Then he was, in his words, converted, and this changed the course of his life. He was already a priest who had devoted his life to God but he realized he had never truly converted! And the way he tells the story, it really clicked for me. I know I don't truly trust God and I long for that conversion. I don't think my stand is about my M, the restoration of the M will be a great outcome of what my stand is really about -- getting closer to God.

Reading his story is helping me a lot, at least theoretically. I have been looking at my life in a different way as a result.

And yet since the other night, I feel like I had BD3. I can't get over my H telling my son all those awful things about me and telling him he plans to leave as soon as he has money. I have that sick stomach feeling we all get at BD, walking up in the morning in a panic like the old days. Sometimes my D9 also tells me things H has said about me or how he complains about me to his mother, etc. It hurts so much. It's like all the feelings of rejection start over each time. And this is even though I truly feel a very strong sense of detachment and am mostly dark. But living with him, and having to creep around at night in our living room/kitchen because he is sleeping there, or having to see him knowing he has told our S how badly he wants out and doesn't want to be with me, it is like being strangled at times.

And at other times, I feel the grace from God, and I feel joy, gratitude, certitude.

[job]

Gerda,

I am sorry that he's projecting all of his unhappiness on to you by telling others awful things about you. He's wearing very dark glasses at the moment and is building himself up for the grand exit. He's providing excuses to others so that they will encourage him to leave. The man is a coward and will not leave under his own steam. He needs to build up that steam and he's hoping against hope that 1) others will encourage him to leave; or 2) everything will get back to you and you'll show him the door. I know what he's saying is hurtful, but sit quietly and allow him to stew. If he complains to you say "I'm sorry you feel that way" and just leave him to it.

If he should leave, you will discover that you've been walking on eggshells for a long time. The relief of having him out from under will be much better, i.e., less tension for you and your children. I can't even imagine the tension that is building up w/your children living in the same household w/him babbling on and on about you.

Dig deeper for patience and please try to keep the focus on you, but more importantly on your children.

[DnJ]

(((Gerda)))

I am running late so this is just a quick note, for now.

I can see all the stress H is stirring up. He is really ramping up his behaviour, and telling all that to S13 is deplorable. (My W told kids everything, no filter)

I read about your confusion about parenting, MLC, etc..., be gentle on yourself, you are doing better than you think.

This is very much like a BD3, so back to basics.

I told ShadowBunny and I am telling you.

You are the most important person in all of this.

You!

Do not forget that.

You must heal. You are the most important person in your life.

Then kids, H, parents, friends, etc... I just type them it is not the order of importance, I mean H is not third, well not right now. In a proper marriage he comes after you probably then kids and so on.

The big thing is, and it sounds harsh, you are first - kids are second. If you are ok your kids will be ok.

The last few days have knock you down and around. You need to regain your balance. Don’t worry things will run ok on autopilot for a little bit. Focus on you and your kids.

A quick thing on this parenting with an MLC spouse. You are the sane parent. You rise above so much, gain so much strength, because you have to. You love your children, so you heal, and gain the strength to do what needs to be done.

It is amazing what the human spirit can accomplish where you have a purpose, a responsibility, larger than yourself.

I hope this helps.

Look after yourself and S13 and D9.

Talk soon.

DnJ

[Gerda]

job and DnJ, thank you thank you thank you. You are a life line. I treasure your words.

I am out of town again in my favorite place and both kids are with me. I got this letter this morning via e-mail.

Gerds,

I tried calling S13 — no answer. We had enthusiastically agreed that we'd talk and spend time daily: that we'd go running, share meals, maybe regular trips to Nyack for skateboarding, etc — and that we'd talk while he was on (where I am now). All were his ideas, he volunteered them enthusiastically and I simply had to agree enthusiastically. Now, no word. Is he ok? Does he seem to you to have slipped back into his usual disintegrated / dissociative fugue-reality? I find that subhuman reality in him sad and alarming. And it definitively doesn't have to be his reality, his baseline.

I ask because we seriously got close the other day / night. And I felt a great sense of relief, consolation that he was more or less back to the real Leos. What happened that afternoon / night, Gerds, was that we struck a profound reality of intimacy and unguarded openness, unparalleled and unprecedented in our relationship up to that point. He was totally a transformed person —very alive, very engaged, very present. I did not say he was hyper-joyous; rather he was simply aware, wide-awake and present (not once did he go on his phone in 3-4 hours) and he was vital, playful and very loving towards me, in spite of (or perhaps because of) the difficult stuff I was gently and honestly narrating to him about what the future might look like. He was plainly relieved to hear and engage real unequivocal careful and responsible words and not experience more of a yucky undercurrent of ambivalence and doom-narratives. I am sure that amid the recent months — growing of course out of years of non-closure and ambivalence — he's been incubating mental imbalances, on virtue of suppressing, not integrating, what to my mind absolutely requires integrating.

In short, I am convinced it's because he simply could not integrate what he longed to integrate but in fact did integrate for a few hours while we talked and walked: namely the possibility of feeling unguarded unafraid (gushy) love for me without feeling that he was turning against you, AND the possibility of feeling unguarded unafraid love for you without feeling that he was turning against me. He was momentarily in a state of health. It was very obvious.

In other words, his baseline has been for a while psychological disintegration: his baseline entails being captive to some prima facie (and mostly subconscious) traumatic assumption-narration that it would be a dark taboo to love both me and you amid a reality in which there exists an existential gulf between us. This absolutely does not have to be his experience, narrative of life — disintegration and darkness — and I am sure of it because during our several hours of talking and bonding together, L slipped naturally into a place of amazing warmness, freedom, into an acceptance, and he experienced this equanimity while at once experiencing the truth of an existential wedge between his parents.

I conveyed (in plain unequivocal terms) that what flows from me to you is definitively and unequivocally love and appreciation, but that sometimes the inbetweeness of life and marriage demands more than what only love and appreciation can manifest. I merely conveyed to him in plain terms that what's of the essence on my side of things is that I feel (as much as you feel) that I have been materially and spiritually "deprived" around Jones for many years. Whatever the truth of my view and experience of things, I told him that I unequivocally love you (his mother), but that hardly is it possible for me to realize myself — let alone "know" myself — when only one grown up in the family has always had a managerial monopoly over the invisible image, the total overarching gestalt and infrastructure, by which a family organically flows into the future in both material and spiritual ways.

I believe that it was partly my fault for acquiescing for so long the experience of being an emissary of your image and vision of life and partly your fault for cultivating this emissary experience in me. You may see it another way. It's how I experience it.

I did not and never will convey to S13 that really what I feel — probably just as you feel — is that I have been materially and spiritually "mistreated" around (our house) for many years. My experience is that you have always had a very firm and unbroken monopoly and final word over the material and spiritual destiny of householder life — for example, final word over what parenting and education is and how and when it should be conducted and by whom; final word over how and what and when we as a family eat; final word over what does and does not count as leisure, play, recreation and when it will be and for how long and how much money will be allocated to it; final word over how the cabin and the guesthouse will be used and what these homes will look like and when they will be altered and/or not altered and why and by whom; final word, over the question and definition of what material, fiscal and spiritual "scarcity" is and whether or not we are actually (or only imaginarily or psychologically) in a reality of "scarcity."

Gerds, the question of whether there has ever actually been a time in two decades when a fight-or-flight over-anxious war with "scarcity" was not the fundamental reality under our roof is of the essence. My estimate is that a hidden and unremitting affinity for worry and suffering and something of a poverty syndrome and a persecutory syndrome is of the essence of (our home)'s myth and I believe that for this reason it's a maladaptive and dark myth. I am of the belief that our kids and all kids need a better healthier myth.

Anyhow, talking deep and long with S13 the other day for many hours — in which he looked at his phone not once but miraculously purely stayed entirely with our conversation -- was seriously eye-opening: at once heartbreaking, cathartic and healing. He had to have intimated something was up, or possibly he'd been talking to you about what we'd been talking about, namely a transformed reality entailing me not living under (our home)'s roof — since I assume you'll want to stay put at (our home). And however disorienting and painful such a transformed reality will be for all of us — and I am pretty sure you'll discount my following vision of this transformed reality a weird chimera — I believe it's a positive life-affirming decision, and I certainly affirm it as preferable to the long protracted undercurrent of ambivalence, ambiguity and confusion which we're in, and which has got the kids in a holding pattern of emotional confusion and turmoil that I (yes, for their sake) would like put to an end. I had always wanted to end their confusion sooner but had not the financial resources to do it. Finally I borrowed money from (my kids' godfather) and, after meeting with several lawyers and financial advisors and mediators and shrinks I retained a lawyer, (Lawyer's name) — who'll contact you on his own eventually, since it's impossible to work out our fundamental differences without a third disinterested mediator.

I mention and have concluded all this because I believe that trauma and darkness does not have to be S13' and D9's and our baseline condition any longer. Spending that time with S13 the other day proved it to me.

I came to be of the mind that encouraging a fluency and literacy with integrating difficult intractable stuff in life— whether it be consciously exposing oneself to dark movies or dark life — constitutes health and integration and that, by contrast, suppressing and/or exiling from oneself difficult intractable stuff in life constitutes disintegration and the maintenance of trauma, and I hardly want the latter for any of us.

With love,

-H

[sjohns6]

Wow! I feel exhausted after reading that tedious letter. Does he at least TALK normally, or does he use that many words when talking too? If he talked like that I think I'd zone out mid-sentence while listening.

First things first, how you are feeling is completely normal given the circumstances. This IS like BD3. My W has now moved out twice (this one feeling more permanent) and each of them felt like a BD. I can say that the time leading up to the move out was awful. Once out, I was amazed at how much better I felt. I think of it being like how you feel when you get out of town for a bit (like you are now), only at home. I had grown to feel that walk on eggshell feel when being at home regardless of if W was there or not and did not look forward to going home much. Once she moved out it was a huge relief. I did not see it coming. I wanted her to stay and work it out, but her being gone gave me a place of peace again...a daily one. Not a place I had to go on vacation to, but a place of peace within my home. I did not know how much I had missed it until it fell back in to my lap. None of this is to say that I no longer want to repair things between W and I at some point, but it has given me a safe place to heal. I hope that if this plays out for you like your H describes, that this will be your experience too. The way you describe Hs contributions to the family, I tink he will have a rude awakening being out on his own taking care of everything for himself. It might be just what he needs.

Regarding that letter, I think his tone and words suggest that HE felt better after opening up to your S. He had a weight lifted after telling all. He thinks it was S that benefited, but you know better than that after talking with S. It was H who benefited. He gave his justification to S and S didn't run away in tears from the conversation so H thinks he has support and feels vindicated. H is messed up in the head if that's how he views his conversation with S. The fact that he had this level of conversation with S shows how wrapped up in MLC he still is. No one who loves their child dumps that much emotional baggage on the kids and is then proud of it.

Something DNJ said really hit home for me. That I (we) are first, and kids are second. If I am OK then kids will be OK. I really needed to hear that. I have been struggling recently with that exact thing. Feeling bad about my semi-depressed state when the kids were with me. I pushed through but was really hard on myself for not feeling like superdad when I was with the kids. I felt like being with them was my happy place and that I should be enjoying myself when with them. I had been triggered a little bit by W before that so it was reasonable that I was feeling like I did, but I was hard on myself for it. Thank you for that.

Naruto? Thats a pretty popular one. I've watched that with my kids a few times Hope you are having a much better day today with your kiddos at your favorite place!

[DnJ]

Wow what a letter. I almost need a thesaurus to read it, by the way it took three times. It took forever for him to get to the point - he wants to move out. I was surprised he borrowed money and saw a L.

First things first. Gerda I am sorry for you. This is a cowardly hurtful way to deliver he’s news.

H’s recent conversation with S13 looked like he was ramping up to something. S13’s behaviour yesterday is expected from such a talk. Did H speak with D9? How is she doing?

sjohns6 has a clear accurate view on when his spouse left. His post is good advice and some good comfort.

I suspect it will get overwhelming in the next while, if it hasn’t already. Please do not worry, do not be afraid.

Focus on yourself and your kids. Do not beg or plead. Let H do what he needs to do, and let him do the heavy lifting. Don’t worry about his words, even if there are 700 or so. You will be fine.

I am thinking and praying for you and the kids.