how do i keep my hope alive?

[trytryagain]

it could hurt, OTM, since everything out of my mouth to him apparently makes him feel like nothing he does is good enough. i know it wasn't EASY for him to come to this decision (separation), but instead of him telling me how much he's hurting over losing ME, i get to hear about how hurt he is for losing the DOG.

let me tell you how loved that makes me feel!

[Vulcanized]

and as if to prove my point...i got an email from my H today where the entire first paragraph was all about how hard it was for him to have given up the dog (he is staying with me because he is a certified therapy dog and we do therapy visits together several times a month), and how much he loved the dog, and how special the dog was, and how it stung for him to hear from a friend who had seen me post something about the dog on facebook, and to please not let my mom talk badly about my H to the dog, and he knew i would give him a good life...

really, H? it was SO HARD AND PAINFUL for you to give up the dog, yet he could walk away from his WIFE, who he vowed his LIFE TO, like it was nothing more than an every day business transaction??

of course, i did not say that to him. i only responded with sympathy towards his loss and gratitude that he agreed to let me keep the dog. in all honesty, i probably would have let him keep the dog in the end, but he went and got himself another dog weeks ago, so...that is just about where my feeling sorry for him ends. it's just you and me now, dog of mine. i wonder if i have to fill out any legal paperwork to change his last name, too?

Wow, what a turd.

Totally agree with you; how very, very, very difficult for H.

Keep your dog. Especially in light of H getting 'replacement' dog.

I raised H's dog the first 9 months we had her. H worked 12+ hrs a day/6 days a week. I spent every single waking moment w/her. She's totally my girl, but she was H's XMas gift, so technically his. It kills me that H has her. Along w/house, OW, plenty of cake to eat, etc.

You know that your dog will always be true!!!

[idontunderstand]

I'm with you, TTA.

The WAS will take anything that we say and turn it around to make it mesh with their f'd up view of things in their mind. Our feelings mean NOTHING.

Don't give him the satisfaction of knowing he hurt you.

[Vulcanized]

it could hurt, OTM, since everything out of my mouth to him apparently makes him feel like nothing he does is good enough. i know it wasn't EASY for him to come to this decision (separation), but instead of him telling me how much he's hurting over losing ME, i get to hear about how hurt he is for losing the DOG.

let me tell you how loved that makes me feel!

Another thing, duh, how'd I miss this?!? It's jumping off the page, waving a flag & yelling.

Perhaps H is transferring his feelings of loss over you/M to the dog?

[trytryagain]

Another thing, duh, how'd I miss this?!? It's jumping off the page, waving a flag & yelling.

Perhaps H is transferring his feelings of loss over you/M to the dog?

this is a good point, ruined...but while i'm sure some of this is true, my H really, really REALLY REALLY loved our dog. they had a very deep bond and i actually really do feel afflicted at separating the two of them. it was my H's idea. i think it was more like his way of saying, see, i can't be that much of an A-hole if i'm willing to let you keep the dog. or sort of like a condolence...hey, i'm leaving you, and i feel awful about it, so i'm going to let you have the dog.

clearly the animal itself has no say, and i think that given the choice, the dog would have wanted to be with my H. i felt selfish keeping him from his daddy. he's learning to live without him, though, and doesn't sit by the door waiting for my H to come home anymore, but he's not the same dog, either. it's helped me more than i can say to have him in the house waiting for me and i know he'll be fine and that the therapy work we do is important, but...i guess knowing that just doesn't make this any easier.

[trytryagain]

I raised H's dog the first 9 months we had her. H worked 12+ hrs a day/6 days a week. I spent every single waking moment w/her. She's totally my girl, but she was H's XMas gift, so technically his. It kills me that H has her. Along w/house, OW, plenty of cake to eat, etc.

ruined, that's a tough spot to be in...TECHNICALLY, my H is the one who's name is on the adoption papers, so he could have claimed the dog as his own. i really think my H let me keep the dog to make himself feel better about leaving, though. either way, i'll take MY DOG. my H can feel however he wants to feel, that's not really my problem to deal with anymore.

[trytryagain]

had an AMAZING massage last night and spent some quality time with my girls (and a bottle of wine!) before heading back home. sometimes i am SO OK with starting my life over and sometimes...i feel like i'll do anything to avoid going back to that empty apartment (well...the dog is there!). i wish this is something i could just scrub off of my skin once and be done with it, instead of feeling up one minute and down the next for who knows how long.

my rational mind knows i'll be fine and that i'm holding on to thin air at this point...but it's like my H just asked me to stop loving him just like that, and i don't work that way. this is so, so real to me now...i really thought he'd come running back by now, or ask for one last chance, or call me crying about the huge mistake he'd made. i know there's nothing i can do about his being gone but keep living my life and find love again. everything i need to make me happy i already posses within me. but letting go is a very, very difficult and painful thing to do.

[Vulcanized]

my rational mind knows i'll be fine and that i'm holding on to thin air at this point...but it's like my H just asked me to stop loving him just like that, and i don't work that way. this is so, so real to me now...i really thought he'd come running back by now, or ask for one last chance, or call me crying about the huge mistake he'd made. i know there's nothing i can do about his being gone but keep living my life and find love again. everything i need to make me happy i already posses within me. but letting go is a very, very difficult and painful thing to do.

Absolutely. I feel the same. Much as I'd like to be w/H, that isn't an option right now. At this point, I gotta be the one that loves me, much like all of us in these crummy sitches.

I think the path back to reconciliation/M is contingent on loving yourself first. Begging, pleading, reasoning, etc. WAS to reconsider definitely not the way to go. I gave up the hope that H would see the error of his ways and ask for another chance months ago. It may happen down the line, but I'm not holding my breath waiting for it.

Now, I'm walking my path, he's walking his and perhaps they will re-converge in the future. And that is applicable to you as well. You have the right attitude. The bolded above - right on. You get it. That statement, that truth alone is proof that you will be ok, either with your H or without your H. I think that is the powerful force that just may help H find you again!

[trytryagain]

had a bit of a rough night last night...i was supposed to meet up with friends, but i cancelled and lied about why. i stayed home and read, watched mad men until 2am, and gorged myself on old notes and letters from my H that i keep in a box under the bed. i went to sleep with an ice pack on my face, my eyelids were so swollen.

bad choice, i know. backsliding, i know. i've just felt so numb to what's going on around me lately, that it actually felt GOOD to feel SOMETHING, even though it was pain.

i thought a lot about my H and about our M. i've come to the conclusion that this really isn't about me at all...it's about him. it's always been about him. my H isn't a bad person, and i know he never set out to break my heart this way...but he's never really been fully present in our M. for the last 5 years, i've sat across the table from him, and i would look at him and think, who is this stranger, who is this person, and feel like i didn't know the first thing about him. as well as you know someone, sometimes you don't know them at all. i think my H's intentions were good (although they say the road to hell...), and i think that at the beginning, my H thought he was capable of being in a solid, happy M. what both of us forgot was that my H is not one who likes to be tied down. the last 6 months or so, the conversations about mortages and down payments and babies, i think all that did was point out to my H that he was a glaring failure at giving me the "normal life" that i wanted.

he's always been one to cut and run when things got too complicated...i've mentioned before on this thread that this is the 4th time we've broken up in 5 years together, all initiated by him. every time, he'd come running back. not this time. perhaps this time he's realized what i've always seen and never wanted to admit: that while he loves me, that love also weighs him down and forces him to admit failure, time and time again. and not just failure with our M. failure with his businesses, failure with his jobs...failure with him living up to who i wanted him to be. this isn't about the fact that i nagged him to quit smoking or that we would fight about money from time to time, or that he left his dirty socks on the floor one too many times.

we got down to the wire, to the BIG QUESTION of starting a family, and i think he saw that as the final failure, the final way to disappoint me and let me down. i think he saw the finality of having children and came to his senses about who he is. the sh*tty thing is that he used ME as the scapegoat, trying to justify all this by saying that we just couldn't work things out, we just weren't meant to be together, i needed too much from him, he couldn't be the person i needed/wanted him to be...but i think he is just scared out of his mind to take on the responsibility of being someone's father and being fully, completely, utterly accountable for a life outside of his own.

for years i've felt like my H kept me at arm's length. i was close enough to feel close, but not so close that i could see his cards. he never fully surrendered to loving me because that kind of love scares him...because he's never had it. he told me over and over that he tried so hard to make things work, to make me happy, but it was always on the surface and never what i really wanted. sure, the movies and the day trips on the bike were nice, the dinners at home, the flowers...but what i always wanted was a H who was fully present for me. who would linger in bed with me on saturday mornings instead of jumping out of bed to get to his office. who would lay in the grass in the shade with me on a blanket, and just read or enjoy a quiet picnic lunch...instead of someone who insisted that he hated grass and couldn't be bothered to put his iphone down.

i know this is long and probably boring to most everyone but me, but it's nice to get it out on "paper" after milling it around in my head all night. my H has been telling me since january that i may not see it now, and it may hurt now, but that this will be best for both of us in the long run. that it's best that we split now before we have children and property to argue over. i guess i should be grateful that he's finally come to terms with who he is and who he's not, and what he's capable of giving me. it saddens me, though, to know that he may go through life never fully surrendering to that kind of love, never fully letting another person posses his heart, or understand his soul as they do their own. it's silly but i was watching mad men last night until the wee hours of the morning and i so often see things in the main character, don draper, that i see in my H. and in the episode i saw last night, someone said to him, the only thing stopping you from being happy is the feeling that you're alone (despite him having a beautiful, loving wife and doting children and a successful career and the admiration of his peers and colleagues). and he said, but what if i am? i have to wonder if my H feels that way...that even when he's with other people, he is alone in all of this. i get that sense from him and it breaks my heart.

it helps curb the anger and the "how could you's" when i look at it this way and when i see his suffering instead of my own. i miss him every minute of every day...my heart breaks for him time and time again. he told me not long ago that he wished he could be "normal" and just live life the way everyone else seemed content to do. but that's not who he is, and i can't be mad about that and the greatest way for me to love him and honor who he is is to let go with both hands and let him fly away.

[trytryagain]

interesting weekend...went out with my girls on friday night and ended up having to ask my H via text message if he could leave the bar he was at. i had plans to meet about 20 people there (which i mentioned to my sister in the elevator which was overheard by a mutual friend of both my H and I who lives in my building and was on the elevator with us), and later got a call from this mutual friend that my H and his buddy were already up at that bar and had asked him to join them. so he wanted to avoid any awkward run in business. my H had no way of knowing i was planning on being there, but i couldn't ask 20 people to relocate because i didn't want to run into him, so it got a little weird.

he texted me about 30 minutes after i asked him if he and his 2 friends could go somewhere else, saying that he had left. he also said something along the lines of "so i guess this is where it gets strange." i answered back that i thought it was pretty strange before. tried to have a good time when i went out that night, but he was weighing pretty heavily on my mind.

i emailed him saturday morning to say i was feeling weird about asking him to leave and to let him know a good friend of ours had recently had her baby. i also said "i miss you" in the email...his response was a one sentence reply: yeah i saw the baby, cute, no worries about the other night, none of this is easy.

no mention of missing me, no acknowleding that i'd even said it. i don't know what i expect from him at this point, but i've tried every other approach, so i thought maybe i'd reach out to him and let him know how much i miss him...and i got nothing in return. who is this man? who is this person who can walk away from me and not look back, who can promise me years and years together and let it all slip away and leave me to start all over again? who is this man who swore to protect me and to make me feel safe, who can turn around and be the one to hurt me so much?

i cried a lot this weekend. A LOT. took some codine to get to sleep on saturday, but all that did was make me feel sick. i don't want to have to worry all the time about being out and running into him. i don't want to have to worry about seeing him on a date or with another woman on the back of his motorcycle some day. i want him to move far away, so i don't have to think about him, or talk to him, or maybe one day run into him.

how do you get to a point in your life when someone who was once the center of your gravity becomes a distant stranger?