So XH is on to GF#2 - to describe her would be a blonde me. She is a professional, loves swimming, has one son, owns a home....seems normal. So, the pain is different from GF#1 - who was just WRONG in every aspect.
Anyway, what does it really matter? He's gone and he's not mine. He has moved on and has had multiple opportunities to "start over." Me - I've been working the last 2+years "finishing" parenting our son and trying to keep things together for the other kids.
So, what's wrong with me? I don't know why this anger keeps surging - I feel like it all has been so easy for him and so difficult for me. I'm fed up with it! I actually had a dream last night of him leaving me and I woke up crying!!! It has to stop! But the embarrassment, the humiliation just keeps surfacing!
What am I doing wrong?
M-48/XH-48 M=25/T=28 years Ds-24,22/S-18 D - 3/11 A Day at a Time
You know what I think is hard for us LBS is how we were comfortable in our lives, especially after being with someone for so long. IB 28 years is a LONG TIME. I was with mine 21. I was comfortable and settled, though I now our marriage needed help.
They uproot, and just move on like all those years together never happened or matters at all to them. Or they uproot and start on with someone else and still act like they wants us in their lives in every sense of the word except living together and sex.
Well given he's on to GF #2, what do you think that says about him?
What does it say about you, who's been at home making sure your children are loved, cared for and nutured while he's flaunting about with other women?
IB, he chose to walk away from his responsibilty. You chose to walk straight up to not only your responsibility,(not that you ever walked away) but his too and take it by the horns and DEAL WITH IT. Your anger keeps surfacing because its not fair! I mean come on, look at what these MLCers have done to everyone in their prior lives?
I've felt this too so much.I have been so angry for so long. I knew it was eating me alive and prayed for God to help me get through this so I could let it go. It's taken a while, but somehow my thoughts started to shift and I started to see XH and how he's living his life very differently. I no longer see someone that's out there living the high life, throwing caution to the wind and just higher than a kite. I now see someone that's made some choices that really are starting to come back on him and his life isn't so grand after all.
At least from what I've heard, his life doesn't sound all that gratifying or happy, at least I know I sure wouldn't be happy if that were me!
IB, Kimmerz posted a very good posting. But, I would like to add that there are going to be days for quite a while that the anger will bubble up. It's all part of the grieving process. You will bounce back and forth through the grieving steps, just as he has done in the mlc. Accept the anger and release it as quickly as you can. You do not want to get stuck along the way and become a bitter person.
As Kimmerz pointed out...what does it say about him if he's moved on the GF #2?
Take the time you need to work through your anger and then find one thing each day to smile about...soon you'll be smiling all day and every day about something that could be as small as a toothpick, but it meant something to you in a special way.
What you are experiencing is all about growth and you are growing each and every day.
Sit quietly, the answers will reveal themselves when you least expect them to. The past is gone, the present is a gift and you need to focus on today, allow the future to reveal itself when it is ready.
Agreed. You're not doing anything wrong. Eventually the anger goes away. I still have days when I am angry, but I also realize that I can rest easy with my life choices. I did my very best.
You're pretty early in the process. It takes a while for the facade to come down. It did for X, and it came down hard and horrible. I have felt sorry for him now.
And as far as the kids...at first I wanted more time to do what I wanted. But that changes so quickly. D is more independent every day, and I want to spend more time with her. X is busy with New Woman and saving her, and is losing time w/D every day. When he turns around, she'll be a teen and won't want to be with him.
Work on yourself. Learn, grow, think about what you want from next R. You are going to be fine.
M: 16 years Bomb 4/07 OW 20s long gone Divorced 11/09 I remarried New Guy Cooperative r w/X regarding D
Yes this anger will still come up, I think that's inevitable. But as you heal, the anger will become less and less. When it does come up, it will only stay for a short time, and then be gone.
I think the best thing we can do for oursevles is give ourselves permission to grieve. Give ourselves permission to let the emotions wash over us, and we take the time we need to sort through it all. And accept it's going to take a long time to work through this and don't fight it. It's ok to grieve.
Sometimes I've thought that the WAS seems to engage the LBS in some sort of game of "one up man ship" as to who's life is better by who does the best GAL things. Or maybe we the LBS tend to do that given how we look at their lives at face value. I know that's how I felt. But then when you realize what their lives really are about and what their priorities are, compared to what your priorities and life is about.....well I choose the LBS as the best candidate. Personally I'd rather have my life about the ones I love, raise my children to the best of my ability and live an authentic life with integrity and truth, compared to riding inmature high's of blowing money and fornicating with new people.
Learning to let go and accept that their train of thoughts and thinking are very abnormal really helps.In fact this morning I was thinking about XH and how irrational he acts, and once again was questioning if I missed something. So I went back and read old texts from a few weeks ago. NOPE! IT AINT ME!
Seriously, if we knew for a fact that someone else was diagnosed with bi polar disorder, schizophenia, etc, it would be much easier to accept that behavior without behing offended or angered wouldn't it?
And to be truthful...getting a little info on the side to indicate that their lives aren't going so great, is self satisfying and helps boost our ego's a bit. I admit it did mine...for a short time. Just be quiet, and listen. Stand back and be objective, as if he were not your husband and put the pieces together. Your perspective will change!
Ego boost or not, I started to feel sorry for him. Then I felt glad I felt sorry for him because that proves that I have EMPATHY. You will too IB, it just takes time.
What a wonderful post, just what I have been struggling with in my own situation. I did look at his life at face value, seeing that he has someone and I am choosing to be alone right now. But then I realized he is spending all his time with her talking about or to me, his lies to her about his history and lifestyle-she doesn't even know the real man I had for all those years. She only knows the alien shell of depression and anger. (The little info on the side in which I became the other woman was a real eye opener as you said.) So I am being quiet and continuing to listen and laugh at some of the antics.
But for a time I wondered if I was the crazy one as he said. When one of his oldest friends came to me and said he is off his rocker, I felt so vindicated. But now I feel only a bonecrushing sadness for him while I wait for his world to implode further so that the fallout does not destroy me as well.
professor.....it's difficult when you know someone is on a smear campaign against you.But remember YOUR TRUTH. If over the course of time you realize maybe he was correct about some things, this is ok. We're not perfect. It helps you put things in perspective.
Ok professor, stand back and look at that objectively. If he were to come back to you with all of his drama in tow, all the anger, depression, fights, cycling, and circular arguments, would you be making any progress in the relationship? How would it get any better if you were just going back to the same thing?
Well it wouldn't. I firmly believe that it takes two to make it or break it. If one of the two is NOT on the same page, it won't work when it comes to relationship problems as intense as MLC.
Even though the rejection we may feel when the WAS leaves us for someone else, we MUST remember the REALITY of what was going on with our relationship. And Must REMEMBER that just because they have someone else DOES NOT mean that they're not the perfect person we hoped they'd be and all because they found someone else....even if they're acting like it. They're hauling their emotional baggage right along with them and creating even more by the choices they're making now.
Be glad you're away from the drama and if you want to become the best and healthiest you can be, stay away from the relationship.
We can still care, we can still pray and we can still have hope for that other person, but we do it from afar.
You have every right to feel the way that you feel, just don't get bogged down in it. I still wake up at night angry and wishing I'd said this or that to him. In the end, would it have made a difference? Nope. He wasn't listening anyway. Sometimes taking the high road, and keeping to the high road, is a biotch. I know I myself would like to light a bag of doggy doo on his front doorstep and yell FIRE.
Kimmerz put it very succinctly. I too feel the anger from time to time. At this point, the anger comes for a very brief period of time and then it's gone. I smile so much people have asked if there is something wrong with me or if I'm on medication
Quote:
Personally I'd rather have my life about the ones I love, raise my children to the best of my ability and live an authentic life with integrity and truth, compared to riding inmature high's of blowing money and fornicating with new people.
That's worth reading again.
Grieving takes a while. Let it. Don't shortcut it and have to deal with it later. Deal with it now and get it done.
Sometimes, when I think I'm not making progress, I take a breath and look at things differently. Kind of like a stock market graph. I find there are ups and downs, but that the trend is upward overall. For me, grieving has been kind of like that. Coupled with trying to parent, work, live a life, etc., it's been difficult to do all of that at once. Give yourself time and let go of the expectations while you accept and deal.
It gets much much better as you will see sooner than you think.
Oh, and when the anger comes up, try to challenge it and think about why you are feeling that way. Sometimes, it is nothing to do with ex but you take it out on them like a punching bag. When you challenge the reason you are angry, you often find it diminishes more quickly. Might work for you too.
AJ
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter" MLK Put the glass down... "Yesterday I was clever so I wanted to change the world Today I am wise, so I am changing myself."
