Positive developments? #2

[MichelleLT]

Make sure you take care of you.

(((jon)))

[jon2911]

Had a great day involved with a lot of church and work stuff, very good things happening there. Also got a car repair issue taken care of, which I worked on most of the evening yesterday. I hate when mechanics try and screw me over, but I stood up to them and it worked. Feels good.

Deciding to try more contact and see what happens, I called W at 10:15, it sounded like I woke her up. She told me she was up, but had had a very bad day. She was supposed to get lots of projects done with FIL, and didn't take her pain medicine because it makes her loopy. She hates showing him how badly she's really doing, because he just gets mad. He blames me for all her migraines and head trauma pain (she has both). We were in a rollover accident right before getting married, and he blames me because I let her drive. I think the major cause is HIM, but I digress.

Because she didn't take her pain medicine, she ended up in bed all day. He still came over and worked on some things at her apartment for her. I can't help but wonder if one of these "projects" was supposed to be filing for D, but that's idle speculation.

She sounded slurred as she told me this, but it was a nice talk. I asked her how the stepping stones out front I put in for her are, and she said she might need more. Then "don't come and surprise me with them, I can smell your brain burning". I told her I wouldn't do that against her wishes. After that, she fell asleep.

3 different meetings tomorrow, with some close friends, a pastor, my counselor, and then recovery group at night. Interested to see what they say about all this, and my DBing friends here as well.

I might even send her flowers with a "hope you feel better". Not red roses or anything, but she does like tulips. It's nice to be in "what the hell" mode. I mean, what's the worst that could happen? Divorce?

[K4D]

I mean, what's the worst that could happen? Divorce?

Been catching up on your thread. Yes, D is the worst that could happen. But ultimately you are trying to avoid the worst that can happen and prevent the D. It looks to me like you are doing the absolute best you can. And you do appear to have the FIL against you and your M. That is not an easy obstacle to overcome.

I did see where you said that being nice is what got you hear. Being nice is what finally started changing my MIL's heart towards me after over a year of ulginess from her on all levels. She is now thawing. My W is now being nicer over all this month for the first time as well.

DBing isn't about being mean and cold to change your circumstances. It is about being the best you can be as a person to give your M every shot you can to be saved.

Yes, it does include setting boudaries and detaching, but don't confuse that with not being nice. You can be nice and still set those boundaries and detach which would be far more effective in the long run than turning cold and not being nice. Being nice also doesn't mean you are a doormat. That is where boundaries come in.

You can be cheerful and out going to her while setting boundaries which is more effective than just turning cold. I don't think you will be cold though. Anger is normal. This is a hard road. Everyone experiences it from time to time. It is the betrayal and frusturation that isn't ending that brings on the anger. You just have to control it and keep focused on your goals in life. One of them being the most effective way to save your M which I think you already know and are working at.

I can understand your joy of the start up versus the big corporate world. They each have their trade offs and ultimately you have to do what works best for you in that regard.

Here is the thing, even if she does file for D, that doesn't mean it is over. There is still time on your side even if the D gets filed for. I do think filing for D to make taxes easier is about the weakest excuse I have heard, but that is just me.

There isn't alot you can do about FIL. I understand your frusturation with him, believe me I do. But whatever you do, don't criticize him to your W. That won't help matters. And I don't see anywhere that you have which is good.

How is your praying going? Do you pray daily for your M? Do you pray daily for God's will to be done? Do you trust in him? It is hard to keep faith sometimes when everything appears to be against you. Lord I know this. But I would keep it up anyways because you don't know when things can change in the blink of an eye.

I don't know if you have been to rejoiceministries.org. If you haven't, I would encourage you to do so. I think you will get a lot of encouragement from that site.

One of the reasons that I am where I am is because I made so many wrong mistakes in the beginning and for sometime. It is going to be a lot harder of a road to turn that back around because I didn't do what I needed to right off the bat when all of this started happening. I did the complete opposite of what I should have done.

Don't lose heart. It still isn't over. Things can still turn around even against all odds.

One thing I would incorporate if you aren't already is praying and fasting on top of what you are doing to divorce bust.

Kevin

[dday101798]

Hi jon,

Kevin covered a bit of things that I would have said.

But, and I don't think you'll like this, but, in looking at signaure, you've only been married 3 years and seperated 2 of them and filed on twice? That's not good. When I got M'd, everyone kept saying, once you get through the first few years, you're good to go. Low and behold, we had our issues in our 2nd year and thought we'd patched all that up. Ends up being, what happened then, was patched up with duct tape and manifested it'self in with all the more current issues that resulted in D.

So, a lesson learned is that you should always make sure a issue is done with, period.

I haven't had a chance to read up on everything here, can you give a very brief re-cap?

-dylan

[K4D]

dday101798,

It looks like he was only filed on once. And it was dismissed. Ironically, mine was to. To this point I have at times tried to look at the dismissal as a sign from God that if I can just hang in there and really do what I need to do, that it will eventually come back around again.

Maybe Jon would benefit from looking at it that way as well if he hasn't already.

I definitely agree with you that Jon and the rest of us need to make sure issues are completely resolved and not just patched up if this has been happening. Again though, I don't know if this was the case with Jon and his M. I like you want to learn more about his story than what we have so far.

Kevin

[dday101798]

This was in his update post from a few days ago.

Back at my place, she told me that she's decided to file for divorce. We're been separated for over two years, and she's not going to move back. I told her I'm sorry she feels that way, and she said "I'm disappointed too", but that it's too hard to continue doing taxes and details this way. "Wouldn't it be nice to just call each other too see how you're doing, not to check on taxes?"

[K4D]

Oh, you are talking about the first time she filed and now her getting ready to file a second time. I misunderstood thinking you were saying he has already been filed on twice in the past. My bad. I gotcha.

Kevin

[jon2911]

Dylan,
Yes, I was thinking a quick recap would be good. I need to update my sig as well.

W and I started dating in college in 2003. We had common interests, common dreams, and she was one of the first I felt I could be romantic with. It wasn't awkward, it was great. Those were the good times, enjoying each other and getting to know each other.

Then, halfway through that first summer, her head started hurting so badly she ended up in the hospital. I visited her there in disbelief. Friends had warned me that she had bad headaches, and I thought "OK, take and Advil". I had no idea how severe hers would get, and how much they would affect our life.

I went off to Seminary to keep furthering my career, because I could already feel the pressure from my future father-in-law about how much I should be making. I still wanted to work in the church, but thought having a Master's would help make the kind
of money I needed. I buried myself all the more in school to try and make it work.

At the start of 2005, she failed out of her nursing program for the second time. The headaches had grown worse, even with trying every treatment available. Botox ended up helping for a time, but it was $2,000 a pop four times a year, non-insurable.

We moved ahead to marriage in August 2005, and I went, twice because her parents were divorced, to ask for her hand. My C says that there are lies that can permeate marriage, until everything becomes about the lie. My father-in-law told me he would give us his blessing, but "she'll never be happy on a pastor's salary. You need to give that up right now and get a real job."

Her mom told me her side. It was like they both wanted to convince me the divorce wasn't their fault. I could care less. "my husband is a dry alcoholic. He rules his family with all the anger, control and fear his dad used, but thinks he's fine because he's never had a drop. But all the of the damaging patterns are still there." My wife told me not to listen to her. She was the crazy mom who had abandoned her kids.

What FIL said had angered me so much, I thought it was unfair to her and I still do. But everything in our new marriage became about proving it, that she wasn't a spoiled brat, that I could make something of myself. I pushed harder at school, joined a band hoping we would make it big and get rich, all trying to prove FIL wrong.

MIL died 6 months into our marriage, which brought up all the baggage of her parent's D, but we didn't deal with it. Her headaches got worse and worse, and I was growing desperate. I would get through all the interviews and to the last round for a job, and the other guy would get it. Every time. I had never faced rejection like this. School had been easy compared to that.

The more frustrating things got, the more I escaped into my coping mechanisms. Sports on TV. Porn and other things on the Internet. July 2007, Proxy-Connection: keep-alive
Cache-Control: max-age=0

was 3 hours short of my masters and had finally gotten a church job offer, when she told me we were done, got her own apartment and moved out. I couldn't believe it. I gave up all musical pursuits, got a high-paying computer job, and started doing anything she wanted. It worked for little while. We had gotten to the final step of divorce, but she never finished it and we started living together again and reconciling. Then she moved home to Houston March 2008.

Since then, it's been up and down. She'll get miserable and tired of her family, and will start to open up again. We even decided to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas last year together and ditch our families. It was great, and we were seriously talking about her moving back.

Then I lost my job in January, we went through a tax audit in May and June (Kev, go through one of those and you'll understand why she'd use taxes as a reason to D), it's just been a very tough year. I've let it affect my PMA and GAL.

There hasn't been any D talk until now. She's in too much pain to work or do much else. I understand that she's frustrated with the limbo, I am too. I don't want to keep living apart, I want her here. But I'm realizing how much I don't want a D either. I think if she would get help and counseling, it would help with her pain, but she and her family think there's a medical answer for everything.

My C today said "well, I hope she and her father are happy together." He said to not comfort her in this decision, that I've done everything I can. I'm trying to get as many perspectives on this as I can.

Here's the thing, reading your comments Dylan I relate. There's always been a spark between us, it's never gone away. She tries to fight it like crazy. We had a great visit and sex as recently as October. Great talks on the phone this week. She's just still convinced that D is the right thing t

[K4D]

You have had a rough ride in a short and young period of time. I wonder how much of this headache condition is affecting her decisions. Any idea what she is hoping to gain by a D other than tax relief?

Kevin

[jon2911]

Kev,
She seems to want closure. And yes, I think the headaches have a whole lot to do with all of this. But in the end I'm to blame according to FIL.

Firefox cut off the end of that post and added some proxy message. Thread should end "She still thinks D is the right thing, and that's what makes this so painful and confusing".

The other thing I relate to about Dylan's story is how much health issues and a death in the family can bring up things that you thought were dealt with. Maybe that's for the better in the end, if we can work through it. It was a whole lot to overcome early in a M. Maybe that's why I'm still trying so hard, don't feel like we got a fair shot the first time.