She got a price change by raising the deductible, and had decided that she didn't want to pay so much so she might drop herself from the insurance and go to the free clinic. We're talking $150 per month here.
For Pete's sake. Does she think the free clinic does appendectomies? Or cancer chemotherapy???? Stuff happens to people and it is just crazy to go without at least catastrophic coverage. To protect YOURSELF financially, I suggest you make sure she stays insured until you are divorced.
Jack is right, and that is my downfall in life. Needy, afraid, controlling, victim. When I pick myself up out of that place things work for a while, but being 'alone' with no friends to talk to causes me to fall back into it again.
That's why I fail. That's why my marriage is over.
I know eventually I'll find my way out of this place of fear and doubt and hurt. It's going to take a long time.
Yesterday afternoon W was taking with D17 and let her know that we were 'having problems' because D17 asked her why we were acting so 'weird'.
Later, she told me we have to tell the kids soon. Said she was uncomfortable pretending and unlike 'last time' she wanted to actually DO something, move forward, take action. She felt that she had NOT done anything 2 years ago, or the time before that, because she had no confidence in herself and she needed to do something now instead of wait around.
She told me she knew a woman who would rent her a room and she was going to look into it. She wasn't sure when she would be able to move but was looking at any options.
I'll skip the details of the talk and just include highlights. Most of the time she was calm and not emotional.
- W is angry and hurt that we weren't able to make it work.
- I told her that I had seen our counselor and that she had said that I was suffering from anxiety / traumatic stress and had needed help. I had been waiting for W to help because I didn't realize that our dynamic was such that I needed to help MYSELF. Counselor had said that with help we could have gotten through this.
- W said she was sorry that she was such a damaged person and couldn't do anything to help me, but she had told me I needed to get help but I didn't listen.
- I explained about the fears, anxiety, shame, etc. and how it kept me frozen.
- W said that she wanted an emotional connection that has been missing between us and she has no faith it will ever be there. She has no faith that if we were to work on the marriage that it wouldn't just go back to the way it was after we get comfortable. It always has.
- Of course I said we weren't in the same place at the same time, that I didn't realize what I myself needed to do. I showed her my cell phone calls and told her about each person I know now from helping them on the board and that I've been reaching out for support, something different than I've done before.
- She feels that she can't open her heart to me again. She has no trust any more. She is making 'connections' with others and it feels better than being in this house. She's been unhappy in this house for a long time.
- She says she isn't looking for anyone because she feels like she needs to spend some time with herself. Her 'friend' is something she couldn't explain because she says it started out 'flirty' but is now just some kind of friendship she can't explain but says it's not anything more than that. She didn't meet up with anybody on her trip, she spent it alone as she had planned.
That was around dinner time. She said she didn't want to talk any more and left to go see her friend down the street. When I said we should tak because this is the first time she and I have communicated she accuse me of controlling her, of trying to get her to feel emotions and cry because "that's what I always do".
D17 came in and told me she loved me and gave me a hug. She was visibly upset so I asked her to sit down.
She did and I asked her what's bothering her. She then starts to cry and says "I wish you and mom would just get divorced already because I hate all this pretending. We don't do anything as a family any more and it's uncomfortable. You're never going to make things work so get it over already". I decided to try to explain where things were with me and started to tell her about how the events 2 years ago had really worn me down and as soon as I started to talk she started to yell "I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ANY MORE SOB STORIES! I'M TIRED OF IT!"
I was calm and said to her that I'm not telling a sob story I'm explaining why I was so out of it for the past many months and she got up and was hysterically yelling "I don't care any more!" and started to walk away. I told her to stop and sit down and calm down and she just kept being hysterical and I stood in front of her and told her she needed to calm down.
She decided she didn't have to talk to me and tried to walk around me or otherwise leave. As I kept telling her to stop it and sit she kept telling me she didn't have to and screaming until W came downstairs to see what is going on.
I told her that I was handling it and D17 was being rude and I was telling D17 to sit down. I kept repeating myself and W was telling me I was wrong to be telling her she had to 'sit down and listen to me'. Well, W has always stuck up for the kids if I use a loud voice or do anything that might be 'scary'. So I told he that, that she has done that for years and it undermines any authority I have. If I EVER raise my voice to the kids I have always been yelled at for it.
D17 meanwhile is giving me an evil 'F - you' look and I'm losing any control of the situation. D17 finally sits and starts going on about "Why won't you guys get a 'f-ing' divorce because we're all tired of living like this."
W is 'calm' and looks at me and I'm not calm any more. The earlier talk with her, and the hysterics of D17 just are overwhelming to me. I look at W and I say "I hope you're happy, you win. You got everybody to want a divorce". Probably shouldn't have, but it doesn't matter any more.
So we all calmed down and sat with D17 (D12 is at a friends house). W is calm, I am calm. She explains that it's over and we're working out how to split it up. I sat next to D17 and put my arms around her while we talked. we both tell her we love her and after a little while more she goes to bed.
There was a lot more to the conversation, but the general story is that D17 is upset, I talk to her, thinking that if I explain the past year as it related to me that it will give her some perspective, she loses it and gets hysterical, I try to get her to stop and it turns into a clash of wills, W comes into the mess, D17 pushes more buttons and we end up talking about the divorce.
I went in the living room and sat down. I was totally angry and hurt and just feeling lost.
First of all, I'm so sorry about that whole interchange and how it must have made you feel. Talk about the ugly side of divorce.
I really don't think your wife has convinced your daughter that the two of you should get divorced, or that divorce is a good thing. You have three competing desires taking place in that conversation, in that house.
Wife: wants freedom Daughter: wants peace and a real family Frank: wants his marriage and his family
Your wife, in typical WAS fashion, has convinced herself that true happiness and freedom cannot be had within the bonds of matrimony with you. So she wants a divorce. But can I tell you Frank, her words to you, if you've shared them somewhat accurately, don't sound like absolutes to me. Only when you PUSH do her desires start sounding like absolutes. When she shares FREELY, without competing pressure from you, her words sound like a lost person who would like to be found. I don't say this to offer a strange form of hope. I'm just sharing my observation.
Your daughter wants a normal family, or at least as normal a family as possible. She's been through this once before too, and clearly is not looking for a repeat performance. She has shared comments before that make it clear she sees her Mom as the one with the issues that are negatively impacting the normal family that she wants. Now you start sharing about YOUR problems and YOUR needs and she's losing the one person who was SOLID for her. You can't do that with her. She may need to know what's going on between the two of you, but SHE DOES NOT NEED to see her Dad as yet another weak link in the family. It makes her insecure, and it scares her.
And you Frank, you want to stay married to the woman you love. As much as you try to detach emotionally, you get easily sucked back into trying to FIX your relationship. YOU KNOW that you can't do it, but the person you are inside insists that it must be possible. You agreed before that these relationship talks were unproductive and caused you to spin. And here you are in them again.
What a terrible experience to have to go through for not only you, but your daughter too. My guess is that your wife was wholly unaffected by the events. She likely saw last night as the next step to her freedom and a necessary event in the natural order of things. What a shame that she cannot see past herself, but that is her current state.
So what to do Frank?
Your wife said she is looking in to an apartment. I think this is a VERY GOOD thing. Let her continue this, facilitate it if there is any way you can. The two of you need to be apart. This is NOT working out together. Can I keep you from getting too hopeful if I say that I see the chances of a positive outcome being more likely if she leaves than if she stays? Please don't latch on to that last statement.
Most importantly, your daughter now knows, which means your other daughter will know soon enough. You and your wife now have an extremely important task to handle. The two of you must find a way to live at PEACE with each other. To maintain the normalcy of the home for as long as possible so that your children can process through this at their own pace.
I'm sorry Frank. I hate that you had such an emotionally wrenching evening with your daughter, whom I know you love.
This is not the end. And you do NOT have to be lost. If I had posted this thread TO YOU, you would know JUST what to tell me to do. Think about it.
Blessings,
Bill
"Don't tell me the sky is the limit when there are footprints on the moon."
W came into the living room and asked me if I wanted her to sleep in the guest bedroom.
I said I don't know. she came and sat down in the leather chair across from the couch. I asked her not to sit there right now because the situation is reminding me of when she came back from connecticut and told me all about how she was in love with OM.
I said please sit on the couch. She looked at me and said she didn't think she could talk to me since everything reminds me of past hurts.
I said that it wasn't everything, I said that right now I am feeling those feelings again so please sit on the couch.
She did, we talked.
- I said I was sorry for not handling D17 very well. I said that I was still raw and when she got hysterical I wasn't calm.
- She said she understood and that she knew we would all be happier after we go through this. She said she has a 'vision' of me being much happier in a year from now. That I won't be able to be happy or 'fix myself' while we are together and that neither will she.
- She said her life needs to go in this new direction. That she loves me enough to let me go and be happy.
- She feels like she is making connections with 'others' and she doesn't want to hurt me so it's better if she isn't with me. She says she knew I was hurt when she made connections with men friends.
- She says she feels like there are two souls inside her, one is the W who has been in love with me all these years but is not strong enough, and the other is the strong one who keeps telling her she needs to move on and do the things she was meant to be doing on her own. The strong one was the one who gave her the strength when she was 14 or so to stop drinking and doing drugs and she almost became a nun. But she met me and the 'other one' fell in love and has been suppressing the strong one. The strong one has tried to get her to go 3 times now and she hasn't listened to her because the one who was 'in love' with me was in charge but now the strong one is, which is why she is calm and determined to go now.
- She says she is sorry that it's taken 3 different times but she hasn't had the faith in her 'strong soul' to actually do it until now.
- She said that she was strong the past year, she kept the kids out of my hair and gave me 'space' hoping I would fix myself. She said that took all her strength to do and it's clear to her that it didn't work. Maybe she should have done more but she thinks that was what she was supposed to do. She also said that when we went to marriage counseling she was also trying to make it work but it didn't. (We didn't go very many times and I explained that to her, and that I wasn't in my strongest place at the time. she doesn't care)
- She just doesn't believe we should be together. Neither of us will ever heal while we're together, and both our lives are meant to go separate ways. She says she can't say she doesn't love me any more, she always will because that never goes away. For the most part she feels like I'm always going to be in this needy / emotional place with her, and we'll never change as long as we're with each other.
- No amount of counseling will make a difference because she is just done, not willing to put any effort into our marriage any more. She thinks I try to control her and her feelings.
- But she wants to be friends. I told her that as soon as she is in any kind of dating I couldn't be a friend because it would hurt me and I wasn't going to go through that again like I did 2 years ago. She agreed that as long as she lived with me she would respect my boundary and that she was really 'getting' that she needed to spend some time with herself anyway and not dating. She feels that when she moves out she is not 'married' and can date if she feels like it. I told her at that point we would not be friends. Friendly yes, not friends.
- She asked about sleeping in the same bed until she moves and I said I was still ok with it, I joked that I miss having any physical contact since I don't get hugs or anything from anyone because all my friends live far away, and that sometimes at night she rolls onto me and it's the closest I get to a hug from anyone. She said she was lucky she has friends close to her. She asked me if she could give me a hug then and I said that if she wasn't feeling sorry for me that would be ok, she responded that she often hugs her friends when she's feeling like they need it. I declined the hug saying I don't want to be receiving because I'm needy, but because she just feels like giving it.
- I said it was ok to touch me or hug me if she felt like it in the future but right then I'm feeling like it's forced and I'm uncomfortable with that.
- When we went to bed she reached over and touched me on the head and said good night.
So, I see how needy I was, and how scared I was to lose control. After she hurt us with her affair I was the one who put the most effort into fixing it, and later into getting the reconciliation to work. But as we all know I slowly slipped into being needy and scared and anxiety. I didn't believe she would stay and she didn't.
I really think I'm most of the reason this didn't work. It takes two to be sure, but she did the best she could and now she's still doing what she thinks is best. Her calm and resolve and my hurt and fear are opposites. I'm codependent, insecure and afraid of losing her.
Maybe she will get a room to rent and move out sooner. That will probably be better and make it easier to let go than it is now. She doesn't think I'll keep the house very long and maybe she's right. she seems to be right about a lot of things that I don't want to be true.
I'm a mess, and I didn't take care of myself. My marriage is over, my kids are broken hearted and my W loves me but sees no reason to try any more. Her heart is closed and she wants someone else to show up in her life who doesn't have these issues.
I talked to D17 this morning. She understands that I love her and her mom and that I'm going to be all right so we'll have a decent life. she figures she'll only be around for a year till she graduates from high school anyway and she'll do something with her life. I told her she should plan on going to the local community college for a couple years and she doesn't have to decide right now.
When she shares FREELY, without competing pressure from you, her words sound like a lost person who would like to be found. I don't say this to offer a strange form of hope. I'm just sharing my observation.
I don't take it as hope but I do believe you're right in your observation.
Your daughter wants a normal family, or at least as normal a family as possible. She's been through this once before too, and clearly is not looking for a repeat performance. She has shared comments before that make it clear she sees her Mom as the one with the issues that are negatively impacting the normal family that she wants. Now you start sharing about YOUR problems and YOUR needs and she's losing the one person who was SOLID for her. You can't do that with her. She may need to know what's going on between the two of you, but SHE DOES NOT NEED to see her Dad as yet another weak link in the family. It makes her insecure, and it scares her.[/quote] Yes, I understand that. I won't do it again.
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And you Frank, you want to stay married to the woman you love. As much as you try to detach emotionally, you get easily sucked back into trying to FIX your relationship. YOU KNOW that you can't do it, but the person you are inside insists that it must be possible. You agreed before that these relationship talks were unproductive and caused you to spin. And here you are in them again.
Yes, well it won't happen any more. I give up.
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What a terrible experience to have to go through for not only you, but your daughter too. My guess is that your wife was wholly unaffected by the events. She likely saw last night as the next step to her freedom and a necessary event in the natural order of things. What a shame that she cannot see past herself, but that is her current state.
You're guess is right, she only had a few tearful moments in our later talks but they were when she was talking about how hurt she was when she was 'trying to make it work'.
I guess you're also right that she cannot see 'past herself'. She sees no hope any more and right now neither do I.
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Your wife said she is looking in to an apartment. I think this is a VERY GOOD thing. Let her continue this, facilitate it if there is any way you can. The two of you need to be apart. This is NOT working out together. Can I keep you from getting too hopeful if I say that I see the chances of a positive outcome being more likely if she leaves than if she stays? Please don't latch on to that last statement.
Yeah, I think this is best also.
A positive outcome might be that we're happier apart and I guess I can accept that. Still, she probably won't be moving before March 1st if this 'room for rent' is available.
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Most importantly, your daughter now knows, which means your other daughter will know soon enough. You and your wife now have an extremely important task to handle. The two of you must find a way to live at PEACE with each other. To maintain the normalcy of the home for as long as possible so that your children can process through this at their own pace.
Yeah, I lost it last night. That can never happen again.
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I'm sorry Frank. I hate that you had such an emotionally wrenching evening with your daughter, whom I know you love.
My heart is so broken over this. I have been crying all morning. It's all my fault, I've been so hurting for so long I just can't do this any more.
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This is not the end. And you do NOT have to be lost. If I had posted this thread TO YOU, you would know JUST what to tell me to do. Think about it.
