Divorcebusting.com Forums Open Forums Midlife Crisis To agree to a D or not..... that is the question

ACJ

You could nicely ask in the next email..

This is for xyz

H.. when I send an email about the kids could you personally
send a reply so that I know You rec'd it
simple as yes, no, thanks...


My H will send.

Noted

i hate that with a passion. But he has sent things and I did not get them and he realizes that when I do email it is only about the kids so he is kind enough to say thanks or noted.

it may not be that day but will be with in 48 hrs.

hb2

HB2 I have already tried your good suggestion to no avail. It's like if he doesn't reply I don't exist. Unfortunately b/c it's only ever about the children it feels like they don't exist either.

TL thanks for your wishes for my D18.

There are two people missing this morning at this momentous point in my life. H & D18! She went out with her BF last night and stayed out. I'm disappointed but she is officially an adult now so there didn't seem any point in making a fuss. I have to learn to take a back seat in her life w/o it hurting.

She is officially 18 and 1 hour old I probably won't see her until lunch time as she is having her hair and nails done this morning. All that matters is that she enjoys her day but I have to admit I'm feeling a little bit sorry for myself. H and I should be celebrating our 'achievement' of raising her into a beautiful young woman. I feel very alone today.

Hopefully the day will get better. I think I'll be exhausted before it even gets to her party as I've so much to do before my house guests arrive. Typically there is no here to help me either. Well S15 is here but I don't suppose he will get up until midday

Don't suppose I will have time to come back here today I hope you all have a good day.

Alison- those apron strings ! you will find they are not cut just loosened off. My children are older but they still need me and we are v close even my son who turns 30 this year.
I hope you all have a wonderful party and enjoy your visitors.
If H is a no show then thats his loss.
I have lots of first time alone experiences and it gets easier. I can't lie and say it doesn,t hurt but I no longer let it detract from the joy I feel.
My sons' graduation, d's wedding, birth of our first grandchild all times I wanted him with me but hey I survived. You will too.
I hope you dance and don't even have time to remember all those what ifs.

I hope you have lots of fun today, Alison! You are right: it IS a great achievement, whether or not H is there.

N

If it were me, I would let him go alone to parents evening.

I would also encourage your children to e-mail / write directly to their father themselves.

I really wouldn't bother. If he wants to know he should ask. Why should you 'force feed' him information about his children.

I think you need to drop the rope with this man.

SERIOUSLY.

Cat is right, let him go.


He is fighting to make you hear that he wants a divorce, If you hear him and give him what he wants, he may well find that he got what he wanted and he still feels no better.

It is difficult where children are concerned but at 15, your son is old enough to have his own relationship with his father in a way that both of them see fit.

Nutty

happy bday to your D ACJ))))))))))))

Try to keep H out of the equation when a landmark comes up, like this one. Look at the (sorry!) glass as half full. You have a lovely daughter and you are there to celebrate her life and that is what counts right now.

I remember one thing my father told me oen day, that each time he'd talk to my sis (whom we hadn't seen for years and had move with her H and kids to another country) he'd picture her as an 8yr old with pigtails, she was always his little girl. So, there she is , 18yrs old, but still your little girl

Sweety wishing you a wonderful day with your daughter ! Happy Birthday to her ! xxx

Hi, I hope you have a great day. Your h is certainly in denial. I never heard of anything so silly as not going to parents evening. Hardly someone who is detached is it??

ugs, A

Ang.....

The wine is showing

You should drink some outside in like 90 degree weather....then hit the air conditioning

WARNING VERY VERY LONG POST

Thank you so much for all your kind thoughts and best wishes for D18.

Her party went really well. H did turn up with MIL & BIL. They stayed a decent amount of time so that was also good. I had a giggle to myself at one point. I got up to dance with D18, it turned out that as I stood on the dance floor I was right in the eye line of H. He knew this b/c I saw him look. Then he moved behind a pillar and stayed there all night

The day however wasn't all roses. When H came round with her gift her also asked to speak to me. It was about S15. We talked for well over an hour. The longest convo we have had since he left. We agreed that things weren't working out with S15 living here with me. He wanted me to tell S15 by myself that we had decided that he should go live with H (if only temporarily). I said I wasn't prepared to do that unless H was present at the time I did. IMO S15 needed to know that we were both singing off the same hymn sheet and that this wasn't a punishment that I was giving out. At this point H refused to be there. At one point he also told me that if S15 gets into trouble with the police again he will be applying for custody of S15 as I clearly cannot cope. That was the only time I felt threatened. More about this later. I have to get this down chronologically.

My parents arrived and my mum helped me finish off tidy the house ready for my brother and his family (including his dog) arriving.

My brother and his family arrived. My niece (true to form) never cracked a smile all evening. She is 14 (just) so quite close in age to D12. D12 had arranged to get ready for the party with two of her friends who had been invited and her plan was that her cousin would join in with that. My niece had different ideas and then sulked even more when D12 carried out her plans. She wouldn't eat the food I had prepared despite being told by both me and her mother that there wasn't food at the party and so if she didn't eat there would be nothing until breakfast time on Sunday. She had brought her new SLR digital camera with her so I jovially said that's great N14 you can be the official photographer for the evening. She groaned, pulled a face and then went and sat and cried.

I was late arriving for the party b/c S14 and his GF took my brother's dog for a walk, decided they would call at GFs to let her get ready for the party and then had to come back to get S15 ready.

My brother sat and sulked all night. At 10.15 he asked for my keys so that he could bring his family home as they had had enough. I gave them to him. I had gone with my parents so that I could have a drink but was hoping my brother would give D12 a lift home as the friends she had gone with were being picked up at 11pm. I just made a simple comment to my mother that the children and I would get a taxi home as there wouldn't be room for all of us in my dad's car. I was happy to do that. I didn't want my dad to do two journeys as they were staying in a hotel and it was some distance from our house. My mother took it upon herself to ask my brother to stay so he could take D12 home. He didn't like that. Things went from bad to worse from there on in. This story is already long enough so I will cut to the chase. The upshot was that my brother and his family who had driven 5 hours to get to us went home that very same evening. They left just gone midnight when I got home with D12.

S15 was supposed to be following on in a separate taxi as one of his friends had turned up at the party after finishing work. That was big mistake on my part b/c it ended up with him not coming home at all again.

Fast forward to yesterday. I sent H a TM. I apologised for communicating in this way but pointed out that i am not comfortable phoning his house. I said we both needed to talk to S15 together as he didn't come home again the previous night.

Several hours later he phoned me back wanting to know why S15 had stayed out all night again. He steadfastly refused to be here when I told S15 that I thought it would be in his best interests that he go live with his dad. I told him to grow up and ended the convo.

Some time after that I found out that S15 had finally arrived at his dad's house (he should've been there at 1.30pm and this was about 7.30pm). So I phoned H again and asked him to please bring S15 home at an hour that allowed me to speak to him about what had happened, what we had discussed the day before etc that didn't mean we were sitting up half way through the night. He resisted being here for that at first but I got VERY emotional. I told him that I wanted nothing from him except good support with the children. At that point he relented.

The three of us sat here for over 2 hours. Most of the time H was completely silent. The convo between me and S15 was a repetitive circle. We were getting nowhere. So in the end I was honest with S15 and said I had asked his dad to be here b/c it was meant to be a dialogue between all of us not with H as an observer to the convo between me and S15. At this point H did join in. Using different words but with the same meaning he told S15 why we both thought it would be best if he went to live with his dad. He reluctantly agreed he would try it for a week starting tonight.

Needless to say I didn't sleep well. I'm concerned that H will use this as a way to freeze me out of my son's life in the same way he has frozen me out of his. I have to get through somehow to both H and S15 that I am not relinquishing parental responsibility for S15. The best it will ever get is joint custody. I haven't gone through all I have to end up loosing my S15 as well as H. I'm also concerned that he is doing this for his own gain in respect of the financial settlement that still has to be decided. I hope I am wrong on both counts.

This morning S15 told me that he very much feels that he is being punished and that I just want rid of him. This was my worst nightmare. I tried for the upteenth time to tell him this couldn't be further from the truth but he is not open to listening to me anymore.

Amidst all of this I am supposed to be studying today!

I have to get some sort of positive out of this so I am hoping against all hope that if nothing else this will help H to rebuild bridges with his children and he will become more open to communicating with me about them. We will see.

If you got this far thank you.