No, Jo, it is good that you are posting. Yet let me point out just a few observations:
Quote: I was already massively upset before he came to get Alicia because of his email basically giing me the brush off.I was in tears for about 3 hours before he even turned up
Your 'crazymaker' (as I like to call my racing mind) was already running, priming the visit for a certain outcome. I've learned to stay quiet when I notice that.
Quote: I've not been eating correctly and drinking loads of coffee (too much), period is here again
There's an amazingly strong body-mind-spirit connection, and its good that you're aware of this impact on your thinking and feeling. Take better care of yourself (self-love) and wait until next week to see how you feel.
Quote: we had so many plans for my birthday (he and they were supposed to be sleeping overnight for the first time, I thought they might do something nice for me - it was supposed to be a turning point and now this).
Make no A$$sumptions and keep low expectations. This is DBing, and will still require tons of patience.
I've gotten amazingly upset when I think of how much S5 has been ripped from my life due to my W's choices. He and I literally have lost months of bedtime stories/prayers/kisses/hugs/reassurances. When I think about that, I begin to resent, even hate W. Yet, that is giving into a despair based upon unknown possibilities. Further, it is quitting, and I don't quite know how to quit. I never have.
Focus on the positives, Jo. You've healed your R to such an extent that they are making - not merely buying - but making BDay cards for you. And writing heartfelt messages inside. He can't ever take that away from you.
Finally Jo, your BDay is TOMORROW. Give him time to surprise you next time, stay a tad more flexible in terms of him making amends as he knows how, or extending yet another olive branch. Baby steps, Jo. He's barely beginning his work.
Try to forget his email. What is the DB mantra? "Believe none of what they say (or write) and only half of what they do." Hang in there, Jo. Please take very gentle care of yourself, tonight and tomorrow. You are young, beautiful, you have 4 wonderful daughters, you are intelligent! So many women would love to be you! There is plenty of living awaiting you.
It's time's like these that our friends here on the BB are so important and such a source of strnegth.
You are so good at providing well reasoned and calm advice for others and now you are finding yourself in a spot where you could use a little 3rd party advice. We're both lucky to have Gabe as a friend. I know that he has straightened out my thoughts on more than one occasion. He has some good advice here for you.
What about trying the 24 hour rule, as Gabe and I have learned it? That is where, when you feel like you are at an emotional pitch and want to take a drastic action, you sit back, take a deep breath, and wait 24 hours, or 36, or 48, or whatever to calm down, clear your thoughts and give yourself a better chance to make a rational analysis and decision about what it is that is bothering you.
I glanced through Gabe's post and maybe he already suggested that approach, but it's worth considering regardless.
I really wish all my cyber friends were real in the flesh, so to speak, instead of floating about in cyber space. I can't get it together today. I didn't answer my helpline because it's not ethical to do it in this state of mind.
I can't stop crying, I haven't eaten all day and I don't even feel hungry. I walked passed the toaster and realised the bread has been there for 2 days. I put it in the freezer so it doesn't go off.
I was at the job centre yesterday about small business help and I bought sandwiches and chocolate for me and dd4. That's the last time I ate. I must eat tomorrow morning or the injections might make me sick.
The thing is Gabriel, I DO believe what he says. The first time he did this in 02, we were separate for 3 months. Second time he left the R in June 03, we were separate for 1 year, third time he had a fling with me and then backed off again July 04, now this time he has backed off, I imagine it will be months again, if not permanent.
I simply cannot keep having this on-off R, waiting for him to come back and trying to agree with everything he says in the process.
I feel if I don't leave my family properly, he will never come back anyway - he'll just keep dipping his toe in when he gets scared and then running off again when he is reassured I still care.
I thought this time was it as I spent so long dark and he said ILY and talked about commitment ceremonies so I thought this was different.
I've struggled for 3 years for this man and my kids so I think I have done everything.
He wouldn't have done anything for my birthday even if I had left it till tomorrow. I know him too well. He didn't even want to talk to me and I didn't do anything wrong, all I did was go to my daughter's ballet - hardly crime of the century.
You see what I mean about him hating anything I do with the kids???
First, I really wish we could beam over to see each other when we needed to as well. Your coffee and tea rituals seem very grand by the way. Over here, I tend to just grab a cup whenever I'm filling up the truck with gas (petrol? ). Always tastes like someone swirled it around an ashtray first. But I digress...
First, remember Jo that the DBing punchline is that all this work is about YOU. Not H, as he can't be depended on to do what he's gotta do. But about you and your changes.
Your changes will positively influence your R with him. Believe in that. And surely you can see it. Even with the occasional step back, things have been getting better - slowly, but surely.
I don't buy that he's that predictable or unchanging, Jo. If you or I and all the others can change our human frailties in lasting ways, so can he. This underlies all such efforts, the idea that human beings are doomed to repeat the past, but can willfully change their own behavior.
Trust that he's learning, Jo. And eat something decent! Please! You're making me hungry over here for you!
((((Jo)))) I truly feel for you, and I know what that state is like - as a result I've lost 25 lbs since the D-bomb. But I've kept it off via hard, disciplined exercise and better diet - true forms of self-love that I wouldn't have fully bothered with in the past. But now I get it: If I don't take care of myself, who is left? And if I'm not here, who will father my S5? Talk about a motivator! NO ONE is going to be subbing for me.
You're secure in your DDs hearts - dont reject them, Jo. Join together, stronger and in ways that ONLY mothers and daughters can. He just can't compare in some respects.
I agree with Bulldogr. Let the sitch sit for a bit, and you please delve into some very notable self-care this weekend, okay? And if the DDs come round, maybe celebrate your Rs and love.
Jo, What is your "legal" visition for you girls? Is this something that can be changed to your advantage and their benefit. No matter what happens between you and Andy, it is "not" right for him to hold the girls hostage to control you. He is extremely selfish in keeping them away from you and not a good roll model for your children.
Why not look into legal ways to spend more time and have a larger roll in your girls life? After that is accomplished, if you still want Andy, work on the DBing. In the meantime, it gives you a mission to focus on and if it means stepping on his toes for awhile, so be it. You have nothing to lose, it seems.
Jo, I am sorry to hear abt. your sit., please hang on for a few days before you make any major moves. We all care abt. you. I don't know what else to say because I am so down today.
Quote: he's not remotely interested and I haven't the faintest clue what to do.
First take care of yourself and eat somethig healthy. Quit trying to guess what Andy is thinking or doing.
Quote: I mean, he said ILY and now this
I agree Jo, tough to be in this up / down type relationship.
Quote: I feel like I'm in total crisis at the moment which is why I didn't want to post
Crisis for sure, I see how hurt you are about your R with Andy and the dissapointment you must feel with the girls not staying over night. I am a dad and can only imagine how a mom might feel not being with her kids.
About not posting Jo, If it becomes too painful quit for a day or two if you have to. Personally I think you need more friends. Sorry we are only cyber ones. It's OK to vent here and ask for help. You certanially deserve our support.
About spending time with your girls, could you possibally have DD1 overnight sometime in the near future? Maybe asking everyone to stay overnight was too big of a step physically to actually happen and too big of a mental step for Andy? Maybe Andy saw there was not enough enough room for everyone and instead of saying something, he pretended to ignore the situation.
While working in the group home I discovered some of the boys did not have the nerve or social skills to ask for something they wanted, so when no one was looking they took it. Basically they felt they had been rejected if someone said no to them. Not trying to make excuses for Andy, just saying some people don't take no's well.
Gabe seems to have the better advice Jo. I just wanted you to know lots of good people here on the DB site are sending you their best wishes directly to you and then wishes for a better R with your girls.
{{{{{Jo}}}}}} Please have something good to eat and drink. NO Alcohol please. Any chocolate candy in the house? How about a small bite?
I have PR which means legally I can see them whenever I want but in practice it doesn't work like that as Andy is holding the strings on them.
I also walked out of court in April 04 (the process was nowhere near finished yet and had already gone on for 2 years - I couldn't take anymore so I read out this speech about how I had fought for 2 years and if everyone thought I was that bad a mother I was leaving) - so I read this to the judge and just walked out half way through proceedings and then collapsed in the lobby and had to have my lawyer grab me to stop me fainting.
I swore that day I would never let him control me through them again.
As a result I have no legally set down contact, no court order. He broke my court orders all the time anyway so there seems little point to me unless the judge were to slap a penal order on it.
It's not so much that he refuses every time I want them - he doesn't, it's more that he dictates when I can have contact. For instance, he was perfectly happy to bring them yesterday but because HE wanted to. When I ask he's too busy, or going to a home ed meeting (that I am not invited to).
He seems fine for them to be at my house, but oh no, he doesn't want me involved in any other aspect of their lives and he has total power to say yes or no to everything. This wrecks my self-esteem and makes me feel like his babysitter instead of the mother of his children.
Even when I do have contact which is agreeable to both of us, he then dictates what I can and cannot do. For instance, when I tried to do home ed lessons with them he got at me for not syncrinising the lessons with him - he said they should learn the same thing at both houses.
I got verbal abuse for giving dd3 medicine for ear ache. I bought dd1 a magazine which had a family tree in it and he went MAD over that because he said it was 'harping on the past' (despite the fact he shows them wedding photos) and because I listed myself as mother on the tree.
Everything he does to do with them makes me feel like nothing more than the egg donor I am going to be today. I went through the pain of birth and he ended up with all of my reason. Sometimes I feel like telling him just to take my eggs and make his own kids in a lab and then he wouldn't have to bother with a mother for them at all.
I've run out of legal aid and the only way I can get more is to go to mediation first. He has already said what he would offer me and no amount of fighting in front of the mediator will help. I suppose if we disagreed at mediation, that is my door back into court but since the last custody battle took 2 years, to be honest I don't want to do that.
I feel like I'm fighting too big a battle for them and I'm sick of him putting me down in front of them, condradicting my parenting and me always being in tears.
I am not like that on my own with Alicia - I just get reduced to tears when the others are around me. I can't check my responses around them. The whole non-custodial sitch makes me so unhappy. They seem to be the focus point for my unhappiness because it's only through them that he can still control me.
He even wanted dates once, that I would be away, for the whole year - and he sent dates he was supposed to be having dd4 FOR THE WHOLE YEAR so I wouldn't book anything on his days. He didn't even allow for holidays and yelled at me once for taking dd to the beach, and that was MY day.
It's like, oh gosh, she's having fun with the kids without me, that won't do!
Of course I deleted his list and wouldn't let him know my plans for the whole of the next year.
Anyway, I could rant about this all morning but I have to get dd4 dressed as we're going to the IVF clinic for my injections.
It's tea that's the big thing in the UK. Whenever there is a crisis, people get out the tea and biscuits, like tea and biscuits will solve all the world's problems.
My life is falling apart but hey, let's have a cup of tea, that'll make all the difference
The coffee thing is more me than a Brit thing. I drink it all the time as it raises blood pressure and heart rate and is a stimulant so when I used to be up till 3am every night writing to my lawyer, the coffee was what kept me going. I kept up the habit afterwards which is why I was always offering H coffee and it is like a comfort thing to me. When something goes wrong my first response is to cry, my second response is to drink coffee.
I didn't eat before I went to IVF as I got into the above rant and then only had 15 minutes to get ready and we were still in our PJ's.
I just ate some toast now when we got back - oh, and there was a coffee machine at IVF clinic
). Always tastes like someone swirled it around an ashtray first. But I digress...