Seems that I have been in an overall downward drift the past few weeks. I feel like I am running out of time, and the frustration and anxiety are growing. This can't be how it all ends. This isn't how it is supposed to be.
Another tearful encounter in the driveway. More stonewalling, saying it is done, he doesn't want to try. The more passive I get, the more aggressive he is. The same event unfolds, like we have rehearsed it. His parents bring me back to the house, while he punches my car before peeling out of the drive.
I feel like this is life or death; to give up is to give up my very being. To be without him... How do I convey this to him? How does he not understand? I know he cares, that he loves me--he calls back, he stays even when I am like this.
But he is not in love with me anymore. He is in love with someone else. He doesn't want to reconcile. I feel so hopeless.
I want there to be some way to reach him.
Yes, I can move on and find moments of happiness, but it will never be the same. They will be fleeting, and tainted with what is missing, the void within me. He will always be the father of my children, the one I pledged to love for as long as I shall live. I will live the rest of my days under the shadow of that. I don't think I can face that. Any happy moments just bring up the pain that is always there, the stark contrast. The kids compound my failure--I needed to fix this for me, but also for them.
Proposals are on the table. The divorce can be final in a month. Dear God, please help me. Either take away my love and need for him, or open his heart to the possibility that our marriage is worth an attempt.
If he agrees to go, he will join me in my long-term therapy session this Saturday. Is there anything that I can say to make him reconsider?
I am hoping to bring prayers and hopes for another chance with me from friends and family for him to see.
Yes, I can move on and find moments of happiness, but it will never be the same. They will be fleeting, and tainted with what is missing, the void within me. He will always be the father of my children, the one I pledged to love for as long as I shall live. I will live the rest of my days under the shadow of that. I don't think I can face that. Any happy moments just bring up the pain that is always there, the stark contrast. The kids compound my failure--I needed to fix this for me, but also for them.
God, I can FEEL those words of yours and they brought me right back to tears.
I posted in the prayer forum the other day in a desperation of my own. Please go see what people posted me, the scriptures. Please go read. They are for you, too. I know that because I NEVER come to this forum and today I did, and I saw your post.
Call your C. Go to your al-anon meetings. Quit trying to control the situation.
If you really want to make a last ditch effort, do this: let go and quit trying to change how STBX feels.
Until you quit trying to run the show, STBX will NOT reconsider his choices.
So, again, your last ditch effort: quit trying to run the show.
Maybe a year or two from the time you really do that, STBX might take stock, maybe not. Taking STBX to therapy with you will certainly not prompt him to do so. These efforts are giving him more reason NOT to reconsider his choices than anything else. Leave him alone.
Call your C. Go to Al-anon. Take another vacation at the hospital if you need to. Connect with your sister. Get out of that house, it is not healthy for you to live with STBX's family. Take care of YOURSELF. Become the person YOU want to be, then see who you want to be with. Now is not the time for you to focus on STBX or any other male for that matter.
Quit going in for the drama. Quit feeding it by coming here. Take the steps you know how to take to take care of yourself. Now.
I'm sorry for your pain Donna. I wish it was possible to suggest one last ditch thing that would convince your husband, but if there is (which I doubt), I don't know what it is.
I know it's a bad time for you which makes it hard for me to say much of anything. I'll put this as mildly as possible. If what you wrote was how you speak or act around your husband, then it won't work. He can sense the desperation and the need and he can contrast that with another woman that right now probably doesn't seem that way.
I know it seems hopeless right now and you'll never find happiness, but things won't always be this way, especially as you discover the person you can be without him, and with time.
What I would suggest saying...."I'm letting you go. I want you to be happy. Thanks for sharing part of your life with me. I wish you the best."
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years. Abraham Lincoln
It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. Theodore Roosevelt
I have no advice. Just Me is right, OT is right. You have tried and tried. I don't believe anyone has tried harder than you. But you are up against a brick wall. It will not give. And even if he went to the therapy session just to be nice to you, he would not change into the man you want him to be.
We miss you here. It's nice to see your name in the list of posters. I hope teaching and school are going well for you. I think you need to find your happiness within yourself and your children. And I think you can. I have seen your strength.
I've never posted to you before, but I was caught by the agony in your post.
Oldtimer is right, IMO, not just in your case but in all of ours. WE can never, never, never force another person to do anything. I deeply believe that the peace you are crying for only come from letting go totally as far as your H, and turning to the prayers that AmyC suggest.
I hope things start to feel better for you. I believe they will.
What I would suggest saying...."I'm letting you go. I want you to be happy. Thanks for sharing part of your life with me. I wish you the best."
Donna,
I totally agree with Just_Me. To paraphrase a quote I heard.... "We need to let go of the life we had planned so we can embrace the life God has for us." I know this is easier said than done.... I know just hard it is to go through the intense pain...
Take Care,
No_More_Dodo
"Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years. That is what makes a marriage last --more than passion or even sex!" - Simone Signoret
The kids compound my failure--I needed to fix this for me, but also for them.
HEAR ME NOW....YOU HAVE NOT FAILED...NEITHER YOURSELF NOR YOUR CHILDREN!!!
Donna, so many of us want you to be healthy and whole. Please, please, please listen to what your old friend OT is saying... call your sponsor, get to a meeting, call your counsellor.
Your precious children want and need you to be healthy and whole...and you can be! You can stare down this fear of the unknown future; you can beat it... Please let H and your M go, completely and totally. NOW
We are all here rooting for you...feel our strength and feed on it!!!
Everyone has said it so well already, so I just wanted to add a hug.
You'll be OK Donna. You've been strong before, you can and will do it again.
Me 35, H 38; Together 13.5 yrs, M 7 Bomb 1 10/07/06 Sep'd 1/14/07 - 4/15 Piecing: 4/07 - 9/07 Bomb 3 10/11/07: Never loved you, let's separate 2/08 slowly improving 7/08 Piecing (7/25/08 rings back on!!) Current thread
I wanted to let you know that I was thinking of you and sending you positive thoughts. I'm not sure if there is anything any of us can say during these times to make it better. It is strange, being on the other side of it, divorced, moved on, in a position where I realize I wouldn't take my husband back now if he wanted to come back, etc. When you are where you are at, you never imagine that place. You can't imagine getting to that point. It seems impossible. And no one can really make you believe that you will be okay, but you will. As humans, we have this uncanny way of surviving, growing, and making choices to learn what we can from crummy situations to make our lives better. You control that and you can and will make your life wonderful and you will have many good days ahead and a great life. It will take time. It will take healing. It will take day by day steps and then it will continue to take healing even once you have moved on. But it will get better.
When we are left by our spouses, we are overwhelmed. All we can think is about getting them back. Yet, if they were sorry and wanted to come back, would we take them back? We say yes and think absolutely that we would, but it isn't that simple. Your husband has done a lot and put you through a lot. He has made a choice to walk away from his life with you and your children. And in the end, if he were the one pursuing you, I don't think it would be an easy answer for you regarding taking him back and rebuilding. You are committed to your marriage, I truly believe that I was too. I would have done anything. But in the end, when the other person isn't committed, there is NOTHING we can do to really change that. We can DB our butts off to make our life better but when we are DBing to try and get that person back to us, well that isn't really dbing and it won't change things really. Because in the end, that person, your husband, has to figure this out on his own, in his time, and in his way. And that sucks! It really does. But you can't control it sweetie and it isn't fair and it isn't what you wanted or expected from your life or marriage or what you would have chosen. But it is what it is because it is what he has done and chosen. And you can't heal him or fix him. He has to do that himself. And it may be months, years, or he may never get to that place. In the end though, he will have done so many painful things to break up your marriage that it would be so difficult to recover from. Not impossible, but difficult. So keep that in mind. Keep in mind that really, you made mistakes probably in your marriage, but you were committed to it, and in the end, he is the one that is making the choice to end it and you can't fix that, and it isn't something to respect. If he were pursuing you, would he be a man you could respect and trust and love again fully? A lot would have to change. And it may or may not change in the future. Only time can tell. It truly sucks, but you have to move on with your life, move on, and see what the future will bring. You do have the control to make your future great.
Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking. -Marcus Aurelius
