I am empathetic to this, but stop it. It is happening, reality is you have been here before and you know damn well that the longer you fight with reality, the longer you will feel all of this hurt. Do you remember posting to me very early on in my situation about the Alpha Male philosophy? Do you remember sending me and Tyson the article on being the Alpha Male? Maybe you should read it again.......
Stand up dude, you do not look good on your knees.....SHE DOES NOT DEFINE YOU.......
Right again. I don't look good on my knees and I'm staying there less often. And one other thing - I LET her define me for too long and that is part of the reason I keep falling down. She IS a 'boat anchor' around my neck because I have never felt like it really was OK to be me for way too long.
I made a new friend tonight. I had gone to a DivorceCare class last Sunday, pretty beat up and feeling low. There was a guy there who was pretty together and he was kind enough to give me his number and said to call him if I was needing to get out of the house and talk. So I did.
He had a lot of insights since he was already quite a ways down the path - over a year since being separated and divorce proceedings. What was most interesting was how similar in many ways our W's were. What he really did for me was show me that there really is peace at the end of the process as he is at peace with his life.
More to the point he got me to see that we were living in 'little things' all the time. By that he meant we would always be on our guard and overly sensitive to our W's feelings. So much so that if we said something we thought they would take the wrong way we would go off into a 'what I meant was...' to try to 'fix' things, rather than just let her deal with OUR feelings 'as is'.
That is not a good place to be in a relationship because basically you're living with no security. No security that no matter what, there isn't anything you can do or say that will ruin the relationship. You are never feeling 'safe'.
I can't say I felt 'safe' for a long time. While my W did not demand 'appeasement', I felt like I had to be on my guard for any cracks in the relationship and fix them.
Again, not a good place to be in a relationship.
Why does this matter? Because he was telling me about a lady friend of his who he did the 'what I meant was...' thing with and she just stopped him and said 'do you know you do that? You start apologizing when you say something you don't think I liked hearing?'
You shouldn't have to be in a relationship where you're ever wondering if the other person is going to leave you. Ever. You should be relaxed, at peace in your home. AT PEACE.
My W may not have been happy, and life was difficult for us, partly because of where I was at and partly because of her INaction. BUT she never had to worry if I was going to leave her. Never.
He also said 'Peace comes before Understanding'. In fact, we may never fully understand this whole thing. But we WILL find peace.
