I guess it's all timing. Our timing has been lousy for the last several years. We were living out in the middle of nowhere where it was hard to connect with friends and then we moved back to a high-stress situation. I started questioning my abilities and sinking, she started soaring. We both have a love of the outdoors and being with people, but engaging in those loves for her became intimately connected with her career - an area that I tried to be involved in but was never fully invited by her. I mistook that to mean she wanted freedom in those areas, so I stopped trying to be involved. And we grew apart.
I guess what hurts is knowing that she saw the problem but never did anything about it - she preferred to focus on herself and her career. The "rewriting" of our history together helps justify that, I guess. She knows she was as much responsible for making the M what she wanted as me, but if things are cast into the light of basic incompatibility, she doesn't have to feel guilty.
Things have gotten better. I realize that looking through my journal from the past 9 months. She doesn't paint our time together as all bad anymore, she admits she wasn't really involved in the M, etc. But the few times we've talked, we always connect and when she asks about it, she realizes that I want the same things out of life that she does. So in order to continue justifying her actions, I think she needs to avoid this as much as possible, which is what's happened.
It makes me sad that I could never find the right way to reach out to her, but I think the combination of OM that was part of her career, her excitement and doing new things, and her desperate need for feeling independent conspired to make any sort of reconnection impossible. And I still wonder if LRT was a mistake. Maybe I should have competed with OM more at the beginning - been stronger. Of course, that would have threatened her career, which is why I chose not to.
The rotting fruit smell? No, that is not a pleasant smell. I clean up the fruit every night to try and get rid of it. The plums are almost done and then it'll be gone.
Enough rambling for a workday morning. Have a great day everyone!
I guess what hurts is knowing that she saw the problem but never did anything about it - she preferred to focus on herself and her career. The "rewriting" of our history together helps justify that, I guess. She knows she was as much responsible for making the M what she wanted as me, but if things are cast into the light of basic incompatibility, she doesn't have to feel guilty.
lodo,
That is the tough one.... If they saw it was a problem... Why not bring it to light? In the end, we need to realize each partner is responsible for communicating his or her wants, needs and perceptions... You cannot blame yourself for not being a mind reader.....
NMD
"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
I can't know how bad you're feeling, but I think I hear it in your words & thoughts. Hug.
I think it boils down to; you were not afraid to try & work, she was. She took the route that she perceived was easiest. She is wrong, she doesn't know it yet.
You're a great guy & she's losing big time. Once a man "gets it", he'll be an amazing husband. I believe you "get it" & I think you're a huge catch for some lucky woman.
Make a list of every quality & characteristic you'd like your next woman to have. Put it away in a drawer, & live your life.
Take care of yourself.
M 19 years, MC for 8 months, DB'd for 8 months 4 kids; 18, 15, 14, & 10 I was never meant to be a doormat. It took me years of therapy to become assertive enough to stop his abuse.
Hey friends - thanks for posting to me. Feeling a little alone at the moment.
NMD - I'm not blaming myself any longer. It's taken longer than I thought to get to that point, but I think I'm there.
Cookie, I don't think she sees her route as easier or less scary. I think she sees her route as her route. But her history has always defined the pursuit of anything meaningful as precluding the possibility of a relationship. She wanted to go to boarding school? She dumped her friends and moved east. She wanted to go to a prestigious college? She kept everyone at arm's length and focused on her grades. She wanted to pursue a master's degree? She told me it was over with no chance to talk. She decides to finish her PhD? She decides divorce is the only answer.
It's a cycle. I hate it, but it's a cycle. I should be glad that I was the one that stayed in her life for the longest period of time. Unfortunately I can't help but wonder how many OM have there been and should I get tested.
I don't know if I "get it" or not. I think I do, but I also thought that 9 years ago. If I did get it, then "getting it" clearly didn't last. Live and learn I guess.
Hey girl - nothing new with ring girl. I have class tomorrow night so will see her then. Did I mention she's willowy?
Hey girl - nothing new with ring girl. I have class tomorrow night so will see her then. Did I mention she's willowy?
Willowy is so nice. I'm jealous of the willowy ones. Give her your most charming grin. I was showing my friend the fb site - we did a search for his new "friend" and found her on there, but didn't request to be added as her friend because we weren't logged in. I told him to search my first name last initial and when you're not logged in, it automatically shows 5 of the friends of the person you searched. Your photo was there and I said, "hey, that's my friend "lodo"!" and he said you looked like a really cool guy and I told him you were amazing and started listing all the really wonderful qualities you possess. When the one we love more than anything in the world rejects us, we have a hard time seeing just how spectacular we are. Don't second guess yourself, friend.
Give the willowy one my best. ;-)
M: 37 H: 36 Married: Aug 13, 2004 Decision to Divorce: July 20, 2008 Reconciled: September 2008 Current: Ambivalence
lodo, you chided me about memory lane and nostalgia but you won't wade out of your own sea of it. It's okay to dip your toes but stop drowning in it! Try turning around and looking at what's ahead of you and just take an ocassional glance in the rearview mirror if you have the need.
You are a fine funny caring guy that cooks in the kitchen as well as other rooms of the house, you've got a great place, you're young and athletic, techy smart, you travel and talk easy to anyone. Don't think you will be on the market for long!
Thanks for that enlightening story about walking under the stars with nothing on but your tongs. That explains the crazy naked man I saw that night!
Live your life while you are still living. Riding the trail less traveled.
girl - I'm always honored when you stop by. Am I a "cool guy"? Even with DAM pattern baldness?
WCW - I'm not wallowing in nostalgia, I'm mourning the loss of my marriage and my best friend. It's a process and I'm progressing, but cut me some slack, okay?
What's ahead of me? I don't know. Evenings alone. Okay - it's not that bad, but I'm just saying .... Work is overwhelming, my W is shut down, and I feel so mistaken, trumped, and foolish.
Where else do I cook besides the kitchen?! Been so long since I cooked anywhere else ... Not young anymore, athleticism ... well, I've slipped a bit. My techno-smarts are passing to a younger generation, but I do travel and I like to talk. Or, hear stories in any case.
Crazy naked man? Maybe naked, but not crazy. Let me tell you something, you poor midwesterner! Something happens to the human mind in moonlight, and when that moonlight is reflected all around you transcend the limits and boundaries of earthly life and pass into another spectrum of being. That takes emptiness, exposed rock, bareness. No grass. No trees. No nothing. It's survival and it is stark and it is absolutely, brilliantly, crystal clearly beautiful. Our very beings are infused with the essence of pure moonlight - it soaks into our soul. So go outside tonight, drop those jeans, howl into the night and let the lesser sun heal your aura.
I believe I have given you the message.
lodo
ps. that last bit was a joke, BTW. From a movie .... I don't really have a message, just late night rambles.
