One of the hardest things I'm having to learn is that the kids have to develop their own relationship with each parent. Being flexible with your three year old wanting to spend extra time with his mom is wonderful co-parenting and respecting his needs. Telling your older son what he can and cannot say to his mom might be a different story.
In a divorce the kids are most important. But that does not mean we run interference on our spouses behavior. The kids have every right to ask, make demands of each parent. If it hurts you to listen, walk out of the room. Not putting the children in the middle is a delicate balance.
I try and be here to support, encourage or pick up the pieces for them. I know it's hard for them to come to me because they can still see I'm hurt. They love me, they love their dad. I do the best job I can. Like you, the kids know that I'm not going anywhere, that where I am is home.
Your wife's drama is hers and hers alone. Listen to your children, what they are saying in their words. Let them be the one to ask questions, not the other way around. Whenever my daughter shares some tidbit of her father's new life I die inside. It's just not good for me to go there. It's kind of like learning to listen to the melody, not the lyrics. The words aren't as important as how they're said.
Tal, I'm okay with S3 wanting to be with his mother. I really understand and appreciate that. He's only 3. I know he loves me, that's all that counts. Yes, it stings a little, but I love him enough to know when I need to give into his needs -- as long as I don't overindulge his wants.
Gypsy, welcome. I agree with you about S7, but like I said, I saw it as the lesser of evils. That's why it bothers me so and makes me angry -- I don't like being put in this situation, having to choose between two unsavory options, either of which is negative for my son. I know that life is rife with such choices, but I especially hate that this one is due solely to the selfishness of my wayward spouse. Her self-serving choices to sever our family and our M have put me between Scylla and Charybdis.
I saw my lawyer today, spent a good long session with her hammering out more details for the Separation Agreement and settlement. She's been in contact with W's L, knows her and even has another current case in which they are representing divorcing clients. Small world.
My L thinks that we're not so far apart anymore that W and I can't come to agreement on a document we can each sign with some confidence. It might be just a matter of weeks now. She also said that in her conversation with W's atty. she had advised W to not file for D until we had accomplished a signed agreement first. So that explains why W has not yet filed, despite being eligible for nearly two months now -- she's simply complying with her L's advice.
I'm no longer fighting this, but I'm still not going to advance it either.
I'll talk more later. Right now I need some sleep.
My L has already been on the other side of a divorce case with W's attorney -- thus they've already been in negotiations with each other. My L says that the other atty is a "nice person" and fairly easy to work with, although I gather that the firm she works for is not known for being nice. We'll see.
One of the things my L wants to get an answer to is why W has decided to proceed with moving into an apartment when the house hasn't yet been sold. My L is going to ask her L and let her know that her client is still going to be liable for half the mortgage and utilities on the marital home until it does sell, so why is she going to also take on the added expense of a monthly apartment lease? (W is crazy, what else could it mean?)
I left work today early to meet with S3's pre-K teacher. W was there. The W and I have been getting along relatively well considering. We both had a little levity with the teacher while talking out our S. We almost seem to be cooperative co-parents now. Almost.
S3 chose yet again last night and tonight to stay with W. I don't blame him for wanting to be with his mother, being as he's only three -- and he doesn't know or care right now what kind of person his mother really is or what she has done and is doing. It hurts, yes, but I want to encourage him to feel free to say if he needs to be with W instead of me. I warned W in the parent-teacher meeting there would come a day when S3 desires more to be with his father than his mother, and she needs to prepare herself for that.
Afterwards I picked up S7 from school and took him by the house so he could give the homemade greeting card, by S7 and S3's own hands, to their mother -- it is W's birthday today. She seemed appreciative of that. I even asked her did she want both of our S's to stay with her tonight since it was her birthday. She declined saying she can celebrate with them this weekend when she has custody.
W had not one but two bouquets of flowers delivered to her for her birthday. One was one from her sister. The other -- a massive, very expensive arrangement --was, as she put it at first, "from her office". I was tempted to steal a glimpse of the card on that latter bouquet, but resisted -- even though it appeared to be open and in plain sight, curiously.
However, and this was sort of funny, S7 saw the card and whipped it out of the bouquet -- I then inadvertently caught some of what was printed on the card. To top it off, S7 asked out loud, "So, who's 'Bob'?" (the words, "Love, Bob" were at the bottom.)
I told S7 to put it back. W replied in response to S7's nosey question, "A friend."
I said nothing and then decided it was time for S7 and I to leave. I asked S3 again if he was sure he wanted to stay with W, and he did. I was bothered less by that than by W's coy response to S7. I hate that this got to me, in fact I was starting to get peeved, and I didn't like feeling this way. I felt again that same pain, the reopening of old wounds. I saw that W had left the card turned outward in plain view and I suspect she either didn't care if I saw it or not or was hoping to get a rise out of me. I hated being baited and falling for it. I maintained my composure, but made my exit as soon as I could, though S7 wanted to persist in asking his mother questions.
So many things hit me all at once when I saw that birthday gift. Such a large and expensive arrangement -- had to have been close to $100 or more -- is so galling. Never in all our years of M would W have ever accepted such a gift from me. She'd have had my head on a platter for "wasting" such money.
Another thing: "Bob" was the pet-name (or code name?) W gave to OM in their emails -- it was their little inside joke. Or so I had concluded. It doesn't really matter. The fact is that W is again flaunting her so-called "friend" to me and others. Perhaps with me seemingly no longer openly opposing her plan for D, if not advocating it, W feels that her plans are now back in motion to pursue the R with OM openly.
My first reaction is to hate her for this, for hurting me and being so brazen and callous in her contempt for me. Like I am inhuman and incapable of feeling anything. But then in humility I can overlook that and realize she is the one who is the loser here -- what does it profit her to gain all that she wants of this world when she is losing her very soul?
And then I realize again that she is still the mother of my children with great influence on their lives, and how her selfish actions jeopardize the security and serenity in their own lives. I realize how poorly she models righteous moral standards now because of her continual willful sins. And then I get angry and disgusted yet again on a whole new level for the sake of my children.
The transgression against me, I can eventually let go and forgive. The sins against my family and against my children? I can't forgive that as much. Frakk her.
I saw that W had left the card turned outward in plain view and I suspect she either didn't care if I saw it or not or was hoping to get a rise out of me
Is it possible that she just didn't think you would be stopping by today? Maybe she is so blind about the 'normalcy' of her adultery, that she didn't realize what she was doing (leaving a card/flowers out from her married boyfriend is appalling to us, but everyday life for the adulterer).
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it was their little inside joke
Blecky. I know (through OW's H) many inside jokes. I wish I didn't know them.
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And then I get angry and disgusted yet again on a whole new level for the sake of my children.
See that lady standing next to you, the angry one on your same level? That's me! (waving). I hear ya, mister. I am most angry for the kids. Oh the selfishness of H gets me very angry.
Wanted to save the best for last.....
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I left work today early to meet with S3's pre-K teacher. W was there. The W and I have been getting along relatively well considering. We both had a little levity with the teacher while talking out our S. We almost seem to be cooperative co-parents now. Almost
Is it possible that she just didn't think you would be stopping by today? Maybe she is so blind about the 'normalcy' of her adultery, that she didn't realize what she was doing (leaving a card/flowers out from her married boyfriend is appalling to us, but everyday life for the adulterer).
Well, I had forewarned her after the parent-teacher meeting for S3 that I was going to pick S7 up from his school and then come by the house so the both of them could present their birthday card to her.
And is it customary for one to open the little card on the "fork" in the bouquet, taking it out of it's little envelope, folding the card inside out and placing back in the "fork" on the bouquet and in plain view?
Perhaps this was done at her office so everyone could take a look at who had sent them, and maybe she just absent-mindedly left it that way, but even that tells me she's at least flaunting this to her co-workers. No, she's pretty shameless.
Thanks for the complement, Lwb. I may have highroaded it as you say, but I just don't feel that way myself right now. I'm still quite a bit too angry and sad this has happened to me and my poor little boys. You see, I've decided that my real wife, the person I had fallen in love with and married or thought I had, if she ever really existed, has died. That person committed suicide, and I can carry on in my own mind knowing she's just gone and I have to survive without her. But the problem is that her animated corpse is still hanging about and my S's are being co-parented by the sad, lost alien hell-spawn succubus, and that means I am still going to struggle to find peace for me and my S's in the resulting turmoil.
My guess would be maybe that she was trying to upset you flaunting the flowers/card like that. But why I can't imagine! My H has done things like that too in the past; I turn a blind eye to all that stuff. Seems very weird and immature to me, but my H does remind me of a teenager sometimes. High school stuff.
Yeah, when I was reading that I was just thinking about your kids. My H lies to the kids about his "friend" too. To me that is the worst of it, lying to their kids and being immoral in front of them. I would never have married H if I had known he would do stuff like that to our precious kids, and I'm sure you wouldn't have either!!!
It seems to me like from what you were saying you were in control or at least acting in control and didn't freak out like most would have? You should feel good about that, b/c I think that would have been bad for your S's but oddly maybe your W would have been happy if you had freaked out. Don't understand that, but guess it is what it is. She's so messed up. Do you think she even realizes that? Karen
I think she was subconsciously trying to get my goat, so-to-speak. In the past I would have taken the bait and blown up over the fact my wife was allowing herself to be courted (let alone bedded) by an OM.
I was gong to let it pass and didn't decide to curtail my visit until S7 noticed the card too and began going on and on about the flowers and asking who they were from. W's coyness and smugness was a bit too much. And while I was cool and did not let her know how this got to me, my abrupt departure was undoubtedly a tipoff.
I am sorry if I am letting myself vent too much, in an unbecoming manner, calling W a "succubus" right after making a favorable comment about how we seem to have been at peace this week. The truth is that I am again absolutely furious at how this is and will make my sons see their father as they get older. I am trying to practice healthy Christian humility and this is already difficult enough without this added burden... that my sons now face the shame of their father being a cuckold.
My own pride aside, what does this say and do to their own self-esteem and how they view marital relationships? I know they're both still quite young now, but time flies quickly and the example I present to them is not all that encouraging, at least not at present. But then maybe this is really just wounded pride on my part after all. I don't know.
I want each of my boys to have a healthy relationship with the women they will some day meet. I worry that the cycle of either hurting someone else or being hurt themselves has not been broken with their parents. This was precisely the first conversation W and I had on our first date together eighteen years ago, breaking the cycle of betrayal and divorce, and developing a healthy relationship, unlike our own parents -- now that is all dashed to h*ll.
Does she realize she's messed up? If she does she has convinced herself that I am so much worse off and refuses to see evidence to the contrary. She is absolutely convinced that I am an immutable emotional cripple suffering from Asperger's Syndrome, without a shred of compassion for my fellow man and wholely incapable of it. She has made me the embodiment of everything that is wrong in her life. At the same time she has surrounded herself with enablers and unknowing folks who have bought entirely into her fantasy that she is the chief victim in the demise of our marital relationship.
W has developed a psychosis that is unshakable by any human endeavor, including DB/DR. I firmly believe her resolve can only be broken by God Himself and only if she reaches a point in her life that she will allow Him to do so. Sadly, she is just not anywhere near that point as yet, and I am beginning to doubt she ever will be. But I know this is well beyond me and what little I can do, so I have given her over to Christ Jesus.
She's a big jerk. To even have them in plain sight knowing they came from him is just WRONG. She is just plain mean and nasty. Its not enough that she has committed the act, now she's got to flaunt it???? You are SO much better than her.. really Your sons will see this in due time, People often don't change there spots and she sounds like she's going to keep hers for a long time.
Of course she is going to try and make you the bad guy, what else can she do, actually take responsiblity for any of it.. YA RIGHT. She is too self absorbed, with her righteous BS.. Its sickening.
You don't want someone like that. Its just unfortunate that the kids have to be around someone like her. All you can do is teach them right and wrong and strong morals.
No she doesn't think she has messed up, she is thinking that because she was unhappy with whatever it was she was unhappy about, gave her permission to commit adultery. Bottom line, she will defend her actions with that, because there is nothing else.
Stay true nocodes as I know you already do, she is forever sinking and will hit bottom. It will come back at her 3 fold.
(((((nocodes))))... your a wonderful man. Don't forget it.
me: 37 H: 44 Married for 18 years this june S7 S3 porn issues, and much more... since 7/06
Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.
