Hi NW - That's right, you had mentioned that you were from Hong Kong...I studied Mandarin in college - though I think I've forgotten far too much of it over the years...
Getting to a PMA was not easy or swift for me...a lot of it came from reading other posts here - and looking deeper into myself than I ever have before. I certainly made a lot of mistakes over the last few months - since the bomb dropped - and I know that I'm not completely where I want to be - but I have to get there - and I will work hard - harder than ever - to get there.
Even though my W has moved out - I don't know if it's completely over between us. The night before she moved out, while having a brief conversation she said, "I don't know what will happen next." And neither do I. I do know that I can't continue to be married to the person she had become - nor could she continue to be with the man I had settled into offering her. We will both change over the months ahead - we will both have a kind of painful independence for a while that will eventually give way to more calm...and hopefully in that calm will come more clarity.
I'm going to continue to go to my T - and talk through my pain, and my issues. In my last session he talked with me about how much I had given in to my W's definitions of me - and we recalled how I had initially started seeing him in order to talk about being a verbally abusive husband - and to learn to manage anger...I understand more about why I lost it with my wife when and how I did...and I never want to be in that position again - never let myself get that desperate or frightened again - where I'm in a situation in which I have to take someone down in order to protect myself from being abandoned...
What's strange to me - and this is something that my W doesn't seem to see - is that she is defining me according to how I fell apart after the told me she wanted to leave me. Before that I wasn't overtly anger - rather I had withdrawn from her and just didn't expect very much from her - and so I offered her very little of myself.
Before the bomb, I had pulled away from my W and didn't offer her the man she loved anymore...After the bomb, I regretted my withdrawal and wanted to rescue our marriage. Now, as we're apart - I can see that I didn't just withdraw from her for no reason - we had stopped supporting one another - we had stopped sharing - and I truly felt used and taken for granted by her - and was just exhausted by my work and my life. And I expected her to step up and save me - help me in ways that she could no - no one could - because now, as I look at myself in this new situation, I can see how much of that frustration came from me - not from her - and I can see how much more I can do to make my life fulfilling. Granted she could still have been more supportive - but deep down, my issues had a lot to do with me...
Do I want to forgive her abusive side? Or how she treats my S11 when he's not doing what she think he should be doing? How do you forgive someone that treats your child poorly? Or goes back and forth from treating him wonderfully and treating him terribly? The amount of calm my S11 has when he's home with me now is just amazing. His mom told me last night that he used to be sad when he would come over to my house because he would end up spending so much time alone....and that was largely because whenever her was here my W would insist on asking me to talk with her in the bedroom...
Okay...time to get going...time to sit zazen... -c.
