things might be getting better...

[Esky94]

Gosh, it's been a long time. I'm feeling pretty good today, but as I sit down the feelings start coming out. A bit angry. More sadness. Shame for letting my girls down and allowing things to get to this point. I've learned to not get down on myself for having these feelings. I've learned to just let them flow through me and not react to them. It doesn't change the pain they cause because that's still real, but it's good to be able to just sit and feel through it all.

I still have faith that the way to patch this marriage is to be patient and learn to work through my anger. It's tough as a guy because I have to learn what normal emotions are all about and my first experience is with this whirlwind of self-blame, insecurity, anger.

I'm still able to focus 100% on the girls. They're doing really well. We needed to talk to the D6 teacher about some concerns we had about D6's behaviour and W and I were able to present a united front. The communication back and forth with the teacher was excellent and we solved a lot of things and she was able to take many things on board. She even commended us on how we write in the "Team Book' back and forth and said we should give a seminar to other separated parents. I'd rather not get complimented on that, but I have to remember the present is where I am now.

For someone like myself who's always been scared of fighting, I've been having lots more fights lately and getting better at standing my ground while trying to listen actively and try to mirror back. W got pissed off at me because I was trying to mirror a situation back over the phone. I don't think that works very well.

I sent her a memorial card around the time her dad passed away. I miss him too and wanted to tell her that. She shaved all her hair off for "The Big Shave" and she was happy that I sponsored her a big amount. She shaved it to support a work colleague who's going through chemotherapy. I'm just trying to be as encouraging as I can from a distance.

I've decided that if this is all gong to end I'm just going to lead the last mile. So I sent her a big long letter on the various chats and mediation sessions we'll need to finalise the
parenting plan and financial settlement.

I just spoke to her tonight and she didn't mention the email. We were interrupted by the girls. I'm not going to be awkward and ask things like "Did you get my big email?" when she's trying to get the girls to sleep.

I was reading something in the Quotes II sticky and R2C posted a link to this thread. It's amazing. BH does not exactly have my situation, but the list of books at the bottom are really good. It's nice to see how many I've read myself.

Well, in two weeks we're off to a church weekend camp. She arranged for us to have sleeping quarters with the pastor, but when she came to talk to me about it, she asked "The girls and I will be sleeping in the Family Room. There's room for you or did you want to sleep the Men's Single section?"

I said "No" and pointed to the Family Room. I figured she would not have put herself in the position of being that close to me overnight if she didn't want it to happen...so we'll see.

We've had a few verbal altercations, one was my doing, the other one...geez, I wonder why sometimes I want to get back together with this one. But I try to learn as much as I can from it and let it go. Arg! *sigh*

I need ideas on nice things to do to keep building that friendship bridge.

Esky