I think that my sitch is going to end up pretty much like yours. Will W be able to make it on her own...who knows. The way she goes out and parties right now...not going to happen. She's gonna have to cut way back on her social life to even have a chance at it. Kinda glad about the legal separation from that perspective because I will be protected from that. And will she rethink things? Maybe, once she hits rock bottom. My IC said pretty much the same thing. That she will need to crash hard (which he and I both believe will happen) before she comes out of the fog and starts thinking about more than herself. Will I still be around...don't know. I'm going into this separation like it will be a divorce. Not that I'm going to run out and start up a new relationship because that's really not where I'm at right now. But I am going to keep working on myself and making myself happy and who knows what will happen from that. If I find that I want to be in a relationship with someone else then I will initiate turning the LS into a D. That's the only fair thing to do for everyone's sake. It's not what I want but I'm playing the hand i've been dealt for everything it's worth.
Trying to stay positive. Sometimes it's really hard. Like everyone else...there are good days and there are bad days. Just trying to make it through them all as best as possible.
Ugh. Going through the parenting plan and financial stuff for the separation/divorce is just pure depressing. So much stuff I had not even thought of like splitting up holidays, birthdays, etc...with D3. This just sucks to high heaven. Not to mention the hit financially this is going to cause. I've already killed a lot of savings this year (about 20K) trying to save the marriage and now it's going to take a bigger hit with the split. I will be so glad when all this is over so I can process through it all and start rebuilding my life.
Today W is out looking for apartments. It's not like I haven't seen this coming but I'm still kinda depressed and anxious about it. She is planning on moving out in July. My birthday is in July and she asked if I would prefer she move out before or after my birthday. I just gave her a weird look and said it didn't really matter. Honestly, it doesn't. Either way it's going to not be the best birthday ever. Jeez. We have to go back to the mediator on Thursday with the financial and parenting plan paperwork filled out. W hasn't done any of it yet. I've done my financial stuff. I asked her this morning if she wanted to get together to fill out the parenting stuff and she said maybe tomorrow. Ummm....well, has to be tomorrow since the appointment is Thursday morning. I just said ok. If she doesn't show up tomorrow night to do it i'll just fill it out with what I think would be fair and leave it at that. As much as this all just sucks and I wish we could work on the M I'm at the point that I just want to get the separation and move out thing over. Then she can focus on figuring stuff out and I can focus on myself and moving on if necessary. This is all just so stressful.
Went to mediation again today. Finished up the financial stuff, parenting plan, and division of assets. It was an eye opening experience for W. She is in a real dilemma now. She doesn't make enough money to afford to live on her own. With her current pay she is $250 over her budget each month and that is just with student loans, rent, groceries, and gas for her car. We haven't been married long enough for spousal support of any kind and because I'm paying for all of D3's childcare/school/insurance and for W's car (it's paid off in a year) I already pay about twice what she is entitled to for child support. Actually just with D3's school/insurance W would owe me the minimum in child support ($100/mnth) but I'm not going to ask for it. Once D3 gets to regular school age if she goes to public and not private school then I would have to pay W child support but that's 3 years away. So W has a dilemma now. She can't really afford what she is doing so she would need to get a second job. If she does that though she will lose a lot of her time with D3 which she doesn't want to do. So she really has some thinking to do. As for me, well....dividing everything up really sucked. So many emotions in that. And then having to do a plan around D3 with holidays, birthdays, vacations, etc.... just really really sucked. It hurts that I'm not going to be able to see D3 every day. I guess I'll get used to it but right now it just isn't pleasant to think about. So W's plan right now is to move out as soon as she can. Which would be between next weekend and mid-July. So instead of a D right now this is for legal separation. So we have 2 years from the date it goes into effect to decide to reconcile or D. The mediator said that usually that decision is made in 6 months to a year. That you will either grow closer together during that time or farther apart and with the clarity you get from the distance from each other you will know which way you want to go. I guess I can see that. It is still pretty emotional with us living in the same house even though we are living like roommates. I get that once the initial emotions from the moving out are over that you can approach the situation with a more level head and really decide what you are going to do. So that's my update for now. Trying to still process it all since it is so fresh and real for me now. In 2 weeks the paperwork will be done so then it's really just taking it to a paralegal for processing, to a L for review (if needed), and then to file it. Feels like it is moving so fast now. I still hope things will get better but for now I need to step back, reassess everything, and move on with my life. I feel like some serious redecorating, painting, and household projects are in my near future.
So this weekend was a pretty good weekend. Good for myself, good for D3 and I, and was a really good weekend for W and I. Saturday morning W came home and the three of us had breakfast together and hung out until W had to go to work. It was pretty pleasant. Nice light conversation between W and I and we spent the time drawing pictures with D3. Yesterday W had to work from early in the morning until 3pm. She came home and told me she wanted to make me dinner for father's day. I said that would be great and I couldn't wait to see what she had planned. She went shopping for the ingredients and then came home and made us a 4 course meal. It was fantastic. It is nice to have a chef around the house. We played with D3 until she went to bed and then just hung out and had some wine and talked about all kinds of stuff. Her work, my work, friends. It was a little interesting in that I slipped up once and mentioned divorce and she quickly corrected me that this was not a divorce but just a separation for now. She also said that she was talking to her girlfriend the night before and told her that all these guys she knows from work and school and all just weird around her and lying a$$holes in general and that it really makes her see me in a different light because I'm normal. I told her thanks, glad to know I'm a normal person. ;-) We laughed about it and then she asked me what my favorite memories were from being a dad so far. I told her and we talked about D3 and all the cool stuff since she's been in our lives. It was good. No real deep relationship talk. Just friends kind of talk. I liked it. After we finished the wine we were both heading up to go to sleep and I thanked her for making the meal and told her it was amazing as always. She gave me a big long hug and told me thanks for talking to her and listening to her and for being a great dad to D3. Felt really good. So nice weekend! It's kind of odd in a way but we have gotten along so much better now that we went through the mediation and that the separation is pretty much coming in the next month. I guess that fear and burden has been lifted now and we can just relax around each other. Anyway, hope everyone had a great weekend!
Hold the phone. Just got a call from W. She started to say something about 5 or 6 times and stopped each time. So I sat there and finally said Hey, I'm about to head to the gym and it seems like you have something you really want to tell me or ask me so hit me with your best shot. She responded with "I don't think I want to move out". I told her then don't. That choice has always been yours. Then she tells me that she also doesn't think she wants to proceed with the legal separation. Ok...that one threw me for a loop. Composed myself, remembered not to seem overly optimistic or excited. Told her that I think that we should get the paperwork from the mediator in 2 weeks (I mean, heck...already paid for it). Take it to a paralegal to get it finalized and then she could have the paperwork to do whatever she wanted with it. She was good with that plan. Then she tells me she thinks that now she wants to grow old with me and get back what we had. Again...compose myself. Tell her that we should probably sit down and talk about this later when I'm not at work and we can really talk. We talked a little longer and she said that she probably shouldn't have told me all that. I asked her why she felt that way and she said what if I change my mind. I said...then you change your mind. But if she was having thoughts like that then she should talk to someone if not me. We chatted a little after that about D3 and then ended the call. WTH???? Not going to read too much into this. W has waffled around all this before but never actually saying she didn't want to separate or move out. Hmmmm....reality catching up to her maybe. Second thoughts? Everything is coming to a head right now with the separation paperwork and her moving out so I expected her to have some thoughts about this but I didn't really expect this. Gonna proceed with caution. As they say...gonna need to see some actions and not just words before I really buy into this. But, it does show promise.
I'm on the fly, dc, but let me say EXCELLENTLY HANDLED!!! This is EXACTLY how you want to handle such news! No "melty man" -- just "well, let's see, looks like we both have some decisions to make" kinda stuff.
