I feel like I am operating in a vacuum

[Gardener]

I'd love to be able to show off some of my "changes," which are for real, but she's not there

Just because the W isn't near doesn't mean that other people won't notice your climb and report back to base :-)

Well put, mac-ct. I like that!

[cville22901]

Gardener & Mac-ct

Thank you for your posts. Here's how crazy my thought process has become.

In addition to sending an email to my wife, I tried to give her a phone call last night in order to invite her to the dinner for my son. Since 6:30 last night until 10:00AM this morning, I get a busy signal when I call her line. That would indicate that her phone is off the hook. She is very religious about checking for voicemails because she works out of her home. I can't believe that she has just left her phone off the cradle for more than 12 hours unless she did that and went out of town. I am concerned that something may be wrong, that she has disconnected the line, or that she has deliberately left the phone off the hook so that she does not have to talk to me. This last point does not make a whole lot of sense to me because I have only called her once or twice in the last month. It's not like I'm stalking her or calling every day. I have no way of knowing what's going on, my imagination is running wild to the worst case scenarios, and there could be a very simple, plausible explanation that has nothing to do with me (but my head goes to the "she hates me stuff). This is very bizarre. A part of me wants to drive over to check on her. I'm not so sure if this is motivated by pure concern for her or if I just want to see if she is getting my messages and to do a status check (which would be really selfish of me and stupid).

I keep thinking back about our twelve years together, and it still boggles my mind that she could just give up and say that she can't live with another person and that she wants to live alone.

I try to convince myself that she is not going to change her mind and come back. I am trying to tell myself that she is dead to me. I look at my experience with her phone over the last day, and it is a metaphor. I keep calling and calling, but there is no one there to pick up the line. I know that I need to stop "calling" and just let it go, but acceptance is very hard.

I guess I could accept this if we had had really overt problems. I guess that we had hidden problems that ran much deeper than I ever suspected.

I thinking that writing this post has helped me to walk myself through a few things. I will not drive over to our house. I sent an email last night. If she gets it, fine. If she accepts the invitation, she'll contact me. No more emails today. No more phone calls to the disconnected phone.

I need to go dark if I can find the self-discipline.

[beepee]

Hi Cville:

i just read thru your entire post and there are definitely some similarities in our sitchs. firstly, im so sorry that you're going through this, i know how painful it is, esp when your WAS seems to be so cold and distant, and there is hardly any contact if at all.

the biggest difference btwn our sitchs are that my H left because of my depression and couldnt take it, saying he really has nothing left to give me anymore and has gone to completely ignoring me and shutting me out of his life (like you said, i dont understand that either). and you know where your W is, i dont know where my H is at all, i have a guess that he might be in the city an hour away from me but its only a guess. i havent spoken or seen him for 5 weeks since he packed up and drove away from me when i came home one day.

i have the same concerns as you, how can you show them you're changing when you make no attempt to contact you at all? i made the mistake of telling my H that i didnt want to be friends with him anymore and that i just wanted all of this to be gone and we would part ways and never see each other again. since then, i havent really heard from it and im very worried that he really took what i said seriously. he is DEAD SURE that he does not want to be with me and IS going to file for divorce whenever he can. as far as i know, i could be served tomorrow!

but ive learned through this website and the DB/DR books that i cant control any of his actions, only mine. and that theres no point in trying to understand WASs behaviors, why they do the things they do (like your W shutting off the phone, whenever i tried calling my H, he would shut off the phone completely and turn it back on in a few hours and then id call again and hed shut it off again and this kept going on and i had to get it in my head that he's not picking up for a reason, he doesnt want to talk to me!). everything they do can only be understood by them and the best thing we can do in the sitch is to understand ourselves, reflect on our own behaviors and what needs to be changed in order to become a better person who has so much happiness and love to share with others.

ive been depressed for a very long time, i do believe it is genetic as my mom is severely clinically depressed and has never done anythign about it. shes tried to kill herself numerous times and so have i and this sort of extreme behavior was somethhing my H was not at all prepared to deal with and i completely understand that. but what i dont understand is how they can walk away and shut you out when they know you're suffering from an illness. maybe he believes that if he doesnt leave, ill never get better but who knows? i just have to focus on controlling my depression. ive been on ADs for about a month now and they havent totally helped me either. but im going to give it more time before having it analyzed by my C.

all in all, in our given sitch, i think its best for the both of us to do the LRT and go dark. no more contact in any form. im on the start of my 2nd week of NC. it might be helpful for you to set some similar goals, my goal is to try to reach one week without NC and ive done my first week, onto second goal of another week and then i would reward myself with something that makes me happy, like yesterday, i went out to a party in the city with all my friends and dressed up and had a lot of fun.

i know you're having difficulty detaching, so am i, BELIEVE ME, so am i. ive had many amazing people on here kick my a$$ whenever i contact my H or spiral downwards towards self pity all over again. they are a great resource and although im very sad that you are here, im glad you found a place that will help you heal and help you become a better person FOR YOU. you deserve to be happy in life and you will be much better off in the future (with or without your W).

we can do it!! detaching for me is the hardest step and i feel like its the same for you but we both can do it!! think of how amazing your life will be when you reach a stage where you're happy within yourself and no one can ever take that away from you. thats my motivation right now!!

[mac-ct]

I have no way of knowing what's going on, my imagination is running wild to the worst case scenarios

Stop it now! Stop thinking the worst. You have no control over this. You have no idea what is going through her mind so don't even try.

Going dark: do you think yourself as being a "controller" if not - DONT.

Just leave the lines of communication open and - wait. She is hurting as much as you are. She's thinking things through and you need to give her time to sort all her sh*t out. Watch, wait and see.

I know (and so do so many others who are on the BB) how painful this might be. Nothing you can do about it apart from use the time to sort your sh*t out. Get some R&R and work on yourself. Do "things".

Just do it!

We're here for you - rant, rave do everything you feel you need to do - just do it here first!

Keep your chin up

Mac

[cville22901]

MAC-CT

Thanks for your post. I will continue to rant and rave. This is a great medium for venting. It does help to take the physcial action of writing.

Beepee
I'll try to share some things about myself in a future post. We are very, very similar in our histories. I need to get ready to go out and celebrate my son's birthday (he's 27 today), but here's a quick proposal for you. As of today, I'll stop the phone calls and the emails to the wife. This bulletin board is a support group. So, I'll support you, and you can support me in a pact with each other to try and refrain from contacting our respective spouses. You've got a two-week head start on me. Don't lose your head start! Maybe if I can turn this process into a competetive sport, it might help. Take care, and come back here for more sharing.

[beepee]

cville:

i look forward to hearing more about yourself.
im glad you have decided to do NC and i am more than happy to be here and support you and vice versa!
i promise i wont lose my head start!! theres no going back now, only forward.

enjoy your sons birthday!!

[cville22901]

beepee:
Thank you. I had a great time celebrating my son's birthday last night.

So far, no contact today with the ex-wife today, and I'm expecting to get through the rest of today without any phone calls or emails. The weekends are particulary difficult because I find that I have so much time on my hands to just obsess.

I said in my post last night that I would share some of my background with you.

I was originally married from 1981-1990. I had three kids with my first wife. She was a doctor, and I was a teacher. I thought that we had a great life, but she called it quits. I have probably been depressed all my life, and it was never diagnosed. I think that my constant pessimism, which I thought was rational caution, drove my first wife away from me. Suffice it to say that I ended up in a psych hospital after a suicide attempt. I got to the point where I has convinced myself that everyone would be better off without me, including my kids (which was big, big mistake).

Since 1990, I have been in and out of psychoanalysis, I have been taking Prozac, Cymbalta, (now) and Lexapro.

In 1997, I got married again, and, after twelve years, my second wife said that she wanted out. That was at the end of Mrach. Fortunately, there are no little kids involved this time. Again, I feel that my depression caused me to be emotionally unavailable to my wife because I was so wrapped up in my little world. I took her for granted. She is dealing with some very real life problems with herself and her family, and I was way too self-invovled to be there to support her. This is why I find it so difficult to deatch. I know that there were many things that I did not do, I am aware of them, and I want to make it up to her. But, she's just not interested in having any contact with me.

In the past four months, I have, for the first time in my life, read a couple of self-help books for depression and "Divorce Remedy."

I am trying to apply the recommendations in what I have read. But, it is very hard and discouraging at times because the progress is slow. I want a quick fix, but that's not going to happen.

I am very tired of defining myself as a "depressed" person in my life. Despite all the things that I have read and that I know that I could/should be doing, it is still very difficult to "do" things. I have made a lot of progress in the past months, but it slow going. I still feel the need to drop on the bed each weekend afternoon and zone out for an hour. It's not napping because I cannot sleep. My eyes are closed, but I am totally awake. Finally, this afternoon, I did jump up and go to the gym. I feel a lot better now.

I do not have a lot of advice to dispense because I do not really know what I am talking about with regard to relationships and battling depression. If I was good at either one, I would probably not be on this blog.

Happiness is something that I have had from time to time, but it seems like something unattainable right now. I guess that if you start to believe in it, it can happen, but the circularity of that process makes me want to throw up my hands in frustration and despair. I guess that I need to learn how to hope again.

I guess that I am rambling, but I just want you to know that, in terms of dealing with the depression, you are not alone in your struggle. I envy people who are not depressed, I wish that I could be like them, and I wish that they understood me better. I hope that you can find the strength in your struggle to become a happy person.

When I read some of the posts on this thread and some of the others, I wonder what makes some people "tick." That is not a knock against the. It is a knock against me. That is, I have difficulty comprehending how they have captured happiness, I don't know how they did it, and it scares me that I may never be able to achieve the same. I guess you just have to have the Bela Karolyi attitude and yell, "You can do it!"

I wonder sometimes if posting here is constructive or counter-productive because I am wallowing in my self-pity. I am not much of a cheerleader.

One book that I read is called "Feeling Good" by David Burns. It's a book about cognitive therapy. It has provided me with some pretty useful tools. I can't say that they cured me at all, but they certainly have helped me to begin to understand why I am so screwed up. Maybe that's a first baby step in the right direction. We'll see.

[cville22901]

mac-ct

I was reading through your post again. I have the conviction, whether it is well-founded or not, that she is not still sorting out her baggage. I think that she has been doing that for the last two years, and that she arrived at her decision to end the marriage, not as a rash decision, but through a long and agonizing process for her. She has been going through menopause, and she has been suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome (so the doctor thought) and periodic migraines. I think that the physcial probekms were partially induced by stress. The stress was caused by her sense of feeling trapped in an unloving relationship, where she felt that she was being taken for granted, and she was torn by her desire to get out.

Despite the fact that I want to reconcile, I think that she is probably gone for good. Although I would like to patch it up, I do not think that she has any desire to do so.

I have had very little contaact with her in the past two months. I have tried to do all the "right" things as far as avoiding pursuing behavior, but...

In the one or two times that I have actually seen her in the last two months (very briefly), she has told me that she is doing well as long as she does not have to deal with me.

If she is "thinking things over," I'd be shocked. It appears as if she has thought things over, made her decision, and chosen to stay on the path to divorce.

I need to stop hoping for the miracle and learn to move on somehow. At 57 years old, it is tough to contemplate.

[beepee]

cville:

thanks for sharing your story and glad you had a great time celebrating your sons birthday!

i agree with you that weekends are the hardest. but the best thing to do it to make plans for those days so you dont have so much time to obsess. i was obsessing so much the past few weeks but this weekend, i went out and partied with friends and even tho i still thought about my H, it wasnt so strong. i was able to laugh and have a good time and even do some flirting! what do you like to do? schedule something for next week and make sure that you dont have the time to obsess!! i know how hard it is to have the motivation to even do it when you're depressed (oh beeelieve me, i know) but you just have to do it.

our backgrounds are similar. i believe i was depressed my entire life as well and got it from my mom who is severely depressed, and ive never been diagnosed until a year ago. i was pessimistic too over the past few years but ive been through a stage in my life where i was really really happy with myself and with life and im determined to get that feeling back. my H left me because of my depression as well and that drove me into suicidal mode and was hospitalized for a week.

i did all the same things you did to ruin my M. i was always sad, overly critical, took everything out on him and smothered him with all my problems instead of seeking help elsewhere. i, too, was wrapped up in my own little world and i was the only one that mattered, i didnt care about how he felt, i didnt care about his emotional well-being and its only now that i realize how horribly i treated him and how i took him for granted.

when you talk about difficulty detaching, i feel the same way. i think our depression makes it a lot harder to detach. but we have to change that. the meds you are taking should be helping you to feel a bit better, counseling is great too. your wife isnt contacting you just like my H wasnt contacting me and i thought it was the worst thing in the world. but you have to let that go for now and focus on your mental health before you can even begin to work on your M. thats something im only beginning to learn and accept. you are more important than anything and if you're not feeling well mentally and arent happy with yourself, there is no way that you can make the M work. sorry if im being too blunt, i didnt want to believe any of this either but i know its the only way to move on and be successful in the end.

everything youre saying in your post mirrors my sitch. ive been reading books but sometimes i get discouraged and feel any sort of progress is slow, i want things to be fixed right away, i find it extremely difficult to "do" anything, and i have to lie down in bed more often than you do to be able to get on with my day!! and i dont sleep either, my body feels so worn that i need so much time lying down in order to re-energize and get back up. and the hardest part is forcing myself to get out of bed but i know i have to do it.

i envy people who arent depressed too. i wish i didnt feel this way either, no one wants to feel this way but you accept it and feel the pain and then you do something about it no matter how hard it is. i know you feel like happiness is unattainable right now, but it is!! trust me! if you felt happy before like you said you did, you can certainly feel it again!

and please, for your own sake, dont ever say you're screwed up. because you're not. being depressed doesnt make you screwed up. you have to accept that you have depression, and do something about it. YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. it takes a lot of time and energy but i believe in you and i believe in myself. we are both going through a difficult time battling depression and trying to salvage our marriages but i feel grateful that you are here and now i wont feel so alone. i hope i can be of help to you while you make your way back to a happy life!

sorry for the long post! it WILL get easier. and remember, schedule something to do next weekend!! no obsessing! i dont want to do anything either but im going to force myself to go to the cape with friends. I'm sure you will feel better once you're out of the house and doing something fun!!

[cville22901]

beepee:
Don't ever apologize for a long post. I get a lot more out of something with some substance than I do from reading a bunch of hit and run instant message notes.

This was a real roller coaster today.

As I mentioned earlier, I went out and celebrated my son's birthday on Saturday. It was great. We did a Chinese restaraunt with my other two kids and their various significant others. We then went to my son's place for a drink. His two step brothers were there with their wife/girlfriend, and we had a great time talking.

Then my buddy and I went to a bar. I ran into my doctor, who I've only seen on one other occasion socially. He invited us to his table and introduced us to a couple of single women. My doctor left after about a half hour, and we spent the next hour or so chatting with these two ladies. It was very pleasant. They were both very smart professionals. I ended up talking to one of them most of the night, gave her my business card, and asked her to call me.

It's strange to go back thorugh my posts and read that last line. It makes me sound like the most fickle man on earth. It was quite an effort on my part to be even that bold. But, I told myself that getting a life would mean striking out and trying to connect with new people. I do not know if this woman will ever call me, but it would be nice if she did. We seemed to be able to converse pretty easily. I asked her to call me. It wasn't like I was asking her to marry me.

I guess my observation about my behavior is that my depressive "all or nothing thinking" almost held me back. Why should I waste an opportunity to befriend an attractive, intelligent, independent woman just because my wife is no longer interested? Granted, we haven't signed any separation papers, but it's been four months of nothing but "I want out" from her.

Sunday was okay, but it got very slow after my friend went back to DC.

Then, today, it was the pits. I did not sleep well, and I took half of an Ambien at 5:00AM. Then I went to see my counselor at 9:00. By the time I got finished with him, I was in no mood or condition to drive an hour to work so I took a sick day. I spent about three hours in bed trying to sleep, but it didn't work. Finally, I got up, downloaded a pdf file on "Mindfulness" (meditation) and read. I actually tried meditating for the first time in my life for about twenty minutes. I have to admit that it was pretty soothing and energizing. I hit the staionary bike for half an hour and then cooked a taco dinner for myself and my son.

He's a freaking saint! How many 27 year old men would want to put up with their father's sob story about a divorce time after time after time. Maybe he's just really hungry all the time?

Anyway, this afternoon, I also went back and reviewed a chapter in the Burns book about procrastination and "do-nothingism." This is a big problem for me. Because I do not feel motivated, I don't do anything. I just want to sit in a chair with my eyes closed. Then, I feel bad about it. The worse I feel, the more I want to sit.

To break the cycle, I just have to do something. It does not matter what. That action creates additional motivation and energy.

I consciously know this, but I find it hard to put it into practice at times. Maybe I need to put an electric fence around my bed when it is not night time. I rationalize that I am tired. Maybe I need to realize that I am not "tired" and that I am depressed and that the worst thing that I can do is to sit still.

Anyhow, what started out as a very crappy day did turn around. My plan for tomorrow is work, then volleyball (if it doesn't rain).

This weekend, I plan to go to a party in DC. My buddy and I were Peace Corps volunteers from 73-35. He has a son who is headed to Uganda in August. Second generation Peace Corps! He plans to invite some other former volunteers who live in the DC area. It will be a good time.

Half of today was good; I'll take it.