Looking for Advice

[gutwrenching]

Update from last night:

Last night I got basically the I don't like your changes speech. W needed to do some work and asked me what I was going to do. I replied I am going to start on a project to get the house ready to sell. This made her upset...she thought I was trying to make her feel guilty about not helping. She then asked me why I don't just go in the room and spend a bunch of time on the computer like I used too. I simply told her that I still use the computer but am not consumed by it. I said you always used to complain that I spent too much time on it, now not enough?

W proceeds to tell me that she told me to prepare for the worst and then I start spending more time with the kids, want to go to church again, and do more around the house. She was implying that I was playing games...so I calmly asked her that...are you thinking I am playing games. She said no, that's not the right word but it appears to her that the things I have changed were done to show her what see will be missing if she leaves.

I re-iterated as I have many times before that I have really enjoyed all the time I have been able to spend with the kids. W replied that if there is one good thing that comes from all of this it is that I realized how much they need me and that they are much happier now. I only added that they are even happier here recently now that W has also been spending time with them. W replied "I know."

I also re-iterated that I don't need W to go to church with us, and that she knows the reasons I really want to go since I openly shared that with her, and that I will take them with me. W replied no you won't, I will go for the girls...struck a nerve there...basically said there is no way that this will be something I get to do with just them...jealousy I would guess.

I ignored the houswork comment, nothing much has changed there, it is just how she is re-writing history on me not doing much around the house which is complete BS.

She also said she needs more space and that is why she goes to the basement. I told sure seems like you are hiding something when you do that...and her reply was she was hiding from me to decompress. In the past I would sit on the computer for a couple of hours in the evening and that would be her decompress time but now that I don't do that, she needs time alone. She said we work out together in the morning, and at lunch, and I am normally home when she gets home...so not enough space. I reminded her that the lunch gym routine could easily be avoided, but she had said she liked doing it that way...and again, she said no she didn't want to change that.

I did validate that I understand how she could perceive things that way, but that was not the case. I told her I was not going to be consumed by the computer and I should not be viewed as a bad guy because I am doing things that make me happier. Lastly I said something about the stress that she is dealing with and let her know that I too have to deal with stress. She said stress of what: so I replied, work, upcoming move, getting house ready to sell, probably going to lose money on house, youngest D really going through one of those stages. I did not say anything about R/M, I think that is what she was expecting and wanting to me to say...but I didn't go there.

So, more space I can give her. I did last night and went to sleep before she came up from basement. It was midnight when she went to bed. This morning she tells me that she lost track of time (I didn't ask at all, didn't care really) and has to be better about that because now she is tired. I didn't respond.