The journey begins

[ClingingToHope]

Thanks Gardener. Feeling good today -- although I'm still sick as a dog. I'm watching the Pacqueaeo-Clottey fight with friends and then going out and then I'm resting tomorrow.

[ClingingToHope]

Another GALing weekend out of the way. My last stop last night was a bowling alley bar where a friend said he'd be. He was and this place is a huge hangout for my high school so there were a couple dozen people there I knew.

Ended up seeing two couples that I've known for about 25 years and they were part of a group of couples W and I hung out with back at the beginning of the M.

We stopped hanging out with them for two reasons. One, my best friend in that group moved away so I didn't get as many invites, and two, we started turning down the invites because one of the women in the group also named their daughter the name we gave our oldest.

That upset W. She said they knew that was the name she'd wanted to name her girl for years and she felt it was disrespectful.

So when I was invited to join them W would ask if this particular couple was going to be there. If they were we wouldn't go. Eventually, everyone stopped calling.

One of many stories like this.

Anyway. One of the wives knew we were getting divorced. I worked with her husband last summer when everything started. The other had no idea. So I spent the last hour going over everything. They felt sorry for me, but agreed W has always been a little off, always a little unhappy.

Funny, one of the couples I always looked at for hope. The husband, a friend of mine, was tossed out of the house twice because he wouldn't grow up. He went out every night instead of helping around the house. He had affairs. He was a player and didn't want to grow up.

The second time he got it and was promising to change. Begging to come back. But his W was done. She'd hired an attorney, started hanging out with single friends. It was over.

Then a weird thing happened. She had to travel with a co-worker who was also a marriage counselor. This co-worker was happily remarried and really in love with her second husband.

But she told my friend that if she could do it over, she would have worked it out with the first one. The D caused so much wreckage with her kids and financially that even though she ended up finding someone new to love, she would have rather stuck it out.

That woke my friend up and she let her husband back and he's a new guy now. He's in residential construction so there's no work for him. Instead, he's super dad. He learned how to cook. He keeps the house clean and takes the kids to everything so his W can concentrate on her job.

It's an amazing transformation.

She said maybe there's a lightning strike out there for my W.

I told her I'm not counting on miracles anymore.

[Gardener]

CTH, Sounds like a real good GAL night. A bit bittersweet, perhaps, hearing old friends acknowledging things like W being a little bit off, always a bit unhappy. And the pettiness over baby-naming resulting in friends "dropping you", so to speak, over time.

For me, this part stood out:

Then a weird thing happened. She had to travel with a co-worker who was also a marriage counselor. This co-worker was happily remarried and really in love with her second husband. But she told my friend that if she could do it over, she would have worked it out with the first one. The D caused so much wreckage with her kids and financially that even though she ended up finding someone new to love, she would have rather stuck it out.

Early on after the second Bomb (the D Bomb, not the S Bomb) while researching - desperately searching, is more accurate - the internet for resources (the day I stumbled across DB, as a matter of fact) I came across the following statistics:

87% of couples who separate, or even do a "trial" separation never reconcile.
In a follow-up, of those 87%, some 75% of them regretted it 5 years later and conceded their lives were worse off on many levels (love, companionship, depression, financial, social, etc.).

Of the 13% who did reconcile, 5 years later a full 95% of them were glad they did, glad they stuck it out and worked it. Because it improved and M & R & life were far better and happier.

So, good for your friend for her epiphany:

That woke my friend up and she let her husband back and he's a new guy now. He's in residential construction so there's no work for him. Instead, he's super dad. He learned how to cook. He keeps the house clean and takes the kids to everything so his W can concentrate on her job. It's an amazing transformation.

and for her/their success.

She said maybe there's a lightning strike out there for my W.

I hope so. A (very) small part of me still hopes against hope for the same. But in my case, that person truly is no more.

I told her I'm not counting on miracles anymore.

I hear that.
p.s.: Could you tell me how to append that "first thread, second thread, current" thing to my signature profile?

[ClingingToHope]

Go to tinyurl.com and paste the long address of your thread in there and it'll give you a shorter one. Then put it on your profile.

[ClingingToHope]

OK. This is where NC is a problem. W was turned down by two of the afterschool sitter candidates and hasn't heard from a third.

So she sends me an email at midnight. I respond (at 3 a.m. when I got home) that the old afterschool sitter may work another week and I'd liked 5 candidates so has she called the other two?

No response so far, which is not surprising, she doesn't check email much. So I sent her a text.

The last part of her email is "what do we do if we can't hire anyone and old sitter won't work."

I'd already thought of that. I asked my boss a couple of weeks ago whether I'd be able to be in the office until 2:30 p.m. and then just work from home for rest of day if necessary.

She said OK.

I didn't put that in the email because I want her to sweat a bit -- yes, I know that's a little evil.

My guess is I'll be putting the ad back in for sitter candidates and spending more time at home with girls.

I won't mind and it'll be a nice point to bring up in the custody discussions. I can make adjustments in my schedule easily. W can't.

I'm spending the afternoon in at the office trying to complete a major project. Next weekend I'm working in Chicago at the Shamrock Shuffle and the two weekends after I have the girls bookending spring break and our trip to Florida.

Final note. I promised a friend I'd do the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University Class through my church before I made a final decision on bankruptcy. Now I know the guy is good, but I can't believe he can help me create a plan to wipe out $16,000 in credit card debt when my take-home check is likely to be around $900 after the D.

The class starts tomorrow and I signed up to see what he has to say -- and to be around people. I have the second round of my Marriage Rebuilders Class starting on March 23.

[awest1217]

It is so hard to juggle this with kids because you don't want to talk to W, but at the same time you need to be in constant contact because of your Ds. It is such a fine line to walk.

I hope you have a better week this week.

[ClingingToHope]

Got a call from W around 8 p.m. I was almost asleep -- cold medicine. Still no resolution on after school sitter so she was asking if I could keep them on Monday and Tuesday. Her mom can help on Wednesday or Thursday.

I actually can stay home all week after school if necessary, but I decided to just let her keep running through hoops.

Yes, yes. Not the nicest thing to do.

I meet with my L in an hour to respond to W's initial offer.

Should be a fun week with girls. Too much going on tonight though. Daisy Troupe for D7. Want to go to a pizza night fundraiser with D11. Then first night of Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class.

Then ... well, I'm skipping basketball tonight because of a sore foot. I'm hoping rest will help because I'll be on my feet all weekend for the Shamrock Shuffle in Chicago.

[poet]

At least she's calling.

poet

[ClingingToHope]

Sitting with D11 as she does her homework. D7 is out playing with a friend.

Weird feeling after meeting with the L ... giddy.

That's the wrong feeling isn't it?

We rejected W's proposal point by point. We're going for sole custody -- so that I can settle for joint.

No child support. We'd split everything. She'd take half of the CC debt. She'd owe me about $3,500 on her car to equalize values.

We included her pension. They hadn't.

The last part was interesting and I hadn't thought of. W got her annual bonus Friday -- $3,600 net. My L said I'm entitled to half of it or we should insist it be spent on marital debt.

I wasn't sure, but then I thought the nice guy approach has gotten me nowhere. So he included a paragraph asking for an accounting on how the bonus was used. It is our position that it should be used to pay off debt -- the tax bill, summer camps, the $2,000 swing set that W bought on a credit card in my name AFTER I moved out and summer camps.

I have a feeling W isn't going to be happy with our proposal and furious that I'm even mentioning the bonus.

Oh well. The game is on. The next step is we are requesting mediation on the child custody issue.

[ClingingToHope]

Just finished my first night of Financial Peace University. I didn't learn anything I didn't know before. The problem was W never really got on board financially -- she shops when she's depressed -- and now I'm so far in the hole I don't think Dave Ramsey can save me.

Week two will be interesting -- how to get out of debt.