tired of trying...

[beingreal]

Thank you guys. I appreciate you keeping up on this mess. It's hard enough for *me* to keep up on it.

I called h last night to ask about S8's bookbag for school, he'd left it at MIL's. H found it, mentioned that he might bring it up, along with the Boy Scout rocket that had gone MIA. He then went on and on about how it didn't matter, there was one in the attic, S8 didn't even like rockets, which was strange to him because he liked them when he was a kid, so on and so forth. He was kind of talking in circles, all I could really do was listen.

He talked about his healing injury (motorcycle accident last week), about all the work he's doing at his mom's. I'd manage to get in *maybe* a dozen words in the whole time he was talking. He was lucid, I don't think he had been drinking or doing anything else. He was just chatty. And not nearly as negative.

He again mentioned coming up to bring S8 his school supplies, and I mentioned that I had a few things here for him, like his new car insurance card. That led into him talking about having gotten insurance on the bike on his own since he'd left.

My response? "I wondered about that, I just wasn't going to pry."

Of course, I'd have had every right to ask, we are still very much legally and financially bound to one another. But I didn't. I just have to trust that he's going to be a grownup, and grownups have to make their own decisions.


I have decided that I will need a few things from him before I even entertain the notion of working on our R. Let me know what you think...

~He will need to see a physician to check his thyroid & his free testosterone levels. Both can make you batty if they are out of whack. He will also need an STD panel if he chooses to engage in any sexual activity. I don't think he will, but again, he's not under my roof & must make his own decisions.

~He will need to seek IC to figure out what is going on in his head. And if his IC suggests to him (like the last one did!) that he get on meds, then I want him to do just that. I don't care if he doesn't think he needs them. He can't see the forest for the trees right now.

~He will need to be gainfully employed. Since he does not put much stock in the importance of raising children and helping around the house, then he needs to find another way to contribute. He quit school, he bases his ability to take care of his family in monetary terms, then he needs to start adding something he feels IS valuable.

~He will quit drinking and stop using any drugs that weren't prescribed to him by a physician. Don't smoke pot, don't take you grandmother's *nerve pills* just because she thinks you need them, don't take what's left of my pain pills (for a peritonsilar abcess, I'm getting them yanked in a few months) just because you say you hurt your back/shoulder/ankle/whatever.


H had developed an addiction several years ago (smoking weed & taking prescription drugs). He revealed it to me, but was terrified he'd lose us. It never occurred to me to leave him right then--I supported him while he went through outpatient rehab. But I told him that he forfeited any right to privacy he had when it came to the topic of drugs. I wouldn't nag him about it, but I reserved my right to question him if I thought he'd been using again. He could do whatever he wanted--just not as my husband or their father.

Of course, that could be why he'd hidden it from me so well.


So what do you think? How and when do I make those contingencies known? I'd read a bit in other threads of letting the spouse know that there *is* a way home, if they choose to take it. Of course I don't want him home just because he's sick and tired of living at his mom's. I want him home because he misses us and chooses to be with us. I want him back as an independent, self assured man--not another little boy that I have to contain, control & coddle.


Are you listening, LBHs?? When the wise ones tell you that your WAWs want you to be men, they mean it. We do! Confident, calm, put together, and happy just being himself--if my H showed up at my door to get the kids as that man (like he used to be!), I would not be able to get him off my mind.

That being said, can someone please email my H & clue him in? Thanks.