WAH in MLC with PA

[DiamondGirl]

Thanks Snodderly, CW, shelbel, SA & Mila (sorry if I missed anyone),

Mila - I'm working at getting back the detachment and strength. Not easy to do right now...

SA - It does make sense... and I appreciate the info.. I read about it a little in the MLC resources, but I'd lost sight of it.

I was the one who initiated the conversations, and pushed his buttons first this time (I'm ashamed to admit) and I'm trying to figure out why I did.. I don't have an answer...

He had said something that I know was true in all of the BS, and I was trying to make sense of it in my head.

We had been having yet another argument a few months before he left about selling the house. (H would every now and again come up with how we couldn't afford the house, though I knew his spending is what was making things difficult, so I would disagree without calling him on the spending).

He came right out with either we sell the house or I leave and I said so leave as at that point I was tired of arguing and fed up with his blaming things on me.

I so regretted saying that afterwards and never told him I did. I didn't want to reopen the argument.

He brought it up with the ranting and I was trying to figure out earlier today why I *had* been so resistant to selling the house knowing he was so unhappy. Why I impulsively chose the house over him (in his eyes anyway).

I'm not materialistic by any means and can be a real tighta-s about spending money I admit. So what was it about the house that I didn't want to let go of? (besides my mom's investment in it too)

I realized that it wasn't the house I was clinging to, it was the financial stability it represented to me.

All the years of our marriage we struggled financially because of a combination of my not working (for various reasons over the years) and his not being able to stay at one job for longer than a few years at the absolute most. Every time he changed jobs, there were things that went unpaid or we did without. The financial instability killed me each time. He always had a job within a week of leaving the last, but it always resulted in us being short of funds for a month or so after each change.

In his eyes the fact that he had a job right after should have eliminated the insecurity. It didn't. I grew up with a father who was at the same company and job for 35 years, day in day out. And by this point my self esteem was already at a low point and I was insecure about everything.

Now I am faced with my own internal dilemma again about the house I'm in now. I can't live with my mom under the same roof. So I will be without her financial input after September or October.

I can't afford a down payment on my own home to purchase as I don't have much savings to speak of. In my province you cannot borrow towards a down payment (on paper anyway.. anyone have any rich friends? JK)

The idea of renting terrifies me as I equate renting with instability. When H and I were renting we had a few landlords who were unreasonably intrusive and threatened to kick other tenants out on a whim. I can't live like that again, depending on a stranger's decisions for my shelter.

I am not comfortable renting out a room in my home because of my children's vulnerability to strangers as there is no separate quarters that can be established. Based on my own abusive history I can't tolerate the idea of a stranger having access in the night to my children.

Getting a second job again would mean additional daycare costs and I am already looking at costs for before/after school care for both kids in September because of my mom moving out.

I don't know what to do or think right now.

I'm pretty sure that H is not paying anything because he can't really afford it right now, but also because paying me money to help out with the house would mean I wouldn't fail at being able to keep it. I think he is hoping I do have to move so that he can say he was right in our not being able to afford it. He pretty much said as much yesterday when he was here. He said now that I am paying everything myself I can see how hard it is to do alone. "Doesn't feel good does it?"

Any thoughts on the above are gratefully appreciated. I'm too close to all of it.