Wow, this vague (by necessity) thing makes it really hard to get targeted advice... Didn't realize it would be this hard. I'm tired, long day of apartment hunting and trying not to think about what's actually happening, which I'm getting good at during times I don't need to be distracted. Compartmentalizing.
A friend asked me a question that was very pointed today:
"If your child was not involved...would you still want to be married to this man? That's a very important question [that] you need to answer honestly for yourself. Being a mother adds major layers of guilt, duty, etc to the sitch. But first you need clarity of what the marriage is to you aside from the parenting components."
Here was my answer to friend:
here's my honest answer. I loved him and we had fun together. He was my best friend for many years. His personality- up until a year or so ago- was great for me as a partner (balanced out things about me that tend to extreme, made me see the world differently, in a good way). We shared so many interests and I easily saw us raising a family and growing old together. Life was good, not perfect, but good. He was kind, funny, fun and a great lover. I want all that, still do. If he were to go back to how he was, particularly before child, and I could rid myself of the anger and resentment (and he could too) that has built up in the years since then, yes, I'd want him. I would need to do some things differently- and so would he (which I wouldn't bet on him doing, though...)- to keep from getting to this place again. But I don't believe that it would be any harder than any other R- I'm not under the illusion that there's some easier R out there with a man who's got less baggage. What makes it harder now is the build up of negative feelings and things that can't be undone, plus a negative communication pattern. Parenting issues, too, but you asked about w/out kids.
And it's SO hard to answer your question and separate kid out of the equation AND how he's behaved the past 4-6 months. Interestingly, a lot of the worst behavior has been POST-bomb... Now that I've seen him at his worst and have his answer: that he doesn't intend to do anything radically different in our R... if that's true, no, I wouldn't be happy with him. There, I said it. The tough thing is that what if.... What if he woke up and realized he's losing me and returned to that first guy? I know him at his best too, and that unperfect best is good enough for me- it really was. But I don't know if he'd ever be at that best again with me. So how do you separate out whether you want them when you don't know which H you'd potentially have-? if I can only answer for the present, sadly, no, I can't be happy going on like things are today if nothing changes. So confusing. And sad.
