Thanks fullmoon. WH is going back to the city where we lived these past few years - his hometown. He has a lot of 'explaining' to do to our very best friends (they were his friends first, but after 15 years we are all close). He will find it hard to introdce OW to our circle. At least in the short term. BUt cos I am here, and they are there, eventually I am sure they will be accepted...that's if it lasts. And as OW is part of WH's extended family friend circle, I am doubly concerned he is going to do his darndest to make that relationship work, or else he will have screwed two women's lives up, if you see what I mean? I think WH will avoid the places we frequented and lived, and hang out more in OW's area and the area of his former work.
sorry i have to say more (i'm typing little because baby is now sleeping)...
the sitch is perfect. he leaves this note 'forgive me,' you say nothing back, he hears nothing. he is with ow but at the same time he hasn't heard from you which surprises him. he hears oh, you are now _____ (playing an instrument, doing a new sport, volunteering somewhere) and he wonders who you are meeting. he asks you about bub and you sound happy and distant. hmm.
and it starts from there.
and all at the same time you really are detaching and becoming happier!
even if they do 'accept' ow, they will not favor her over you. not after this.
he doesn't care about how many lives he screws up! and if he goes back to you, he still has only screwed up one. even if that doesn't fully make sense, he can see it that way.
yes, he might avoid where you frequented. but then one day he stumbles into a place... or gets invited there...
Sounds good to me, G. Thanks for outlining it. And the good news is I have some surprising things coming up. Friends have invited me to join them up north at a beach resort in one week's time. This will be bub's first plane trip! Then two weeks after that, I'm heading to another big city up north to spend a week with my SIL and niece. So I am not going to sit around moping and journaling on here ALL the time, ha!
Another tactical question: I don't want to pretend I am all happy-go-lucky when I am actually trying to recover from a personal set-back (to use an understatement) with common friends. What "image" do I project, if I know it's going to get back to WH?
Do I just say "I am doing my best to move forward ..getting a lot of joy out of bub..", stuff like that? and not mention WH and my pain?
You know how Bob Hawk's "wife"(OW turned W) had the book out and people are disgusted at how they profess their "greatest love ever" in public? It's a good example of how people see infidelity, their immediate circles might be polite and seem to 'accept' it but I really question whether they do. And OW being eaten by insecurity even if she doesn't admit it herself... to write such a book. Explains a lot about how WAH and OW's minds work, and it doesn't at all look like an eternal bliss.
That's awesome about your vacations. You have to tell me what flying is like with bub. That reminds me to get Thanksgiving tickets...
Anyway.
Originally Posted By: Piano
Another tactical question: I don't want to pretend I am all happy-go-lucky when I am actually trying to recover from a personal set-back (to use an understatement) with common friends. What "image" do I project, if I know it's going to get back to WH?
Do I just say "I am doing my best to move forward ..getting a lot of joy out of bub..", stuff like that? and not mention WH and my pain?
Well. I guess I would say to talk to close, true friends about your pain. But people who are common friends, yes. Doing your best to move forward, had a setback but doing quite well, etc etc.
You can even make a policy that you guys won't talk about him. It helps a LOT later for yourself. Because if you want to know what they know about WH, you've already set up that you won't talk about him. And it's good to just not know!!
1. He wants to see the baby, he doesn't want to see her, he HAS to see her one last time -- he's being eaten by guilt. Let him stew in it a while longer so it can get a few more big chunks out of him.
2. DON'T contact him, as the others have said. Silence is a powerful thing. It makes you imagine the worst. Especially when you KNOW you've been a complete ass.
3. In times of crisis, you learn who your true friends are. The b@stard who housed WH while you were pregnant? NOT a friend. The people in Europe who accept OW? NOT your friends. The people who REFUSE to socialize with WH because of OW? Friends. The ones who tell him off and then call or email you to say what a jerk he is and that OW looks like 40 miles of bad road? Soul mates.
4. How do you endure the questions when you're with your friends on holiday? Compartmentalize. Stuff the pain in a little box, lock it tight, and tell anyone politely who asks, "I'm not really ready to talk about that right now. What good movies have you seen lately?"
Someone wrote upthread that all BS are handed a sh!t sandwich, but they don't have to eat it. I actually read one I liked better on another thread: WAS are making a sh!t sandwich that they keep trying to get US to eat so they don't have to. Shove it back at them enough, and they have to eat it themselves.
My WFIL has been chomping on his for 25 years. It doesn't taste any better with time...
Do I just say "I am doing my best to move forward ..getting a lot of joy out of bub..", stuff like that? and not mention WH and my pain?
Perfect. Also agree to allow yourself to talk to close friends and family about your pain. Just be cautious that the more you "bash" your H the more they won't want you to R one day.
And I must say that no contact is definitely the way to go. Commit for a month to start. Vent here when you are tempted to communicate with him!
Last edited by newmama; 08/18/1006:26 PM.
me,34 exH,34 S,16 months S:3/31/09-left for OW started DBing 10/09 d final: sometime 10/10 current: http://www.divorcebusting.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=2022856&page=1 met in 2004
Someone wrote upthread that all BS are handed a sh!t sandwich, but they don't have to eat it. I actually read one I liked better on another thread: WAS are making a sh!t sandwich that they keep trying to get US to eat so they don't have to. Shove it back at them enough, and they have to eat it themselves.
My WFIL has been chomping on his for 25 years. It doesn't taste any better with time...
I woke up this morning and I felt a sense of relief. Relief WH was on that plane and that the daily drama was over.
By lunchtime, I was starting to miss him.
By evening, I cannot understand what has happened to my life & I feel extremely anxious that here I am, bunking in with my parents, in a city I only came back to because we were coming together, and no home/direction of my own.
Bub is nice to cuddle, but it's not the same as the comforting arms of your mate, now is it?
I am starting to wonder if wanting to R is detremental to my health. It's keeping me in limbo.
Also, get this:
My mother (who has a very bad memory and cannot recall anything) tells me today that when WH visited yesterday, amongst the few things he said to her was "She STILL loves me!".
I asked what tone did he say it in? Was it negative, like "what a silly person, she still loves me, only an idiot would love me after all that's happened"
And she said, no, he sounded sort of bewildered.
Hmm...even so... alarm bells going off in my head. I think he has no respect for me and thinks I have low self esteem (true).
He's said several things to me since Bomb to the effect of, "I wish you could live without me".
That's why I am starting to doubt if I love him or if it's more that I don't love myself.
To top things off, just had a fight with my mother and feeling fed up that since Sept 09 I have not had a place of my own. I can't even imagine myself being happy in a little flat here with bub.
