I'm now healing and moving forward

[ericmsant2]

Grit

Honey...sweetheart.....I let you take a picture of me at your place and here you go sharing it with the world.

I'm hurt that you would share something that was so personal and really just between "us".

Because of YOUR actions I have put up a boundary...I will have no part of you in my life if YOU continue to share our "personal" pictures with everyone".



On a serious note....what kind of web sites are you surfing?

[ericmsant2]

All

I wanted to share with everyone a long conversation that I had with my mother in law last night.

Here is a little background before I summarize our conversation….

Over the past few weeks the interactions that I have had with my in-laws has changed substantially. The phone calls and text from MIL have for the most part stopped. The last time my in-laws were at the house was about 3 weeks ago; and as I suspected they would do….they once again tried to talk to my W about the D. I told my MIL not to bother. I went on to explain to MIL that what my W was doing and dealing with is something that she needs to deal with and that no one could help her or talk her out of it. MIL knows about OM; however, W continues to deny it. Anywhooo…. I warned my in-laws not to have the conversation with her and they did anyway. When I walked upstairs, my in-laws and W were speaking and my W was crying. I still do not know what was said to my W and really it is none of my business. My MIL called me the following day to see how I was doing and only provided the following comment regarding her convo with my W : “Eric, she feels she has done nothing wrong and she has not accepted responsibility for anything – it is all still your fault”. My response – I told you guys not to bother, this is something that she will have to deal with if and when she ever feels like dealing with – it is in her and/or God’s time – not mine. That was the last convo I had with my MIL until yesterday.

Yesterday, my MIL sent me a text telling me “that I need to keep my faith in God and that remember God is God”. FTR, my MIL does not agree with my W choices.

So after some thought I decided to respond to my MIL….The point of my response to her was to let her know that I have decided to let completely go of my W and to live my life.

Me: Mom please know that I still love my W and always will but that it is now time for me to move forward with my life.

MIL: I know, it has been a year already

Me: Yep, and I have learned so much and still have a ways to go. But I am stronger now.

MIL: Yes you are. Just remember that God is always with you

Me: Mom, I cannot thank you enough for your support throughout this ordeal.

MIL: Eric we love YOU both. Both of you are our children. We are praying for both of you.

Me: Thank you, I want to be honest with you….I am not sure that I want this anymore in my life. I am not saying that I am done I just really want to focus on me and
my life. My life with my children and whatever that looks like.

MIL: I understand Eric

Me: Mom, there has been so much damage in the past year and what I have learned about myself and about where I went wrong has been a blessing.

MIL: yes Eric, Mary Ann cannot see what she is doing.

Me: I know mom. I suspect that something traumatic will need to happen in order for her to begin to look at herself but really who knows, it is between her and God. As for me, I have decided to let go completely. Nothing I do or say will matter at this point. Ya know Mom had this not happened I would not have realized the things about myself that I have and for this I am grateful. In a some weird way grateful for her. Maybe it was God will that this happened. I don’t know and I may never know. What I do know and accept now is that where I am today is right where I am suppose to be. Do I know why? Nope. But I have faith that whatever is gonna happen is gonna happen.

MIL: You will always be our family (at this point I can hear her start to get a little chocked up).

Me: Yes Mom I will. Things may change in the future – who knows. What I do wish and would suggest is that whomever W ends up with, and maybe it is me, you guys love that person as much as you loved me. Show the man who you guys are. As for me, I’ll be fine.

MIL: You know this had to happen to both of you. I know you did all you could.

Me: Thanks Mom. Look we both did the best we could. I will never bash Mary Ann. As I have said we both made mistakes.

MIL: I know….I know…I still believe God (she chocked up again).

Me: You should Mom. Boy, have I made mistakes. Ya know what though….a friend of mine said the following word to me…”intent”….I have thought about it mom. I made mistakes, many, BUT I never “intended” to hurt her or my family or you. I can look in the mirror and say that I know with all my heart that every mistake I made was never done with the “intention” to hurt anyone. As for my M.A., maybe one day she will need to ask herself if her actions were “intentional”…if they were you can tell her, that is if I am not around, that I forgive her. As for my mistakes, I never want to forget them. Never…they are a reminder of what I was and what I now am and WHY.

MIL: Keeping praying Eric always look up and never let go of God – whatever it is He will be with you.

Me: I know Mom…I know…

We chatted a bit more but I guess my point of this post is this…

I had an opportunity to…..see just how much pain can be caused by a D. Pain felt by everyone – it sucks.
I also had the opportunity to…. see just how much I have grown. I still have a ways to go…but I felt okay after our conversation and realized…one big thing….I have forgiven myself and in many ways have forgiven my W. I always wondered if I would be able to and finally realized that honestly…It just happens. It just happens one day. Does this mean that I will never be angry with my W – no – what it is says to me is that I am….going though….


God Bless,
Eric

[smith18]

You are a lucky one Eric. A lot of people dont have a mother in law like yours. I was lucky too in that my mother in law was very nice, although I was not able to communicate directly because of the language difference. The last time she came to the USA, she gave me a nice ornament made of gold and some other gifts. Plus, she hemmed my pants and put on a new zipper.

PS... I remember seeing a picture of your mother in law and she is very attractive.

[iluvme55]

My heart goes out to you and my eyes are filled with tears because I am myself am a MIL had same convo with my SIL......this hurts like nothing else, not even the death of a loved one hurts this bad......my journey has been over 3 yrs. and I am still standing...I am in this for the long haul.......or till God says otherwise.....take care and BELIEVE...

[dl443322]

Sweetie, I know how much this all hurts. I know how much I wish we all could have learned what we needed to with less pain. It could not have been. We needed to learn it in exactly this way.

But here's the thing - you are getting to the good part in all this. Yes, there are a lot of good parts. We often find ourselves closer to God. We find out about ourselves things we never would have. We grow in ways we never dreamed.

But the really good part is the part that comes next - peace.

That's what I am waiting for for you, my friend. That is not to say you will never have anger, sadness or pain again from this. But, you will come to the place of peace. Where you can feel that you have done all you could. Where you know without a shadow of a doubt that you acted as your best self. Where you have listened closely and heard God's will.

Your MIL knows. She knows. She is a mother and she is hurting for her daughter, for her family. You have given her a great gift. You let her know that you understand, that you accept, that you have compassion for her child.

All roads lead to peace.

[fisherman]

Eric, you f'ing rock!

Sorry, I know that conversation was a difficult one and my comment may seem a little out of place but damn dude...

You spoke openly and honestly to her, showed nothing but respect for her and her daughter and never once tried to use this as an opportunity to get your w to change her mind.

I can't see how you could have done any better.

Absolutely awesome!

Keep staying strong, I'm sure you already know but just a rememnder, that she is their daughter and they really don't have any control over her. There may be more distance from them in the coming months, know that it isn't anything personal. They don't have much of a choice in the matter you know?

I'll have to tell you about the convo I had with my Ex's mother and grandmother last weekend sometime.

For now, keep going and keep working hard to stay on this path, you've changed so much for the better. Don't ever question that.

Take care.

[Truegritter]

That was all you man...

You are living what you have learned and I am glad you shared this.

Keep the faith.

[MHL]

Eric,

I have a similar R with my MIL and she supports me and wants to have a relationship with the kids and realizes that while her daughter is in MLC the R with the kids will be through me.

The last time I was with her we talked a lot and I told her that her daughter had to do this on her own and in her time. I think she felt bad for me but went on to say that I had more patience than anyone she has ever known.

It is nice to have that support and know that if one day you were to reconcile with your W the R with your MIL will still be there and probably be an even stronger R.

Cheers

[Mila]

Eric - your conversation with your MIL really touched me...it reminded me of my conversations with my FIL. He feels the same as your MIL, doesn't approve at all of my H's choices. Said that he can understand how one can get into an affair, but can't comprehend that they would sacrifice everything for it and caused so much destruction and pain. Said that he doesn't want to loose a son over this and is praying that everything will work out in the end.

I made mistakes, many, BUT I never “intended” to hurt her or my family or you. I can look in the mirror and say that I know with all my heart that every mistake I made was never done with the “intention” to hurt anyone. As for my M.A., maybe one day she will need to ask herself if her actions were “intentional”…if they were you can tell her, that is if I am not around, that I forgive her.

Eric this paragraph really "jumped at me".....you are right we sometimes behave in ways that hurt our spouses.... unintentionally. In marriage this could happen....and you may not even realize that you are hurting the other person unless they tell you. I don't know if having an affair would fit into that category....they have to know from the start that it's wrong and they are hurting us.

(((hugs)))

[ericmsant2]

I wanted to give everyone an update as to where I am, what I have been thinking about the past few days and my most recent interaction with W.

A few days ago I had a very nice interaction with her. The purpose of our conversation was to discuss some of the custody issues and other divorce issues but the conversation ended up turning into a very relaxed, open and honest R discussion.

My take/summary of the convo….

First off, my W continue to remain pretty firm on the D. She did not say that per se BUT based on some of her comments it’s clear that she still feels that she did all that she could do to try and save the M. I tried to validated her most of the time but I also wanted to be very honest. This was not about a tactic for me – NO it was about me being me. The flawed man that I am today…the man that I am still working on today…but none the less “me”.

Rather than try and recap the whole conversation, which quite honestly I could not do. I will try and layout some of the key comments.

FTR, my D kept interrupting up so the conversation went on for about an hour and a half. The first section of this post is really about the R discussion we had.

Some of my comments to her were:
“yeah we both tried – we did the best that we knew how to”

“I now realized how much work it takes to make a M – it was like we were trying to unscrew a screw with a hammer instead of a screwdriver – neither of us knew better”

“W you tried to fix me but ya couldn’t – I had to fix myself. I can go on and on with excuses but really it does not matter – we are where we are none the less”

“So although you tried to fix me during the M and that was not YOUR job. I have to say that in the end, you succeed in a way; unfortunately it took this for me to realize that I was responsible for fixing myself – not you”

“I accept and own my mistakes in the M. I will be the first one to raise my hand.”

“Although I made many mistakes in the M, I know in my heart and no one can tell me otherwise, that none of the mistakes I made were made with the INTENT to hurt you”.

“Ya know, when I changed job and started to stay home more often I realized just how much I missed out on the family. It was obvious that the family had kinda move on without me – that I will regret for the rest of my life. Having said this, what I have done in the past – does not and WILL not define what I do going forward”.

“yeah…you may think I was trying to control you by not actively pushing you to work full time. I am sorry but I do not agree. What I thought we both agreed to was for one of us to stay home and raise our children – maybe it was not the right choice. Who knows, what I do know is that we have three wonderful children”

“Ya know W…while I was depressed and in my own crisis, I should have spoken to you – I didn’t. What I now can see is that somewhere years ago we stopped talking. Just stopped. The one thing I think I miss the most about you…is our conversations. I really do miss talking to you and the fact that we can have this type of conversation is nice. I pray that we can continue to have civil conversation with each other”.

“Although, I made mistakes, I will no longer beat myself up over them. Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone. What I have learned…is that it is how you deal with your mistakes that defines your future. This has been extremely painful. My mistakes….yeah I can see them now…I also never want to forget them – they are the reminder that I need for ME to always remind me to do better – to always do better – to make sure that I am never that person again”

“I now realize just how much my f*cked up childhood play a part in our M”

Some of her comments to me were:

“I kept trying to tell you that I was unhappy…..I kept trying to do everything that YOU wanted”

“I kept trying to love you”

“it seemed like all you wanted to do was work and not be home”

“it was like you did not want to come home to us”

“I tried Eric and this is not easy for me either”

“I would warn you not to do some of the stupid things you did – like go off road in a new jeep – ya did anyway” (FTR, my response was that was stupidity on my part)

“I had so many dreams for this M. I never wanted to be in this sitch”

“I lost myself in the M…all I did was take care of you”

“it was always your job…always your job”

Actually, I agreed with most of what she said. As much as I wanted to beat myself up again over it, I realized that although she was right in many cases, I am not longer that person. I thanked her for her dedication and time that she gave to the M.

We also talked about MLC and why the term “crisis” is used. She just listened. At a few points during our interactions she looked really sad.

At one point she asked me “did you not think it was over when I said it was? Did you not believe me”…my response….”no I did – what I was trying to do was give you the space you needed to figure your own chit out. I also took that time to work on me and it was the best thing I ever did. Ya know W, I will tell you that IMO, when something like this happens you can do one of two things…you can go run….for me it would have been a bottle or just hanging out all night or you can finally stand and face your demons. I choose to stand and face them. If you ever get the chance, spend some time in yourself…it is well worth it. Painful as hell but worth it.

It was very honest R conversation and one that I felt we needed to have. We both talked about the anger that we had. I believe she said that “she wanted to rip my heart out at one point”. We spoke about me finding out about OM and I was honest with how I felt and said “yeah…I wanted to ram your head through a wall”. The back and forth were nasty…just a matter of fact type discussion.

While we were on the OM topic (and other than me confirming that I found the phone not much else was said) – she did not admit having an OM.

We talked about co-parenting the kids and how we needed to be in synch with how we deal with them. We were going to tell our D about the D but decided not to at the last minute (my D suspects but really does not know for sure). I explained to my W that I thought that by me continuing to remain in the house, we may be causing more damage to the kids. And that I was concerned and did not want them to think that it is normal for a married couple to sleep in separate rooms and barely speak. She agreed.

Later on, I brought up some of the legal process. I read some of the email that I sent to my attny that outlined the custody agreement that we had reached. Some of the stuff she did not agree with and wondered why it needed to be in the agreement. My response was to protect both YOU and I.

I tried to explain to her that we can continue to fight things out through the lawyers but that really that did not make financial sense for either of us. For example: assuming she has spent the same amount on legal fees that I have to date, well then we could have very well paid down ½ the debt already. She agreed. I told her that my intent has and never will be to hurt her. I also said that I do not want to be hurt in this process. Then I asked her what she felt she needed in terms of financial support. I said that if it was something that I could do I would do it but not at the expense of me not being able to live. She responded “I have no idea Eric, you always took care of it – I just started writing bills for the first time in my life so I don’t know”. It was at that point that I realized just how scary all of this must be to her. It that an excuse for her actions? NO but I do understand how scared she is. I can see that she is operating just on emotions. I can see that the reality of her having to work a full time job is starting to wear on her. She is very thin now (she was 5’7” 130 lbs and I think she must by about 105 now – she looks very thin). As we were talking I could see just how hard this is for her.

At one point I pulled up spreadsheets that contain a financial plan for both of us. She tried to look at it but we get getting interrupted by my D. She commented again about how she does not know how much she will need. I asked her if she knew when she would know (I did not offer to help as that would be me trying to rescue her and really this is something that she will need to learn)? She said she did not know. I told her that she probably would not have to worry about the mortgage based on the support payments that she would receive. I also explained to her that I am being open and honest with her and although I am struggling with trusting her I am trying. She said she understood. I explained to her that this conversation was the most civil conversation that we have had and that in the past I felt like when she was nice, she tended to have a knife behind her back and ready to stick me with it. She said she understood.

This is the first time we actually had this level of interaction.

As we were discussing my impending move (and I did tell her that I wanted to leave as soon as possible), we agreed on some of the household items that I would take. She agreed. I also told her that I have accepted the fact that I will always love her BUT that when I left my intent was to limit our interactions as much as possible. I think my comment was “I just need to finish healing and really grieving this and in order to do that I really can’t see you”. This may not have been the best comment BUT I was being truthful.

Towards the end of the conversation she said that “I warned you that I would bury my love for you if you continued on going out after work to “network” and continue one”…..my response….W…just remember whatever is buried can be unburied. It takes work but it can be done. Okay now I know that is pursing but ya know what I needed to say it!

So now that I have rambled about our convo…I wanted to let everyone know where my head is….

I can say that the interaction we had – has placed me back on the rollercoaster ride but not as bad as I expected. Here are the thoughts rambling around my head.

Do I still want this M? Am I quitting? Is this just too hard for me? Is this just a cycle that I am going through? Can she ever really meet my emotional needs? Are any of these feelings I have the result of some anger that I still have? I assume some of this is normal but is it – what is it? Is this what falling out of being in love with someone feels like? Can I really trust her again? Can I look beyond OM?

I know that all of this is my choice – so what choice do I want to make? (beside the commitment to myself to work on my own chit).

My heart screams….Eric you still love this woman….my mind…tells me NO….my emotions tell me not to trust her. Fu*k…this is hard.

Okay…so what am I sure of…

I still love her

I am so focused on working on me that really I cannot look at her

I get to choose what I want in my life

I will make it

I will survive

I am a great dad

I am a good man

I am changing and growing and although it is painful- it has proven to be worth it.

I am calm

I deserve to be happy and that happiness is no longer tied to her or is it?

She is in pain

She is responsible for her own choices

My life is different – I am different

I can forgive just about everything

I want a healthy R, one with a partner that knows how to communicate

I now also realize just how looooongggg this process is....

I have a lot on my mind….a lot….

Sorry for the long ramble.

Eric