Ok ya'll I am posting this for myself. I know it is right before the holiday and there are not a lot of people on the board right now. I am making my plan as I write this…
Just took a BIG hit today regarding R with H. Have to see him in just a couple of hours.
On the way home from church, D3 is chattering away. We were talking about the Halloween party H took her to last night. I asked her if she saw her Aunt J and her little cousins. Chattering back n forth like this is normal for us BTW. D3 pipes up that she has another Aunt J. She went to the fair with other Aunt J and her daddy and they saw a Farris wheel. Suspected OW has the same name as H’s little sister. D went on to describe that this Aunt J looks like OW’s niece (who is not even her niece, just her best friend’s daughter).
She chatters on as I call my neighbor to meet us at the park with D’s best friend. My neighbor is truly the only friend I talk to about all the gory details. We talk for a bit as I try to calm down. After she has to go, I try my therapist. He has his cell off (understandably) so I call a crisis hotline and vent. I feel better now, but I am still furious. I am hurt. I am HUGELY disappointed in my H.
REASONS TO NOT EXPLODE OR CONFRONT:
1. Tonight is NOT OK to confront H about an affair. We will be surrounded by children who do not need to be in the middle of this.
2. This is not really a surprise. I had held out hope till now, but this just killed that.
3. I don’t want OW around by baby, BUT OW is not dangerous to my child’s health or safety. I just hate her. A lot. Especially right now.
4. H has no mysterious plans involving our D3 at this time. Right now all of his plans involve us spending time together on my b-day this Tuesday & D staying overnight with him at his parent’s house on Wednesday.
5. There seems to be cheese at the end of this tunnel. H has been working up to telling me something, and my current line of DBing seems to be allowing him to open up to me. Whatever direction he takes, talking to me is a good thing.
6. Good or bad, my time is coming soon when the affair will be confronted, but now it ‘feels’ like the time to step back from H and see what he is up to.
7. I need more time to talk to lawyers etcetera. Just in case.
SO HERE IS WHAT I PLAN TO DO:
1. I will go early, upsetting H’s attempts to isolate me from the rest of the family and behaving differently from how he expects.
2. No crying, no looking like my cat just died, and no hinting that I might be upset.
3. I will be FABULOUS! I am taking care of myself, getting a life, looking good, and EVERYONE there will know it!
4. I am going to enjoy taking my daughter and her 3 big cousins out trick-r-treating tonight. I deserve to enjoy tonight, and so do all of these kids.
"The difficulties of Life are intended to make us BETTER,not bitter". "Fear is a prison, where you are the jailer. FREE YOURSELF!" "Life is usually all about how you handle Plan B." - Jack3Beans
Thank you all for the encouragment. It was great to come home and find this waiting for me. I needed it.
That said, I kicked @$$! I followed my plan to the letter. I even navigated some extra road bumps from my MIL before H showed up.
MIL is a bit of a narcasist and seems to be spinning her own romantic fantasies about H's affair, but that is an issue for annother post. Anyway, even though MIL knows older cousins have not been told about the situation, MIL kept asking my D questions like, "did you tell you mommy how many corn dogs you ate yesterday?" refering to my not being with D that day, and "Did (H) give you your b-day card yet?" right in front of them. Thought SIL was going to hit her at one point. FIL looked embarrassed. That was not how SIL wanted to talk to her kids about this, and not on a kid holiday either. SIL and FIL have been most helpful of my in-laws through this.
When H finally called to say he was on the way he commented that he was surprised that I had gone over early. I just said that "I wanted D to have some time to settle in and play with her cousins. Besides, your parents brought pizza for everyone." Ha ha ha! I have become mysterious!
When H got there, he gave D a great big hug, responded “hi” to my hello, and walked right on by me.
H did this 3 times.
It was the first time family had seen us together in months.
Everyone saw it. (except the kids)
I didn’t flinch.
I acted “as if” and I DBed on.
We started on down the street for trick-r-treating. I focused on having fun with the kids. 15 minutes later, H starts to loosen up and starts standing near me again.
SIL stumbled while introducing us to some neighbors. Said “this is my brother, and this is his…” Ended up just introducing me by name. Awkward moment, but I knew she just didn’t know what to say. I kept DBing. I went up next to her after a bit and told her I would still be her sister-in-law. SIL and I laughed and she said she just hadn’t known what to say. She was going to say “wife” but hadn’t known what to do. I told her not to worry, its ok. H was near enough to hear this and to hear us laugh.
Later I was telling someone about D’s first Halloween and how her daddy had decked the house out so good and dressed up so scary that no one would come to our door. I purposefully didn’t indicate H was involved in this story, but H jumped in to help me tell it. By the end of the night, H was relaxed and chatting back and forth with me.
It took everything I had, but I did it. I am a superhero.
Just one more post outlining what I learned tonight.
1. I set the tone for how H treats me with his family. From now on, DBing extends to the in-laws.
2. SIL's whole family & FIL are my two best advocates inside the family.
3. I was able to enjoy the rest of the family, regardless of how H was behaving.
4. H has told SIL she can go ahead and tell her kids that he has moved out. SIL says it hasn't come up. This was about 1 1/2 weeks ago, right befor H started talking to me again.
5. I consider my MIL relationship to be unsalvagable. I am in the process of detaching from her permenantly. I can still behave with grace and dignity in her presence though, and I will. She can only hurt me if I allow her to, and I won't ever do that again. This is BTW what all 3 of her kids have warned me to do with her from first day I met her.
6. I am stronger than anyone ever gave me credit for.
7. Confidence attracts people to you and puts others at ease. Not just my H either.
8. Holding in the tinny bit of gut I still have after dropping 42 pounds for 3 hours makes for one sore tummy!
