Darker days ahead

[DumpedforMIL]

note: i did not proof read this so please excuse the typos.

think - trying not to think too much
It's good to avoid "paralysis by analysis". And my guess based on your posts, is that most of your thinking gets negative when it comes to your h, and the mind reading is also counter productive. So, good for you. Relax, put a "Stop Sign" in front of you next time you find yourself veering off course.

YES. i don't usually use capital letters but i had to use it there. i can get very imaginative .. in a negative way and it is not productive.

act normal - trying to do this too - slowly getting there.

Not sure what you mean by this. Can you elaborate? What do you do that isn't normal, other than the over thinking? Do you have friends who are "normal" or some examples in your life?

i have to be myself. not some crazy chick who just complains about her breakup.

react .. smartly - failed this so far but we'll see.

Meaning what? You want to change behaviors? Do you see how vague this is? It's so vague it's hard to comment upon but perhaps that is a goal of yours. I mean, journalling is fine but if you want feedback, you have to be able to take it, and you have to provide enough specifics that we can offer something of use.

every time i hear from my lawyer, i would react with emotion. that's because my lawyer heard from his lawyer and my h would be asking for something stupid and it would make me pissed. i would call up my lawyer and say "what the heck is he doing? blah blah blah!" .. if he's trying to get a reaction out of me, it would work every time.

my mom notices it too. every time i find out something about my h, i would react with a lot of emotion. when he switched lawyers and his new lawyer contacted my lawyer and said he wanted this dealt with quickly. i reacted emotionally. when his net worth statements came through and i saw that he was claiming my wedding ring, engagement ring, handbag, and wedding jewellery .. my heart sank. it makes me feel like naive. and i hate feeling that way. but it gets to me .. each and every time.

my lawyer knew i wanted to reconcile with my h. he gave me the opportunity to go talk to my h and say "hey, let's try to negotiate without our lawyers." my lawyer told me to gauge his response and this would determine if he was open to reconciliation or not. then i can walk away knowing i tried. my h and i stop talking to one another since july. on the rare occasion that i would see him, i would not acknowledge him. thinking .. you are dumping me. why would i even want to be friends with you? and i didn't want him to cake eat. and i'm so confused .. i want to reconcile but i want him to realize what he's missing by getting rid of me from his life. i know .. wrong approach .. but just explaining how confused my thought process was at the time.

do something different - halloween party tonight night. never been to one, will go. GLad you went. It was different and it didn't kill you. Yay.

it kinda killed me. i got home late and i'm still feeling the effects from saturday. but no regrets in going.

emulate - not sure what this means or involves.
Find someone you can use as a mentor and then act more like them in some way you admire or need to do more of. When I was a kid I had to use a character on a TV show b/c I didn't have a role model in real life until I was 14.

there are so many people to choose from. i had stuck with dr. randy pausch and oprah. i can relate to dr. randy pausch because his lessons on life is in line with my morals and values. i listen to him and it's like my mom talking to me. oprah's stanford speech from 2008 taught me that in order to move forward, i have to give back.

do work - if i knew what it was, i'd try it.

The "work"... that's the part of this process that yields real growth and change. That is what this is really ALL about. The part that requires true bravery. The work that means you peel back your layers, like an onion, and look deep inside to fix what needs fixing and to nurture your soul. Underneath all those layers is NOT a monster. The work is where you care for yourself and accept yourself in a way you may never have done before. It's facing yourself in all your glory, warts and all, and still loving you. Seeing yourself through God's eyes, if only for a minute. Staring boldly at what isn't so pretty and working on it AND forgiving yourself for what isn't acceptable, AND changing it.

i know what needs to be fixed in me. i have given myself a long hard look in the mirror and this is what i've discovered.

knowing what i know about the breakdown of our marriage, part of it was because i felt like i had to follow the normal route that everyone else was taking. get married, buy a house, start a family. this is what everyone else was doing. and i tried to be what everyone else was like. i tried to want what everyone else wanted. i was ready to let myself go for the sake of having children. was it what i wanted? not necessarily but i felt like i couldn't say that i didn't want children for fear that others would think that there's something wrong with me. that i'm selfish for not wanting to have children.

i tried to be like my sisters. i tried to do the same things but it only made me unhappy. y'know, even now .. my mom says i'm 'different' from the rest of my siblings. and she makes it sound like it's a really bad thing. how am i different? i like to watch sports, i love history, i love trivia games, i love the discovery channel, i enjoy photography, i love learning new things, i make exercise a priority, i have taken an interest in fine wine .. and that makes me different. my sisters who are married have settled into their SAHM roles. they don't do the same things that i enjoy because their priorities are different. they have never been interested in learning the things i take an interest in. for me, learning keeps my brain sharp and the more things i know, the more well rounded i become as a person.

secondly, i harped on the gold digger label that my h gave me. i didn't like it because my entire life i felt like the cash cow. and to have someone call me a gold digger when i've always felt that others were digging me and i didn't even think to call others a gold digger .. it just hurt me. i grew up poor and i watched my dad be irresponsible with money. i saw how it made everyone feel scared because we didn't know how we were going to pay the bills. i swore that i would never let that happen to me. hence, i have always been one to keep an emergency fund well stocked. when i watch my h spend money like water and not save for his retirement, it reminds me of my dad's financial irresponsibility.

it ties in with why i don't like men claiming that women want financial security. the men in my life has never given me that sense of security before. i wanted to go to grad school but because my dad decided he didn't want to work any more, i had to give up grad school and i took a job i didn't like but paid fairly well. and i became the family breadwinner at 23 yrs old. i took care of everyone with my salary. my sister still remembers that i covered her tuition when she needed the money. i provided financial security to others. and deep down, i wanted that feeling of someone looking out for me. i am not looking for a sugardaddy .. i want someone to say that they have my back and really mean it. because i feel tremendous pressure to provide and hold things together for others. i just want a break from that job for a while - and i'm afraid to ask for it because i'm afraid the answer is no. they say you treat others the way you want to be treated. i take care of others the way i wish to be taken care of. when i married my h, i felt like he married me because he needed to delegate the crappy work to someone else so he wouldn't have to do it. he hated filing his personal documents, he hated calling the cable company if they screwed up our bill, he hated cleaning the toilets, folding laundry, cleaning the kitchen, taking the trash out, ironing, booking appointments, reading the fine print on contracts and documents, etc. by marrying me, anything he didn't want to do .. he would delegate to me. he wanted to buy a new car but didn't want to do the negotiating work - that was my job. he doesn't like negotiating for a better price because it would make him look cheap but it was okay for ME to look cheap. he wanted to go on vacation but he didn't want to do the research on where to go, how much it would cost, and booking the actual trip.

this leads into my third point .. and that is that one of the things i am most grateful for about my m is that my h taught me how to live. as mentioned above, i was the family breadwinner at 23. before that, i didn't have an allowance and didn't have any money. when i started working, most of my money went towards the family's needs. i saved but my parents had control over how i spent my money. i wanted things like a camera but wasn't allowed to spend my money on stuff that was deemed as 'nice-to-haves'. mind you, i told you that my mom says i'm different and sees it as a bad thing. well, me wanting a camera to pursue my hobby of photography was not well received. it's a waste of money. i grew up not having any hobbies because it cost money. after i got married, my h did encourage me to pursue my love of photography. he bought me my first DSLR. (just so you know, i spent a fortune on his hobby as well - majority of his wine glasses were given to him as gifts from me. i wouldn't want you think this was a one-sided relationship).

lastly, sex is a huge issue with me. i know you've read that it's due to my father calling me a whore when i first started to date my h. and it has had an impact on me. sex is a big deal to me. i don't take it lightly. it's like giving someone a part of me. sex only feels right when i feel connected to my h and that there is deep trust and real love there. my h said that sex was neither a passion or a priority of mine. after our first anniversary, i got a chance to reflect on what that first year was like and i felt that he didn't marry me because he loved me - but because i was that person to offload the crap work on to. he didn't need a wife. he needed a maid who moonlighted as a sex worker. and that wasn't the job i wanted when i married him. i have needs too. i pick up the slack for him but my needs weren't being met. i need to know that i'm #1 to him. and time and time again, i didn't feel that i was #1. and therefore, i lost that deep trust and love connection towards him. sex was just an act and i don't do that. my need is that in order for me to have sex, i need that deep trust and love connection. when i don't feel it, i won't give myself to my h. i don't care if his balls are blue .. i don't give myself to someone who insults me or treats me like a doormat.

sex is a priority for me now. and it's not because i want to have children or anything like that. i want that feeling of being loved by someone .. to be able to give myself to someone who i fully trust and love .. and it's reciprocated .. i want that. i didn't feel it with my h but i really wanted to. i wanted him to love me and have that connection with me but he chose his parents time and time again.

And letting go of the mistakes we ALL make AND learned from, accepting yourself and others with all their warts and all their glory, and learning about living happily, no matter what curve balls life throws at you.

sometimes i call my marriage a mistake.

Your mil had issues for sure. She's a depressing kook. And? I mean, Mine was schizophrenic and violent and I was often the target of her episodes. As you admit, you had good times too and your h won't forget ALL of them. But this isn't a contest of MILs. Just means we deal with it. And after the detailed post you gave regarding what your h would say if he were posting, I still think your mil was relatively small factor b/c you yourself admit you two had issues quite apart from her. Why does this matter?

i left stuff out. that's why you don't hear much about it.

B/C when you refer to her and her behaviors, you are talking about something you can do nothing about and therefore you avoid "the work". If we are talking about you and h or your M or your behavior, then we're discussing something you CAN affect, but stop short of. Why? I think the real work is what you are avoiding.

i was looking for the 'will work" technique but that's not realistic of me to think. you don't know if it doesn't work until you try.

You said your m would be different today than before, (but not better). Just words about trust being broken so it's a done deal. We know that. I'm talking about what you've learned about yourself and what you'd change. After all this pain, surely you would be a better w than before. I'd think so, but if so, how? If not, how tragic. Do you see why I say this? Do you discuss this with your IC?

no, i don't because my ic isn't focused on making me a better w. she's focused on getting me through the grieving process. walking away from my m.

i need to make a real conscious effort .. not this yo-yo of "oh woe is me" to "i'm gonna make him pay" attitude.

So, I guess, I take it you mean you won't see things so black and white, "all or nothing" anymore? Good. And yes you do have to make a conscious effort at this. None of it happens by accident.

you'll know when i'm pms-ing. that seems to be when the black-to-white swing occurs.

Wow...Without knowing your history enough to know whether this is based on reality or your admitted overly suspicious nature, all I can wonder is if this is going to be helped by you trying to think more "Normally"? It does not sound normal, fyi. Sorry but it doesn't. Why would he think you are stalking him? And even if he gets a restraining order, how would that effect the property division? I don't think it would. Stalking him? Why? B/c you live in the same building? I found it odd, but Did he get a restraining order on you then, or do you simply fear he wants to?

i fear that he wants to.
when he sough ic himself, i don't know what he told his counsellor because she told him to pack an overnight bag in his car .. in case it got too stressful at home, he was to leave. and it messed me up because that kind of advice is reserved for battered wives. again, i didn't do anything .. i don't hit him, i don't pick fights with him, i gave him space when he needed it .. i moved out of our bedroom to give him space .. i did everything i could to make myself scarce .. and i'm an abuser? i'm 5'2" 100 lbs and he's 6'4" 190 lbs .. there's no way i can attack him. he must've made stuff up.

his mom makes stuff up and exaggerates the truth herself so should i be surprised that he would do such a thing? he's being guided by his mother so i can't sit back and assume he's not doing anything. i'm sure there's some plot to get me knocked off so he can claim everything.

before you give me your advice, please understand that i did not tell the full story. there are things that i have kept to myself because if this is a public forum and i don't want stuff on this public site that is too personal.

You said You've looked and looked for a "smoking gun" (ie OW) and have found none. Then Why keep looking? I mean What difference does it make now if your divorce can't be based on adultery? Isn't it possible you are looking for a reason NOT to try and reconcile? Just so I know, how'd he break the trust (other than wanting out of the M, b/c there's no OW and no lying that you've discussed here)?

if there was an OW, i wouldn't reconcile. i can't be with someone who has been with another woman. that's my issue to deal with. i don't have sex with someone who has had multiple partners. the risks, the fact that his thing has been in someone else's yoohoo .. you can bleach it to kill any trace of her but it wouldn't help.

May I assume something in the past leads you to worry about this that I simply didn't see in the posts, or are you totally over thinking this? "Slapping a restraining order" on you for merely contacting him isn't realistic. Either something is missing from the story, or you are doing some serious negative mind reading. I'd nip that in the bud.

i'm really good at figuring things out about him without digging through intel or whatnot. the amount of dirt i can get on him is frightening. and i could use it to my advantage if i'd like .. and i often think that he could take me out for having so much info on him. i know his dirty little secrets. i won't let them out but he probably fears i will leak his dirty laundry.