After what? After After!

[gr8 day 2B alive]

CS,
I have caught up with your sitch except the the past few posts.

You say you want to reach out to W and invite her to do something as a family?

From your tagline your D is going to be 2 soon, correct?

My idea, if you want to invite the W to do something is for you to make plans to get your D2 pisture taken at a studio.
Invite your W. If she excepts, great, if she doesn't, no big deal. You still go and get the pics.

Just an idea.

hope all is well.

gr8

[♪CS♪]

I just took a chance man. That is it. If I remember correctly, I think that I asked W if she wanted to take SS to movie with me. She agreed. A week or so later I invited them to do something else. You can look at my thread from January 15 or so through Feb 10 or so. That's when all of that occurred.

I will take a look, thanks.

My idea, if you want to invite the W to do something is for you to make plans to get your D2 pisture taken at a studio.
Invite your W. If she excepts, great, if she doesn't, no big deal. You still go and get the pics.

Really good idea, thanks.

One problem that I just thought of.

All the time I have D, are the days/nights W works. So I can't really invite W to join us when it is my time with D. It would have to be a time she has D, which makes it a lot harder to pull off...

Hmm....

[25yearsmlc]

CS,
you mentioned a plan already, albeit with little fanfare. I mean, you filed the minimal response needed to protect yourself, and now you can let her or her L do the rest of this, IF she wants to.

I don't think I'd mention anything to her about it. As if it's totally separate from your R with her and d. She may have forgotten this, literally, I mean she has to have put this div on the back burner so to speak. Why would you want to change that?

So, how about continuing to allow her to steer things for now, backing off otherwise? If I had to choose a side of the fence, I'd choose the backing off over the pressuring.

At this point, at a minimum, you come off looking like a stand up guy, a "pillar", a good dad, a good son in law, and about as kind & cool as any stbxh could be. That counts!

Remember to keep this about doing the right thing, and not wanting pay back from her. Presuming to be "close again", b/c you were there for her, might seem as if you are EXPECTING pay back, and we all know you can't have expectations...given the circumstances, it would look tacky.

The pics and sending them, doesn't seem too pursuing if you are not also sending notes. But I'd limit it to a small number. Unless the pic is REALLY cute or unusual, like she's blowing flower petals, etc. then limit them. I mean, She has a camera too.

Hope this helps. Give all this more time. This has thrown her for a loop, but on the whole, it has to have improved your position. (Sorry if that sounds crass)
I'm betting/guessing, that SHE does NOT KNOW what she's feeling right now and doesn't trust herself much b/c of the grief. That's wise on her end.

hang in there

[gr8 day 2B alive]

So, how about continuing to allow her to steer things for now, backing off otherwise? If I had to choose a side of the fence, I'd choose the backing off over the pressuring

.

I agree with you 25.
I wouldn't pursue at all. However folks here do get impatient and feel they NEED to do something.

I remember when I started to piece I was thinking about buying flowers for the W. Most if not all the people here said not to.
I did it and it did pay off for me. She did text me and said thanks, It's exactly what she needed.

CS,
It took over a year for my W to reconsider her decision about leaving.

[♪CS♪]

I don't think I'd mention anything to her about it.

I definitely have no plans on mentioning it to her. Are you referring to my statement about her being notified? I was talking about how a copy of my response must also be sent to her. Nothing I can do about it.

I mean she has to have put this div on the back burner so to speak. Why would you want to change that?

This is exactly what I was thinking when deciding to file the response at all. Like you said, I did it to protect myself, but at the same time, it means she will get a copy of my response and be reminded that this is going on. That was my dilemma.

So, how about continuing to allow her to steer things for now, backing off otherwise? If I had to choose a side of the fence, I'd choose the backing off over the pressuring.

I agree, and this is where I am ending up.

The pics and sending them, doesn't seem too pursuing if you are not also sending notes. But I'd limit it to a small number. Unless the pic is REALLY cute or unusual, like she's blowing flower petals, etc. then limit them. I mean, She has a camera too.

Thanks for the thoughts here. I do battle with this, where the line should be drawn. The whole pic thing goes back to before any of this ever happened. I would always send pics of D when she was working, and she always appreciated it.

I know she still enjoys receiving them, I don't think she see's it as pursing at all, because if I don't she usually asks for them. She also often does the same thing when she has D.

I think I'll work back to waiting for her to ask, maybe throwing the unsolicited ones here and there when they are particularly good ones.

[♪CS♪]

It took over a year for my W to reconsider her decision about leaving.

Yep, time to put the timeline back into perspectiive. Too easy to see little positives and want to jump on them.

Getting my mind back to where it needs to be.

[gr8 day 2B alive]

Quote:
It took over a year for my W to reconsider her decision about leaving.


Yep, time to put the timeline back into perspectiive. Too easy to see little positives and want to jump on them.
Getting my mind back to where it needs to be.

I'll tell you when I truely let go, start leaving my life happily without her and except her decision to D me, she finally had second thoughts.

I removed myself from her life totally except for the exchanging of the kids.

[2stepboogie]

Risk? I am the master risk taker.

What gr8 is saying is right though. It's funny we all fear letting go compeltely we see it as giving up or sending a signal that you are done and moving on with your life but it never fails once you start to live your life is when you see a reaction that you have been looking for.

I think overall you have good instincts CS.

Your gut is usually right

[25yearsmlc]

true 2,

It's an odd thing we seem to fear letting go, even though for all intents and purposes they are already gone.

Do we really (rationally) believe that if we let go and move forward and GAL detach and start being happy, that Suddenly, they'll say "OMG LBSer is happy and moving forward so it must have been right for me to want out and now I'll never go back to them...???? I mean, wow, that makes very little sense.

At the start of all this, it was as if I thought showing our pain and suffering would remind the WAS of our love and therefore they'd come home, (INSANITY ON OUR END) even when it fails over and over...even when it pushes them away, even when it makes US Feel uncomfortable with ourselves and even when our own family & friends tell us to stop moping and to move forward and Detach...even then...it takes something within us to finally get it.

yep, been there, done that. But I learned. And I won't repeat that mistake...b/c God, how I learned...

[♪CS♪]

Thank you all for your support and suggestions.

I know that letting go and moving forward for ME is what I need to do in the long run. Overall, I think I have been semi successful with this. Especially with what I have shown her.

I think my confusion right now, is more for the short term, while she is still dealing with the death of FIL. I don't feel it is right to leave her in the rear view mirror right now.

With that said, I feel a lot more comfortable today with where I am and what I am doing. 25, you made a good point. Just keep being good.

So I got a long text from her today regarding some schedule changes. She is taking next Sat and Sun off to go to the coast with her mom. She switched the days with others, which means some changes with daycare and my time with D.

I responded with "Sure, np. It is important for you to spend time with your mom."

She said "I'll call with details. Thank you so much"

She then added give D a kiss for her and asked me to let daycare know of the changes. She has asked me to be the one to call daycare before, and after the last time I was tempted to ask her to call them, but with everything going on, not now.

Anyways, I said I would.

W: "Thanks for taking care of all of this."

So then she calls. We go over the details and work most of it out. No biggie for me. I lose 2 nights next weekend, get one back the following, and she offered a few suggestions for me getting the other night. She wanted to make sure none of this shorted my time with D. I said we can work that detail out later, it's not a huge concern for me right now.

So we also talk about how work went for her last night. She said it is still hard. She said how much receiving the picture last night meant to her (guess that was a good idea). I told her I would send her another one tonight.

She brought up how she has times now of feeling normal, but still a lot of saddness. She cried for a while yesterday. Talked about how preoccupied her mind is, which I know people here said it would be).

We also had some light convo about D. She told me about a funny video she had of her, and she would send it to me.

Her mom called while we were talking, she said she would just call her back. This surprised me.

Anyways, she was getting to work and we ended the convo.

Soon after she sent me the video she was talking about and a couple text back and forth about it.

And that is it.

She is taking D up to her moms this weekend as well. A part of me loves that all of this is taking time away from OM. Does that make me a bad person?