alcoholic H decided he wants D

[Queen_of_Swords]

It's not the type of addiction that's the problem, it's the source of the addiction. IMHO.

[imthemom]

Thank you for the replies..
obviousely i was in a pretty bad place, just had listened to him again tell me how he is sooooo happy now with what he has and was not the least bit interested in working anything out with me and just wanted to be happy and move on.
I also have been sitting here watching this just demolish my S14 and that is killing me. I honestly never saw this comeing and every morning I wake up and realize what is happening and get that same shocked feeling in my stomach...
last night went out to dinner with some girlfriends and that helped alot. have started running on a regular basis again, but nothing seems to ocupy my mind so that i can stop thinking about him...really, i just want to forget this is all happening
alcohol IS evil...what it has done to my family is unbelievable..but Im not so sure that AA has helped either...

[imthemom]

Lots to vent about tonight....
H and i started co parenting counceling yesterday, so we can help S14 who is really having a hard time. Got report card last week and it was terrible, and his attitude is not much better.
But in the discussion i found out that last week when H took S to the C appt and told him about "his decision" as he put it, he actually went in alone and told councelor and then left the room and had the councelor tell my S that we were getting divorced. So not only did he not discuss it with me first, he didnt even stick around and tell him himself.....
Obviousely im hoping the co parenting sessions will help...
Who is this man?????.. i do not recognize him at all, he is almost whistling as he walks away from his family....
All i can do is help my son and take care of me...the other 2 are older and seem to be ok, angry but ok..S14 has always been my sesitive one...crys at the sappy movies and commercials with injured animals...he is so sad...
I need to pull it together for him...

[imthemom]

Oh, forgot...starting a divorce support group in my area tomorrow...excited to go and see what its like...hopefully it helps with the anger...but today i was happy to finally feel mad, instead of feeling like a discarded piece of trash...

[verycrazy]

Hi, itm, that was just so cowardly of him to leave it to the C to tell your S. I have a very sensitive S, too, so I can understand it. My H didn't seem to care if he hurt anyone's feelings, he even said he was doing it for himself and nobody else's feelings mattered, even our S. So, I was our S's advocate in getting him through it. Now my H and I are "piecing" and maybe considered reconciled, and my S and I have become even closer than we already were, and he has a lot of respect for me, he says, for how I handled myself during this. He was 13 when we first found out, so close in age to your S. He had so much anger towards his F.

I hope you are able to get some help from the support group. I guess when you start going from abject despair and depression to righteous anger, you are beginning to heal a bit.
And I know how you feel about being a discarded piece of trash, but you are far from that. You are someone who deserves to hold her head high, and know she did all she could do for her M and her family.
vc

[imthemom]

HI VC..
your right, cowardly is exactly what that was...and really its the way he has always handled his buisness. Its funny how you forget the bad and just focus on the "good times" when you are hurting. Its confuseing to me because for the 2 yrs we have been seperated I watched him go from this man who cared about nothing but were he could drink and not get nagged at to this amazing involved father.
for 2 years he never missed a single school function or meeting with teachers; was attending every after school function (which ment leaving work early, something he never did in the past)and Drs appt we had with son when we started him on medication for ADD. He was spending time with us every weekend and spare minute he could find.
just when I was beginning to trust that this could be a real step in the right direction he suddenly went right back to working every weekend and not attending even the basic conference with his teachers. and not seeing his S for weeks on end. Then after a few months the D bomb...obviousley he had decided on D and it suddenly didnt seem as important to put the effort in if he didnt want to be with us. I can see that my son feels abandoned and angry. I just happen to be the one here to take it out on.
How did you ever forgive your H for the way he treated you both during that time? I wonder if he was to walk through that door tomorrow if I would be able to do that.
When he talks about why he wants a divorce its all about how hard I was to live with and how he cant go back to that ...no mention of the fact that he is an alcoholic and living with him for 17 years was not easy, no remorse or mention of hes sorry for what he put us through for all those years or how it could have contributed to the end of our marriage at all. He is very holier then thou right now because he has been sober and is acting as if he did nothing wrong..no accountabilit what so ever.
But i guess that is not my problem, i have admitted my faults in our marriage and am working on bettering myself and my relationships with my sons and that is all i can do.
its great that you and yours are piecing now...its a positive in all of this right? and your S must be so happy to see that. good luck with it and I hope it works out for you!!

[verycrazy]

I think if I hadn't been a Christian, I would have never been able to forgive H. Sometimes it tested my patience. Him continuing to contact ow, blaming me for everything bad in his life. Him saying because I didn't have a career, he didn't get to live in the rich area of town like he deserved to do. Him saying he has struggled all his life. All totally untrue!!
He is a cop, and I know it's a hard job, but it pays fairly well, and we have a nice house, so struggle? But, so works the mind of MLC.

I do know I still don't trust him. Maybe for some things I trust him, but the important things like not cheating, no. Maybe that will come one day. He has mentioned once in a while that he had a hand in how things were, but never has he apologized to me about the way he treated us. I don't even expect him too, anymore.

If there is any activity that your S enjoys, or something new he would like to try, get him involved with it to help take his mind off things. We did all sorts of things, like getting in the car and just drive; I would ask S which way, he would say, and off we would go to wherever! I took him to the high school parking lot to teach him to drive at fourteen. You may want to try that.

vc

[imthemom]

Thats an awesome idea!!!!...thanks for that, and i love roadtrips so will try that to....am feeling so good today, for the first time in months. I know i tried and i will not take all the blame anymore. Now im just focusing on taking care of us and trying to find daily things to be happy about.
Thanks so much for your support.....

[imthemom]

still no D papers ....after all his pushing and preasureing, im confused on that point. after telling him several times that this was not what i wanted and would not patticipate in it, and if he did file I would get my own lawyer to protect myself and my S, i finally broke and told him fine, i wont fight it anymore, lets sit down and work it out and he could file the papers with his paralegal that he had already paid for. No reply...and that was a week ago. He has not mentioned it since.
I am trying not to take this as a sign of his hesitation, that just makes it harder.
Yesterday out of the blue my S14 says "im going to live with D"..."well not just me, all of us are going to live with D, why cant we just do that?"..it broke my heart..
I didnt say much, just that we couldnt do that right now and sat with him to see if he needed to say anything else. I had him call a friend and took them to pizza to get his mind off of it and seemed to work.
everytime my S says something like that it makes me angrier and helps me not to wallow in my pain, anger is never a good thing, but at this point it is getting me threw.
ended up not going to D support group to stay with S and take him to pizza but spoke to leader and will start next Wed.
the only set back Ive had was filling out papers for something the other day and they asked for emergancy contact....realized that i didnt have one of those anymore, He was it...that made me feel very alone and sad....

[verycrazy]

Your H could still be your emergency contact. I am sure he still cares for you and your well being.

How close by does your H live to you? Can you call him and just say you are on your way somewhere and say you want to drop S off with him for awhile? How often does he see him? I remember how sad I was when I was little and saw my F only a handful of times for years. It was like withdrawal, because I cried for him, and dreamed of him coming home. If only I could have seen him more, it would have been a bit easier for me to bear.

Maybe it is a sign of hesitation on your H's part. Things said in the heat of the moment, like go ahead and get your D, may not reflect what they really mean in their heart. Don't mention anything about your M when you speak to him, don't talk about Ls or D or anything that will steer him to the subject. If he does want a D, he will get the ball rolling. Then, you can get you a bulldog L to protect yourself and your S. You may have to plan out in advance anything you will say to him, so you won't say things you will regret saying later. Let him have those second thoughts, let him see the you he wants to try again with. What you do and say is very important. So, go and GAL, go out and have lots of fun with your S. My S is 18 now, and back then we got in the habit of having our talks in the car, because the car figures big in a boys life. My H saw how much fun we were having, and began to want in on it. He began to enjoy family life again.

So, why is his hesitation harder to take than getting the D stuff over with? I would have hoped for some hesitation on H's part. Maybe you are dwelling too much on things.

vc