Living with groundlessness

[AntoniaB]

Kara, thanks for posting your H's comments...enlightening especially in the context of my situation. And I agree they are GALing too. My XH has often said "I feel regret/remorse/guilt but I can't let that dictate my choices now or my life now, I have to move on." I never thought about it till you said it above, but that is entirely the concept behind our GALing, only that we are saying "I feel hurt/betrayed/anger/loss but I can't let that dictate my life."

You are very right about OW. For her to "make him promise" that he "would not linger after the funeral", two phrases he used more than once when he was here, that's pretty deep insecurity. I said, "what does she think is going to happen, what does she have to be insecure about", and his only response was "well if you were her and I was going to see my ex-wife, you'd be insecure too." Awhile ago he took the pics of me off fb, I'm sure because they bothered her, but he never removed the pics that I took of him. There is a pic of him up that I took at least 8 years ago when we were on vacation. I would think that would bother her. And yet I mentioned that OW's girlfriend has about 10 pics up of OW with her ex on her wall, and he said that they have asked that girl repeatedly to take them down and she won't.

Here's my feeling. If I got involved with a new guy now, I would NEVER ask the guy to remove pics of his ex from his life if he wanted them out. I'd NEVER have jealousy over his past or feel insecurity if I believed that his relationship was over. I wouldn't get involved with someone who seemed to be tied emotionally to their past in the first place.

But this woman is jealous/insecure about me and any mere contact between us. The only thing that could fuel that insecurity or jealousy is if she is AWARE that XH is not entirely "hers." The fact that he says "I don't know that I will ever get married again" is significant. He wants her and says he loves her, but not fully enough to commit. Her lease was up this summer. She didn't move in with him.

I think he likes to think that this shows he has independence from her and she isn't "needy". But she is, if she's making him make a promise to her in a traumatic situation. And he broke that promise and was here for about 4 hours. She knows it doesn't take 4 hours to have a funeral. It will eat at her what we talked about because he'll lie. He'll never say he told me he would always love me or that he held me repeatedly. Or that I kissed him on the neck. Yep. I did it. No flinch ;-)

Eventually it will wear at her that he will not make a commitment. Does she really want to never marry herself? Doubtful. I'm walking around publishing my work with HIS last name, because I kept my married name. And she has no legal right to use that name unless he marries her. I think at some point she will expect an engagement, and maybe he will give in, but I don't know...I think he'll resist being tied down; his future and retirement are already SO deeply affected by what he lost in the divorce. If anything begins to cause friction with them, this is it.

Wow I really got off on the OW tangent there ;-)

But thanks Kara for your sentiments in the last paragraph. I do see doors opening and I do hope there will be someone who will be right for me some day.