my son was sick today (he's going to be 5 on Dec 30) and today was the first Open House for our home to sell. Even if we stay together without her working we cannot afford the home. in any case, we all stayed in one of the small bedrooms today. as we were getting it ready, she rushed into my arms to hug me... i started to cry and said "i love you" and she replied "i know". i'm sort of devastated by that yet it is what i've come to expect. she'll send me an email saying how much she still loves me and wants me to be a fully participating parent...once she decides it's ok for me to be so. then she'll purposefully do things to push my buttons...my therapist thought that she was actually trying to provoke me enough to make me strike her! i've never done anything like that in my life with her!
it was an ok afternoon...she used my bankcard (she doesn't have a job and no money in her account) to buy some lunch for us...and i fixed a few little things around the house without her having to ask me more than once. we used to get into arguments about that all the time. when we first were married, she'd ask me to do something and i'd stop, immediately, doing what i was doing and do as she asked. she didn't like that. we talked about it and it basically boiled down to i didn't have to do it right when she mentioned it but she didn't want to have to mention it again. i admit that i've got some issues with follow through on certain things yet when she claims that i don't do anything, i look around the house at all that i've built, repaired, maintained, installed and created and wonder what she's talking about... as it turns out, that isn't it. she's talking about me making phone calls to Doctors or whatever. i've dealt with Doctors for a very long time and i'm simply uncomfortable doing those sorts of things.
she took control of our finances from the first week that we met and it's remained that way until i closed our joint bank account and now i'm paying the bills. she gave me a spreadsheet and then, a few hours later, wanted to know if i had logged on to my bank account to check it. since i hadn't spent *any* money from it yet i told her "no" and she said "why am i not surprised" and i didn't know why she was surprised... i've never liked online banking in the least little bit and i argued with her about doing it...being and IT geek makes me quite wary of online banking and bill paying. in any case, when i did check it i found it to be exactly as i had left it a few days earlier.
i find it really hard to disengage from her as my therapist is suggesting. when we have a conversation, if it gets heated and i leave the room she accuses me of "just leaving when i don't like having to answer the question" trying to guilt me into staying. if i stay in those situations i find myself unable to remain calm and say things which i later regret and which she shames me with later.
she's my best friend...i'm losing all that i've considered important in my life even though i've got a whole slew of personal challenges to face, i never thought that in my hour of need my love and friend would desert me. i'm simply devastated at what has gone on.
indeed, i was in an in patient trauma unit dealing with these issues (finally) and three days before my release she tells me that she is done...whereas just the day before it was "i love you forever and don't worry it'll be ok."
i'm hurt and humiliated. i've moved into the basement since i returned home and i've not really been able to work on any of the things which i was supposed to work on from the hospital due to the toxic environment which i'm in now...it's just anger and recrimination all the time which makes it impossible for me to get things quiet inside my head enough to focus on doing what i need to do to fix me.
i've tried to put myself in her shoes and i keep coming back to the same answer. i promised her i would never leave, sickness or health, for better or for worse. i realize most people aren't as serious about their promises as i am however i've only made 6 promises in my life and i've never broken a single one of them. they can take everything from you however your honor and integrity are something that you have to choose to give away and *won't* yet i'm faced with having to break one of them or two of them.
when we first were married my wife made me promise that if i came home one day and she was gone that her dad had had her kidnapped and not to stop looking for her. i told her i would never stop until i found her. now i'm looking at having to break that promise too...for she will be gone one day when i get home and it won't be because she's been kidnapped, and i promised to her that we would always be together... JnR 4 Ever is what we both used to say. i have a card from her on our anniversary and it says, in her words, "i love you forever no matter what." i suppose forever has gotten a lot shorter than i thought it was and "no matter what" means until i feel like i'm done.
she said it just clicked i her head and she has to follow her gut.. her heart and mind keep telling her to stay but she claims to have ignored her gut for so long that she's not going to do that any longer. no facts or logical discussion can penetrate that.
i feel as if everything in my life is being taken from me by someone that took over my wife's body...like in V or something...she's so, completely, different than she was just two and a half months ago that i hardly recognize her.
she's got her own share of issues, major ones at that, which she has neglected for so long. i feel that IF she is able to come to some resolution for them she would be able to be with me again regardless of what my body looks like.
i don't have a mental disease, i'm suffering from trauma caused by someone else. this is fixable with effort and time. i *know* i can do it, others recover from this all the time whilst some others do not and as far as i can tell the difference is self belief. i have had a large amount of self confidence yet now my wife claims that i have lacked it and have only been pretending to have it. i'm a combat veteran with jump master wings, air assault badge and all the rest...i can survive in just about any condition or situation... yet i never expected or imagined that this would be the one where i'm having to do it.
in some ways, i feel like i just want to give in and let her go on about her life. this is my second marriage and her first. she thought i knew all about it, though i never made that claim, and says that her ideas about it were all wrong and she was too young (29) to get married et al. however my sense of honor will not let me walk away. i still wear our ring though she has removed hers. she says she kept hers on when i first got home because she was afraid that i would freak out. she's taken "important" papers from our son's folder (i haven't asked about them yet though i feel i'm entitled to a copy at least) and didn't tell me about that, either, because she was afraid that i'd freak out.
my room in the basement is like a shrine to her and my son, their pictures are up everywhere.... it was because of them and wanting to be better for them that i finally got the level of stabilization that i did at the hospital and now it seems like something of a waste. don't get me wrong, it's helpful for me in any event, still it's as if my motivation was taken as well.
i'm just a mess. her parents are paying for her lawyer whilst on my disability income i cannot even afford the retainer fee. when the paperwork comes then i'll do what i can which will mean not paying some bills which will work to my disadvantage but what else is there? the pro bono attorneys i've contacted have all said "no".
