Brand New here, my story, my ?'s

[Ichrus]

So tonight is the first night I am home alone and W is moved into her new apartment. Now there have been nights where she stayed at her parents, and she has sleep on the couch for the last week...but this is very different, more final in lots of ways. It is a quiet and somewhat surreal experience. I feel sad, angry, have moments of feeling resentful...there is also a small amount of peace or serenity too. It is comforting that my three little girls are asleep in the home with me, and we get to spend all day tomorrow together as well.

I feel I am cycling through emotions and feelings...there are times of being very angry and hurt (how could you be so naive to give up your family and not even try to work on us because of some OM whos reality is sure to be very different from the fantasy in your mind)...to interspection and some guilt (I know I was neglectful in our M too...was I so bad that I forced my W to feel she just had to get out at any cost...even hurting her kids, damaging her family relationships and going against her catholic upbringing)...to some calmer detachment and acceptance on some levels (the weeks and months ahead will teach us both major lessons about ourselves and where we want to take our lives moving forward...I know I have been changed by this, for the better through pain and truth, now is the time to know myself and make my own happiness, be a great example and lesson for my children).

I know this will be hard, and I have a long, tough path ahead...but I also know I will be ok, and could even create a fantastic life coming out of this for me and my girls...and a future partner. Maybe that partner will be my W, maybe someone new...time will tell.

I do still have raw, fresh feelings of bitterness and resentment...right now I very much want W and OM to have life and reality hit them hard and fast and for their fantasy to crash and burn. I want W to realize the cost of everything she is giving up is not worth what she is chasing. And I suppose one of my bigger, somewhat irrational fears is that W and OM build a great relationship and get married and are happy together. I know it is petty and sad and vindictive, and I would feel much better about W finding happiness with anyone besides OM too. Intellectually I know I need to drop the rope, not worry, focus or care so much about W (and certainly not care one whiff about OM) and just focus on finding myself again, GAL again, build my own happiness again...but emotionally it is just hard in this moment.

So we both will certainly have time and space now...we both will have some major time without kids to GAL and do whatever we want (an odd feeling to have after almost 12 years of marriage and 7 years of young children to care for nightly). I plan on getting back into competitive swimming, playing some more golf, reconnecting with old high school and college friends, and building better relationships with my family and with coworkers and new friends. I know wife plans on OM...and I so badly want to stick it to them with a "how does it work with you both being "good" Catholics and W and I still officially being married?" but I will bite my tongue and refrain from that bit of vindictive jab and really try to just let her go and let life teach them whatever they need to find out.

Just felt the need to get a lot of this out tonight...tomorrow is a new day with my girls and we all will have some challenging and interesting weeks ahead.