Time for LBH to move home? WAW can do the walking.

[AlwaysTrying]

A very bloggy post. I'm trying to process through our latest arguments:

We fought a little bit last night. W was having a hard time putting the kids to bed. They were unruly and there was some yelling and, after D3 slapped her in the eye, a lot of anger. I was catching up on some work downstairs. Kids wouldn't cooperate, so story time was cancelled. W told the kids get into bed or else, basically, and was standing outside their door fuming. I quietly came upstairs to lend my support.

W started lashing out because she assumed that I would have to be writing recording this bad parenting moment to convince the court that she was an unfit parent. W said my lawyer is lying to me if she says the court will likely grant 50/50 custody without my going out of my way to discredit my W as a parent.

W was really hostile. We had planned to clean up the house together after she put the kids to bed, but it didn't seem like it was a good idea to be around each other. When she came downstairs, I told her I was going out for a walk. I ended up going to the corner store and buying her favorite candy bar and some iced tea. I put them on the dining room table when I got home as a peace offering and went upstairs to clean my room instead.

After 20 minutes or so, I came back downstairs and started to help cleaning up. She warmed up and she sat down on the couch so we could talk.
At first we were talking about D16's permit. I want her to be allowed to get one, but W doesn't think she's ready.

Things morphed into R talk. We talked about a lot of things, and some of it gave me hope that things can improve. But she also said that she is angry and getting angrier all the time because I want to fight her over the kids. I deflected, but not really expertly. She would say things like, "Why are you putting the kids through this. Think about what is best for them." All I had to do was look at her and she knew I felt the exact same way about her.

When she wants to hurt me, she'll come up with some version of "and that's how I know I don't want to be with you". It's usually something I did or said. It's almost as if she wants to punish me for something I've done in the past and deny that I can be any different now. In this case, she said that when she filed, I responded by saying please give me one week to show you that I have changed. She said that made it obvious to her that I had no clue and leaving me was the only thing that made sense.

I told her that when I said that, I was bargaining. I was shocked and looking for a way to save the marriage. I told her I knew that it would take longer than a week to make the changes that were important to her and to prove that they were not just temparary, but I believed then and still do now that I can demonstrate understanding and change every week if she is willing to be part of the process.

She acknowledged that there has been a lot of change but there is still a long way to go. I told her that she doesn't really know me any more and things may be more different than she realizes. I also told her that I'm really glad she is coming to counseling because many of the changes she is waiting for that have not happened yet are because she isn't communicating to me about them.

I felt a lot of positive exchange happened in the conversation, but she got agitated at some point and said something like it is pointless to talk to me. Oh, I remember. I said something about her anger. I don't even remember what. She took it to be invalidating - that I was saying that she needed to just let go of her anger so we could move on. Then she said that no one should ever have to live with me and stormed off to her room.

I thought about our conversation for about 20 minutes and then called her on her cell phone. I told her that acknowledging her anger doesn't mean that I don't think her feeligns are real and that I never want her to push her feelings down or pretend they don't exist again. I wish I had written this down yesterday when it was fresh in my mind.

She appologized for saying no one should have to live with me. She said that she didn't think the kids shouldn't live with me, only that she thought that she shouldn't have to live with me.

I don't think I'll get her back to C until 6/22. She hasn't given me the gift of time. I've stolen it. I want to make the best use of it I can. Our next court date is 7/11, I believe, but the law guardian will be talking to us and to the kids sooner than that.