Thanks for checking in T. My summer has started out with a bang, and Im sleep deprived. I will catch up on sleep and feel human again and be able to think straight. It just dawned on me that alot of these rollercoaster emotions I have are due to sleep deprivation and having a very demanding life style as it is. It's time to work on me big time!
Well guys this is where Im stuck between a rock and a hard place here. I feel my girls have been very open with me in regards to their feelings about their Dad, and the dynamics that go on between him and at his place with OW. The problem is...the girls do not feel safe talking to their father about their REAL feelings about the situation. Their father is the same way. He hasn't created a type of repor with them where they feel safe to really let their feelings out, even about him. I feel the biggest factor in that is because their father acts like nothing is wrong. This was also a big issue between us..you know...there's an elephant in the room but we ignore it. We walk around it, and avoid it and step over the heaping steaming piles of elephant doo doo. Up until we trip over the rug that we've swept so many issues under that there's a big bump and we fall...only to face plant in the big steaming pile of elephant doo doo we've ignored all along. Then, it's my fault!
The girls are very put out by the OW plain and simple.From what I've gathered, they want their Dad to themselves, they don't want to share. Ow appears to understand that these girls have a mother and has kept and extreme distance from them. Her only reaction is to act like a nice hostess to the girls, which entails of greeting them when they come over, and then has nothing to do with them the rest of their stay.
However I realize I played a part in the girls being very put out by the OW. I handled it the best way I thought I should, but no matter what choice I made, it was extremely difficult. At the time I feel I was stuck between acting out of intergrity to my own children for the sake of their lives, or just sugar coating it for temporary comfort measures. I talked this over with my oldest yesterday and she adminantly told me that she wants me and expects me to always tell her the truth about things because she hates being lied to. When XH came out in the open about Ow, and exactly who thie OW was, I told the girls who she was. This womans ex husband tried to kill their father 4 years ago. I remember being really stuck in if I should've told them who exactly this woman was. But at the same time I knew eventually they would find out, and that for their very own safety I felt they should know now, then down the future. Our biggest concern has been what when OW's ex husband gets released from prison, he will most definately go after XH and OW now that their relationship is open and legit. My biggest fear is this OW's ex husband will go nutts and on another shooting spree while the girls are with XH and OW. He's not released for another 3 years. Perhaps XH and OW won't even be together by then. But it still scares me alot.
I asked my oldest daughter if I hadn't of told her who OW was would she have remembered? My daughter had a look on her face that expressed " I don't know ", then said to me " Mom I wanted you to tell me the truth. Always tell me the truth, because I hate lies. Im glad you told me. Sometimes the truth really hurts, but it's best to always know the truth".
Damn...at least I did something right with her!
Another problem. My Xh feels Im the one to ultimately blame for the girls anger and resentment towards him leaving. When I told him I needed some answers from him because the girls wanted to know when he was coming back, it was then he emailed me and told me he wanted the divorce. He then told me tell them whatever I thought was best and if I needed any support just to let him know and he'd back me up....Damn! Hind sight being 20/20! And I was heart broken over a man that left me to break the news to the kids?
When the girls were having a very hard time, with him being gone I wrote him emails telling him what they were going through. He never once talked to me about it or responded to me about it. He refused to speak to me for 3 months because it was also at that time I had gotten my attorney.
Over the course of the last few months he tries to parent with me an anything BUT emotional issues the girls still have with the divorce. It got brought up a week ago in regards to a bedwetting issue my daughter still has. When I explained to him (via text, he won't talk to me in person unless I march out in the driveway and corner him) THAT THIS ISSUE WITH HER HAS EMOTION PROBLEMS ON IT, He didnt even respond to that. he didn't ask what they problems were, what could we do, what was going on with her to make her feel insecure, nothing. Infact I didn't hear from him for 1 more week, and that was his schedule.
So basically, I feel XH is emotionally unavailable to not only me all our marriage but to his own children. His mother was never emotionally available to him, but she's always expected others to be emotionally available to her.
I don't know what else to do but just take this on my own as usual, because there's just no getting through to him. And any attempt to do so will result in him placing blame on me. Last time our oldest daughter was having an emotionally hard time with him and was crying in her room at his apartment, I got a nasty text stating it was all my fault she was crying because I made her feel guilty for having fun and being with her.
Quite frankly I really wonder if his OW is pumping these ideas in his head. either he's always been this paranoid and has just now let me know this past year, or someone is brainwashing him. He never used to accuse me of all these things before ever! Yes emotionally unavaiable, but these accusations of alienating the children, sucking all his finances out of him, making his life hell, when he was the one that walked out in the first place?
