How many licks does it take...?

[2thepoint]

Dammit! I can't sleep tonight! I thought I was tired, fell quickly asleep but it wasn't deep and my mind was racing and here I am. Something woke me up and I think it was finding myself dreaming/thinking about my life and where I am in the grand scheme of things.

Just about 4 years ago my life took a dramatic turn after I lost my job/career in the financial services industry. I had been very successful and had built a very comfortable life for myself and my family. The loss of that job just happened to coincide with the financial collapse of the US economy. It proved to be extremely difficult to get back on my feet.

After nearly 1 year of a job search that turned up dead end after dead end, I finally landed a gig in consulting. I thought, thank God, finally something has turned my way. But it was to be short lived. One year to be exact. For I found myself unable to prostitute myself and my talents in an industry that expected and rewarded BS be fed to clients at $150 an hour. If a business solution could be identified and implemented in 3-4 weeks, and presented in 50 pages of carefully sourced data and analysis, you were expected to "fluff it up" to 150 pages and take 6-8 weeks to deliver the final product. I just couldn't see myself doing this work over the long term and so exactly 1 year later, I left that job.

After that I was basically lost at sea. I felt defeated and lost my bearings in life. Although I was spending time at home raising my two boys while my W continued with her successful career, I felt my life slowly slipping through my fingers and I couldn't figure out what to do to get back control and get my feet on solid ground again.

I spent the next 2 years experimenting with real estate investing. I found the work to be physically, mentally and financially rewarding, albeit risky. And yet, I still felt lost. Something wasn't right. Then last September my W dropped the biggest bomb and my world has been completely upside down ever since. Her bomb was that she was DONE! She said that I was controlling, selfish, emotionally unsupportive, etc. Oh, and later I discovered she was having an EA that turned physical after the bomb. All the things we see repeated over and over in these forum pages.

Which brings me to where I am today. Am I any less lost? Do I have anything of substance for which to hang my hat on? Is there any hope for my future?

As I think about the answers to these questions, I often find myself tempted to view things through the prism of my failed marriage. When I do that, the answers are not good ones. I don't see things improving much with my W and our R. She shows no signs of wanting to work on us. She continues to be wrapped up in her secret world and nothing I do or say will snap her out of it.

However, when I look to answer these questions through a wider angled lens, I see that I am in fact less lost. That I do have important, substantive things for which to focus my energy and attention. That there is hope for me and my future, with or without my W.

What I have discovered is that my children are my life. I have an important role to play in guiding them and mentoring them and showing them the way forward. Over the past year or so, my relationship with my kids has grown significantly. I am more involved in their daily lives then ever before. I have found ways to connect with them that will help shape their lives for many years to come.

And it is through this renewed focus on their lives that I have found the strength, courage or whatever you want to call it, to move forward in my own life. I have reestablished a relationship with God that has provided me with comfort and hope during my deepest, darkest moments. I have chosen a new career path that will allow me challenge, flexibility and financial stability. I have developed a new circle of friends who support me and allow me to support them. I have begun to experience things in life that had always been put on the back burner. I am slowly regaining my confidence that had been lost for so long. And I feel like I am starting to finally live again for the first time in many years.

And yet, there is still a huge hurdle to overcome; what to do about my M. I must solve that before I can completely move on in my life. I know what to do. You all have been pounding it into my thick skull for many, many months now. And I've been saying for the past several weeks that I am itching for a change.

I think I'm just about there.