Keep breathing...

[mamabird]

Well, H's birthday has come and gone. He told me it was the nicest birthday he could remember. I certainly put a lot of love and sincerity into my efforts vs. going out to a fancy dinner and getting him a nice gift, which is what we usually do. I am sure he recognized that.

Somehow it worked out that we all were around today. The boys' school was closed, H took the day off and I work from home on Fridays. Plan was executed as I detailed above - breakfast in bed, movies, casual dinner and cake. H was truly surprised about the homemade cake, since he has complained in recent years that I bake for everyone except for him. I have never made him a birthday cake before so I decided it was about time (it was great by the way). I got him a very small gift, something he needed, and said it was from the boys.

I also mentioned that H has been feeling low because he has this pain and swelling in his ankle. He really hasn't been able to walk around much and we finally figured out that it's probably gout (which he's had for years). So Ive been Florence Nightingaling him with that for the past 2 days.

Tonight we fell asleep cuddled up together on the bed watching TV, but then when we woke up it was business as usual, Regretful gets to pull out the sofa bed and do that whole thing. I did actually lodge a complaint, that it was a hassle and I was getting tired of it, and his response was simply "I know, it's a pain," and that was about it.

So, it's been 2 months since I've been back at home. I was out for almost 3 months. In the two months there's been considerable progress and I'm very happy about that. I seem to have hit a wall though - it's like that plateau when you're trying to lose weight. Sometimes you even gain weight.

H was very pleasant and appreciative today, but I just don't feel love from him. And maybe that won't ever change. It's like when you're dating someone who you're really into and you work and try and think about it a lot and nothing changes, and finally you realize, "He's just not that into you." It's like he's made this decision to stick around and co-parent for the sake of the boys, but he hasn't bothered to tell me about it.

One sort of positive sign is that he's again talking about things he wants to do with the house - the lawn, maybe buying furniture. And we're communicating better about money. I told him that he needed to be in charge of helping the boys keep up their room, a "steward" as it were. I'm sure I will have to continue to nag here but at least now he's officially responsible for something.

This is all fine and dandy but for the first time I really feel like he doesn't love me. He wants to be loved but does not feel obligated to return love. Breakdown says he does not know "how" to love me, but I think he actually does not love me. I have gone through periods of not loving him, but it was not during a time when he was being loving towards me. Maybe I am overdoing it with all the fussing over him which is allowing him to become more complacent.

I remain committed to sticking out the status quo through the end of the year, but I will probably be here every day complaining bitterly about it. Now that the low-hanging fruit is taken care of, my biggest complaint at this point is the sleeping situation. I understand that it's important to let a WAS do things on their own terms, but as I have said so many times, it's a fine line between "giving them space" and being a doormat.