Separation at 17.5 months

[adinva]

Hi Sweetbriar! Are you in Nova? I'm in the western part of Nova.

Accuray, thanks as always, you question me the way I need to be questioned, instead of the blowing of sunshine that I don't want. Perhaps H's motivations were compassionate in emailing me. Really, I don't know what they were. And yes, getting mad about that detail was a diversion from being mad that it's happening, which is a diversion from feeling hurt and out of control. Which I can deal with if I'll admit it to myself. Working on it.

KG - my desire to put off going public as much as possible was to make it easier for him to save face if he chooses to come back. The more people who know, the more stake he has in feeling like he did the right thing. BUT. If it being hard stands in the way of him coming back to me, then the work that's to follow in finding our way back to each other is a lot more of a fantasy. So the value of this line of reasoning is reduced almost to nothing at this point.

I look forward to the relief of this being out in the open with my kids, I really do. I was thinking today that what I'm really terrified of is handling the pain of their feelings. If they cry or punch walls or do nothing, I'm afraid that will be painful for me. But part of my job as their mother is to face their feelings head-on, whatever they may be, and help them to sort them out and process them in a healthy way. I can't and don't want to dictate, control, manage their feelings. I hate that they're going to be hurt, but the hurt is already happening whether we talk about it or not, and it's going to probably be lessened the sooner we start talking about it at this point.

I'm going to make a separate post about our first negotiation talk.