As scheduled, XW and I met for dinner at a nice place that we had been to before at a resort. The discussion and mood was far more light than I anticipated and we enjoyed each other’s company.
She did initiate R talk over dinner – I think I handled it OK and I really tried to not react or drag up the past (that becomes important later). I guess to spare the blow-by-blow recap, the overall theme was this:
She clearly sees that there has been change within me…she no longer questions it. She still finds me physically attractive . And in her own words “there is nothing I want more than to want to come back home with you”. The hold up is still what she has mentioned before. She is struggling with feelings and essentially said that so much happened during the process that she still feels kind of shut down. She said that she knows we BOTH did things that drove our marriage into the ground…and that she is learning to forgive both of us. I think she is very sincere when she says that.
In listening to her, it is so so so obvious that a lot of the loss of feelings resulted from things in the past….during the marriage….during the divorce process….things that I told her I cannot go back and change, things that I told her that I do regret at times. However, I did not try to bring up my position on the old issues or defend myself on them. That is new for me. I have learned that they are in the past and that we simply do not have the same memory of events…and we most likely never will. It is truly something that is irreconcilable – and for the first time in my life I think I am OK with that….I don’t feel the pressing need to be “right” about the past. It’s a road to nowhere.
One thing really did dig deep at me, though – and I had a hard time not blurting out a few things. XW said that I fought her during the whole divorce…that I was in a vengeful mode and/or frame of mind. I calmly tried to tell her that that was the LAST thing on my mind and at the time I was in shock, emotionally distressed, deeply hurt, deeply depressed and just trying to get by day to day. I gave her an open invite to go to my psychiatrist with me to hear from a third party exactly where I was at the time…I doubt she will take me up on it. She cited that I would fight her on everything…not let her take things from the house….I think she thought I was just trying to stick it to her – but in reality I was barely hanging on – I WANTED to help her more, just look at my old posts…I was just trying to detach. She feels that my fighting everything drove up her legal bills and eventually wrecked her financially. I didn’t say it, but in my head I thought that I was fighting for 50/50 custody of my son, not to get stuck with $10,000 of her legal fees, and not to get kicked out of the house – all of which her L was aiming right at me. Even in my depressed state, I could not take that lying down. I had to fight. But it wasn’t to lash out at her or to be “vengeful”…..it just wasn’t. We may never agree on this and it seems to be a sore spot with her.
Despite this part of the convo ^^^^, we really did have a good talk. We ended dinner with a good long hug and agreed to meet up at church on Sunday. We did church and brunch with our S and just spent time walking around together at an outdoor mall…it really was a lot of fun. Later in the day, I thanked her and told her that I enjoyed the time we spent together even though we had some hard discussions. She responded in kind. Later in the day she texted some old pictures of me and S together….said that they were some of her favorites. This morning I got a text from her saying that the three of us should go for another adventure this weekend like our trip up North a few weeks ago. I was glad that she brought it up.
SOOOOO…..I think it was an OK weekend. Clearly, there are still things that need to be worked on and hurts that need to heal. She isn’t heading for the hills just yet, and still proposes time together. I am hopeful that is still a positive sign. I don’t know if this is “piecing” or not just yet, but I am starting to see the road that we will need to walk to get back on track – if we ever do.
Thoughts? Is this normal? Should I be concerned about the “feelings” things still???
