DBing, European style

[Papa4Life]

Sometimes, I have to wonder (like the great Neil Young before me), "why do I keep on effing up?"

The last few days have been like the huge dips on the roller coaster after a few weeks of the click-click-click incremental climb up the mountain that I thought we were making over the past weeks.

As I wrote in the past couple of posts, last week, W looked me in the eye at the therapist and said she wanted a divorce. Even though I made it clear to her that I validated her feelings and said I wanted her to be happy, I also reiterated that I thought we should stay and work on the relationship. The next day I told her that I didn't think we should see the therapist anymore because it's doing more harm than good (as the great 25 confirmed, she uses our failed attempts at counseling in the past as proof that we've "tried everything"), as evidenced by the fact that the therapist has made suggestions such as SBRs, separation, starting work on a D plan, all of which W immediately pounced on: it validates her feelings while allowing her to ignore her culpability for the negative consequences!

At any rate, one of the points that we are going to address in the D plan is the point of dating. I've been reading a lot in SuckerPunch's thread and I realize now (again, based on the feedback from Stander and 25) that this is a slippery slope. Okay, full disclosure: one of the reasons that I brought up dating was because I know that W has always had a high level of anxiety regarding my cheating on her (which, other than a very regrettable dalliance while we were having a long-distance romance before I came here to Europe, I have never done) and I knew that bringing up dating as a consequence of our being separated would give her reason to reconsider her choice. Anyway, she's been having an EA with a co-worker (her assistant manager, a man 20-something years her elder) and I believe she is seeing him... no wait, I know it because she's said as much, albeit apparently with a second assistant manager in tow. She always clams up when I bring up his name so I try not to mention him because I think it's a bit of a power trip for her.

Rats! There is just so much to say.... Ahhh, the heck with it, let me just get it all out in the open and don't sweat it if nobody but me ever reads any of it.

Okay, SO! A few weeks back, my wife asked me where I was going to be when I was getting ready to go out. I pointed out to her that I very rarely knew where she would be when she went out with work or with friends, and that I think it's unfair/unrealistic for me to keep her informed of my whereabouts. I have to admit, this is just more-of-the-same behavior on my part, because I always weigh what is being asked of me against what she is getting in return and if it seems out of balance, I get irritated. It all goes back to the cornerstone argument in our marriage: my wife works 4 1/2 days a week in an office. I work at home, and I am responsible for bringing the 4 kids to school/daycare and picking them up, as well as cooking dinner, and oh yeah! Running a one-man translation company. When W goes out with work or friends, this means that I have to get all four kids ready, bring the kids to school, take care of the twins all day (if it's my day at home with the twins), pick everybody up -- including friends if they have a playdate -- bringing one or both of the oldest kids to sports, making dinner, cleaning up, bringing them to bed, and then, oh yeah! Going back to work doing translations. It just bothers me that the W refuses to acknowledge that I have a great deal of responsibility at home. She just says, you can work at night and on the weekend! Great, who doesn't love to work at night and over the weekend? As more than one person has pointed out, I'm probably suffering from "housewife" syndrome -- but that's understandable, IMO, because we consciously chose to reverse the traditional roles because I wanted to be there to see my kids grow up and my wife LOVES her career. But any time anyone brings up the whole "housewife syndrome" thing, she becomes extremely agitated. And, look, I try (admittedly unsuccessfully at times) not to bring up R, M, D talk, but when we bring up things at the therapist, this is a point that comes up. There is an angry, selfish part of me that looks forward to seeing how she's going to arrange this when/if we separate. She seems to expect that I'll continue to take on the brunt of the childrearing, just as I'm doing now, even after we D! But as I've pointed out, because I've put my career on hold, I'm going to have to focus MUCH more on my work in order to be able to support myself. She has even acknowledged that she will very likely be required to pay palimony, and hey, my ego might object to accepting payments, but rationally I can only admit that I probably deserve that support, since I really was a major factor in enabling her to advance as far as she has in her career. But that's neither here nor there right now.

Today, I asked W what her plans were for Easter weekend. She pointed out again that I could come to her parents' house on Easter Sunday, but that she would prefer that I not come along on Saturday when she and the kids would be spending the night with the parents. I told her that I would have preferred not to be alone on Easter weekend, but I thought maybe I would go out with friends. She then mentioned that she had plans for next Friday. Oh yeah? With whom? Se refused to respond, and that once again brought up the issue of informing each other where we would be. After the last disagreement on this point, I told her that I no longer had a problem letting her know where I would be (was I worrying that she would start to clam up too?) in case of an emergency with the kids. I brought up the point of dating (idiot! idiot! idiot!) and told her that I didn't think I would feel right dating because I still believe in our marital vows and dating would only complicate things unnecessarily. She stated that she couldn't see the problem with dating, giving the circumstances, but that she wasn't dating now. I think mentioning this was the right thing to do, based on the responses I read on SuckerPunch's thread, but it hurts SO MUCH. After a few minutes talking to her, I was so upset that I said to her, "Why are you so mean?!? I know I've made mistakes in the past, but why do you still feel so little compassion that you can be so mean to me?!?" And then walked out... Rats. Some people take 2 steps forward 2 steps back. Me? I take 2 steps forward, and then 2 MILES back! I've got to stop shooting myself in the foot like this.

See, this is what I think I'm still missing when it comes to DBing: everything about it seems to be geared towards validating W's feelings, detaching, getting on with your life. But what happens if you DB yourself right into a D?!? If I just keep acquiescing with her every wish, won't I just back myself off the cliff? Phew... this just so unBELIEVably hard... I guess I just don't get it yet. I thought I was doing the right things, but now I'm seeing that I might need to get reading again... Or get ready to hire a moving company and a decorator...

Where have you gone other DBers? A disheartened man turns his lonely eyes to you!