I just re-read your post and you really slogged through a lot of stuff. Hope you slept well last night.
A couple of things popped out at me... "I am bitter" you aren't bitter, sometimes you feel bitter. A small change but those changes of realizing I am not my thoughts or feelings have been helpful for me.
Quote:
(about asking H to help)even if I feel like I shouldn't have to, even if I feel like it's easier not to
I thought this a lot when the kids were younger and not talking about it with my H added to the resentment and bitterness I allowed to grow.
But "doing it all" did give me a certain position of superiority, in my head anyway.
Accepting that sometimes I will feel resentment has been helpful. Looking at the root of it (usually my expectations) has been helpful.
I don't know if you meditate but loving-kindness meditation has also been very helpful for me. Meditation is the closest I get to praying.
That post stirred up a lot of stuff. Thanks.
Me 57/H 58 M36 S 2.5yrs R 12/13
Let me give up the need to know why things happen as they do. I will never know and constant wondering is constant suffering. Caroline Myss
Hi Bug, early riser! By displace, and this was my interpretation not anything that was overtly discussed, I meant this:
Instead of setting a goal of not being bitter, and working on eradicating bitterness from myself by doing various bitterness-opposing things...
I can be something that is not bitter and so bitterness is displaced, it's gone simply because something else is there, compassion, perspective, love.
My IC showed me in a few ways, that I need to pay attention to my thoughts that lead to the feeling of bitterness and/or resentment that I was thinking I really didn't have. If you asked me questions I would have better, more loving and more evolved answers. But I was "bad" on purpose with IC to get something more useful than a pat on the back, and what I found surprised me a little and gave me something good to strive for.
I like how you rephrased it. I'm not bitter, you're right, but I do see some people whose feelings are so entrenched and constant that they do seem to be defined by those feelings, and those feelings do definitely affect their life course and their relationships. I do not want how I feel (sometimes) to be bitter.
All along here in DB land we've fought against what is natural and understandable, or else we'd all be here b!tching about our no good rotten husbands and wives who scr@wed us over. Because it sure would be understandable and natural and plenty of other people do it. Seeing that it's possible for me to release this stuff and one day be happy for H when he is connecting with the kids, if that should ever happen, makes me want to get there. I don't think it's a Mother Teresa act, I think it could really be how I really feel and I would be the better for it. I think Betsey went that direction and some others here, and it seems achievable.
Adinva 51, S20, S18 M24 total 6/15/11-12/1/12 From IDLY to H moving out 9/15/15-3/7/17 From negotiating SA to final D at age 50 5/8/17-now: New relationship with an old friend __ Happiness is a warm puppy.
Before I forget, if you're not the praying type, do your visualization a in a way that makes you comfortable. Many of my friends meditate and visualize the outcomes they desire. Same thing, different way of asking.
Score keeping definitely allows bitterness to creep in. Sometimes you just can't help it. I still do too, particularly when my XH goes on those long travel excursions for work back to DC. I know he hates them, but they always seem to occur at the most inconvenient times. If I didn't own my own business it might not seem so intrusive. Anyway, you just have to manually force yourself to change gears.
It IS doable, and I'm no mother Teresa. My sole motivator was to make sure I didn't poison the relationship he had with the girls. I did it for them. But I also realized later that it benefits all of us. It didn't happen overnight. But it WAS a consistent set of choices.
Besides, the elephant in the room is that maybe your boys won't want that relationship with him. If they choose that, at least you'll know they weren't using you as the excuse. If D19 were the ages your sons are, I think she would be a whole lot less accepting of her dad and his choices. I also doubt she would want to be emotionally close to him. She's kind of a prickly rose, that one.
Anyway, you're doing fine, friend. Keep plugging away. I swear it gets better. It just takes time and sometimes for a door or two to close so new ones can open.
Have a great weekend-
Betsey
"There are only 2 ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."
Thanks Betsey! Yeah, prickly roses, that's what I have too!
My older son avoids H like the plague and trash talks him to friends. However, my parents didn't get divorced and my dad wasn't verbally abusive and I still did the exact same thing. Teenagers, ah!
My younger son seems pretty complacent but when he's been around H for a little while he's all scabby from sores he picks at on his face and arms, so it's a different kind of rebellion. Wellbutrin has made a world of difference for him. He doesn't have the pack of rebel friends to work stuff out with.
I would sometimes be happy if H just disappeared off the face of the earth. He is difficult to deal with. If I didn't have kids I would be long gone at this point, and really wouldn't have any compulsion to communicate to him at all. He had said at the beginning that we'd be friends, but my friends look me in the eye, my friends are happy for my fortune and care about my misfortune, my friends ask me how I'm doing and listen when I talk. H doesn't act in a way that rises to my definition of a friend. I would be his X, not his friend, unless he got a lot more connected.
Since we have kids, I enjoy the perfectly pleasant way that he is around me, when he's helping with the car or the handyman type stuff or taking the kids when I can't. He's like a pleasant neighbor, the one people say later "kept to himself, seemed like a nice guy." But if I ask questions about what's going on in his life he's abrupt or evasive. He does not ask me any questions. I can do this for the kids but I wouldn't bother if not for them. I feel sorry that I picked him for a dad for them, honestly, but I guess he was a necessary part of their being who they are.
FWIW I wrote him back in a friendly manner: "Wow, lots of news. I hope it all goes well for you. I'll mention to the kids that you're moving to ___ if you want me to." to which he said "Yep, let them know. I'll have to put some stuff in the basement storage area because the room I am moving to is smaller than the room I have now. I'll get rid of some stuff from the basement storage area too. There are boxes of things in there I don't need." I wrote and deleted a comment that the guns should move out as soon as practical but his other stuff was welcome in the storage area. I decided not to use this particular opportunity to ask for something he's not in any position to accommodate, so I said: "OK, you're welcome to use the storage area, just let me know when you're coming and going."
I hate that the guns are here, but I installed a combo lock on the storage area so the teenagers would have to work even harder to even be in the same room as the locked safe. I know they can't get into that stuff, but I'd feel safer knowing it wasn't even here. Oh well, it's here and it's locked up, and that's the best I can do. When I was feeling more irrational a few months ago, I thought the guns were safer here than in H's possession. I don't know what might send him over the edge and do something out of character. The whole past 3 years have been out of character. Anyway, right now I believe we are as safe as could be expected, so I'm letting this slide.
Adinva 51, S20, S18 M24 total 6/15/11-12/1/12 From IDLY to H moving out 9/15/15-3/7/17 From negotiating SA to final D at age 50 5/8/17-now: New relationship with an old friend __ Happiness is a warm puppy.
Adinva 51, S20, S18 M24 total 6/15/11-12/1/12 From IDLY to H moving out 9/15/15-3/7/17 From negotiating SA to final D at age 50 5/8/17-now: New relationship with an old friend __ Happiness is a warm puppy.
2 how are YOU doing? What is going on with you? Still looking at antlers?
Adinva 51, S20, S18 M24 total 6/15/11-12/1/12 From IDLY to H moving out 9/15/15-3/7/17 From negotiating SA to final D at age 50 5/8/17-now: New relationship with an old friend __ Happiness is a warm puppy.
I'm trying to model for H what I would like to see from him when making plans. And I learned it's not as easy as it looks. I consider myself pretty well attuned to how my words will be read, because it's a big part of my career. So when I had to write and rewrite this to get it clear I could see better why my H who is not in a communications field has trouble with it.
This will be much easier when we have a schedule that's agreed upon in advance, instead of this "I have the kids 24/7 unless something comes up" routine.
Here's what I wrote: === subject: checking schedule I'm planning on taking the kids to the beach for a few days and want to make sure it doesn't conflict with plans you wanted to make with them. I just added it to the calendar but if you had wanted to have them then, we can still change it. We are planning to be away 7/31 to 8/4. ===
In other news, I got a chance to separately let both boys know dad said he'll be moving in August to a room in someone else's house. Both said "ok" and nothing else, no questions. Not that I would have answers anyway; it is what it is.
Adinva 51, S20, S18 M24 total 6/15/11-12/1/12 From IDLY to H moving out 9/15/15-3/7/17 From negotiating SA to final D at age 50 5/8/17-now: New relationship with an old friend __ Happiness is a warm puppy.
