Suckerpunch needs a life

[labug]

SP, your heart will let go when it does. It won't happen overnight or because you one day say "Heart, let go."

Start small, try something new a couple of days of the week, even if it's just changing your routine.

Change something in your house. Take your D to a different restaurant, anything that changes your old patterns. Just keep building on that day by day. Try a new workout.

Don't beat yourself up about not being as detached as you think you should be, that just serves to increase all those negative feelings. You'll get here but you do need to commit to working on it and I don't think you've done that yet.

You're not ready to engage with her now. Do protect yourself.

[swoop]

I have tried it all. I can pull myself up, for the moment. However, once I am finished with whatever it is I am doing, my mind races right back to focusing on wife. Almost every morning for the last couple weeks I have woken up, dreaming or consciously thinking about my wife and marriage. I don't know how to stop that. I am sleeping for crying out loud!


I am really struggling with putting her behind me and moving forward. I will not lose myself though. I refuse to let this portion of my life control my future. I just need to get through it, some how, some way, so that I can move on.

I am going to try my best not to engage wife anymore, other than in regards to daughter or divorce agreements. I just need to let it happen, the quicker the better at this point.

[labug]

I'm not telling you to stop that, I'm asking you to accept it. This is where you are right now. I did that waking up and the reality hitting me thing for a long time...a. long. time. And I still do it occasionally. It is what it is. We aren't living in the Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

What I did was build new routines/activities into my life that helped to give me other things to focus on. Sometimes it was just minutes but over time those minutes lengthened into half-hours and then hours, etc. Sometimes I didn't do those routines, I didn't beat myself up about "taking time off" but just started again.

Now when I have those mornings, I don't try to make the sadness go away, I acknowledge it, see it for what it is, an emotion that will pass, and go about my day.

Just so you know once again, this doesn't happen overnight. But it's one of those thing that I've built into my life. It's helpful (understatement) to me.

Be in charge of what you can, let the rest go.

How about if you think instead of "I'm struggling" "I'm going through a very painful time in my life and I'm doing the what I can to move through it."

Give yourself some breathing room.

[MrCAS]

Less snooping? Hmmmm.... Should change that to NO snooping. As tempting as it is, it will cause nothing but grief and pain. Speaking from my own experience, the self-inflicted wounds seem to hurt more and last longer.

I was seeing my pastor for counseling in SC and he introduced me to a psychologist from the church. This guy told me to eat better, get more sleep, and exercise. He feels that AD should be a later method if the first ones don't.

I feel stronger every day. I still have emotional days. i am still angry sometimes. I just can't pretend that the last thirteen years of my life no longer exist.

However, I am getting better at dealing with this all. You will too.

Off to church for this guy...

[swoop]

You're right, MrCas. No more snooping at all. I was continuously looking on her Facebook. I have stopped that completely, because like you say, it has caused me nothing but grief and pain. As much as I want to, it is just not healthy for me to see.

This weekend was a whirlwind. Daughter and I were very active, had lots of fun, and I also shed a few tears. All in all, we had some good "quality time" together. We engaged in some fun activities. We visited with friends, took in a car show, went to a open air market. Daughter got a chance to do some simulated rock climbing, and she made it all the way to the top, to ring the bell. I am guessing she was up around 25-30 feet. She loved it! Yesterday, we went for a ride in our custom car. We also spent a few hours down on the river bed with a couple friends, tossing rocks, building sand castles and trying to catch a fish....Unfortunately no fish :-( We ended the night having dinner with family. Daughter got a chance to play with her cousin. Again, it is kind of ironic, but these are wife's family members that I have become very close with. Wife has distanced herself from them....such is the oddity of this whole process. You really learn who is important to you and who is not.

One thing I learned about myself and life, this weekend, is that I need to put more focus on enjoying time with daughter and loved ones. That was always an issue with W and I. She wanted to play all the time. I wanted to focus on home and business. I am beginning to see how important it is to have a balance. Life is too short to miss out on the potential fun times. I need to get more involved with fun stuff, not that I don't have lots of interests and activities that I already enjoyed, but I think I need to do more of the stuff that pulls me away from home.

This morning, I was up and awake at 3:30am. My mind was doing it's thing again, worrying about the failure of the marriage and how unfair it all seems. I accepted that I was just having feelings, and that they would eventually pass. They did. I also did a lot of thinking about how to end this all. Wife says that she needs to have a settlement before she moves out. As much as I hate the thought of it, I think I am going to have to really dig deep and start letting go of the material and financial things, simply to move this situation along. It's funny, but when she first left me she expressed that "we had nothing". She meant that our relationship was nothing, and all we had were material things. She said over and over again that she didn't care the slightest bit about material items and therefore there was nothing even remotely holding her to this relationship. Now, here we are getting ready to battle over a bedroom set or a washer and dryer. It seems ironic to me, especially considering how I have always been the material one, and I am now ready to just give it all away in hopes of saving myself emotionally. It is surreal that this aspect has come full circle.

[swoop]

I am trying to figure out how to go about doing this "dark" thing. I dearly need to find some peace. The constant worrying, hoping, crying, stressing, etc. is really breaking me down. I am at the end of my patience, in hopes that wife will return. She asked me today about taking Daughter on a camping trip with OM. She asked, because it would interfere with my visitation day. I get that. She was being considerate of my time with daughter, but it doesn't make it any easier for me to stomach. I agreed to let daughter go and make the time up at some other point. I tried to keep the text conversation as short as humanly possible. I don't want to talk with wife anymore. Actually, I feel stupid even referring to her as "wife". I need to stop that. I just want some peace, for myself. I need to find a way to come to grips with that fact that this thing is over. My marriage is done. I feel completely broken, and emotionally drained. I just want some peace and happiness back in my life. How do I go dark without becoming distant and cold? Does it even matter? I mean, why am I trying so hard to keep a loving, caring connection with this woman who doesn't choose to reciprocate? Why am I not telling her, "have fun, good luck and get F%&#ed!"?

[MrCAS]

SP... a recap of a conversation I had with myself yesterday...

"So, I pulled over and had a talk with myself...

I asked myself what can I do about any of the past?

Hmmmm. Nothing.


What could you possibly say to the W that will magically change her mind?

Hmmmm. Nothing.


What can you do for the W that will speed her along her journey?

Hmmmm. Nothing.


What would I change about the journey I have taken the last seven months?

Hmmmm. Nothing."

I have those days and moments. The days get further apart and the moments get easier to handle.

Detaching doesn't mean you can't have hope. It doesn't mean to forget. It means to let go.

The hardest thing I had to learn was I can not fix this. I can not change this. I will never make my W change her mind. I have to accept that she is on her own journey. I can not help her on her way to a quicker resolution.

I feel that any attempt to make any move towards reconciling is going just push her further away. It is just going to make her feel something I don't want her to.

I got it.

It will come, brother. Honestly.

[jp787]

SP, for what its worth I am struggling majorly. Somehow we will get through this. I have been trying to focus on my breathing when I am alone and hurting. Just close my eyes and breathe. Feel your chest rise and fall, feel the breath come in and go out.
Peace

[swoop]

Thanks, Cas. I need to write that down and read it to myself when I get anxious. Good words.

[MrCAS]

Stop by for a slice and a beer.