I am titanium

[Raine]

snodderly, the little one is doing so great! I can’t believe how the time has flown by. He is very attached to me, huge smile and laughs when he sees me. I guess that’s what you’d expect, but he sure has brought a lot of joy to the entire family. All of his older brothers are so cute with him. Even S age 2 is super gentle and sweet, and this is the boy who successfully torments his older brothers.

I don’t think H will leave either. His leaving will be either because he is in a healthy, stable mindset to handle divorce, or because I force him to. That was pretty clear to me that he would do absolutely anything at this point to stay in the house: get counseling and stop all contact with OW. I feel like he is more distant now from me than he has been in quite a while, as far as anything beyond a friendship. He wants to do family things, go out together with the kids, hang out with me at home, but he seems really leery of doing stuff out and about just him and I. This kind of [censored] because I want to get out, but seems weird doing “us” things without him. Going and seeing one of his favorite bands or comedian with someone else and not him…just feels wrong. Oh well. He has a great time during and after, but probably the anticipation is getting to him.

I have been reading Silent Sons. So much of it applies to H…it’s scary! I’ll keep you posted on more of this. Really great book so far!

Hey complicated! I do feel like I’m in a really good place. Things upset me still. He does things to push my buttons for sure, but I’m pretty good at brushing them off and ignoring them. A lot of times I just think he is completely clueless.

Catching up…
Monday I let him know what I’m making for dinner. I don’t say time or anything or ask if he’ll be home, just put it out there. He rolls in at 7, but I was planning late anyway. He tells me not to be offended that he has to get some work done, and he wasn’t going to leave the office until much later. He said he didn’t want to offend me when I said I was making dinner so he came home. So, not thinking I said, “Oh, I don't get offended anymore. I'm used to it by now.” His face totally falls. I jump into recovery mode and say “I mean I’m used to not getting offended by things. I like to be able to just let things roll off my back. It’s not a big deal. I mean, I know you'd never do anything to intentionally hurt me. You’re just not that kind of person.” And he says, “But I do, and I have. I have hurt people on purpose.” Yeah, that one was a convo stopper.

Tuesday he comes in late again, skips out on his friends who were expecting him, but has stopped to get himself something to eat. Work is really stressful right now, but he loves it. Says it is keeping him sane. That he really needs this right now.

He is talking to me a lot about other people. He has been helping multiple single guy friends with their women and dating issues, which is really funny to me. I think he really likes to think he is an expert at this. He started telling me about a convo he had with one guy about attractiveness in women and how someone could go from being a 5 to an 8, based on personality, intelligence, wit, etc, but someone who is a 9 could go to a 4 when they showed how dumb they were. (For sure I’m wondering how OW play into this one :p) I asked him for an example, and he couldn’t think of anyone. So I mention someone who I thought was a bit frumpy, but he thought was cute, and he agreed, it’s because she has a fun personality.

He also talked about people noticing him for superficial reasons, and wanting to be liked for who he is. I told him those things were never the reason I was attracted to him. I’m just not fazed by this, just like I’m not fazed by other superficial things with other people. But I do sense that the OW like him on the superficial level. They don’t know him. He doesn’t let them in, and not like he is anything like himself or who I hope he will one day become.

We talked about his trust issues, that he doesn’t trust anyone, and hasn’t since he was a young teen, at least that is as far back as he can recall not being able to trust. He is not sure why, but links it to his Dad and to bullying peers. I asked him if it just felt like a normal teen thing, or that he had issues where he didn’t feel like his dad protected him when he needed him. He felt like the later was more accurate.

Wednesday he came home again, ditching his friends who were waiting for him. He came in and grabbed some dinner and went and watched TV for the rest of the night. When he had his apartment, all he did was watch TV, but since he moved back, he has watched very little of it. This was the first time in a very long time. I didn’t see him the rest of the night.

So Thursday he calls me mid-day to have me look at some t-shirts he wants to order for him and the boys. I say they look great. He calls me multiple times on his way home from work, but I never saw the calls. Kind of strange to me that he is calling. Makes me wonder if he has gone to see OW1 or something. Paranoid much? Or maybe it’s because I’m annoyed at him. Here is why:

The before mentioned girl who I thought was frumpy and he thought was cute, we are both friends with her on FB, and she is married too. Anyway, I look at my news stream this afternoon and it has multiple “likes” from H on pics she is posting of her baby and then also ones of her. On one of the ones of her he commented that she looked “gorgeous” and he also commented on another one of her that it was a fun expression. Totally annoyed the heck out of me. He doesn’t even like pictures that have me in it, even though he “likes” everyone and their freaking dog on FB. But I gave it time. Had dinner. He hung out with the boys. After the boys went to bed he asked me if I was going to take care of the kitchen cleanup (nice huh? haha!) and I said to him, “I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to tell another woman on FB that she is gorgeous. I feel it’s disrespectful to me and her husband. It also makes it difficult for me to have her over to hang out.” I told him that I had gone on FB and there was this chunk in the news feed of him liking three photos of her baby and a photo of her and commenting on it. He said he only liked one baby photo. (This is funny. Does he not remember? I mean it’s there in the history, so I really just think he doesn’t remember.) I just said okay to that. I was very calm and matter of fact…kind of like, “hey can you take out the garbage” voice. He apologized. Didn’t intend it that way. In response to me not feeling comfortable hanging out with her, he said he doesn’t need to hang out with her. They’re not close friends anyway, etc, etc. I just thanked him for being understanding and that I could talk to him about it, and that I understand he didn’t mean anything by it and it’s just him, but I it made me uncomfortable. Pretty sure this annoyed him, but I’m glad I said what I did. He needs to get a freaking clue about some of this stuff.

Whew! I’m all caught up.