Hi all, time for an update. News of the day: I have been served.
At the beginning of August I returned from my latest business trip. Since then I have been working for three days per week at one end of my country and have spent the remaining days in the family house with the kids, at the other end of my country. This means two flights per week. (Before BD I had never flown, yet another 180.) I enjoy my job and I enjoy the time with the kids even more. I have reached a separation agreement with W: I keep the house and she needn't pay me any spousal support. Since she earns 3x as much as I do I give her a major six-digit sum.
The kids continue to be sad about the separation but they also discover advantages. W was controlling, without her the kids enjoy the freedom they have with me. - I spent two weeks of autumn holidays with them visiting many places in our city. They told me that we had more trips in these two weeks than in the 1.5 preceding years with W/OM.
There are many more 180ies. For instance, I often played soccer in my spare time during high-school. After high-school I stopped playing. Ever since W entered my life (1983) I hardly did any sports on my own because I wanted to be together with W as often as possible, that's what I thought would be the right thing to do. Now, after a break of three decades, I have started to play soccer again, once per week with my colleagues. What fun it is. I am about twice as old as many other players but I can keep up reasonably well.
W continues to live with OM and with my/our kids from Sunday evening to Thursday evening. No sign of an affair end. He has also been served. I am in regular mail contact with his ex-W.
I can't say that I am happy but neither I am very sad. Apart from BD the big shock was when W moved in with OM in September 2012. The upcoming divorce just adds a piece of paper. That's what I'm telling the kids: nothing will change for them after divorce. They often state they would prefer to live with me all the time. They don't like staying in the W/OM flat. The problem is that I can not find a job in my own city easily and that W would probably put up a fight if I reduced her kids' time to less than it is now, basically a 50/50 arrangement. I expect that the kids will gravitate more and more towards my place as they grow older (D10/D10/S8).
In the divorce filing my wife claims that we agree that our marriage has failed irretrievably. I am not hiring a lawyer and have written a response to the court myself. I am contradicting this point and explain that I don't consider the M to be failed but that I don't challenge the filing. (In my country a challenge prolongs the separation time from one to three years.) I also mention that W wanted a divorce before, a decade ago. At that time she retracted her application on the day of the final court meeting, one hour before the divorce became effective.
