Oh yes, you are very right! I do understand that I'm my own worse enemy most of the time (as horrible as that is to admit!). Of course another big part of this right now is money. A few months before B-day the co. I worked for for more than 10 years closed very unexpectedly. After talking it over with my W, we decided that I would start a co. with some people I had worked with, knowing that for a least the first couple years, I wouldn't make much money but that in time I had the potential to make substantially more than I had. To do this we would need to rely on savings and her pay and she was very much in favor of doing this. Now, that leaves me in a bad spot as things are taking even longer to get going AND I now am unsure how long I can count on her to share costs of everything with me. This is one of the reasons I am so upset about the school thing. In the past, I made enough to send my D myself and still afford the house, car, food, etc. Now, I barely make enough to support myself and I may have to abandon this business as the way she has been spending, her hiding money and just the fact that she is more in control of finances at a time when I can't really count on her doing what she agrees at any given time, money is short. For the 15 years before my W went back to work (almost 4 years ago)I was the only source of income as she was a stay at home mom by her choice. This is now one of the things she blames for her lack of happiness now.
This sitch with money has held me back from doing many things apart from my W that I would like to do but we just don't have the funds to do them. I have tried to find many things that are low cost or free and have been doing those (meetup groups, etc.)but there are many other things (even just going out to have a few beers with friends) that we just can't afford right now. At the same time my W has refused to take over the bill paying even though she said she wanted more control and at the same time if I tell her to be careful with money, will still go out and spend hundreds on things that she really doesn't need and become upset if the bills aren't paid right on time.
Also, since her pay has been the biggest part of our income, if she needs to work late (which has been often) I have been having to rush around and take over getting both the kids to and from school, fed, do all the food shopping, run errands,go to school meetings, etc. which is wearing and makes getting this business really going as I should be devoting more time to it.
When you add those stressors to the stress of my M sitch, it can be hard to find time to just calm myself and relax. After this week both my D's will be done school for this year which will mean more time and less running around getting them but also means at least the youngest will be home alone more often and will need me to spend time with her or help get her places to do things with friends, etc. which I already know my W won't help with. It's like I'm a single parent but at the same time need to deal with a W who does only what she pleases to do and seems to feel no obligation towards her kids.
Not sure how you dealt with 4 years with a H like that! Must have been very hard. I think one of the biggest problems in my sitch is that there isn't a spare room for her to live in. She basically lives on the couch and in the livingroom. That makes it hard for her to feel separate from all of us and since she is always tired and wanting to go to sleep (many days she starts complaining as early as 7:30 that she wants everyone to go from the living room so she can sleep)it is a source of friction with everyone and cuts back on family time together. It also makes her moving out much more appealing as she see's us as in her way and it is true somewhat.
So, while it's true that I can't let what if's stop me from living my life, the fact that I really never know what I can count on from my W, which things she will agree to do but then back out of at the last min., whether she will listen when I tell her that money is tight and watch what you spend on but at the same time need her income to pay the bills at least for now has held me back and I need to be able to get to a point where I don't need to count on her for anything has contributed to holding me back on that front as well.
Mach had asked about how the sitch with my FIL has played out in the past. Up until about 7 years ago, it wasn't germaine. He didn't want to see her or the kids and never bothered calling or keeping in touch. When his father died that changed. He wanted her in his life but not me or the kids. Before she went back to work, she would go up in the summer to visit him while I worked. She would spend a couple weeks there with the kids and I would join later and spend some time at least for the first couple years. After that, I wouldn't bother coming up as it was clear that her dad had no desire to see me but she could spend all the time she wanted with no complaints from me. I wanted her to have some kind of relationship with him and although I knew he would tell her what a waste her life was and that she needed to leave her family so she could "grow" as a person, I never thought she would start to listen to him and agree!
Other times if he came to visit us, he made it known that he had no desire to spend time with any of us, just my W and that was fine with me. I was always nice and would just let his insults and digs go since he was her father and that is just who he is. The problem I have with him now is due to hearing her apologize to him post B-day because she hasn't left. How he keeps pushing her to move faster to end her marriage. How he has been telling her to hide money, telling other family members that my oldest D will never amount to anything and will have a wasted life, never mind she is doing great, Telling my W when she said she wanted to give her marriage a chance that it would just go back to the way it was so why bother, how he manipulates my W into doing what he wants, when he wants with no regard to what is best for even his daughter let alone her kids or family. Now he suddenly wants to be part of my D's life when in the past he wanted no part of her and has been so awful to her she doesn't want him around her.
As far as treating my W "like a child", I'm really having trouble with that, especially since in the same breath she told me I needed to plan family vacations and "make" her go even if she said she didn't want to. She told me that was what her father did when she was a teenager and she was now glad he did, even though at the time she hated it. To me THAT would have been treating her like a child. As far as how she thinks I did that, the only thing I can think is how I took over taking care of things when she was depressed because she was always too tired to function. Other than that I can't see how I treated her that way and she can't tell me or give me any examples which I understand since it's a "feeling" she has that she can't find words for. At times it seems like she is rebelling like a teenager would (something she says she never was able to do because she felt like she had to be the 'adult" around her mom back then because her mom was so devastated by her divorce and was always angry at her dad and overwhelmed by trying to raise her kids alone with no money help from her father)and I am now the father figure and her father the person who wants to help her "escape".
I do understand what I need to do mostly. The first and foremost is get to a place financially where I have no need of her income and am working hard to get there. Also, now that the kids are out of school I will be able to do more without having to worry that I have to pick them up at a certain time which will help my GAL activities greatly. At this point I have no doubt that my W knows just how much I need her income and help and does use this to her advantage. I'm also sure that things would have played out differently to this point if that wasn't the case. None of which makes a difference in what I must do for myself and my family.
