Saw my boy for a bit today. Spoke with the wife sparingly. It's weird...just a few days ago, she texted me with a funny anecdote about when she had gone to pick our son up from school. I brought it up to her and she acted like she had no idea what I was talking about at first. Then she make a half-hearted remark about it. I thought to myself, "you obviously thought it was cute enough to text me about and now you're completely disgusted to talk to me about it." I kept my mouth shut, but the emotional roller coaster is exhausting.
Another thing I noticed is that she always seems miserable, for the most part. I though for a while that was because of my presence (she told me as much once or twice), but even when we are around other people who are interacting with her she rarely smiles or has any enthusiasm. We were with with a bunch of her friends (her idea..stacking the deck, I guess?)to take all of our kids trick or treating (we were the last married couple in this group, interestingly enough. The rest have had multiple marriages each and all had recently separated from long term marriages or relationships. Interesting choice of pals at this time). She seemed miserable the entire time and instead of having fun with her son she spent all of her time kvetching with one of her girlfriends or texting. And she seemed miserable the entire time.
I was having a great time with all the kids (I'm kind of a kid at heart, I guess) the entire night, and even backed off a bit to give her space to have fun on her own terms with the kids, but she didn;t really take up on it. I guess she didn;t like seeing me having a good time, because at the end of the night she invited all of the group back to her place. Except me. Needless to say that ruined my mood. I'm sure she knew it.
I often did things to get her to smile or laugh or get out of her funk over the course of our marriage (I'm a pretty goofy guy when I'm not completely devastated...I miss being that guy, not just for her but in general). I feel terrible if my assumptions about her state of mind are accurate. I want to reach out, but I know I shouldn't. But, as Sandi said, she doesn't want my help, doesn't want my hand to be the one reaching out to her. If she wants my help, she'll ask for it.
My son has also recently started counseling. After she left our home, he started acting up in school. I kept insisting that he see a councilor, but she wouldn't take him saying it was what I fed him when he was over here, or my attitude when I was around him (I always try to put the cheerful face on, but he did catch me crying my eyes out one time), or the jokes we would tell, or the games that we were playing, or that I was putting him to bed too late, or something to indicate that his problems at school were my fault as opposed to the separation (which would, I guess in her mind, make it her fault). I'm guessing this is a part of the WAW thing.
Even if I didn't feel the way I do about my wife, I still would have tried to make the marriage work for his sake. Maybe easy to say as I have always loved my wife, but even when things got rough I never left or thought of leaving. My inclination was to find some way to work it out. Obviously, i didn't go about that the right way, but at least I can say I tried. I just wish I could have fought the right war as opposed to the wrong battles. He would have been the first kid in three direct generations (on both of our familial sides) to have not come from a broken home. Even my daughters are from a previous marriage (which is why I believe they have 'sided' with their mom. This hurts a lot, as I love them dearly as was as big a part of raising thme as she was). I feel like I have failed my boy. And my wife. And my family. And myself.
Please don't get me wrong, I am not taking an "I'm right/she's wrong stance". Nor am I attacking her. I'm just laying out my observations. I really want to understand...I want to help..and I keep going back to one of Sandi's replies in this thread concerning the disposition of the WAW to give me my answer. It just seems like a pretty dark place to be, and I wish she wasn't there.
