I think I'm done

[mustardseed]

Thank you Barely Floating. I did need to hear just that. I do feel like I have been spinning out of control, and it did start around the time that I realized a friendship he had with a coworker was not just light hearted friendly banter, but that this was someone he actually confided in--about our marriage. And this is someone who works very closely with our son--and is the mother of a very good friend of our daughter. I think I feel very threatened. Knowing that this person might know the answers to the reasons why he is doing this bothers me so much. I also felt humiliated when S13 told me how playful H and this woman were when they were away on a trip. I asked her about it and she was surprised and said "we are very good friends for a very long time" and that just pissed me off even more because it sounded condescending. How can yo be very good friends with someone's husband without the wife also being somewhat involved in this friendship? I always considered her friendly, but talking with her the way I talk with other women my husband works with (who are also my children's friends parents) was different. I always felt like she shut me out a little. Is that because he was telling her things about me? I keep telling confidants that I would almost prefer they were having sex rather than knowing that he can actually open up to her in a way he can't and won't with me--because with sex and physical attraction I feel I can compete and win. But with this, I can't.

I do feel desperate and I this morning I realized the difference between now, and before I knew about this situation is that now I feel threatened. And it's making me act like a crazy person. And I am having a hard time getting back to the detached--Acting as if--getting a life--person I was over the summer.

The worst part is that when I am like this, he suddenly is mister even tempered. He suddenly gets to do all of the spinning against me. I know that when I'm like this all I do is give him leverage. When I am the other way he kind of retreats, goes through a dark phase, then lightens up and starts becoming interested and caring towards me again.

I know you are absolutely right. I need to drop the rope. I need to let go. But for some reason this threatened feeling--this need to win over "very good friend" is making it so hard to get to that place. And I'm having trouble identifying the first step I need to do.

I'm going to try using the 12 steps to recovery steps. I need to start really working those steps. I always though step one was a no brainer--ADMIT I AM POWERLESS TO _____________ and that my life has become unmanageable as a result.

I always thought. Ok I admit it. Next step. But I think there is more to it than that.

How has my life become unmanageable?
I have become a person I am embarrassed to be. I have said and thought some really awful things about a person who really hasn't done anything to me except become important to my H. IF she was his sister I wouldn't feel so threatened and I would completely understand. At the same time I have opened up to people about him in a way that I'm sure he feels ashamed (but not other men who might think that means there is an in). And news spreads, so telling one person with connections to his family meant that very quickly his family knew and they are all angry at him. And I sort of did that out of spite. I was very careful to be kind about him when discussing this issue, until I felt threatened. Then it was--this is what has been going on and what he has been doing. Knowing that the chance of his family members catching wind was a real possibility. Everyone's advice is "you need to get out. Kick him to the curb." And now I feel like a fool if I don't.

I cannot change the way he feels about me. I am powerless to his actions towards me. All I can change is how I respond. I was responding in a way that has made my life unmanageable. I have been cruel with my words about VGF. I have been trying to control situations. And it always backfires. I've been trying to show him what a mistake he has been making, but that has been backfiring as well.

I can't live with him anymore. I think I accept that piece of it. But--I still have to shake the feeling of our separation means VGF wins. I created an enemy where there really shouldn't be one and I'm fighting this ghost. There is no way to win when I am fighting a ghost. I'm like Don Qixote right now. I think I finally realize that. The reason why he has the upper hand right now is because he watched me fight windmills for the past few months.

I have to drop the rope.

I have to not care. Surrender. But now I also have some resentments.

After our last talk on Sunday he sent me off to my parents so he could have some time with the kids. However, I had plans New Years Eve. I told him about these plans before Christmas and he said that I should ask my parents if they should watch the kids because he might want to do something too. It pissed me off but I still asked. They said they'd love to have them. But then I told him, he needs to drop them off and work it out with my parents.

So then Sunday I had a melt down, he sent me to my parents to have some time to myself (that's how he phrases it and I bite). He'd bring them out to me Wednesday. That's New Years Eve. So now I don't see the kids all week, and they day they come to me I already have plans. So what do I do? I change my plans. Rather than getting together with this cousin tomorrow I am doing it today, because I want to be with my kids on NYE and I think they should be with one of us.

So he got his way. He got to wash his hands of any responsibility toward them, and knew I would be upset and want to be with them so I would change my plans. Then yesterday he called and said he was planning on bringing them out to me today instead of tomorrow. I told him that won't work because I am not going to be in the state. And then I again got too honest and told him I changed my plans from Wednesday to today so that I could be with the kids when they got here. It makes me crazy how much control he has over me. And this is why I need to learn to set boundaries, but when I do there always ends up being a control piece to it. So I told him I have plans today. He can't drop off the kids. Is that being controlling or is that boundary setting? I can't tell the difference.

The one thing I realize today, though, is that I allowed him to have this upper hand because I lost my Sh!t. I need to get back my control and stop caring about him and what he does.