I think I'm done

[mustardseed]

Just because I told him I am ready to leave doesn't mean I have to do it, right?
Just because I spoke to the lawyer to get the ball rolling doesn't mean I have to follow through, right?
I haven't retained the lawyer yet. I can't tell if my second thoughts are due to fear, to not feeling completely comfortable with my lawyer, or due to the fact that in my heart I don't feel like it is over.

I don't want to live there, but I don't want to leave either. I want us to move on. I want us to get to a place where we can start fresh. Part of me thinks separating first is the best option.

I've made myself crazy over the past 2 months. After feeling like I was really making positive changes for a year, I threw it all out the window 2 months ago. Did absolutely the opposite of what I have learned since BD. All because of jealousy. Is it too late to go back? We were in a really positive and optimistic place in September--but I really just lost my mind after his trip. I got jealous and impatient and slipped back into a bad pattern of needing to control the situation. I'm trying to let go now, but now I'm scared because I set some balls in motion and I don't know if I can stop it.

We have betrayed each other in ways that I'm not sure can be forgiven--or at least forgotten. Actually, that's not true. I can forgive when I feel safe again. But I don't know if I can feel safe again with him. And the fact that I confided in people and now he feels insecure around them. I guess it is kind of how I feel. We see it differently though. I feel betrayed that he could easily talk to another woman about our issues when he couldn't even talk to me about it. I feel like he gave her power of feeling important in his life above me. I confided in people who love us both, which feels like a bigger betrayal to him because he thinks of it as me trying to make people take sides. However, that isn't my intention, I just like to have people who can help me see the other side. But I think it makes him feel like now he can't trust anyone and his reaction is to avoid anyone who might think badly of him.

For example, it doesn't bother me that he talks to his sister about things. She knows me. She might not like me right now, but I know I can rebuild that relationship when and if the time comes. He doesn't approach things that way. He'd rather just cut out all of the people he thinks I confided in.

So I betrayed him in that way. I knew I was doing it--although it wasn't my intention. The only people I feel close to are people connected to both of aside aside from a few work friends. My work friends are great for when I am venting, but they don't know him so it is truly one-sided. The other people know him and remember us when we were good together--so I feel like it is more fair. The people he has confided in are people who know me--but as an acquaintance. As someone who runs in the same circle and hears the same gossip and makes polite conversation. To me that is more of a betrayal because here I was for years making small talk about my marriage and kids in a lighthearted way, meanwhile this woman was probably thinking in the back of her head "oh really, is that what you think. I know better." I think that is the part that is hard for me to let go of. How foolish I must have looked while I pretended my marriage was good, when she came to pick up her kids from the after school program I worked, or the summer camp program. Talking about H as if we were happily married and content, acting as if I knew how to make him happy and provide for his needs, clueless to the fact that he was confiding her about his feelings about me that I didn't know. That she knew how he really felt about me while I was in the dark. To me that is worse than if they were having sex.

But I have to let go of that. Either way. I can't obsess over it. I was made a fool--but I can move on and forgive if I could just let go of the shame. But maybe he feels the same way about me confiding in family. Although, I was very careful about how I did that to make sure he always looked good--that is until I found out about confidante and then I just let the flood gates open.

Is there turning back from this?