Barrybran - A Year On

[Barrybran]

Thanks again Faith2b, rppfl, gogofo, Ganba8e and LFW. After a few days off I can see where my wife, and all of you, are coming from regarding how I handle kid-related things with my wife. At the time, I was seeking advice on how to handle these situation with my wife. What I didn't mention was that my wife and I got into a yelling match at my instigation. I was adamant that she was going to treat me better than she has and she was adamant I would run things by her before discussing them with the kids. Not my finest hour. I sent her a message some time later apologising for my bahaviour but the deed was done. I stuffed up and there's no excusing that.

After reviewing everyone's messages, I reflected on recent incidents and how I'd handled them. There was a strong theme of losing my patience and being unnecessarily firm with my wife. I have struggled walking the line between standing up for myself and going with the flow for the benefit of everyone concerned. I do feel very strongly that my wife has treated me poorly of late but I should have handled this so much better than I did.

Fast forward to the past couple of days and I took the kids up to see my wife for the first time since she moved to her new town. I wasn't looking forward to it one bit as we'd barely spoken since the latest incident. To my surprise, the time away was pleasant. My wife and I largely kept to ourselves, did things together with the kids and also had our own time with the kids. I left her town feeling positive that we could make these visits work.

Only a couple of negatives came up. My wife asked me when the local town show was on, which I told her, and she asked her friends on Facebook later on that night. I get that; she doesn't trust me. I decided to leave it as she would get her answer and it wasn't worth sparking negativity over. The other one was she broached the subject of dating. She cited not wanting to be "blindsided when the kids tell her about Daddy's special friend" one day. I told her that whilst I understood her feelings at the present time, I wasn't going to do anything to further divide our family and that I hadn't given much thought to how to handle dating. I told her I would cross that bridge when the time comes. I'm not sure what to make of things as her job is a stepping stone and dating really doesn't make sense for either of us for the foreseeable future. I'm not sure how I will handle things if I find out she is dating at some point.

On a strange side note, I mentioned the move throughout the weekend and she said that she was in no rush for it to happen. This was really strange to me as she pushed pretty hard to have the kids with her prior to the school year starting and now is prepared to wait. Part of me wants to run with this and maintain the status quo and just get on with my life. I understand why I am making this move though and I feel very strongly that it is the right thing to do for the kids; they deserve their mum no matter how I feel or how she treats me. There's a lot of work to do in the meantime though.

On a positive note, I've received a confidence boost of late. A couple of times I've been out I've received some smiles from women. I've not acted on them; I'm adamant I want to see things through with my wife, but it's a nice feeling nonetheless.