Ganb8te 5 - Escaping the abyss

[gan]

Hi All, Thanks for stopping in.

Zelda - your question re how I would change the dynamics in a new R is still on my mind. I'm struggling to get it out at the moment as I'm feeling a bit down or rather different.

I'm not sure where I'm at really. Definitely questioning whether my heart is still in this. Without contact, it's easy for the tank to run low.

Anyway, off to London next week and then Amsterdam after that (mixture of work and vacation). Part of my wants to reach out to H before I go, the other part isn't feeling very motivated. Default is no contact.

Need to rejuvenate....big time.

[Ggrass]

Well gan,

I got excess data to burn, link me up. I did ask on my thread so would love links there.
I thought you might not see it before you go away.

[jim0987]

Well London and Amsterdam should bring a nice change. Maybe not as far as the weather is concerned but still good.

In terms of Zelda question, I bet a lots changed its just hard to explain. You know what giraffe ears are and can now do crow pose for starters.

[Zelda09]

Hugs, Gan. Your patience, steadiness and thoughtfulness have been an inspiration since day one I followed you. Hope you put on something sexy and remind yourself how F'ing fantastic you are, inside and out, or whatever you gotta do to lift you! Sorry to hear you've been down, wishing you some happy.

[Sotto]

Gan, I too think you sound lovely. Did you decide to do nothing in respect of contacting your H for now? Are you just going to head off on your trip then see how you feel when you get back?

March is a nice time to be visiting us - and hopefully you'll get some nice spring weather in the UK. It's still a bit chilly now, but you never know!

As for my H, I've not had a response since my carefully worded email reply to him. I get a sense that he emailed me in a 'post-being made redundant early morning panic' and may be a bit discombobulated by my reply. I guess time will tell. Will you keep in touch with the boards during your trip?

[gan]

Thanks, Jim, Zelda and Toots.

Toots, no I've not contacted H. I'm not in a strong enough place right now (as my next post will show). When I get back I will have 2 weeks then be off again (Tanzania/Uganda - work but trying to throw in a safari GAL for good measure). After that I will most likely contact a L before/if I contact H. We become eligible to apply for D in early May so I suppose I need to get myself prepared for that possibility. Never thought I would write that, quite honestly. But then I suppose no one here did.

[gan]

Well it’s G&T on the balcony time again. Not H related just me related. Sorry all but you are about to witness a mini meltdown. Probably precipitated by a colleague making an unknowing reference to “whether I had to sacrifice my personal life and family” in order to get my promotion last year...but lets face it I’ve been down for days and this was coming. And yes, I managed to hold back the tears as I replied to his question.

I feel like I live a double life.

In the day - I’m an up and coming academic. I supervise or co-supervise something like 6 graduate and undergraduate students and do my best to make them do well in what they do, help them advance their research, connect them with people who will make their life easier. Twice this week people have referred to me as the "cool supervisor” or something similar. (Not hard though as most of the people on my floor who have offices (like me) are men with silver hair [with no offence to the lovely men with silver hair on here]). In the past 2 weeks I gave a lecture that got applause at the end and I lead an experiential learning activity that got positive reviews by 98% of students. We’re planning a media release for Fs sake, it was that awesome! I try hard to be a good colleague to my peers, getting things done that are asked of me and doing it with a smile as much as possible. And I do all this while trying to draw the line on work vs life - rarely working on nights or weekends and usually turning email off on weekends….only to find on Monday that my workaholic colleagues have spent their weekend catching up on the emails they didn’t respond to during the week.

Yet here I am, at night, alone, reaching out to you wonderful people whose lives have been thrown into similarly nebulous territory.

At our last meetup H said that I am amazing (just not compatible)...and I think I am actually. It’s hard for me to write that as I feel like it’s arrogant. Trouble is, being amazing at my work doesn’t make me amazing at home. Labug, Mozza, Calibri - if you are reading - you have all spoken about how the attributes that make us great at our work don’t necessarily make us great partners. How do we reconcile this? I actually value the attributes that make me good at my work. I think they make me a good person. My relationship with my work is one of few things my H has said out loud was an issue. Help me grow here…

(others welcome to comment, too

[jim0987]

Gan,

Your H said you're amazing, and you know why that is right? You said so above.

Because you are.

Your smart, driven, resourceful and its clear that your respected by your peers. And who wouldn't want the smart, hot one as their supervisor

You got 98% positive feedback and that's really good. I'd kill for feedback on my courses like that. Usually I bribe instead

But in what you said you also showed your considerate, and helpful and reliable.

You do all this at work and so you can do it home. And you know to switch off from work as well, with safaris and London and volunteering at gigs. Its clear some if your colleagues don't and I would guess the one that asked has some anxiety of his own about this balance.

So in short we're back at the start, in that you're amazing.

As for compatible with your H, maybe its true, maybe it's not, maybe he just is prepared for the effort and occasional compromise it might take. But comparability is a two way thing.

Gin and tonic are compatible, gin and vanilla milkshake not so much. Doesn't mean both aren't still good.

So in my opinion (humble as it is) you strengths are your strengths and they are good, don't try to tone them down or compromise them to be a 'great partner' try and focus them differently or learn new skills that let them work for you in all aspects of your life. If you a great person you'll be a great partner to whoever is lucky enough to be with you.

Sorry if I've waffled


(((((Ganb8te)))))

Very jealous of your balcony again by the way.

[Ggrass]

Gan I suspect if he's thinking not compatable he's looking at others.

Quite a few men, see having a woman on their arm as a show of success.

Gan I suspect your right on doing better, my h used to work constantly now supposely has a long weekend with ow every weekend.

It's amzing what people can do when they chose to change.

[Sotto]

Hi Gan, I relate to what you said. In my last job, I worked as a coach as part of my role, and we sometimes used to look at a 'life wheel' - where you have the wheel broken up into (say) eight segments - Work - Relationship - Children - Finances - Home - Leisure - spirituality/faith etc. You then 'rate' on the wheel how happy you feel with each of these areas of your life.

For most of us, there are areas where we feel really positive at different times in our lives. And at other times, there is more challenge. And of course the picture is constantly in transition. Your post just made me think of the 'wheel.'

You seem to be saying/asking - I'm good at my job - but am I/was I a good partner? My IC always said how imperfect we all are. We are 'crooked staffs' And that's fine. I'm sure for many of us we were 'good enough' partners. By no means perfect and we could always have done more.

Some people have very specific and difficult regrets from their partnerships - they worked 24/7, they were unfaithful, drank, abused. But for me, it's more that there were things I just didn't realise at the time, and I made some mistakes. I thought I could 'fix' things and so forgot to really listen, I became complacent about our love life etc. These are things I now look back on and know I could have done differently, and they contributed to our M breaking down. H also did things that contributed - and ultimately he may well regret these (A) more than I regret my stuff.

I guess it's what you do with it that matters. From what you say, it doesn't sound as though there are huge regrets in your 'wifely behaviour' to come to terms with - but things to learn from, for sure. And either your H - or some other lovely guy is going to benefit from this is the future. The important thing is not to be too hard on yourself, be kind to you. We are all imperfect and doing our best in these complex and challenging situations - by which I mean marriage!