Onwards and upwards.

[Barry]

Thanks for checking in on me Toots, I feel well enough in myself at the moment, I'm slightly nervous about the rollercoaster though.

Right now, I'm mentally preparing myself for the impending D proceedings and all of the heartache that it's going to cause. As I've said before, the thing that hurts the most is that my W shows no emotion whatsoever regarding our sitch - she's almost robotic in her extremly limited communication with me. It's like our lives together have had so little worth to her.
She can't or won't offer any comfort to me because she thinks (and she's probably right) that it will give me hope when there is none.

Many people have said to me that I don't know for sure that she's not upset, and that she could be crying herself to sleep at night over all of this. I admit that it's possible, but I think it's highly unlikely.
When I told her I'd be filing on the 15th April, I said she didn't have very long to stop me from doing it so to think about it carefully.
I realise this was temperature checking but at this stage, I don't need to check, it's sub-zero.

She's not going to stop me...I know that really but I needed to tell her that just if for my own sake.
I have to feel like I've given her every opportunity to call this off.

I think you're right about the card, I should keep it simple. That's the one I bought to start with so I should go with that.

I didn't mention this in my previous post but I know I'm nowhere near ready for dating because I went for dinner on Friday with an old friend from school (a divorced woman).

It wasn't a date, but it was a meal in a restaurant with a woman other than my W. It felt alien to me to sit there with no wedding ring on with another woman. There was no attraction on my part but she obviously felt differently as I recieved a text the next day with romantic overtones in it. I've spoken with her and said that although I'm flattered by it, I'm not in the right place for anything like that. She's fine with it and there's no awkwardness about it. I enjoyed seeing an old friend and the meal, it was a good exercise to see how it would be on a date. I wouldn't like it at this stage and maybe not for a long time to come.

One thing my friend did say to me is that she could see that I was doing well in detaching from W, but that when W does eventually meet someone else, it's still going to hurt. She's right, it will. I can't look at a photo or see W in person without still thinking of her as my woman. That day is going to come, and I just hope I'm strong enough to cope with it when it does.

I'd like to thank you (all) for your continued support. I still need it, even though my M is most probably a lost cause.
I do try to chip in on others sitch's where I feel it appropriate, but find it difficult to offer any really helpful advice to save a M.
I haven't been able to do that, but I am saving myself.

Take care, Barry.