I've been lurking on this board for awhile. I never intended on posting; but rather I was 'piggybacking' off of so many of you whose situations are similar to mine- reading your stories and benefiting from the responses. The challenge will be to say this concisely. So if it's not breaking the rules, maybe my first post will be how I got here, and the second will be what I've done. I know it's a lot to expect somebody to read, but honestly I think I'm doing this more to simply 'get it out' even if nobody responds. Well here goes...sigh......
*Married two years. Same age(35). 2nd marriage for both of us, each bringing beautiful kids to the mix. We both exited painful situations and fell madly in love as we represented the friendship, romance, safety, and hope we both craved. Married fast. Love of my life.
Neither of us were whole from our divorces,and our issues reared their heads fast.
Mine: Depression. Money. (My company crashed) Hers: Extreme anger. Alcohol.
Resolvable issues right? We loved each-other and wanted to make it work. We were both working hard temporally and emotionally being patient with the others' shortcomings- while loving the kids, 'grinding' out the hard parts of life so to speak, and trying to have a simple, enjoyable existence.
The problem was that arguments began turning into 'encounters', each one seemingly more severe. They'd start due to very valid issues, but go through the roof because of her anger- and my very poor reaction to it. Also, alcohol was involved in almost every single bad fight.
It culminated one night when she went off the rails, drunk on anger and alcohol. After hours and several unsuccessful attempts at disengaging her I called the police. I'll spare you the details. She had a breakdown. I did not want her arrested, I wanted to get out with my kids with no illegal contact. I lied to the police. Said she hadn't touched me- just wanted to avoid anything worse. Well, separate from me she was going off on an officer, and he said that based off her OWN account of the night they had to take her. She went to jail.
I had several people from 'her side' contact me wanting to know 'WTF?!' - so I wrote an email as not to have to have a bunch of phone or text conversations. In the email I tried to be honest about what had happened that night, and the pattern of volatility that had developed that they probably weren't aware of. She bailed out after awhile, and we legally couldn't have any contact for three days. Once we could, I received an email from her demanding that I move out, and that she intended on filing for divorce.
Many people wouldn't exactly call that a 'bomb' drop- but rather a 'No-sh*t Sherlock'. But the oddest thing happened. It was a bomb. My heart stopped beating. I died a little bit.
I knew in that moment I wanted to save it- and that's how this journey started....
