Mornings are the worst for me - I don't know why. Maybe the enormity of the day Stretched out in front of me makes me scared. Another day on my own with two kids who depend on me to make the right choices.
Yesterday we probably overdid it with activities but it was fun and the kids were happy - just very tired today.
Sometimes I wonder if I had to do this all over again would I? My kids of course make me answer yes but the rest? I honestly don't know. My whole thought process was that I was building a life for my family. So many sacrifices for the family but I gladly made them for the greater good you know? My life that included a family. One that was what I thought it was - just a dream in my head? I question reality now - was all of that family talk and forever talk just a dream or a lie or just stuff that people say in the moment.
I feel like I have a bayonet in my back and I am being marched into an unwanted reality. Two choices at this point, submit to the unwanted on my terms or hers.
Funny how one day I feel so confident and other days just down. Still on roller coaster tells me I am still not detached.
I spent time with a friend yesterday divorced 2 years out and still not detached either. Wow. Maybe this is a lifelong process and that is truly daunting.
I haven't read your whole thread, but I did go back to the beginning to get a sense of what is going on. Though my reason to have come to this site is completely different, I can relate to what you are going through because of the failure of my first marriage.
Affairs seem to be one of the worst experiences, particularly when you are blindsided. It probably feels worse for you because of who your WAW got involved with. You may not have gotten to this point yet, but there will be days when you will feel little more than just a sperm donor. That comes in your situation or in situations where the marriage devolves into your wife becoming "mom" to the exclusion of your marriage and then decides to get involved with someone because the marriage doesn't have the feel it did before you had kids. Mine is the experience of the latter situation where I felt that I was a sperm donor so she could become "mom."
For me, that happened many years ago. Would I have married her again, looking back. Of course, not only because of being a father, but I was deeply in love with her and I thought we would continue to love each other through the rest of our lives. It didn't turn out that way and I would have even preferred that she "found herself" and come back to at least to attempt to rebuild the marriage, but she didn't.
More importantly, I did not want her to come back because she had no where else to go, but because it was what she wanted to do. I told her parents that no matter what, I loved her and I didn't want them to attempt to shame her back into the marriage. I didn't ask them to approve of the situation (and they did express their disapproval).
We ended up with a joint custody arrangement that worked but it was a challenge from time to time.
A couple of quick points just in case no one else has mentioned it.
No matter what, answer your children's questions honestly, but don't use them as spies on what is going on. Allow them to share what is going on in the other household and be mindful that this is stressful on them. Being the solid father that you can be and helping your kids navigate this change is about as important a thing as you can do as taking care of your own mental and physical health and that of your kids (and I found that once my ex moved out of the house, the father I really wanted to be came out in a big way. Not to show her up, but that was the thing that became the only thing about the marriage that I had full control over. My time as father was just that...MY TIME.)
In the early days and months, it is not unusual to feel lost, frozen, in a fog and afraid to move because whatever you do will make you afraid that you are wrong (after all you didn't see this coming, did you?). Again, that is natural to feel this way. In my case, my ex revealed her affair when we were at the beach on a family vacation in early July (I had figured it out just a few days before on her birthday), we agreed to work on our marriage (that went nowhere because she didn't want to let go of the affair, but it took until September to find that out), and I suggested that she move out in October, and she did in early November.
Thanksgiving and Christmas were...well, you know.
But I digress.
It can get better. But it will take months and years. You might start feeling like you are going to survive this (that seems to take 6-8 months), but to feel like you are functional and beyond "just survival" will take something closer to one month for every year you knew her and/or were married to her. Use that time to work on your self as a father and as a man. To really feel like you are getting beyond it, figure more like two months for every year.
You are who you are and that has been shaken to the core. But look at who you are after this façade has been broken off and look at the core that is left. Or a better metaphor: you are a crustacean and your shell has been damaged and you have to let that go. But underneath that shell is the core "you." You will be vulnerable as you build a new shell (and you will), questioning many aspects, assumptions, and expectations that you have/had coming to this point.
Given this chance to rebuild/reconstruct your life, who would you like to become? What is the "best self" you could create to live the rest of your life for yourself and your children?
You will probably still love her and that is okay because it validates your feelings from long ago and a reason to be married to her. Your kids were an outcome of that love. I'm not going to tell you that it's going to be a walk in the park. That love will get in the way in ways that you won't expect.
And there will likely be a time, as you stabilize and feel that you are no longer afraid to do this, that she might have second thoughts. She will be afraid that you'll hold all of this against her (and you might). But if she does have those second thoughts and she wants to be bridged between two relationships, my recommendation is don't let her. My ex came to me with some sort of loving both of us and "we could start dating" about a year after she moved out. I asked her how "he" would feel about that and she said that he wouldn't like that. Well, he'd know how I felt about it but I didn't say that to her.
Rather, I reaffirmed this...I loved her and I wanted her back. If forgiveness, acceptance of her choices was in my heart and what she needed from me, I thought I was big enough that I could give that. But I also made it clear that I wanted her to come back not just because I wanted her to, but because she wanted to as well. And if she never got to that point (and she didn't), then I would need to prepare for that as well.
I realize that the failure of my marriage and that challenge in my life defined me in a way that I never expected. I would never wish that experience on anyone and those who go through this type of experience have a range of emotions, experiences and outcomes that are all over the place. But if that was the only way it took for me to get to the point I was coming out of the marriage, I would do it again in a minute.
There are plenty of "what ifs" in life. Eventually, though we need to deal with "what is" and that we really are what we live ourselves to be.
