Here's my take on your posting. I think you did the right thing in contacting BIL about the situation w/his son. The info you provided will help and his son a great deal.
Now about the other situation concerning your BIL and cheating on his wife. There is nothing you can say to this man about his situation because it is none of your business. In fact, you've got a full plate dealing w/your own situation. It's not your circus. I think what you said to your wife was spot on and if she's got issues w/him, then it's up to her to decide how to deal w/it...but you need to stay out of this situation.
I think you handled it well. Remember...she fired you as her husband. She needs to grow up and take care of her own circus. You are no longer part of that circus.
Sit quietly, the answers will reveal themselves when you least expect them to. The past is gone, the present is a gift and you need to focus on today, allow the future to reveal itself when it is ready.
I wonder, what part will I say was hardest years from now? The entire process of getting to where I am now was pretty damn hard. I said before here a while ago, it sounds romantic in movies to tell someone "I would fight hell for you", but you don't expect to actually do it. And then most don't when the time comes, but some do. And when it began, those who did, were not aware, the hell fought would be the one inside them, at least for me it was. And then, it was for no one else but me.
And when I thought it was hardest, I thought detach was home base. And then once I hit detachment, I thought it was forgiveness that held it all. And now what? I say, it is hard. It is damn hard to feel better, to feel free, and to know I could walk away as I see fit, whenever I want, because I have that strength now.
job - yeah, she fired me as her husband. Great term, she did that a while ago. like getting fired from the factory that employed me all my life. Then I went back to school, got a new education, and now I have found a new job. It pays less, but the stress is lower.
For now, I just keep on being me, one day at a time.
"There is no more important fight than the one for ourselves. Keep on winning." Ginger1, Read her newbies. BD: Feb '16 D: Mar '17 Piecing: Putting the self back together was my piecing. S6
Great post as usual CT - Life is indeed a journey and not a destination. "The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there" - Leslie Poles Hartley
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
Holiday coming soon. Time has passed both quickly and slowly. Spouse has been noticeably different in the past 4-5 weeks. Not sure if it is an adjustment to how/who I am or if it is an adjustment to how/who she is. Not sure I really care. I mean that, I am not sure if I care. I feel like I want to care, perhaps better said like I should care, maybe that's it, like I should. After all, one is so used to caring in all this.
To be honest, I am at a point where I have wondered on my own motivation for continuing to post on my ow sitch here (I do like to come here and read on my friends, sound terrible to say I 'like' to do that, given where we are). I have done so much digging, into me - gone so deep into me - found the things I felt were wrong, incomplete, or unacceptable about me. Identified, exorcised, and lobotomized what I did not like or agree with about me. There are definitely a few things I have left, but the earth-moving is done, and now I fell like I am only planting. Long story long, I feel really and truly honestly good about being me. An alignment of self, so to speak.
I am baffled why I even give enough of a chit (to use Eric's version of the word) to post my dealings with wife now, just thinking there must be something left in me that I am missing. Perhaps that something left is nothing more than the fact that I still love her, after all that has become, I still love her. And not for the surface reasons, which I trust at this point I don't have to explain here, I do think I have proven myself beyond that.
I was leaving her house tonight. I picked up some 'dishes' she had made for my family for Thanksgiving holiday. She called earlier today 'just to talk'. She called Sunday, when I had care of our son 'just to talk'. She says I love you quite regularly now. She sends me emails which have no point. She has begun texting on an interest level in the past few weeks to where I end it just because I don't feel like it. She makes me food...tonight she gave me a bunch of food she made for me to eat, not just what she made for my family. Third time in three weeks she has made food just for me. Tonight she made a joke about her brother, its his birthday and he got outted on having an affair a few days ago, and her joke was "I bet you don't want a divorce for you birthday". I didn't laugh, i felt like I should have walked out when she said it, but I have gotten beyond that childish display of anger and instead just looked her for a moment and changed the conversation. So, I was leaving her house tonight, and I just felt like she was a woman I am simply interested in (granted, in a deep way) and that all of the above did not much matter beyond other things which happened in my day.
I know she is still involved with OM. Does it really matter, no. Is there something I can do about it, no. Do I really think there is some deeper meaning to it, no. I am not concerning myself with any 'stage' she is in, or that I am in for that matter. I think I may just be writing to write it so to speak. Well, not entirely true, do always welcome the comments. It was tempting, for a moment writing this, to say why I loved her. I know why and I will keep that for my own. What I think works better here, is why I love my self. I love my flaws - they built me. I love that I was challenged by people here to confront the 'why' of me, and I met that challenge. I love that I asked for help, and that I received it. I love that I believe in my changes and what to keep them, until I need to change again, and then I will. I love that everyone here kept a promise to help me and that I return it. I love that I love my son in a better way than I did before I got here.
I love that I love me, I love my self, I am not done, but I am so very much closer than I ever have been before - as in my entire life. I still love her, maybe shouldn't, but to quote "deserve's got nothing to do with it". I am more than the sum of my parts. I love that I am the man she would be a fool to walk away from, and I love that this does not matter to me. The real DB should speak to realizing that I am the self I would be a fool to ignore. I am not that foolish, I am me, the best I have, still not the best I will be.
"There is no more important fight than the one for ourselves. Keep on winning." Ginger1, Read her newbies. BD: Feb '16 D: Mar '17 Piecing: Putting the self back together was my piecing. S6
I am me, the best I have, still not the best I will be.
^^^^ Like
CT my dear friend I think you and I are in very similar places on a personal level. Thinking back on all you've written - and there's been a lot - I would like to believe that your W has been a part of your "you" for so long as you've been on and off over the years that she is still entangled with you like another tree next to yours. That entanglement will take a long time to grow out and will keep pulling at you. Will she take a leap of faith and leave OM and seek you out? No clue. That would require an act of courage on her part. Would you accept her back? Again, I believe in both of our cases the answer is "don't know". For both of us I believe that taking on the role of OM-OM is inherently distasteful.
I'm very glad to use my own words that you have discovered the man standing in your boots and that you quite like him. May you continue to stand tall and proud and if we don't correspond before, please have a great Thanksgiving and know that you have a lot to be thankful for.
On a completely unrelated topic I was looking for another book on my shelf and stumbled across this one that you might be interested in professionally/personally. I don't know if you are familiar with it. I have sitting next to me (you can find it via ABE Books which is where I got my copy) US Department of Agriculture Technical Bulliten #479 - September 1935 - Strength and related properties of woods grown in the United States by L.J Markwardt and TRC Wilson. I got a copy for myself and one for my younger brother who is trained as an arborist and worked as an urban logger for a long time. It was written in the Depression to give guidance into the usefulness of non-traditional wood species. Perhaps it might be of interest.
If we do every have our paths cross, I can manage without tea and cakes. A strong pot of good coffee and some biscuits and gravy is also high on my list of conversation aiding foods.
Take care.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
I was leaving her house tonight. I picked up some 'dishes' she had made for my family for Thanksgiving holiday. She called earlier today 'just to talk'. She called Sunday, when I had care of our son 'just to talk'. She says I love you quite regularly now. She sends me emails which have no point. She has begun texting on an interest level in the past few weeks to where I end it just because I don't feel like it. She makes me food...tonight she gave me a bunch of food she made for me to eat, not just what she made for my family. Third time in three weeks she has made food just for me. Tonight she made a joke about her brother, its his birthday and he got outted on having an affair a few days ago, and her joke was "I bet you don't want a divorce for you birthday". I didn't laugh, i felt like I should have walked out when she said it, but I have gotten beyond that childish display of anger and instead just looked her for a moment and changed the conversation. So, I was leaving her house tonight, and I just felt like she was a woman I am simply interested in (granted, in a deep way) and that all of the above did not much matter beyond other things which happened in my day.
I know that is has been asked...Maybe you've answered, maybe you haven't....
What do YOU want CT ?
What are you working toward now ??
What does reconciliation look like to you ??
What signs would you have to have ??
A little something to chew on tomorrow....
Originally Posted By: CT1118
I love that I love me, I love my self, I am not done, but I am so very much closer than I ever have been before - as in my entire life. I still love her, maybe shouldn't, but to quote "deserve's got nothing to do with it". I am more than the sum of my parts. I love that I am the man she would be a fool to walk away from, and I love that this does not matter to me. The real DB should speak to realizing that I am the self I would be a fool to ignore. I am not that foolish, I am me, the best I have, still not the best I will be.
I think that's a pretty good description of what DBing entails...
And a dayum good place to be...
Enjoy your Thanksgiving CT....for there is an abundance to be thankful for....
Andrew/Mach1 - if you two fine gentlemen don't mind, I will return to your comments shortly. I just feel like writing the lucid while I can hang onto it.
Might be the holiday, might be the very long drive I face with my son tomorrow to see my parents (who retired in Nowhere Near An Airport, USA), but I was really banging my head against the bricks today. If I was depressed, I would have a name for it. If I was seeking to divorce her, I would have a name for it. If I was still using drugs, I would have a name for it. If I was who I was 10 months ago, I would have a name for it. I am so damn classified, I want a name for it. There is not one, but since I feel so compelled, its name is self.
How I really feel right now, as in 'these days', is in one part exhausted. Its like I have been searching, searching hard for a reason to get rid of her. To just say 'enough' and tell her to f^ck off. But I can’t. I have encountered so many painful things and I just can't say that is enough, I can't say, "this is the deal breaker, right here, this is it." There does not seem to be a deal breaker. Sometimes I hate it because it feels like I want the relief so damn bad. Sometimes I take hope from it because I am not ready to cry 'when'. She has not told me a lie yet, that if I sought the truth I have not been able to find it. And still, still I am willing to fight. I gave up on the lies, and what I though of the truth. Both those things live behind me now, thy are the past.
Sometimes I think in figures. Like, I want to lay down in the arms of a mother, like a literary or classic painting version of one. A mother scarred by work and loss, a mother humble and resolved. I lay in her arms, bloody and damaged, and just feel her tender hands caress my cheek while she weeps inside without showing me anything but courage and compassion, she has all the strength to let go, to tell me to rest my way out of this world and into the next. Because as much as she loves me, she knows my suffering has earned relief, and that I have earned the right to sleep. I can hear her words as firm as eye contact, "Rest. Rest. Rest." And then my tired hand tightens grip on my sword..."not my time mother". She raised a brave boy.
That is a daydream for my tired mind, but my soul is not yet retired. I knew from the start I could have chosen to let ego reign, to turn my back with both middle fingers straight up in the air, with a false sense of self confidence, with full sense of self justification. I chose what I chose knowing it would not be easy, but also not because it would be hard. I chose a journey at the time because I felt it would lead her back to me. I learned quite quickly the journey was about leading me back to me. Actually, leading to me I should say.
I am out of the wilderness so to speak, but more like a break in it. An open meadow, a stream, sunlight - here I stand right in the middle. The jungle at my back and a swamp before me, comfort all around in this meadow though. I could make a life for myself in this meadow, but that would ignore the fact that I am still surrounded by the wilderness. I could stand in this place of peace and scream her name. I could hope she hears it and decides to do the hard work of slicing through that jungle. That's one choice. Going back and searching for her might be another, but she would only hide from me. Or, I could decide to see what's in that swamp.
Between headbutts to bricks today, I realized I have entered a new temptation. Another choice point, and I will not choose the easy, but I will not choose what I choose because it is hard. I will choose what leads me to me. Waiting is fear. Waiting is loneliness. Waiting is depression. I have never chosen waiting. I want to keep moving forward. Its not leaving her behind. Its trusting her to her self and its trusting me to my self. I get tired, I get dizzy, I get tempted. I cannot argue my way into her. I can not impress my way back to her. I can leave footprints. Even then, I don't want to leave them so she can follow me. If she finds them, she might know she can find a way out. She does not have go out the same way, but she knows there is an out. And if not, I guess not. I trust my future self enough to know what to do with the lost.
The other part of how I really feel right now, as in 'this moment'. I got a little too comfortable in a safe place, surrounded by all that decision, which is to say surrounded by all that fear. That jungle, that meadow, that swamp - those are all inside of her as they are me. If I could leave a sign it would say "I am a better man because of this journey, because of you, because of this gift". Nothing to write on in that meadow, left some footprints. I got somewhere to be. I feel like I can be someone. That someone is going to wake up somewhere and pack a 5 year old boy into a cold a$s Jeep at 5am and be a damn good someone to that little boy by being a damn good someone to himself, one day at a time into forever, for as long as is the long promise of ever.
"There is no more important fight than the one for ourselves. Keep on winning." Ginger1, Read her newbies. BD: Feb '16 D: Mar '17 Piecing: Putting the self back together was my piecing. S6
CT1118 - Just like a traveler in the wilderness who makes use of a hunting camp but then before leaving fills up the log pile for the next lost soul you have left your mark in the meadow. Your writings will live on here after your journey takes you far far away.
In some ways this reminds me of some of my thoughts early in my journey that I had lost some time ago. Sometimes they come back like right now. Early in my journey I was defying the odds, in part out of love, in part out of fear but in large part out of Duty and Honour. My role model at that time was Don Quixote who when I read his histories struck me as a man who BELIEVED in these things and that resonated to me.
As we journey along we all need to find the fuel and the motivation to make those next steps. It sounds like you are preparing yourself to take those next steps while I will probably be in my camp in the woods for a while yet. I have lost my map but you may have found yours.
Happy Thanksgiving and safe journeys to you and S5.
On BD H52, W50 T27, M26 S21, D23 BD-9-Mar-16 D-15-Jan-18 Final-19-Apr-18 I am a storyteller. The story may do you no good. But a story is never for the listener. It is always for the one who tells
Andrew/Mach1 - if you two fine gentlemen don't mind, I will return to your comments shortly. I just feel like writing the lucid while I can hang onto it.
Might be the holiday, might be the very long drive I face with my son tomorrow to see my parents (who retired in Nowhere Near An Airport, USA), but I was really banging my head against the bricks today. If I was depressed, I would have a name for it. If I was seeking to divorce her, I would have a name for it. If I was still using drugs, I would have a name for it. If I was who I was 10 months ago, I would have a name for it. I am so damn classified, I want a name for it. There is not one, but since I feel so compelled, its name is self.
How I really feel right now, as in 'these days', is in one part exhausted. Its like I have been searching, searching hard for a reason to get rid of her. To just say 'enough' and tell her to f^ck off. But I can’t. I have encountered so many painful things and I just can't say that is enough, I can't say, "this is the deal breaker, right here, this is it." There does not seem to be a deal breaker. Sometimes I hate it because it feels like I want the relief so damn bad. Sometimes I take hope from it because I am not ready to cry 'when'. She has not told me a lie yet, that if I sought the truth I have not been able to find it. And still, still I am willing to fight. I gave up on the lies, and what I though of the truth. Both those things live behind me now, thy are the past.
Sometimes I think in figures. Like, I want to lay down in the arms of a mother, like a literary or classic painting version of one. A mother scarred by work and loss, a mother humble and resolved. I lay in her arms, bloody and damaged, and just feel her tender hands caress my cheek while she weeps inside without showing me anything but courage and compassion, she has all the strength to let go, to tell me to rest my way out of this world and into the next. Because as much as she loves me, she knows my suffering has earned relief, and that I have earned the right to sleep. I can hear her words as firm as eye contact, "Rest. Rest. Rest." And then my tired hand tightens grip on my sword..."not my time mother". She raised a brave boy.
That is a daydream for my tired mind, but my soul is not yet retired. I knew from the start I could have chosen to let ego reign, to turn my back with both middle fingers straight up in the air, with a false sense of self confidence, with full sense of self justification. I chose what I chose knowing it would not be easy, but also not because it would be hard. I chose a journey at the time because I felt it would lead her back to me. I learned quite quickly the journey was about leading me back to me. Actually, leading to me I should say.
I am out of the wilderness so to speak, but more like a break in it. An open meadow, a stream, sunlight - here I stand right in the middle. The jungle at my back and a swamp before me, comfort all around in this meadow though. I could make a life for myself in this meadow, but that would ignore the fact that I am still surrounded by the wilderness. I could stand in this place of peace and scream her name. I could hope she hears it and decides to do the hard work of slicing through that jungle. That's one choice. Going back and searching for her might be another, but she would only hide from me. Or, I could decide to see what's in that swamp.
Between headbutts to bricks today, I realized I have entered a new temptation. Another choice point, and I will not choose the easy, but I will not choose what I choose because it is hard. I will choose what leads me to me. Waiting is fear. Waiting is loneliness. Waiting is depression. I have never chosen waiting. I want to keep moving forward. Its not leaving her behind. Its trusting her to her self and its trusting me to my self. I get tired, I get dizzy, I get tempted. I cannot argue my way into her. I can not impress my way back to her. I can leave footprints. Even then, I don't want to leave them so she can follow me. If she finds them, she might know she can find a way out. She does not have go out the same way, but she knows there is an out. And if not, I guess not. I trust my future self enough to know what to do with the lost.
The other part of how I really feel right now, as in 'this moment'. I got a little too comfortable in a safe place, surrounded by all that decision, which is to say surrounded by all that fear. That jungle, that meadow, that swamp - those are all inside of her as they are me. If I could leave a sign it would say "I am a better man because of this journey, because of you, because of this gift". Nothing to write on in that meadow, left some footprints. I got somewhere to be. I feel like I can be someone. That someone is going to wake up somewhere and pack a 5 year old boy into a cold a$s Jeep at 5am and be a damn good someone to that little boy by being a damn good someone to himself, one day at a time into forever, for as long as is the long promise of ever.
Welcome to you....
This is where the rubber meets the road ( not in a walmart parking lot kinda way either)
The place that you, and you alone, are responsible for you and you alone...
That place where you stand for yourself. Nothing less, nothing more, and your decisions shape your life from this day forward....
I have been there, and understand what you felt. Every word, every sentence, every period..
A blessing AND a curse, rolled into one huge ball of excitement, or excrement, pick your poison...
Standing for YOU....making footprints because it's somewhere that you have been, not expecting anyone to follow...
The Pied Piper to nowhere in particular...
What an awesome day, experience, and place to be...
In time, if you focus on what you cannot see now, the vision will appear in stages...
You will realize that you already have the answers within, you have just been asking the wrong questions....
