Wife has filed for divorce

[ngs]

It shows you never really understood what she was going through.

No I never did understand what she was going through, we just moved on with life and ignored everything and never worked through our issues. When she does "unload" and tell me how she feels in the past few months she tells me I don't understand but that it is too late now and she doesn't want to help me understand what she has gone through.

But I think you acting happy, etc. is the wrong thing to do. She really would rather have you suffer. You said you were married for 17 years yet you said you only changed 4 years ago? Why?

Well I was angry (at myself), self loathing, constantly stressed financially...now this wasn't every single day but when issues arised this is what I would revert to. As to changing 4 years ago, I got angry over something stupid and the next day looked at myself in the mirror and had one of those wtf moments. Realizing that I had an amazing wife, 3 awesome kids and life, which I knew...I just didn't act like I knew and decided how happy and fortunate I was for everything I had in life. At the time my wife told me I had to work on myself before we could ever work on the marriage and so I did through counseling and changing my mindset. She still refused to go to counseling until she went to one session with me, said nothing during the session until the end and said "what do I do if I want out?"

I don't think she ever had any intention of trying to work things out again and just figured I would revert back to how I acted previously but I haven't and its been 4 years. Now I haven't been perfect all this time but I have never quit working on myself.

She did end up going to individual counseling for about 5 months until Jan 2016 and told me she realized through that she wanted divorce, but still did not make up her mind until she finally filed Oct. 2016.

And as far as me acting happy, she knows I don't want divorce and I'm not happy about it but I have to be a better person for my kids and being an angry stressed out father was not good for them see and they have seen the changes in me.