A WW? (7)

[lt0402]

Hawk! Always awesome to see you. I hope you are doing well too my friend. We do seem to be hitting a wall somewhat as a group right now. Highly frustrating but not wholly unexpected. Thank you for the kind words.

FG, I agree. That path is not an option. I'll not put things on hold for 9 yrs to grind out an existence with someone who does not want to share a life with me. It'll make me a worse dad bc of the strain I think as well. If W does not want to work on us then there needs to be another path for all of us unfortunately.

Don/MV/Gordie, I'm sorry I didn't respond today. Will repond tomorrow if that's ok. Need to do some quick journaling before bed.

Work today. Sent W a message from work. Told her:

M: We have a team for the tough mudder this summer. You should join us. It'd be a lot of fun! Sending you an email if you want to take a look. We could get someone to watch D that morning.

W: No
W: Don't need you to send it to me

M: sounds good

W: ?

M: Not interested in it? Would be fun to have you there but all good

W: Let me get this straight...we haven't had a conversation in years or done anything as a couple in close to ten. Why are you suddenly pretending you want us to do some stupid fitness thing together? Honestly. What is your point here?

M: Thought it would be a fun thing to do. If you don't want to do it that's ok.

Figured I'd reach out and attempt to include her in our race this summer. Some vile coming back but I actually felt pretty good for asking her for some reason. The response wasn't unexpected but my offer was something different from the norm.

Then tonight after we put D to bed we had scheduled time to talk about selling our house and moving into another one that's in the middle school district we want D to be in bc of her friends. Last Monday when I asked W what she wanted in a new house she told me it didn't matter. She also said "how can we look for a house together when we can't even have a conversation". I asked her what she thought was keeping us from having a conversation and she just stared off into space and didn't answer. Also, about a week ago W made a comment about how when she came home for awhile after college her mom made her sleep on her brothers floor bc she didn't want to mess up the guest bedroom. W then told D that the reason why she gets so angry sometimes is bc she gets it from her mother. I tell W that she's nothing like her mom and she's a wonderful mother. No response but I believe it was the right thing to say. I mention this bc it's relevant to our conversation tonight.

So we sit down on the couch and she begrudgingly has a conversation with me. It goes like this...

She tells me she'd like to rent a house, move all our stuff in there, and then sell our house empty. She says that bc we don't have a ton of furniture it would show better that way. I mention that we could get a storage unit to get stuff into to make the house less cluttered to show. She keeps coming back to renting a place and moving in there for a year so we don't have to rush into buying a house we don't want. W also mentions Ds school will sign a waiver to keep her there if we move out of the district.

We talked about the work we need to do and the realtors thoughts about the house. W got mad bc I asked why not buy a house if we find one. I asked her what she was looking for in a place. She said she didn't care and I would just override her anyway and not listen to her. I told her that's not what I wanted as part of this process. Told her I wanted us to make the decisions as partners. She said we aren't capable of working as a team on anything. I should just find a house and tell her to look at it. She said she didn't want to buy a house bc I promised to do all sorts of work on this house and I never followed through. I told her I'm sorry she felt that way but I do not agree. I expressed my concern that we rent a place and can't sell this place. She asked if it was as big of a problem if she was working. I told her it would help but it's still an issue. She said she wanted to go back to work full time but she could t bc of all the house responsibilities. I told her that we should make a list and split the work. I'm happy to help with the workload. She told me there's no way she'd believe me after I didn't do it with this house.

Silence then I told her I can see that you are unhappy and I'm not ok with you being unhappy. W tells me f$ck you, you have no right to tell me that. She gets up, cries, checks on D, blows nose and comes back. I tell her again that I'm not ok with her being unhappy and I'm unhappy too. She says where was I the past ten years when she was begging me to change bc she was unhappy. Where was I when she was doing everything from work to childcare to house stuff. I tell her that none of us should be unhappy. I need someone who will love me and who will let me love them. She starts to talk about D. How D is miserable around me the past 3 weeks. How I haven't listened to her over that period and it's crushed her. I tell W that I'll talk to D and discuss what's going on but that I can manage that with her. I tell her that my relationship with D is the strongest it's ever been. She starts to cry and says that's what breaks her heart. That I cannot see that's not the case. That i can't see i don't have a good relationship with D. I tell W I'll talk to D about it and that D is the most important thing to me in the world.

W tells me this is as good as it gets and she's barely holding it together. I tell W that I love D and I love her. But That if this is as good as it gets we need to discuss things. I tell her I'm not ok with anyone being unhappy. That I want each of us to be happy and be a family. W tells me we have never been a family (ouch). Not once in the past ten years. I tell her I'm sorry she's felt that way but I don't agree with it. She says I never agree with anything anymore. She says we need to figure out one problem at a time and figure out the house stuff as that's the most pressing. I point back to her conversation about her mom making her sleep on the floor. I tell her that I'm not ok with anyone in our family being forced to sleep on the floor. I'm not ok with anyone feeling like an outsider in our family. She tells me to figure out what I want to do and come back to her. I respond that we need to figure that out together and again if this is as good as it gets we need to discuss this. I tell her let's make the checklist of things to work on for the house together tomorrow and then we can discuss things and I get up and go upstairs.

So, had the conversation I'd mentioned in my last post this evening. Not exactly how I'd wanted it to flow but I'm hoping the message was received that I'm unwilling to continue down this path. W needs to know that going back to our previous M is unacceptable to me. We will see. Off to bed as I'm wiped out. Thank you all for your thoughts and support.