The high road: rocky with a great view

[ciluzen]

Mostly, this is journaling I think, to get my head around things so I can then release them. I value input from others, as I've learned so much by reading threads of similar situations or interactions.

So, enough about the "fun" part of life, which is also stressful; but I guess that makes it kind of thrilling. Now to the bit about H. We have had some contact about D24, but then we've recently had contact about taxes. We are D, so we are filing separately for the first time and needed to make sure our numbers match. Basically, my taxes are simple and his are very complicated. We had a bit of an argument about a certain amount of money that he used to pay our taxes last year, and believed I should have claimed half. My accountant vetoed it, but he was stuck on it. His defense was that he payed a lot and I had "all of his money and he had all of the debt". I got angry.

I didn't mke the choice to leave; he did. We really had no cash. As a consequence, I came away with the proceeds from our the sale of our house (it was half paid off), my car, furniture, and a small part of his retirement. He kept the vacation home (worth more than the family home and his debt is to his parents) and his office (debt will be paid off when my spousal support ends in 3.5 years). He also kept 2 cars, a classic car, and his boat.

When I got angry, I pointed this out to him. He will be debt free in a few years and will have the same job and a large home on a river. I will hopefully be done with my master's program and be able to find employment, but I will be starting a career at 52. He claimed I never appreciated what he did for me...I threw back that he maybe needed to look at the things I did do for him so that all he needed to concentrate on was his career. I not only cared for the house and kids and animals, but he came home to a hot meal, I did all of the landscaping for our 10 acres, took care of the finances and built up our stock portfolios and IRAs, on and on. I even took care of the vacation home, furnished it by Craigslisting and refinishing furniture, patched and painted walls, etc. I painted his entire office and painted all of the paintings he had on the walls. Ughhh...sorry....pity party with anger.

So, the wierd part. He starts to get mad. He's been trying to be unemotional around me...only allowing little jokes...little "I'm sorrys"...little sparks of controlled anger. He desperately doesn't want to part with the money to pay taxes and wanted to be angry with me for recieving spousal support and having the house money, but there was more...

He kept repeating through gritted teeth, "I'm not going to do this, I'm not going to do this"...I realized he was trying to hold his anger in so I started saying "do it! Just say it!"

So he spewed. Briefly about what we were discussing (mere seconds), but then all about his awful day dealing with his parents, brothers and lawyers (dealing with trying to have guardianship over their parents). Then all of the emotions involved in that. As the anger abated he was able to open up more about things and I realized he is doing some deep thinking while alone.

He mentioned something he heard about forgiving and forgetting and why we do it (for us, not them) and how he had thought about that all weekend.

He mentioned how he realizes he holds his strong emotions in so we discussed that.

We talked about his feelings about his mom's Alzheimers and his feelings about his dad. His fear/sadness of losing his Dad soon and how right now, he's accepting his mom being lost already...his concern for her care.

Two hours of him talking.

He is still very focused on him. I guess he should be with all that is happening...it is all he can handle. I need to remember that. Not everyone handles life's stresses the same way. But he is thinking. That's good. I understand that when he has said," I can't care or I will lose my mind" about our daughter, he means that about me and his mother, too. But he does. His actions show it. What he really is saying is, "I'm afraid to care deeply and acknowledge my true feelings about it." But on some level, he really seems to be doing that with tiny, baby steps. And that is something.