OwnIt - thank you for standing beside me while I go through this. Your insight helps prop me up when I need it most.
Sometimes I too think indifference would be nice. But there is a part of me that is holding onto hope that he will come out of this and we can work on salvaging the relationship. Unrealistic? Yes. Naïve. Probably. But I am still hanging onto it.
My H is a cop. Cops need control. It's how they survive on the street. It is a game. How do you get out? You just stop.
As they say . . . detach (as if I am one to talk). Don't let it bother you. Let them make their choices, you make yours.
You are right about resolving the child custody issue and spousal support. (I just asked for spousal as a throw away issue - I will never get it. We make the same.) We probably won't resolve it on our own.
Maybe if I am nice to him and approach him. Maybe if I make things easier on him, he might be more willing to concede on the one issue that is most important to me (custody time). Doing so would defy the advice of those on here that say it's his divorce, let him do the work. Am I just being naïve to think making things easier for him might cause him to give me something I want? Am I being a defeatist when I say that I don't think being nice and making things easier is going to make one bit of difference? Do I just not want to be nice and this is just an excuse for me? Am I torturing myself? YES!!!!
I can feel the little girl in me pulling me back toward old patterns and old ways of doing. As I walked to get some lunch, I thought to myself, I should face it and give up everything. Give up trying to change myself and the dance between H and I. I thought it would really be much easier to just respond the way I always have --> which is to spout off without thinking. It really is so much easier to just default to what we know. It is so much harder to fight that default setting and do something differently.
Maybe me being silent and just not responding is a positive step in the right direction. I am learning restraint - the first step toward learning to respond, not react.
Or am I just being a chicken? Being a chicken would be just giving up. Afraid to change.
Part of me wants to approach H and set a date and time to discuss the particulars (then during the meeting just sit back and let him do the talking, then tell him I need to think about what he has said).
But another part of me thinks I should let him make the effort. This is what HE wants, then he needs to do all the work. That is the approach suggested by many on these boards. My issue with this approach is that meanwhile, he cuts me down. Mentally, I find myself having to fight the urge to verbally joust with him. Then I feel frustrated because I cannot say what is truly on my mind. I am left defenseless.
Oh my. That is it!!!! I feel defenseless. Just like I did when my mother would go on one of her tirades and beat me.
Wowzers. I am recreating that old dynamic with my mother.
So how do I change the dance steps? What can I do differently?
Let's see, I can step up and talk about setting up a meeting. Or I can let him come to me and in the meantime, change the way I see this.
(And let's face it; any meeting is bound to not go well.)
I need to keep my focus on this as a learning experience. I have things I need to learn. If I approach him, I am doing what I always do. Charge forward. Which feels good to me. I feel a measure of control. Almost like I am impacting the direction of this whole thing. But that is just a false sense of control. I don't have control over where this is going. God has control.
So what is God telling me?
I get the sense he is telling me to do the thing I don't want to do; the unfamiliar. I need to wait until H comes to me. Continue to work on me. Focus on me. What's the rush anyway?
How do I know if this is really what God is telling me? How do I know if my instincts are genuine and not a product of what I want? Where can I look to for reassurance?
