25yearsMLC - 10 yrs Later I File D (pt 5)

[Maybell]

25, what's the news? How is your daughter? How are you? You are so busy spreading wisdom to everybody else, please let us show you some care too.

[25yearsmlc]

Dale

Hey 25,

I seen divorce care is starting next Sunday at a local church. Just 10 minutes from me. 20 bucks, cant beat that.

I've neglected my emotions big time, you think that will benefit me? I remember reading a while back that you go/went.

I LOVE my DivorceCare group . IT's practically free. Summers are supposed to be off BUT our members decided to keep meeting for the summer, so we continue to meet every Tuesday night. Instead of the church that hosts it, we meet At a historic "dive" with cheap beer and a decent menu. In September we will rejoin the class.

Tomorrow (Tuesday the 8th) is my wedding anniversary and I chose the friends I've made at Div Care
to share this emotional evening with, (over long time friends and family.)

The div care people GET IT and I wont depress anyone who is happily married, that night.

I'll be with warm, caring (smart) folks who are mostly the ones who are working on themselves and improving as people. I like them a great deal and we laugh a lot.
Now & then a pity party happens but the others lift them out, and show the way. People will be ahead and behind you and we all just pull each other forward...
Summer Tuesdays we support each person and drink beer and have pizza and talk jobs too. I THINK IT"S KEY

and its free. Our "Formal classes are 13 weeks long with some leaders from their church showing a video and discussing it. (I'm not a member of their church but that's not relevant. They just open their church to local groups, like ours) I'm getting a lot out of it, and

So, GO!! Yes!

[Maybell]

25,

I want to wish you happy anniversary and congratulate you for your commitment and endurance and generous capacity for love. I know all the intense and confusing feelings that have probably been building in your heart as this date approaches -- yours probably a multiple of mine since your "years of service" were more than twice mine. You deserve better than what you got for your loyalty and care and I wish you were getting it. Since you didn't, I'm glad you bring that energy here to bring support and wisdom to people who are in such dire need. He may be the doctor but you're the one who brings healing.

I wish you a big dose of healing of your own today. I wish you many more years of grace and fun and enthusiasm. I wish for you to continue to reap what you've sown with laughter and hugs and an over abundance of friends like the ones in your Divorce Care group.

You are grieving today, and it's right that you should, but I hope that eventually you'll come to see those years as the beginning you needed to build you into a life that is richer than you expected because of the challenges and injustice that you are DEFEATING, and that what comes from today forward is so amazing that you're grateful for the painful, crooked path that you got you there.

((((((((((25)))))))))

[Treasur]

Hear, hear x

[dale165]

Thanks 25 it starts this Sunday! That's going to interrupt my favorite time of year, football season. But I think my sanity and happiness is more important lol.

[25yearsmlc]

25, what's the news? How is your daughter? How are you? You are so busy spreading wisdom to everybody else, please let us show you some care too.

Long post coming - Journal entry, really...thanks for asking and I apologize in advance for the length. It's a process and it does help to write it out. Sometimes it's shocking to see my thoughts and feelings on paper. It always helps me, however.

No news on d's college but she herself sounds pretty happy. Yeah it is cutting it close in terms of d's college classes. Very close. Both d's are coming to a family wedding next month so we 3 will be together in my condo. That makes me happy.

How am I doing? - I don't know. I'm definitely seeing signs of stress in that I can see disorganization on my end. That is very frustrating (for me and for my L) and it's odd.
I let the condo become a wreck and only began to clean last night. WTF?

I Last night I had just started to shed some tears & BAM! I stopped myself. I muted the lovely music on the TV. Not sure if that is healthy or not.

Lots of things I cannot watch or hear, but I seem loathe to have silence in the home.

Tonight with the support group, I am practicing self care. I told them it was my anniversary and they are making an effort.

I am Trying NOT To think about the past 35 anniversaries. No pondering the wedding night and putting all my good memories in the sh1tty new light of my own marital revisions.
-
One big big goal of mine now is to STOP the second guessing about when h changed or what I should have noticed.

Don't get me wrong, I made huge mistakes. Gotta learn from them. BEFORE I came upon DB - before the first craziness of "MLC" or whatever, I would get mad & resentful when h chose to work late.

I'd have my arms crossed in resentment. That did not make h come home earlier so even if I had "a good reason" for anger, it did not help ME/family/m.

So you'd think I'd try another tact, like welcoming him home with open arms so he'd want to return more. I mean, at least try something different! Ugh.

It was not until his original crazy selfish episode known as "MLC", that I db'd. And I changed.

Since then, I was vastly improved with restraint. I did not lash out, I did not whine or nag, and I forgave a lot. I did not do it with feigned grace, but with humility and a quiet acceptance.

I loved that man deeply. Now I see that I projected remorse and shame on him b/c I would have felt those emotions if I had made his choices.

But I did not probe when I should have. I did not let red flags of deceit or selfishness alarm me, as they should have. And I let way too much slide. I practically set no boundaries and did not enforce any.

I am not suggesting angry reactions! They never served me well.

Here's a rhetorical question for the world. What if I had slipped h a magical truth serum 10+ years ago - and what if - down deep - we just were not that important to him?

What if that^^^ were the truth? Would I have left then?


Back then, h knew his choices didn't sound like behaviors of a good man, which is how he sees himself. So he edited his answers. And I accepted them...
His choices sounded selfish b/c they were and are. H has a strong sense of entitlement that I did not fully grasp.

H does not care if what he wants is wrong or selfish, (no internal moral compass)

but he did/does care about how he and his choices are viewed by others. It's image management.

That often requires vilifying ME, and I work to detach from that and not care. I have no control over it, obviously...

H had to get everything he wanted. I used to think that was ambition... But it's just entitlement in the extreme.


To my knowledge, the only thing h did not get in his life, was the grand return to Alaska. He could not let it go, so, then he effectively stole & lied to get.


He chose a place/job over me and our marriage and he did it 10 years ago when there were 2 children still at home, one of whom sobbed when he left. Then He got lonely, and missed us then, and we reconciled.

But his present OW addresses the loneliness part so he doesn't have to worry about that. And he has again placed a job and place (and her for all I know) over our marriage and history and over the future I had thought we both wanted...

I did not know of her when I filed for divorce, and I'm really glad. I know it was not an act of jealousy, but of survival for me. So I know it's not about her, but hey, **turns out I resent people who sleep with married partners. And post on FB about their Christian faith. Yeah I'm funny that way

It has now been 10 months of separation, (I mean, you know, the separation I was aware OF)

...when I think of h's over the top fb posts of OW and him, when we were barely separated and my heart was so broken, I am amazed.

Disgusted and amazed. What a jerk. Kind of sadistic really, but WAIT - his pride and HIS feelings were hurt just a week before!! I had a wage garnishment attached due to the insane irregular deposits h would send, ("How dare 25!!?")

AND s31 had declined the chance to meet OW in Mexico (a place we visit every year).

H got angry on the phone with S31, and that was the last time they spoke.

So, HE SHOWED ME!
I wondered if the post was solely to punish AND Or if he just wanted praise and affirmation, which he needs a lot of.

then I remind myself it does not matter why. I will never know why! H may not know why.

I only know it's unacceptable $h1tty behavior.

And I don't have that^^ kind of ugliness in my life anymore, no more hidden contempt suddenly in my face.

No more seething & undisclosed resentments, no more "morphed events" that make his mistakes MY fault, no more blame shifting and no more gas lighting. No more lies that I convince myself are somehow, true...

And no more repression on MY end, where I look away from the painful behaviors of the man I was committed and loyal to, for most of my life and all of my adult life.

I have a lot of authentic relationships now, in fact that's all I have in my life. Man, that feels good to write.

I feel loved and cared for, and you know what? It makes sense! I'm a kind person, I'm smart, (and freaking hilarious - and modest!) and I tune in to people and I give a crap. So I have good r's with people.

My mom's death anniversary is tomorrow - (yeah, not a great week). So my sisters & I are creating traditions that will comfort us and honor her.

And I hope this will be the last week of sad milestones. I hope/think I am turning a corner.

But it's like this is a maze with a lot of corners.

[OwnIt]

25--I have no words. I know how much it hurts. My thoughts are with you today. Hope it passes uneventfully.

[cadence]

For these rough couple of days: ((((25))))

[leahsue]

Dear, sweet, giving 25,
I have thought all day of anything I could say that would make today more bearable for you. I've read encouraging little "sayings", listened to motivational podcasts, cast about for anything that might bring a smile or a moment of comfort to you. I came up empty-handed. And here's why I think that is.....

Because for some things, there just are no words. If I could come to you IRL, I'd sit by the fire, or the pool, or the ocean, with you, and we could just sit together. My daughter calls it "holding space" for one another. I can do that from here in my living room, but not in a way that you can know. So all I can think of, is to share with you a passage from one of my favorite books, and another from a source I cannot even remember, but one I copied down in January, through my tears, on one of my darkest days. Not to comfort you, or make you feel like laughing, or even happy, but to let you know, that I GET IT. The pain, the loneliness, the fear of the future, the sting of rejection, the sadness of what might have been.

"Is there anything I can do?"
"No."
"Is there anyone who's helping you?"
He looks up. "There's nothing to help with. That's what's so hard. There is only her absence. I suppose it's like an illness that I'll have for a while. When I wake up in the middle of the night...I can't tell you what it's like. I have this tiny moment of not knowing what's wrong. And then this overwhelming....." He stops, attempts a smile. "It's so quiet, real grief. I guess I didn't know that."

And the other one- a Korean word "han"- no literal English translation-
"a state of mind, of soul really; a sadness, a sadness so deep no tears will come, and yet still, there is hope"

Holding space for you, my friend.

[Coly23]

Wow 25, you have a lot of lovely friends on here. I especially welled up reading Maybell and Leahsues posts.

I hope your lovely friends in RL are also treating you gently today. My anniversary is also this month and my birthday two days later. Last year I spent those days sobbing uncontrollably, this year I hope I can look back and see how far I have come. You too 25. You travelled this road twice so you know the twists and turns but I know that does not make it easier.

Take care. X