I'm not sure about my in-laws. I tried to be polite as well. In recent months I thought they probably think I'm a terrible person because my husband must have said a lot of bad things, kind of like your concerns recently, but things seemed normal so I don't know what he said.
That's interesting to hear saying one thing and doing another is a pattern with wayward spouses. Why is that? My husband has never been a great planner but he was reliable in the past. Now it's like he could care less. I guess these people just live in-the-moment?
Yeah we're not reconciling currently because my husband hasn't shown any interest in me. It's more just like a gradual warming that seems to be reinforced more each time we interact. Today we managed to make eye contact when we spoke which at least for me wasn't possible in the past five or six months.
I don't want to bore everyone with another re-cap of our day but it went well and felt very natural for the time we were together. After my husband left he called a while later and said something that was funny and I joked back and we were both laughing. That definitely hasn't happened in way more than a year.
When my husband wanted to reconcile the first time it was very dramatic and unexpected. Currently I just can't tell if he's being nicer because I don't bother him anymore now that I moved away and stopped calling him or if it's because he's mildly sorry and regretful for what he's done. I just can't tell. I just wish I was smart or intuitive enough to read the signs better. My feeling is that my husband is sorry and wants to take small steps towards potentially reconciling but he doesn't want to give me hope in case he changes his mind. Simultaneously I'm not doing anything to indicate I'd be interested in reconciling so we're both in-the-dark as to the other's intentions.
The main reason why I keep writing similar / duplicate type posts, which I'll try to stop doing now because it looks like nothing will change soon, is because it's really hard to live with uncertainty for a long time. A few weeks or a few months is manageable but it looks like in my case I'll probably be doing this for many more months like this unless I file for divorce. I don't want to file but it's hard wondering where this is headed and not being able to get an answer.
I still think Thanksgiving will be the determining date. If my husband shows no emotion that day then I'll be quite sure nothing can save us. This is an extremely important day for my husband due to shopping discounts and turkey, both of which he loves. There's no other day of the year when he's happier. Even this past November he sent an "I'm so sorry for everything" text when our situation was pretty terrible. So I'll wait to see what happens unless he suddenly files for divorce before that which is always possible.
The stay overnight request doesn't appear to be anything related to me or reconciliation. It seems to be more about logistics - my husband staying here because it's easier than driving an hour each way and we live near the airport so easier to stay here when he arrives. He didn't stay, but if he did he'd be welcome to stay in the guest room and help himself to anything. I wouldn't try to socialize, cook for him, or do any of our old normal stuff. Perhaps I should simply say no, he can't stay, but our daughter would be so happy and excited to see him in the morning and she's really happy whenever we're together as a family. I don't know.
Regarding your challenge, I'm not really sure. I think I have trouble leaving my daughter in a situation where I don't have confidence in the people who will care for her. I think I hesitated to hand her over for the whole day when I saw her feeling uncomfortable and being kind of ignored while everyone watched the World Cup game.
At the moment when she and my husband left I was planning to leave as well to go to my destination, but I looked at my in-laws sitting there alone and I felt it would be kind of rude to just leave after not seeing them for so long. Plus they had made me a special recipe so I stayed, but I probably should have left and told my husband I'll expect our daughter back at night and then just let everyone figure it out. I'll have to try it sometime and see how it goes.
For the first 1.5 years of our daughter's life, before my husband left the first time, I'd beg him to take care of her. I couldn't understand why he couldn't be a normal father. I had to go out-of-town one day on a business trip and I told him he would have her for three hours after the babysitter left. When I got back that evening he was totally flipping out and said he couldn't ever do that again and we need a live-in nanny. So then we got an Au Pair and from then on he was off the hook. I should be tough and just hand her off and leave when he visits but I care about her wellbeing and I don't trust my husband so I don't know how to do it. I guess I just have to be strong and accept there will probably be mistakes and tears and frustration and hope for the best.
One other update is that I'm going to try to increase my consulting job hours and delay working full-time for now because it appears I'll lose more money by having a nanny plus pre-school than what I'll make.
I apologize to anyone reading that my posts are so long. It's one of my faults - not being able to be concise. My husband says it, one of my bosses said it, and I try when talking to catch myself if I go on too long to avoid boring the other person. I'll try really hard to make the next post brief!
