A new mindset for Burned. This is thread 7.

[burned]

Thanks for the feedback. Useful information about strength vs. anger.

Last night I went to my first "real" GAL activity in a long time. Board games with some people I found on Meetup. We played Room 25, King of Tokyo, and a strange game about figuring out who's lying about being a werewolf. One guy there is super into games and is going to Germany next week for something called Essen Spiel where they show off new games.

Then a most bizarre thing happened. Suddenly we paused because it was time to do a discussion? The topic was grief. Most of the guys there (probably all about my age) talked about how they coped with losing loved ones, pets, and so forth. I talked about the loss of my M, my in-laws (who I was closer with than my own siblings), etc. One guy said he started going to this group because he was divorced a couple years ago. They were all very nice. So GAL turned into group therapy. Wasn't expecting that. But I had a good time. I will be going back.

---

Aside from that, I'm completely exasperated. It's not worth going into details about thermostats, money, anything. I've been doing things as instructed (probably not as well as I think I have), but the sitch continues to deteriorate. There is basically no M left to save. Going dark has NOT made anything better. I know it's just a tool to allow us to have time and space apart from each other, but I don't feel any better after a month of this. Interactions with W are now about as unpleasant as they could be. No temp checks. Texts no longer include even the most basic courtesies. It's just straight business. I think probably that interaction we had last week where I said "I don't think divorce is the solution, you know how I feel about this" really set her off.

This morning I got a terse text asking when I'll be getting my stuff from the house. We agreed that tomorrow works. I'm trying not to be pessimistic but I anticipate it'll be a pretty bad day. And I've had a lot of pretty bad days lately. IC says I have my foot nailed to the ground and I refuse to pull out the nail.

I will say that I'm starting to understand the benefits of GAL. Having had a good night last night, meeting people who seem to like me despite all the things W has told me are wrong with me, that's helpful. Maybe I'd be feeling even worse now if I hadn't done that.