There's not much keeping me holding onto the MR at this point. I know D would be a long logistical process (14-18 months in my state) and involve a lot of emotional turmoil.
U, I feel your pain.
If D takes 14-18 months in your state have you thought about whether it makes sense to start the process and continue MC in parallel. If your R improves, you can always stop the D. If it gets worse, D gives you a path to move forward with your life. Again, this is just something for you to think about given the long time.
In my sitch the entire D only took a few months. I cannot even imagine the emotional toll going through 14 months of D would entail!
MLCxH,
It is a question I am turning over in my head for sure.
Journal ~
This weekend I had the kids. My W had a mini-rant over text that I did not update her for several hours what we were doing, and also that I didn't tell her we went to hang out with a mutual friend (and she instead found out by talking to my kids).
It really triggered me.
In the past month, she has twice hung out with mutual friends of ours, one of him was my best man at our wedding, without telling me ahead of time. And I didn't care! So I'm frustrated she would turn around and get upset, when she doesn't follow her own rules.
The text/update thing was something we agreed to as a short-term plan to get my W comfortable with me having the kids overnight. I also felt like she could have just pinged me to ask what was up, and I would have gladly answered. It just didn't cross my mind, there was no passive-aggressive intention on my part. But she flips this into a "we had an agreement" rant. In the meantime, when our kids are with her, I have no clue what they are doing. Of course I want to know more, but I also respect that it is my W's time with the kids. We do try to have daily video chats if even for a few minutes.
I dropped my older two off at school today, and the younger one up at our marital home. I noticed our family pics are off the wall, replaced by kids' artwork. I was triggered but only slightly, less than I would have thought. I thought.. "makes sense." I don't have pics of my W up at my house either.
I'm getting extremely frustrated in general about my situation. I feel like my W's attitude puts me in this difficult position of having to worry about being bullied due to her abuse talk:
- Child safety: My son burned his hand on a grill at her house last week. Had that happened at my house, she would probably have refused overnights.
- Emotional abuse: She refuses to even talk about our marital problems. She has gone to IC for over 6 months now. For a refresher, what she calls emotional abuse is a regrettable incident where I pulled over the car to try to talk to her after months of silence (to be clear I do not justify this, I do think this was abusive, but I also would like to talk about it with her if she would ever open up). I never called her names, yelled at her, got physical with her, etc.
- Financial: I know if we D today, she would be in a tough spot, and I empathize for her. At the same time, she does not appear to be doing anything to help the situation out (like going back to work with urgency). She will probably consider it "abusive" if I file for D today, for instance.
- General interactions: Every interaction feels stressful and strained. I feel like (for lack of a better term) she is constantly busting my b@lls.
- Parenting: I feel like my W does not understand in a D that we will be co-parents, but also independent parents as well when it comes to certain decisions. I worry that she will not be able to let go of that control, and we will continue to have negative interactions with some distant threat that she may claim the kids are unsafe with me for some reason.
I've also noticed a general trend if one of our kids seems to be going through a difficult period, somehow it's a referendum on my parenting. Instead of perhaps accepting that these are little people adjusting to massive changes in their lives and it might be affecting them? My youngest sometimes doesn't sleep well at my house. Rather than accept she's going through changes, and adjusting to a new house, there are always these indirect accusations that it is my fault (my W is really good at making passive-aggressive digs).
To wrap it up... I feel like I know what I need to do. In no way does this feel to me like a relationship that could be reconciled. I feel like I have let go of the rope but I'm still grasping at it for some reason. Waiting is not going to help me. I could wait a day, a month, a year, and the toxic abuse talk will persist and cloud every negotiation and discussion. I'm just going to have to face it at some point, make sure I stand up for myself, and if L's need to get involved then so be it. Only then can I really piece together a life out of this mess... somehow build something new, for me and my kids, the way I want.
