Do you guys think it’s ok for her to go out to dinner with me and my son? Hard to tell her no especially after my son’s basketball game.
It's fine, but the key is you have to do it with zero expectations. It doesn't change anything. Personally I feel strongly that it's important for both parents to support their kids together. XW and I continued to have joint bday parties for the kids, and we both went to school functions, football games, meet-the-teacher events, etc. After S we didn't drive together, and sometimes we didn't sit together. But we were both there for them. And yes, we sometimes went and had dinner together afterwards. When you do these things just be mindful that it is for the kids.
Now that said, sometimes an LBS just falls apart every time they are around the WAS and they need to go dark to save themselves. If that is you then I would recommend that you do not have dinner with your W even for the kids, at least for a while. Tell her that you need some time and space from her and that you think it would be best not to have meals together for a while until you've done some healing.
Originally Posted by phnix
I’ve got a very close friend that lives in another state. I respect him very much and he is a devoted Christian family man. His advice for me is to get a divorce ASAP.
The purpose being what? Most LBS's that pursue D in less than a year post-BD are doing so out of a desperate attempt to either "regain control" or "wake up their spouse" or both. It accomplishes neither of those things. You've got to work on yourself and process your grief first, THEN decide if you want to pursue D.
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He thinks that my 13yr old son has already told me things like, “You only care about mom and that I let her tell me what to do etc..”. He thinks my son will eventually lose respect for me and in turn will choose to live with my W because he thinks she is the stronger person. This really scares me as I plan on having him with me the next 4 years and being able to coach him and spend a lot of time with him. In reading, “Love must be tough”, Dobson cites several situations where the kids end up resenting and not respecting the spouse that put up with the affair. In some instances they blamed the betrayed spouse due to not taking action.
BD is arguably the biggest kick to the balls you can possibly receive in your life. It makes you question yourself as a person, a man, a husband, a father, a worker, a friend. You fall completely apart to begin with. At this stage your kids will see someone who is broken, without confidence, and utterly lost. That will scare and confuse them. But then you begin the slow process of rebuilding yourself. You gain back your self-respect, your sense of value and worth, your independence, and your sense of what it is to be a man. You rise above. You become the rock and the lighthouse. Your kids see someone stronger and more confident than they've ever seen before, and they will admire and respect that. So keep rebuilding yourself.
There's no magic trick here (especially not divorce), you've got to do the work. Get out and GAL. Leave your W alone. Don't talk about her to or around the kids. Be super-dad. Focus on activities that make you feel better and more confident. Don't talk about your M to friends and family, talk about your GAL activities instead. Make this all about you and the kids.
