It's been hard to find time and focus to write a post here, though as always I've been reading along with everyone's threads and finding much wisdom and support.
bttrfly, Sage, DnJ, may, and Kindly, your posts on dharma and compassion and kindness really have helped me to rethink the way I was framing my relative silence toward H. I've read them many times. I am so grateful for them. Sage, your recent-ish post on your thread really resonated with me, as did the responses from peace, Scout, etc.
Since I last posted, my focus has been almost entirely on me, and I haven't spent any time reading articles and websites in an attempt to understand H. I have a ton of work to do to get ready for online teaching starting in a few weeks, so there's that. Then I started researching other states, other cities. As the fires near here have started to get a little more under control, I stopped feeling the need to run from them and started thinking with less urgency about leaving the state. I've always been adamant in wanting to stay here because I've been here almost a third of my life now, have a wonderful community of friends, have animals to care for, and, despite the fires and high cost of living, there is a lot I love about this region. It's still clear that if I am to stay, I must stay in this house. Rents have gone up so much everywhere else, and there's almost nothing to rent--it's crazy. But H was my family here. I don't have family here now. I started thinking more about whether I will want to stay, long-term, in an area that was expensive for a couple with 1 1/2 the income and will be that much more expensive for me on my own. It seems unlikely I could ever buy a house here on my own unless I win the lottery. Maybe, with a much better job, I could save like crazy for 10 years and manage. That would depend on a lot of factors.
I started entertaining the prospect of where I might want to go if I didn't live here. I started spending hours researching other places. Short answer: I really don't know. What I always wanted was to live where I live now.
bttrfly, you advised me not to try to plan too far in advance. For the last 14 months, I've been operating on the assumption that I would stay here, that post-D I would give myself a year to figure out if I wanted to make any big changes, that no life decisions would need to be made in the midst of what is already such a life-altering shift. But I've been wondering if being willing to leave my life here and move in search of another one is something that would benefit me in negotiation wth H, monetarily and/or emotionally, in that it may mean a quicker agreement, and less time with this alien H. Could any positives there really outweigh what I'd be giving up? How can I know that in the present?
That said, when is this process even going to start? Is he really never going to act on the decision he made last year? Am I really going to have to file myself at some point? I mentioned to IC re-reading the letter H wrote me last fall, the one announcing his decision to file. Even though he was drinking all the time and, from my perspective, not in a healthy place, he was able to write a letter that was somewhat apologetic and rational-sounding. Sure, it oversimplified a lot (you know, the whole I need to D to be happy, all my problems are solved), but that's to be expected. I feel like this is echoing Kindly's post now--it's so hard for me to imagine how someone could make that kind of decision, announce it, and then never act on it. Of course IC reminded me that people with mental health issues often don't act rationally. I mean, every post on this board is proof of that, right? It's par for the course for MLCers.
bttrfly, how have the chickens settled in? How are your friends that had to evacuate? Kindly, I made some cake last week in honor of my friend's birthday (though she doesn't live nearby, it was a good excuse for cake!). I'm not sure what's up next. Brownies always sound good!
