Second roller coaster ride (2)

[Card29]

Hi DnJ,

You are correct that I have more specific goals that I just didn't spell out, at least for a few of them. Thanks for the suggestions, especially about scheduling time with friends, not just winging it. Winging it will be hard for me, especially the weeks I have my kids. Without realizing it, I've actually already done this with one friend that I haven't seen much the last few months. He lives on the other side of the city. My Thursday night grief recovery class is on that side of town. So we have a standing agreement that we'll get together after my class. We went to a game together last night.

Mood update: I've felt much better the last 3-4 days. I have an appetite in the morning again. The lows aren't as low or as long lasting. But this week is W's move out, except for bigger items which she will get next week. So we went through the house on Tuesday and agreed on what she would take. We made a list of what she's taking and signed both copies. The utilities and wifi were in her name, so we switched all of that over. She actually screwed me a little (on accident) as I will not have internet for the next week. I mentioned it to her without being angry, but just standing up for myself. But all of these events have added up to me not feeling very good today so far. I'm really feeling the losses. W, her R with D11, my R with in-laws. And last night was my last night with our dog.

Conversations with in-laws: I spoke with the rest of W's family. I had a 45 minute call with her sister. I sent a surface-level group text to her younger brothers, not talking about any details of the situation. And I had a short phone call with MIL.

SIL is the 2nd oldest of the 4 siblings (W is oldest), and is by far the most well-adjusted these days. I knew from FIL that she is not happy with W's decision. W isn't speaking to her still (after they spoke almost daily for years). I absolutely know that blood is thicker than water, and she will support her sister. And we even talked about that. I just thought we owed each other a conversation. I didn't bury W. She led with the idea that she didn't believe some of the things W has said to FIL or MIL, or that they weren't reasons to leave a M.

One of my main motivations for the call was about FIL. He can be hot headed, and I could see him negatively affecting the situation. As I said before, this situation has triggered his D from 20 years inside of him. We talked about how, whenever W starts talking to SIL again, that SIL will be one of the best voices in W's life. And we talked about FIL and that dynamic with W. She agreed 100%, and after our call, she spoke with FIL. I had a brief chat with FIL later, and he said SIL and him agreed that FIL will give W space until he calms down, and SIL would be the one to talk to W, whenever she's ready. They had been planning a group call, almost like an intervention.

I emphasized it wasn't about SIL saving our M. Our M is between me and W only. W just needs the positive influence, regardless of our future. S1 needs a healthy mom, and we want W to be the healthiest, happiest version of herself. SIL has been benefited greatly from counseling and other mental health activities the last few years, so I really hope she can be a positive influence.

I talked to SIL about what my understanding of W's motivations and feelings have been. I recapped a lot of the last year that I didn't feel comfortable sharing with her before this went down (W's struggles, some of the episodes that occurred leading up to BD) to help give her more perspective since W has not shared anything really intimate with any of her family in a long time. I was the only one to witness it as W can't wear that mask 24/7. Her family lives 5 hours away, so she can put on the happy act for 2-3 days during a visit, and on 15 minute FaceTime calls. It partially feels like violating some rules I've seen here, especially Wonka's tip to not ask friends/family for help. But I also wasn't asking SIL to intervene, to try to talk sense into her, etc. We talked about the opposite, that those would fall on deaf ears at best, and push her further away at worst.

Again, while this all felt like violating some rules, I knew that SIL was not going to get an ounce of truth from the situation today, and was going to be operating on confusion and misinformation. Maybe this was a mistake, but I felt strongly compelled to fill her in on some of the details, to at least let her know how much she has struggled for the last year and this isn't just out of the blue.

My phone call with MIL was mostly surface level, and it was maybe 5 minutes long. I wanted to at least have one phone call with her so that it didn't feel like there were battle lines being drawn (me calling FIL and SIL, but not MIL). W is talking to MIL daily, because MIL isn't challenging anything she's doing. And that's fine, I am not trying to influence that. Not one person on the planet can change that besides MIL and W.

Now that I've had those calls with the in-laws, I don't plan on making any more, as much as I like talking to them. It will hurt my detachment, and if word of regular conversations get back to W, I see her interpreting it as manipulative and pursuing.

Upcoming plans: I have a night with D11 and S1 tonight. I was going to take D11 to the planetarium, as we haven't been in years. But I just checked and it's still closed from COVID. Weird.

My ex-BIL and I are going to a concert out of town tomorrow. He is also going through a D. I don't know how I feel about that as I don't feel like I'm position to help someone out right now. But I'll just see how it goes. My counselor said it might be really good for me.

And speaking of counselor, my next IC appointment is this coming Tuesday.