I am nearly through the working day already - it's quarter past 4 here, so I've got another hour and a half before I quit for the day.
My mood is really low - I feel as if I am on the verge of tears but it near actually happens. It's crazy really, because Andy hasn't actually left me - it's me getting worn out with him.
Slightly worried about the OM, as I wonder what he is doing back here? I think he might start trying to get me back again, and with his mental health problems there is no way. I am hoping he doesn't start the obsessive calling again, but also a tiny part of me is flattered that he still thinks about me.
I guess that's what I am missing from Andy - the feeling that I am special to him, that I am important, and you take away the physical touch, I feel even more starved of affection now which is why I am having a hard time dealing with him and his commitment-phobic love.
Today I answered all my messages on my helpline with no trouble, which is good because I wasn't sure if I could counsel today, given the stress I felt yesterday. I also answered some new calls and spoke to Jermaine from this immunisation centre, who wants to advertise on my site. I am considering his info and what fee I should charge him.
I wrote the back blurb info for the vaccination book and the publisher is designing the back cover as we speak.
Didn't post my orders (I didn't feel like walking the mile round trip to the post office) so I'll do that tomorrow instead.
Jo, I went back thru your posts, and I didn't catch anything that Andy may have done to set off this disappointment/low period. Was it the mixture of watching all the kids and a normal lull in mood in you? I'm sorry you had such a rough spell. It amazes me how you keep plugging along w/work regardless!
Seems like Andy thanked you appropriately for watching the girls. And it seems like they were being typical kids. S6 seems to know when I'm having a lull, pressing for more attention/reassurance with acting out behs. It sometimes helps me to take a 'timeout' with him and just snuggle with some quiet time. I actually ordered us to nap Sat afternoon cause we were both having meltdowns that I figured were at least a little related to tiredness.
You must be a great lover, Jo. They keep showing up at your door. Now, that has to be a PMA booster. Hang in there, Hon, and don't do anything I wouldn't do. If you do, be sure to write about it in Volume II (j/k).
*huge hugs* Wow Jo. I miss you for a few days and everything goes all crazy on you. I think what you're going through right now is something we're all afraid of. Them finally getting it and us not knowing if we can trust them anymore to keep getting it. I'm glad you told him how you feel. Hopefully you'll both be able to come up with something that gives him space but lets you know he's not going anywhere. Hang in there my friend.
Well I've been on a downer since the first ML didn't work very well and that had me questioning the R and whether or not I was still connected in the emotional sense. We have been sexual partners for 10 years and it's NEVER gone wrong like that before so it shook me up. It was still physically nice but it was so different it was as if he was someone else.
Then we said we'd wait till he told OW2, and he's told her now but he still doesn't want to so I am now panicking that he doesn't find me attractive anymore and my sexual confidence has taken a nose dive through the floor. When my confidence in that has gone, it goes with every other aspect of my life. It's my feminine prowess that keeps me together, keeps me intact, and right now I am struggling with so many feelings of rejection and self-doubt that it makes it difficult to facilitate a friendship with him.
He has mentioned just leaving OW2 as a reason for not wanting physical contact and that worries me because he was never bothered when he dumped OW1, and I am now getting an inferiority complex, wondering if he doesn't want me because he secretly would rather sleep with her. Maybe she was better at it than me, etc etc.
He doesn't seem to realise that while he needs time, I need him to ease my hurt over OW2 and I need sexual reassurance that I am the one he wants to be with. He's not doing this, so I am thinking there's something suss with what he's saying and maybe he doesn't really love me. Perhaps he just thinks he does, or maybe he doesn't want me to have anyone else.
He has mentioned her a couple of times and my whole chest just goes tight like I can't breathe when he does that. I really don't want reminders of his previous flings - I don't push my OM in his face like that. He said he didn't want to live in the past, but that's all he has talked about since this started : his R's with OW1 and 2, and how he doesn't want us to argue in future. I feel like I can't have a friendship or a R while he keeps doing this.
I don't want to compete with women he is no longer with. Until he gets to a point where he is just concentrating on us and the kids, it hurts me too much to be around him.
The massive sexual rejection I feel is over-riding the progress I was making in a friendship with him. It's all I think about at the moment, and I can't cheer up when I feel so far away from being the goddess I always thought I was.
Then there's the kids. When I asked to have them, he said no again and that I had 'no authority' (that really hurt) - yet a few days later he's asking me to look after them as if he never said that, and it's because he's stuck for a babysitter. I am a babysitter, not a mother, in his eyes, and every time I have them, there's this hurt all the time that he feels that way, and why?? Then whenever I look at them I just remember the court hearings and how he didn't want me to have them, and I can't get the thought out of my head. I don't know how to look at them and think something happy. This bothers me. I'm terrified of getting too close to them and then him doing his 'I don't want to know' routine and running off again, which would bugger up the contact routine because he always gets really angry when that happens and becomes impossible to communicate with - so part of me thinks I don't want to agree to anything regular with them until I have a cast iron guarantee that he ISN'T going to run off. He won't obviously guarantee anything and I'm just worn out by his ifs, buts and maybes.
I feel really skeptical, because in my eyes, he hasn't done anything different to all the other times and I need something from him which is different to prove that. With him showing no desire for me, this adds to my sense of something not quite adding up. I just don't trust what he says to me.
Then the kids have fought every single time they've been round, arguing, hitting etc etc and if it's not them, it's those bloody boys next door and 90% of my energy is taken up at the moment, trying to keep my emotions level and my PMA normal and this doesn't leave much reserve for when the kids play up. I have zero patience.
I am a far better parent when I feel happy.
I had all this brewing since the first ML, and I've been doing whatever I can, but the WAW feelings wouldn't go away, and then the last straw was when he made that grumbling remark about my new book cover and I just broke down after he left because I was thinking, wonderful, he's rejected me as a lover, I am rubbish in bed, he dislikes me as a mother, and he can't stand my work either
If there is no physical touch, I need emotional reassurance and compliments to compensate, and him being so 'off' about my work was just confirmation that he doesn't want me.
I tell you, Gabe, you compliment me better than he does Sometimes I feel so upset, and then you've written something really nice about me and my PMA goes up for the rest of the day. I just wish he would get that I need that from him if he expects me to hang around waiting while he has his 'time and space.'
(((Jo))) You probably don't want to hear this, but I feel that something isn't quite right also. Can't exactly put my finger on it though. Could it be that he comes running back to you when he's "between" women? Can he not be without "somebody"?
I do wonder why you think you'll ever get what you need from Andy. He just doesn't seem to "get it"....period. It's always all about him.
You were doing better emotionally when you'd decided to move on. I suggest you adopt that attitude again. As I mentioned before, he wants you when it looks like he can't have you. My hope is that eventually you really won't want him and your life will be peaceful and happy.
Qoe may be right about him. I'm not sure. He seems far less confident than you as a person, hesitant if you would.
I see a different pattern with this OW2 vs his behavior with OW1. He was a beast to you in terms of consideration of your feelings within that first R, but in this one - although still acting unacceptably, I seem glimmers of empathy and care for you. Almost makes me wonder if he's taking longer due to being afraid to screw up. Maybe its all about him, but it could include worry about you.
In terms of the girls, maybe pursue what works - you remaining positive and acting like the kind parent. Tell him its so much easier for you to plan for them and make their time nicer when you know in advance. Maybe its time to start off slow, like monthly regular visits, then every two weeks. Scheduled and predictable, in a way that would benefit him as well - giving him a break that he knows is coming.
Not sure if any of this makes sense. Hang in there, Jo.
Qoe - regards Andy needing to have a woman, I have wondered that myself sometimes, but that doesn't make sense this time because he was still with OW2 for easily a month before he started coming round here and we'd held hands, he'd made sex jokes, kissed me etc etc while he was supposed to be with her.
He didn't tell her until after we'd slept together, so it's not as if he was on his own at the time. She was completely unaware of what was going on and he could have kept his R with her if he had wanted to.
Still, there's something that makes me uneasy. Maybe it's just because of what he did last time and now that is undermining my trust in what he says. I'm also thinking that since he's not initiating sex, he might just have thought after he broke up with her, 'help - I don't want to be with Jo after all', or perhaps he just liked her sex better than mine and that's why he doesn't want to, because he would rather have it with her.
Maybe on the other hand, I am just scared and thinking too much.
Maybe, Gabe, maybe. I was seeing signs of change etc, but he never sustains them and that's what worries me. He is more constant when I try to disappear on him, and I can't carry on doing the 'back away' dance forever. At some point, I want a mature adult R. It's like he wants me, but never quite enough. He's never 100% sure, but sure enough that he doesn't want me to move on to another R with anyone else. To me, it feels like he wants to keep me without the commitment.
Or maybe I'm just pushing him too much, I don't know. I just don't want to be in a situation like last time.
As far as the kids go, they are the most major problem in our R, in my opinion, and they cause I would say 90% of our disagreements (e.g last argument was when he said I had no authority over them).
Whenever I tried to organise regular contact sessions in the past, he never agreed to what I wanted. He offered me contact, but only on his terms, and I won't accept on his terms because I feel like it's a power-trip thing, rather than about the girls.
Also, because of all that court stuff that happened and the things Andy says to me about them, I still have so much hurt inside me that it interferes with my interactions with them. Sometimes the visits go really well and I am happy, other times it just upsets me and them being there is a reminder of what I went through.
I haven't raised my 2 eldest since they were 4 and 5 years of age. They are now 8 and 9. It doesn't feel to me like a mother-daughter connection, more like aunty and niece. I am far, far closer to DD4, and much more natural with her.
I have to DB my butt off with them every time they are here, and it's as hard as DB'ing with Andy. This is okay when I feel okay, but if Andy is stressing me or something else is going on, I am unable to do it with them and just end up crying.
I need to have the reassurance that my family is permanent, that Andy will not give me any more stress, either in the R or out of it, before I can divert my energies into repairing the mother R. I am using up so much energy trying to keep my PMA and NOT get depression (which is harder than people realise, on here, my mood still crashes frequently) that it makes it hard to extend energy elsewhere.
I really feel I need counselling about what happened with my kids because I feel I am not going to be able to move forward in my R with them until I come to terms with the fact that I lost them.
Quote: I can't carry on doing the 'back away' dance forever. At some point, I want a mature adult R. It's like he wants me, but never quite enough. He's never 100% sure, but sure enough that he doesn't want me to move on to another R with anyone else. To me, it feels like he wants to keep me without the commitment.
You've got it!!!! He wants to "control" you. I am wondering if he's capable of an adult R. A lot of the stuff you describe is very bully like and immature. He does the minimum to keep you hooked and once he's sure of you again, he backs off. "You" are the one that has the power to stop this because he'll continue to do it forever as long as you allow it.
I really feel I need counselling about what happened with my kids because I feel I am not going to be able to move forward in my R with them until I come to terms with the fact that I lost them.
I agree, Jo. This could also help give you tools to stop or at least not react to his behavior.
Also, you seems calmer, happier and much more centered when you have little interaction with him.
That's why this time I am ademant he commits to the mature adult R I want, on some of my terms, or I am not entertaining him any longer. That's why I'm not agreeing to wait while he has 'time' any longer as I've given enough time, and it's not worth my effort while he's not putting enough of his own effort in.
I am happy enough on my own, and also happy when he treats me right - what gets me upset is the lack of consistancy, never knowing from one day to the next what is going to happen and all the while I am creeping into my thirties and putting up with as much insecurity as when I was 24. This panics me. I feel as if I am having an early MLC of my own.
I liked danger and excitement when I was in my teens and early twenties, but I'm getting too old for all that nonsense now. I just want to settle down.
And it isn't just Andy that unsettles me - the kids do it almost as much as he does without even meaning to. For every 1 time that goes well with them, there are another 3 where I just want to run because I feel so unhappy. I get really really down with them, remembering all the bad memories which were directly related to them, and I'm as mad as hell that 2 and a half years of my life went fighting for them and then I didn't even get them. I have this internal resentment that I can't get rid of and I tell myself that they are just kids, it isn't their fault etc, but still I find myself angry that I went through that.
I find it easier with them when we do stuff as a family unit (him as well) because then I just pretend I'm still married and he never took them and there was never a court hearing and as long as I'm acting in the wife/mother role then the pain doesn't surface too much.
I have a lot of issues to deal with regarding them, and him not being there would not solve those. I suppose an aim I have would be to have some kind of friendship with them that sticks. That would be a start.
For instance, I would like to be able to phone them without getting upset and I would like to be able to chat on msn with my eldest without my mood dropping.
They actually upset me more than he does, and I hate to admit that. Probably because it was more painful to lose them than him, and there is more of a stigma attached to being a non-custodial mother than there is to being divorced.
I did used to speak on messenger to them nearly every day but then DD1 put webcam on and I saw all of them at his house and it made me feel really alone and sad that they were there and I am here, and I couldn't handle the live camera so I stopped the msn.
I keep putting them back on and taking them off again, in the same way I do with Andy.
That's why I've been DB'ing the whole family as I know I have as much to DB with them as him - although now I've decided it's commitment or nothing from him.
Now, that has to be a PMA booster. Hang in there, Hon, and don't do anything I wouldn't do. 
If you do, be sure to write about it in Volume II (j/k).