Thanks for checking up on my WCW. I started a post on my thread yesterday, but other things come up and I had to scrap it. So here...I'll try again.
Journaling----
Things with the house are going well. Up until yesterday things were still very stressful because I was trying to complete the application, but couldn't turn it in until H completed, notarized and faxed the power of attorney to the bank, since he won't be around for the closing. I knew he was working on it, but H isn't usually very successful wading through paperwork and bureacracy crap. He gets frustrated so quick and starts complicating things with doubts and procrastination. But he came through on time and got the documents off to the bank. I thanked him for doing it ahead of time and thanked him again when he got it done noting that I knew he had other stuff going on.
Now I have been busting my butt working on this paperwork stuff and jumping through hoops. All while working full time, dealing with chaos at home, and trying to set boundaries with S3 who is really having a tough time lately. Oh, AND being sick with a head cold and stomache flu recently. I felt like I was holding things together with the tips of my fingernails.
Before, I would not have taken the time to thank H for doing the small pieces he had to get done. I would have figured he could atleast get that much done. But, now I'm realizing that NOT thanking him for even the expected things, will only hurt me later.
When I first gave H the list of things he needed to get to the bank he started to get uptight and freak out a bit. His tone on the phone was making my stress sky rocket, and I had S3 screaming at me besides. So I stopped and said "I know you have plenty to do at work. I know this is stressful. Thank you for doing this." And he started to come down and say it was no problem. After I called the bank again it turned out he didn't need 2 of the 4 things I asked him for anyway.
It all reminds me of the course I took at work about the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I don't remember much about the program except the analogy that relationships are like checking accounts. Everytime you do something to disappoint or criticisee your partner you make a withdrawal and everytime you do something to build them up you make a deposit. You make withdrawals without even knowing it often times. So you have to keep making deposits everytime you can to keep your balance healthy.
Anyway, H came through and I could finally FedEx off the loan application and I'm pretty much done until the bank calls in a week or so to set up the home inspection. SUCH A HUGE RELIEF to have that out of the way.
H also came through for Christmas. During his Thanksgiving visit I worked up the courage to tell him I wanted to replace my wedding ring for Christmas. I reminded him that when I lost it I had it on a chain around my neck along with the mother and child pendant H had given me.
Then on Christmas eve the postman came to my door and said that he tried to deliver a package the day before but the music was so loud that no one could hear him at the door. That would be my brother home alone while my mom was out and I was grocery shopping. I wanted to stomp on him!
So I had to wait until two days after Christmas for the post office to open up. I opened the package at work and it was the mother and child pendant. I was very happy about that. I didn't even mind that it wasn't the ring. I was hoping it was on back order or something. Then when I talked to H on the phone he said there was another package coming!
I don't know what's harder to believe...that H and I have recovered to the place we are at now, or the fact that H dropped the bomb and all this happened in the first place.
That kind of leaves me to look around at where I/we are now. Suddenly the 19 months until H transfers looks SO far away. I still want to wait until after H gets settled in his next job before S3 and I show up and introduce more change into his life. And there's always the possibility that he may request isolated duty where we can't follow (which he's mentioned before).
But, once I get in the new house I'm hoping the wait won't seem so long. Then next big event is meeting the seller's next Wednesday so they can decide whether or not they want to rent to me for the month before the closing. I'm not confident that they will if they know I have a dog. So, I'm not bringing it up unless they ask. I really hope they don't ask.
I KNOW that I posted a reply to Slowly's post. But it isn't here now. It was the same time I had a post disappear on someone else's thread, so I'll chalk it up to a blib in the system I guess...
The short response to Slowly's post, so very long ago, is that H's primary LL is definately words of affirmation and he's probably also an acts of service guy too. But, I am much harder to pin down. I have been thinking I am a quality time girl, but now I'm thinking I might be physical touch. Then I start thinking about it some more and realize how much I want ALL of it.
While it may be entirely possible that you're pretty equally divided on the LLs, don't pin yourself to that idea forever. I think it's hard to assess ourselves during this time because we've been so starved for ANYTHING that hints that they love us still. So, in months and years ahead, keep your mind open on what gives you the most bang for the buck from your husband and be sure to let him know what does "it" for you.
Me38,H:38,S:7 Married:6/99 Bomb:7/04 Sep.:5/05 D Filed:3/08;Final 1/10 Piecing:11/09 H moved back:09/10 Current thread: http://tiny.cc/htcty
I have been reading regularly, but not posting much lately. And I haven't done any updating on my thread because there hasn't been much to say. Just small subtle things here and there that reinforce the direction I hope H and I are headed. Of course, it's all in theory at this point because we don't live with each other and I'm not having to DB in the face of those little idiosyncrousies that drive you crazy.
I think what Nicole said was right on. I've felt starved for anything, and been training myself to look for how he shows me he loves me in HIS love language. That's negative and positive I suppose.
I think that I probably am a quality time girl. But, I get almost NONE of that. In the past or now. It's almost non-existant. For the first time since we got married H suggested we go out to do something during his Thanksgiving visit. I was so touched that he was stretching out of his usual comfort zone/rut to try to do something I would like.
I was so disappointed when he avoided following through though. The days of his visit went by. There was plenty of opportunity for us to go out by ourselves. When it looked like he wasn't going to take me out (meaning anywhere away from his parents house where it would be just the two of us), I made a couple references to our date night to remind him (in a non threatening/complaining way). Finally, on the last possible night, H had all these things to do lined up for the evening, and I asked "does that mean, we don't get a date night?" I tried to sound unaccusing, but it was impossible to mask how disappointed I was. I was so hurt that after not seeing him for 8 months I didn't even rate a couple hours of alone time. And he KNEW I wanted it.
He said he didn't see how we'd have time and I bit my tongue instead of saying that we'd had more than enough opportunity, but TV shows and "for fun" trips to Walmart had been more important. I just said "yeah," and kept my head down and looked busy. I don't know if his mom said something to him or if it was because I was obviously disappointed, but he came back a little while later and said he wasn't going to do all the stuff he said he had to do and that we could go out if I wanted. I nicely asked him if he was sure, and he said yeah. So, we went out and had dinner at a casino and sat for a couple drinks and live music.
When we left the casino I wanted so much to stay out with him. When we got in the car I thanked him and told him I'd had a really good time. He seemed pleased and maybe a little suprised. Obviously, I haven't been so quick to give him those words of affirmation in the past. After I thanked him he mentioned that he had thought of taking me to a piano bar downtown. I held back instead of getting all excited because I really wanted to go right then. But, he said "next time, maybe" or something to that effect.
At the time I made myself stay grateful I got anytime. And I still am glad we did get one evening. But, I wanted so much more. A weekend alone. It was harder than I thought it would be to spend the only visit I would get with H for the year staying with his family. I love them so much. But, I had some rough nights alone in the guest room when H chose to sleep in his brother's room (which he still calls his room because it was 18 years ago) instead of with me. And this was after we had ML and spent long moments gazing into each others' eyes and all that.
I could chalk it all up to him just easing back into the R. But, this is how it has been in the past at his parents' house. Then he drove with me up to the town where I live now. I was at first just happy he was coming up with me at all. But, then I was disappointed when he told me he would only be staying for a couple nights. He wanted to get back to his parents so he had atleast four days there before he had to get back to the airport. Again, I did not feel way up there on his list, and it felt pretty bad.
When we did get away from his parents house for a few days, suddenly I was the center of his attention. And that felt good. We stayed in a hotel, so we were in the same bed at night. He bought me flowers while we were at the store. And he was so physically affectionate the day he said goodbye to go back to his parents. He even showed some PDA in front of my mom (not something either one of us likes to do, generally).
Anyway...out of the not so distant past and into the present...the house is great!!
It's very interesting to see H's reaction to becoming a homeowner for the first time. Even though he won't live in this house, and will probably only visit it two or three times before he transfers, he has gotten really involved with it. He is doing all kinds of research into fencing and storage sheds.
In one of his emails he said it would be really good to have a place of his own to come home to instead of government housing. This takes me back to the time he told me that he could only consider his parents house home. I was very hurt at the time that he wouldn't consider the place where his wife and newborn son lived his home. Maybe it was more about him not owning the townhouse we lived in than about the fact that he is overly attached to his childhood home.
So I'm hoping (and that is usually a bad thing) that during his next visit (this summer) he will stay with me in the new house and "visit" his parents down south. It will be very interesting to see which airport he decides to fly into from Alaska.
So, maybe I am a quality time girl. But, I have also come to appreciate much more keenly how well H gives acts of service. He takes care of S and I from a distance better than could be expected. He is always doing research online to find me something I might need and always asking if I need more money. Through this whole horrible fiasco, that's the one thing I can point to that says he's loved me all along, because he never stopped making sure I had what I needed. And at this point in my life, with a child, financial security is so much more important than it used to be.
I also like the words of affirmation he's so free with. And, even though, I never thought I was a gifts person, when H gets me flowers (because he knows I like them) or gets me a mother and child pendant, I treasure them so much, because it's just a huge symbol of how he will sometimes do something he wouldn't normally do just because he knows I'll like it.
Well, time to get off the computer and start moving!
H sent a package to me just after Christmas with some very important documents that allow us to buy the house. He also said there was "something else in there" for me. I figured it was the replacement wedding ring I'd asked for for Christmas.
Unfortunately I forwarded my mail to the new house (I'm renting from the owner until the closing) in early January and everything was delayed for over two weeks. The package FINALLY showed up the day before yesterday and sure enough, there was my ring! AND an anniversary card. Our anniversary is two days after Christmas.
I emailed H yesterday to thank him for the ring and card. I told him it was good to wear a ring again. Neither one of us are in to those kinds of traditions, symbols, or ceremonies. We got married in a court house in street clothes. So, a wedding ring has never been a big deal to me (that's probably why I was careless enough to lose it in the first place ). But after H dropped the bomb and I moved, suddenly, having lost the ring felt bad. After H and I started talking again I even had fantasies about having a wedding ceremony of somekind to symbolize a new commitment to each other. But I think the chances of H agreeing to something like that are pretty slim, and I don't even like the idea of it anymore. (I HATE being on the spot and having everyone's eyes on me. )
What I'd REALLY like would be a honeymoon!
But, I'm not holding my breathe on that right now. It's funny how I had such a well-thought out list of what I was going to ask H for during his visit last Thanksgiving. I decided to order it based on what was most important to me and let stuff less important (like the wedding ring) drop off the list.
But, when I was visiting with H, I realized that the most important stuff to me was the hardest to ask for and the least likely to get a good response from H (like asking for a weekend alone). I did mention a weekend alone once, but H did not respond enthusiastically so I didn't bring it up again. I did remind him of the date night that HE had brought up, and he came through on that at the last minute after a lot of hedging.
But, as far as LL stuff goes, H is happy to give gifts, so he was happy to get me the ring. He obviously isn't much of a quality time guy, so something that seems as simple as dinner and some live music for a couple hours, is like pulling teeth. Which really hurts my feelings. And NO, I don't feel loved when H can't be bothered to take an evening, let alone a full weekend and spend it with me somewhere other than on the coach in front of the TV.
I think I'm starting to catch on that H offers quality time in a way that he knows he won't have to follow through. Like when he said he had wanted to take me to the piano bar, but only when we were headed back to his parents house and he had already made it clear we were packing it in for the evening. When we were driving up north to the town I live in I mentioned that I had wanted to fly to visit my dad on the west coast, but if we bought a house I knew that wouldn't happen. He replied, "why didn't we plan to drive out there during my visit?" Well, had I even remotely had an inkling that could have been an option, maybe I would have asked. And it was certainly too late at that point to do anything about it. I can't imagine that if I had asked him earlier to do something like that during his visit, that he would have agreed. If he couldn't spend more that 3 days away from his parents house to visit my mom's side of the family and look for houses up north, I don't know why I should have thought to ask him to drive for 6 days round trip plus spend a few days staying with my dad and step mom who H has already thinks don't like him.
I mentioned to my dad on the phone a while ago that H had asked why we didn't plan to drive across country to visit him. My dad said he thought H was making a "safe offer" knowing that he wouldn't have to follow through. I think he's on to something there.
This quality time thing is going to be an issue for us for as long as our R holds on I imagine. But, it will have to be dormant for now because I can't really "ask for what I want" while H is physically unable to give it to me.
But, to end on a good note...After I thanked H for the ring and card, he emailed back that he wished he was here to put it on my finger. (Big "Ahhwwwwww") I hope that if he were here, he would really do something like that. I don't think it's only that H makes offers that he knows he won't have to follow through on. I think also, he WANTS to do things like slide the new ring on my finger. But, it's easier for him to be emotionally vulnerable over email than in person.
During his Thanksgiving visit I worked up the courage to tell him I wanted to replace my wedding ring for Christmas. I reminded him that when I lost it I had it on a chain around my neck along with the mother and child pendant H had given me.
). But after H dropped the bomb and I moved, suddenly, having lost the ring felt bad. After H and I started talking again I even had fantasies about having a wedding ceremony of somekind to symbolize a new commitment to each other. But I think the chances of H agreeing to something like that are pretty slim, and I don't even like the idea of it anymore. (I HATE being on the spot and having everyone's eyes on me. 
)