A blow up today. I guess we were due. Just as a note, I did NOT raise my voice to a 'yell' I was calm, but angry at times.
Wcame into my room to tell me that she needed help with D10's homework issues and I don't help enough, I must think she is supposed to do everything. I said I was sorry, she should ask me more and that in the past whenever I DID get involved with the kids homework she made me feel like I wasn't doing anything right and I was a bad dad, and pushed me away.
She says I'm not a bad dad, and when she pushed me away before it was because I was drinking and she was protecting the kids from seeing me that way. She 'followed me around' the house to clean up after me, if I cooked and made a mess, or any other stupid thing you do when drinking. She said it was the entire 15 years she had been doing this and I've been a 100% drunk, not just the past 6 years. I validated her actions and told her I appreciated what she did but I'm not like that now.
(note: Amazingly I was able to start 2 successful companies during all that.) She discusses times when we had big problems with money or business, and she had to 'hold me together'(?). My recollection is that there if there was an event in our life, I was beat for a few weeks, then forced to pick us ALL up, fix our lives, do what I HAD to do to get it together, earn money and take care of the family. None of this was due to anything SHE said or did, it was because I was in 'survivor' mode. like I am now. It was the BIG crash that I didn't get up from. Partly because I stayed in the environment that caused it for too long. It's MY fault for being weak. I accepted that.
I said she did 'take care' of me but she didn't HELP me either. She said we went to counseling but I would get more upset after sessions and we wouldn't work on stuff, or I wouldn't go. I said that was when she SHOULD have MADE US go and brought those issues up! She gave reasons why that wouldn't have worked. All my fault. I didn't try. She couldn't 'make me'.
She said that she just wasn't the kind of woman I needed, to help pick me up. She couldn't do it.
She said 'I have old diary entries from 10 years ago that show it was bad.' (note: she rarely wrote in her diary unless she was unhappy. In one diary I saw several entries of her unhappiness, and one entry saying how 'loved' she felt by me.) At various retreats she went to, she shared how unhappy she was with others, but didn't have the courage to change it. (Note: She said little or nothing to ME DIRECTLY) Last year she came back from one, talked about leaving 'the marriage', finding herself, etc. but we worked it out and stayed together but went back to life 'as usual'. I said 'why didn't you say 'we need to FIX this!'. Of course she said: because I wouldn't do anything.
She said on this last trip, she was 'ready to change', realized she deserved to be happy. OM was just 'bad timing' because she was going to divorce me anyway when she got back and he just made it more complicated.
I said that before she went to the retreat, we were spending intimate time together, that she said she loved me on the phone every day there, even the last day after OM entered the picture. She called me that day and begged to get an earlier flight home because she was scared, she needed to be back with the family. (note: Even when she got off the plane she showed me love and tenderness. It wasn't until 2 days later all hell happened.)
I said it sure seemed like you loved me then, I guess I was fooled. She said: I do 'love' you, how can I not love you. I've loved you for 20 years and I don't know how NOT to love you.
She went off on how much it hurt her that I said she didn't 'do anything to make our life work and solve the problems' and how she decided that SHE needed to be happy and SHE was going to see OM because She DESERVED to be happy. The 'affair' is not an affair because she 'told me she wanted to be separated' a month before she slept with OM. She said 'why is it ok that you drank and stuff but my 'affair' is wrong?" I said "Because I didn't BETRAY our trust in each other and go fly 3,000 miles to sleep with someone else, it's against MY morals but apparently not yours." She said there's no difference and that it's not immoral because she's 'separated' and that it's 'hardly' a relationship anyway and she will sleep with him again when and if she can because she deserves something different than what she had with me. And it makes her happy. It's over between us forever. She has no feelings for me.
I said I really don't CARE what she does with her life. I fixed MYSELF without her help and it wasn't to 'get her back'. In fact, I don't trust her any more. I said She betrayed my trust and I won't trust her with my heart again. I trust her with ANYTHING else but that. Kids, money, anything. I said that I pulled my OWN ass out of the hole I was in all by myself, that I held the family together during the holidays while she was emotionally with OM, that I even had the COMPASSION to recognize that she was unhappy because she wanted to be with him but couldn't and to SAY so to her with compassion, that I will NEVER let myself be that down again for my KIDS sake. And that if nothing else she should recognize that I have changed significantly - but not for her. That I want her to never have to worry I won't be OK when I'm with the kids without her. I will NEVER allow my life to fall like that again. For the KIDS sake and for my own future.
She said she sees that this time I am different than she has ever seen me be. But in past times it didn't last so she doesn't trust it will now. She said I'm very good at manipulating situations to get what I need. She cried slightly when she said this.
I said to her that may be so, but I really don't WANT my marriage back. I don't WANT you back. You betrayed me and I don't trust you with my heart. I don't know if I ever will trust you with my heart. I said I would SO MUCH like to just leave this house but I won't because I have to hold it together financially and emotionally for the Kids. It would be so much easier for me if I didn't have to see you 'sneak around' to chat with OM or send e-mail or call him. She blew up and said 'he isn't the only person I talk to you know and I don't "sneak around"'. And it's hardly a 'relationship'. I said "but you carry it on right in front of me." She said she's sorry it hurts me but she hurt a long time with me and she just wants to be happy. All my fault again.
There was a lot more but the summary is:
-- She doesn't think she is having an 'affair', she is separated and it's OK. -- Sleeping with him is OK because she deserves it. She suffered and it's all my fault. -- She was unhappy for, maybe 100 years or so, it keeps changing and becoming longer -- Our marriage was a sham, we weren't happy at all. Not at all. Never. We pretended. -- But, She doesn't know how to 'not love me' after 20 years. -- We will never ever be together again. It's over, she says she doesn't feel anything. -- When I challenged her 'compassion' and 'integrity' for the way she's hurting everyone and she's having an affair, she defended herself with examples of being 'nice' to me (compassion) and 'getting separated' before screwing around (integrity). -- When I said I don't want her back and I don't care what she does with her life, that I'm sure I will find someone who can see me for who I am she didn't say anything, looked a little numb. -- Also, both her Mom and Dad do NOT approve of her affair. I am surprised she TOLD her mom, and that her mom felt this way since she did a similar thing to her dad. She even said some of her friends don't either. (Of course her emotionally immature ones do.)
I don't want her or the marriage back. I want something better. I would like it to be with her but it seems more and more unlikely. And I'm tired of being hurt. I deserve better than this for MY suffering over the years. But, it's all my fault as usual. I'm sorry. I really am. But I wasn't alone when all these things happened.
