I know your pain and fear jabez and not wanting to do anything to make the distance greater. Actually, the longer I'm "out" of our old R, the more I realize how I don't want to go back to that. W doesn't understand or believe that. She see's only the old and no other possibility.
What would happen if you said NO. to your W about the girls staying over during the week?...I am curious what would happen. Here's what happened. W emails "DD's are staying w/me tonight". I reply, "We haven't agreed to that, until we agree on a different schedule or a court orders a different schedule the schedule stays the same". W replies "DD's are staying w/me tonight". I reply, "I'll be by to pick them up at 9:00". At 8:30, I call and talk to DD's, ask if they are coming home, they say No, I say, I'll be by to pick you up at 9:00 D14 crys, D15 is silent. W gets on the phone agitated, aggravated, angry, threatens to call the cops if I show up, hangs up on me. 9:00 I ring the door bell. No answer. 9:01 I ring again. D14 opens the door in tears (D15 is in the shower). We talk, I assure her that I love her, I will always lover her, kiss her good night and leave w/o DD's. D14 calls this AM still in tears. D14, D15 & I talk. I wish them a good day at school, tell them that I love them and will see them after school.
I think that I've broken thru my fear of doing the wrong thing. In Tom Peters' business book "In Search of Excellence" he talks about "analysis paralysis". His remedy to that is to "do something, anything". I'm not going to go wild doing whatever strikes my whim at the moment, but after filtering my thoughts thru what I've learned in the past 18 months, I will do something.
