He said he's seeing someone new

[Ophelia]

One of these days I'll write a post that isn't novel length. As it turns out, today is not that day...

Well, something good has happened over the past day or so, but it's not related to H.

My best friend and I are gonna be going to see a production of CATS the day after my birthday. I'm kind of obsessed with all things feline. The first time I saw CATS was with H when there was a production touring the country some years back. We saw it again in London when we were there for our honeymoon. I've been hoping there'd be another Aussie production of the show ever since, so I could go and see it again, (not that watching it on DVD isn't fine and dandy, but it's not as good as an actual live performance of course).

Anyway, there's this free lifestyle/arts/etc local magazine that we hadn't had delivered to us for over a year, but then a couple weeks back, we started getting it delivered again for some unknown reason. Flicking through the magazine, I saw a pic of some of the CATS cast and of course it immediately caught my attention in a "What are the chances that we'd start getting this thing delivered again the same week they have an ad for a production of CATS in it?" kinda way. Divine intervention, perhaps? Did someone up there know it'd cheer me up to be able to see CATS again, so arranged for the delivery so I wouldn't miss it?

I casually mentioned it to my friend when she was over the other day and she instantly got all excited and insisted that we go together. And as luck would have it, there's a performance the day after my birthday which I was able to get 8th row centre seats for, so that should be fun!


Went to my parents' place for dinner last night. My brother and sister were there as well. It's pretty rare to have all 3 of us kids at home at the one time! Anyway, it turns out that bro and sis have recently been considering writing a letter to H. They stressed that if they do, they'll show it to me first, and I will ultimately be the one who decides if they send it to him or not.

You see, several years back, my sister was dating a guy who is somewhat of a deadbeat and treated her like crap. He dumped her on her birthday, and much angst ensued for the coming weeks when she was wanting to get back with him and the whole family was trying to change her mind. (They did end up broken up for about a year, though they ended up back together, but thankfully this time my sister has grown up a bit and isn't getting walked all over like last time.) During this time, H wrote my sister a letter. He talked about a crazy ex of his and how she was rather like my sister's boyfriend. He tried to explain why everyone was so worried about her, including himself, because he was part of the family and hated seeing her being treated like crap by this guy, and how she deserved so much better.

So now my brother and sister are tempted to write him a letter in a similar vein. Who knows what it would end up saying if they ever do get around to writing it, though I imagine parts of it may not be that nice, considering my sister expressed last night that if she ever were face to face with H's new girlfriend, she'd beat the crap out of her (my sister isn't a violent type) and tell her how disgraceful she was for hooking up with a married man.

I'm not so sure that it'd help matters for them to write him a letter, and they said that's why they wouldn't send it to him without my having read it and given my consent first. On the other hand, MIL did say to me that my family have every right to be angry at him and have every right to let him know that because he's a big boy so shouldn't be shielded from how he's made people feel.

It's really not fair to put his mum in the middle of all of this and it certainly won't take you any closer to your goal of getting back together. She doesn't have the power to tell him what to do, like a naughty little boy.

Oh if only she could just send him to his room so he could think about what he's done like the naughty boy he is. I'm quite sure he would be super pissed off if I went to talk to his mum about this. I did find it a tad hypocritcal when he told me not to upset his mum. Like he doesn't think his current behaviour would be opening old wounds for her already without me doing a damn thing?

The way to sensibly DB through this, even with lawyers involved, is to go along with it. You said yourself, it is no big deal really, you are happy to give him the pool table, you get to keep everything else - it's a no brainer.

If you retain a lawyer yourself, you are going to have legal fees (which are usually exhorbitant)and you are going to pi$$ your H off. This is no win-win situation.

Well I still haven't gotten a lawyer. Got my dad to have a look at the letter, and he reckons he figured out where the mystery figure of the $2500 cash came from. If you take the amount H's superannuation has increased by since we were married, then add on the values of the car and the furniture, then subtract the debts, you end up with a figure of about $14000. Half of that is $7000, so with the $4500 worth of furniture I'm getting, the $2500 cash makes up the difference so I'm essentially getting a 50% cut. The only thing is that we don't know how accurate the figures are that are in the letter, like the current value of his car, etc, so who knows if it's actually fair. I'm not really interested in challenging that and splitting hairs though.

The only thing I'm really still concerned about is the implications this may have if we do reconcile, (ie: my signing away any claim to any of his super), so that's what I've still gotta get a professional opinion on.

Just relax and let it happen. You might be surprised by his reaction if he knows you are not going to fight with him. He is more likely to want to be your friend, if there is no conflict.

I wonder what he thinks of the fact that I haven't contacted him about it? Surely he would have known that I'd be getting this letter this week, and he probably would have been expecting another influx of annoying txts, voicemails and/or emails, but he hasn't gotten any. I hope it's shocked the hell out of him that I haven't responded that way. That's why I know it'd be ideal if I could just agree to this settlement no questions asked.

Right now, his actions are telling you that he wants you out of his life - you have to prove to him that you are someone he wants in his life.

List out your attributes, the things that make you desirable. To have a good partner, you need to be a good partner. Start you list simple and design it so that it has some goals. Try something like

My amazing desirable qualities (all goals are made up to illustrate the point)

Yeah, I've gotta sit down and write all that good stuff down. I was starting to work on some of it before the OW bomb, but I've kinda been in a tailspin ever since. I know I've gotta get that stuff straightened out though, so that if/when he does make contact, he'll like what he sees.

Either way, would you want to go into the agreement blindly?
I think it would be in your best interest to find out the details. You can still decide if you want a letter from your lawyer to be sent to your husbands.

Yeah, I really do need to know what the settlement letter really means, and what the future implications of it may be. I'm gonna look into services that offer free legal advice first. That way I might be able to have it explained, and it might turn out that I won't need to actually pay for an actual lawyer in the end.

Don't involve MIL. Having her speak to him would be worst than you calling him directly. He may feel that not only are you disagreeing, you are getting allies to your cause.

Which is essentially what I would be doing, I suppose. And it's not like he's gonna give a crap if my motivation is more because I'm worried about his mental/emotional state so I think his mum should know my thoughts because she's the only one who will really be there for him right now. He'll just see it as me trying to turn his own mother against him, and no good can come from that.

If you feel he is simply doing this for the pool table perhaps you can let him know he can have that without the paperwork signed. But there may be something bigger in his mind he is hoping to accomplish.

On the surface, it just looks like he wants the pool table. Now that I've had the time to digest it properly, I realise that there's much more to it than that. IMO, it's his way of trying to beat me over the head with the "WE'RE FINISHED SO JUST MOVE ON" hammer, because he knows that quite obviously I don't feel that way, so he felt the need to get a lawyer involved, just so I could see how serious he is.

Part of it may also be that he's trying to mess things up even worse in an effort to convince himself that there really is no going back. The bigger the mess, the harder it'll be to fix, so the easier it is for him to believe that his new, carefree life is the much better option.