| It's been about a year. Our wedding anniversary just passed, and in a just a week or so it'll be a year since the big fight where she told me it was over. I've been hanging around these boards, trying to contribute to other people's threads and take solace in the experiences of others, both those who are where I was months ago, and those who are far ahead of me in their journey. I thought I'd write, mostly for my own edification, and record how I'm feeling now - one year later. My wife, or my STBXW, fight almost constantly now. We speak politely when she or I are dropping the kids off or when we have something about the kids we need to discuss, but then there will be a text or a phone call or an email and it starts a battle. But I digress. We're living apart, we share custody of the kids, I have them 4 nights and Saturdays each week. They're young, but they're doing pretty well. She started seeing someone almost right after we split, and when that ended someone in our neighborhood left his wife and kids and they've been dating ever since. We fight about all kinds of things, but mostly (I feel) she wants to treat me like we're still married, in that she can ask me for help whenever she needs it, and I'll drop what I'm doing and help. She wants to borrow money, ostensibly so she can go out on the nights she doesn't have the kids, or pay a babysitter so she can go out when she does have them. She wants to go away for a weekend with her new boyfriend and wants me to watch the kids for a couple extra days. She's tired or depressed and wants me to watch the kids for an extra night or two. Most of this is pretty routine, but recently as I was tucking my D6 into bed she told me that her Mom's friend brings a movie over and sometimes he gets too tired so he sleeps over. Turns out he had too much to drink and didn't want to drive home so he just stayed the night. Months ago, when I found out that STBXW was having her boyfriend over after the kids went to bed we exchanged a number of texts and calls and emails where I expressed my concern about her having new people around the kids, and why I thought it was a bad idea, and could we work out a custody arrangement where that didn't happen. She eventually agreed, saying if our positions were reversed she'd want me to respect her opinion. But alas, it didn't last, and she's doing it anyway. There's nothing I can do, of course, she's not breaking any laws or contractual agreement, but I resolved that I wasn't going to be a person who constantly dropped what he was doing, and expending what little energy I have left, if she couldn't respect my values and the things we agreed upon. I can appreciate wanting to spend time with your new partner, but she should be able to keep her private life separate from the kids, and she shouldn't need me to keep making it possible or to pick up after her when she overextends herself. But, when I try to set firm boundaries she accuses me of being condescending or rude, that I lack basic respect and can't separate my personal feelings from my obligations as a parent, and suggests that I'm causing discord between us and that ultimately is more damaging to the kids than the separation. I, obviously, don't agree, but that's the tenor of our arguments lately. It happens almost weekly now, where she'll want or need to change plans and need me to accommodate, or will make plans or playdates for the kids during the time they'd be with me. We haven't been back to the mediator in quite a while, we have a bill with him we have to settle before we can see him again and I hope to be able to resolve that this week. I just want to know exactly what my responsibilities are and then I don't want her to ask me for anything else. Just leave me alone. Be a good parent when the kids are with you, I'll do my very best for them, and for the rest of it, just leave me the **** alone. Find someone else to help you. Ask your parents, or your friends or your neighbors, leave me alone. I'm not your husband, I'm not your buddy, I'm not your boyfriend, I don't ask you for anything, I don't owe you a favor, so leave me alone. The other issues are money. She said from the beginning she didn't want me to pay child support, but now it's months later and when we argue she's sure to remind me I 'haven't paid one cent in child support'. At this point we share custody, but my D6 had a hard time with the separation and we agreed to bring her along slowly, spending one night with me a week and moving up to two, etc, until now when I would argue we have them both roughly the same amount of time. For a number of complicated reasons I won't get in to here she makes quite a bit more a year than I do, but doesn't work. So she's a stay at home mom but makes about $20K more a year than I do with a full time job. This past year has shown me I don't make quite enough to maintain a 3 bedroom townhome and have the kids half the time on just my salary. I talked to her about splitting some of the benefits she gets for the kids but she won't consider it. I can't afford a lawyer, and I'm very afraid that if it turned into a drawn out legal battle she'd just win custody outright and then I'll be broke and not even share custody of the kids. I think, bold as it may seem, that I'm a great dad. I don't drink, smoke or do drugs, I get them to bed on time and teeth brushed, and out the door to school every day they're with me. I cook and clean, they have beautiful rooms of their own, I read to them at night and do their homework with them, attend parent teach conferences and dr's appointments, and the rest of the time we just play, and tickle, and wrestle and do puzzles and go to the park or go to museums or birthday parties. I adore them, and they seem to really enjoy being with me. My S3 asks to come over here on nights he's with his mom. I never yell, I'd cut my arm off before I ever spanked them, we have simple, healthy rules like eating at the table at dinner time, I'm doing the best I can, and I think I'm doing pretty well. I tried having a relationship for a little while, it wasn't right for me at the time. It wasn't a match, and I didn't have the emotional energy to be a part of a full-time, all-in relationship, which is what she wanted and had every right to expect. But it goes without saying that person was never around the kids and never in the house when they were. When my STBXW and I first split I couldn't sleep at night, couldn't function during the day, would cry in the car after dropping the kids off, and spent endless hours having internal arguments with her about how unfair it all was. I don't do that any more, but on a day like today when we have a big blow-up I'll keep the argument going in my head and stay worked up for the day. I don't want to, but I can't seem to get past it. That's one reason I'm writing this today, just to dump my thoughts out. I don't want her back. It took a long time to believe that, but I don't. And not just because too much has happened this year, but because we weren't going to be happy. I can so easily remember the amazing things about her, and the happy times, but there was a version of her at her best, and then the version I got the rest of the time. The one that went to bed at 7:30 every night with the kids and didn't get up, who never wanted to go out, and when we did go out talked about the kids the whole time and wanted to race home after an hour or two. The sweat pants and hair pulled back; having sex once every month or two; the constant, never-ending list of things she needed me to do and somehow couldn't do herself, and the staggering lack of gratitude or even acknowledgement of what I was doing. An actual conversation we had over and over: "I just need more help from you" "What about all of this that I did this week, I did x, and y, and z, and the laundry and the dishes and the groceries and the shopping and I've hardly seen you." "Well I expect you to do those things. I'm too tired" But I miss her. She was my best friend, the mother of my beautiful children. The first really long-term serious relationship of my life. I'm 34 and we met when I was 23. She's the only person I've really known inside and out. I miss her when I see something funny on TV or I hear about something fun that couples can do in town and I can't share it with her. I miss having someone to come home to, even if she didn't seem to really care when I came home, especially those last couple of years. It wasn't a good marriage, but it still bothers me that she thinks I was the problem and is happy I'm gone. I gave a decade of my life to her, and when we met she was so depressed she couldn't function, had no friends, no money, was getting drunk every night and wasn't talking to most of her family. Now she's happy and healthy, and with someone else. And yeah, I resent it. I resent the new clothes and the makeup, and the way she subtly mentions some of the fun places she goes now - the clubs for live music or comedy. The way she's hitting the gym now, and has to mention it all the time. The way the old nursing bras are gone now and she's wearing new strapless bras now. Where was any of that for me? Where was that vigor and vitality? Why did I get so much less than your best and once I was gone you blossomed like a butterfly? But when you have a bad day you need me to drop what I'm doing and help you out? I honestly don't know if I'm not able to separate my personal feelings from my rational mind. I don't know if I'm choosing battles because I'm hurt and angry or if I'm justified in how I feel and what I object to. I don't know how to act, but every time it feels like I'm being taken advantage of I react strongly and it leads to a fight. It honestly feels like she's making bad, or selfish, decisions. She's letting her boyfriends be around the kids because she wants to spend more time with them and thinks there won't be an issue. The harder choice might be to wait a day and spend time together then. Why is that so hard? I know this is long, it's mostly for my own reasons. I need to get it out of my head and written down, slow my thoughts down enough to type and feel purged. I'm broke all the time and I can't seem to get started on any of my own goals. I thought about pursuing hobbies, but I can barely spare the gas to get there even if they were free. I haven't done a good job motivating myself to improve, and I have to be better at that. There's so little time, and I'm so tired. I basically have Saturday night and Sunday, and Wednesday evening to myself, and Saturday night I'm beat after a long week of work and having the kids, and then being up first thing that morning with them. There's not much of a break. And more and more my STBXW will take a nap with my S3 during the day, and then drop him off to me after work. Once he's slept during the day he's up until 10 or 11 at night, so I'm fighting to stay awake and he can't fall asleep. It seems like everything she does makes my life harder, and I've done nothing but accommodate her. I don't know what to do. This person I was so in love with, even after we split, is like a stranger to me. And this stranger is ****ing with my world. It's a constant battle. For anyone who's read this, please forgive the long self-pitying diatribe. It's been a hard day. If anyone comes along that's in this situation or has been through it I hope my telling my tale helps them understand their situation a little bit. I'm going to try to keep updating, just as a journal for my thoughts. I hope one day I can look back on this and be amazed that it was ever so dark. Best of luck to all of you. | |||
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