One Year Ago This Weekend

One year ago I returned from a girl's weekend getaway, several hours earlier than expected.

Mr. Gone said, "Oh, you're back early" without looking at me and went back to his computer game while the kids played video games.

He ignored me the rest of the afternoon.

After the kids were in bed I pressed him to tell me what was wrong. He didn't want to, but finally said, "I like and respect you but I haven't been in love with you for a long time." My life fell apart.

Looking back, I think there was someone else. Several someone elses. There was one affair I suspected around the time #2 was born. Why else would a married man with two small kids go and spend precious weekend time with another woman? And I think he had a fling during his high school reunion. The weirdness and wrong feeling really started then. I think it was guilt.

How much responsibility do I have?

I could have pushed for counseling sooner.

I went through my own perimenopausal crisis, and a couple of SAHM years that sucked. Multiple small kids, grinding monotony, and continuous uncertainty about whether daddy was coming home that night or being shipped off on a two week overseas business trip. I was not happy. But I had come through that to the other side. Made peace with my partner's faults. He was never going to see the dirty dishes in the sink, or underwear and kleenex on the floor. But that was OK, because I loved him for his good and bad parts together.

I let him get away with putting me and the family very last behind his job. I resented his work. The late nights, the missed holidays, the phone calls during dinner where he would turn from daddy to a-hole in front of my eyes. The work paid for the dinner, and the roof over our heads. A choice I made, and that I let him make.

I dismissed his ideas. Rent out the house and live overseas for a year? No. The packing and prep would all fall to me, and I don't really want to live in the middle east.
Buy an investment property and become landlords? No. We SUCK at maintenance. We had no spare time. At least, HE had no spare time and it would have fallen to me, like so many other projects.
Move closer to his office? I found a couple of houses. He didn't like them. I told him to look. He found houses we couldn't afford. No, really, a mortgage that's 50 % of your gross income is a bad move. Really. Really. And then he told me I didn't understand money and real estate was a smart investment.

Mostly, I let him get away with being absent. Emotionally. Physically. When I tried to bring him back, I always backed off so he wouldn't accuse me of being clingy. I worked on myself but didn't urge him enough to work on himself.

But in the end, can we change other people? No. Only ourselves.

So that's how I got to where I was a year ago. Self justifying, maybe. The universal reaction, though, has been, "He's going through a midlife crisis." From my friends. Our mutual friends. Acquaintances. Neighbors.

Next time, the past year in review.

Rubbing in my Face

Mr. Gone was in California "visiting his mom" this past week and "vacationing with the kids." So MIL took all the kids to stay with their cousins, a four hour drive away, for the bulk of the week. Mr. Gone had maybe two meals with his mom and the kids, and was on his own in his mom's house the rest of the week.

He posted a series of pictures on Facebook that are reminiscent of the Charlie Sheen partying with women hanging off of him paparazzi pictures that were making the rounds during the worst of his craziness. The kicker is that these were all high school classmates of his. He started to get weird right after he went to his high school reunion a year ago last April.

Do the dots connect?

I'm very sad that he blew up his family for this. Whether it's unresolved aging issues, unresolved adolescent issues, unresolved daddy issues, I really thought that I married a better man than that. He needs help. He's told me repeatedly that counseling is a crock.

I've spent the past couple of days very angry at him, and at the situation. I'm trying to move forward and focus on myself, and started to drag some of the attic office furniture down to clear the space so I can find a tenant and stay in the black. I've also set up appointments with a number of contractors for roof repair and all the other things this house needs done that Mr. Gone was "going to get around to."

Just deep breathing in the face of extreme stupidity.

Help for First Few Days Post Bomb Drop

Looking back at the first few days and weeks post Bomb Drop, here are some of the things that helped me.

First 48-72 Hours Post Bomb Drop
You've been dumped by the person you trusted and loved and vowed to. You're the walking dead. Pain pain pain pain pain. It. Hurts. So. Much. Someday it will hurt less, but you have to survive. Go into survival mode. Nest. Text your girlfriends.
Eat, whatever you can get into you, but something with calories. Drink water. Walk outside for a few minutes every day. Breathe. Get as much sleep as you can. Rescue Remedy, the economy sized bottle. BE CAREFUL not to hurt yourself falling down the stairs, in a car accident, with sharp objects. Your brain is so full that it's very easy to have an accident. Be gentle. Skip out on all responsibilities you can possibly avoid. Take a day off work, you are sick. Wallow. Order out pizza for the kids. Avoid alcohol and drugs.

72 Hours Post Bomb Drop
CYA. Cover Your Behind.
1) Mental Health: find a counselor.Friends are great, but a good counselor will help you to move forward.
2) Financial Health: get copies of EVERYTHING. Mortgage, bank statements, bills, credit card statements, retirement accounts, wills, Keep it with a friend, in a safe deposit box, somewhere other than your home.
If you have a joint account, move at least a month or two of living expenses into a savings account in your own name. This is an emergency fund. Don't spend it, but keep it for backup. Open up a checking account in your name only too, and move some money there. Keep copies of all the paperwork.
3) Find three family practice lawyers and consult with them. Organize your paperwork from step 2 before the consult. Find out what you are fairly entitled to. Lawyers are expensive, but you, especially if you have kids, are about to negotiate the biggest contract of your life. You need someone professional in your corner.
4) Disengage. No contact. You miss him and you want to see him. You want to make him change his mind. Don't do it. If he wants you he knows where to find you. You can't start healing until you let him go.

Your life has changed. It's not your fault. But you can choose how to respond, to make things better for yourself. Good luck to you.

Letting go

Weird thought popped into my head today, geek moment. The caring man who did so much for me and the children is gone. Not a single phone call or email this week. Thought of the scene in Star Wars where Obi-Wan Kenobi tells Luke that Darth Vader betrayed and murdered his father. The man I loved is dead. There is a person walking around in his body, but I need to accept that the person I married is gone forever.
I celebrated my fifteenth wedding anniversary by making an appointment with a lawyer. There's been talk of mediation, but I want legal counsel in my back pocket. Not sure what will happen but the kids and I need protection from this evil stranger.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-K11j6iwMU

Making Lemonade

I'm trying to put together a list of the good things to come out of this. Here's some of the lemonade from lemons.
1) No more expecting someone else to do dishes/laundry/grocery shopping and being disappointed.
2) No more episodes of sudden rage triggered by little tiny unexpected things.
3) Better control over the family diet, fewer trips out for burgers, fries, and unhealthy crap.
The man I loved is lost to me, and a stranger has taken his place. I mourn the death of my husband and must exist with the reality of a person in his body, with his name, but not him.

Self Help book of the Day: Coming Apart

So I've been hitting the self-help section at the library.
Best book so far: Coming Apart: Why Relationships End and How to Live Through the Ending of Yours by Daphne Rose Kingma.

It's short and easy to read. The section on emotional stages of separation especially hit home as I am bouncing back and forth between so many of these feelings, from the "crying all the time" to "it's his fault" to "it's my fault" and back again.

There's a workbook chapter that I intend to work through and a ceremony for saying goodbye.

Going to tell the kids this weekend.

Right now I'm gluing together some fractured pottery for him. Symbolic: he breaks things and I get to put the pieces together afterwards. And he blamed this break on someone else.
Guess right now I'm in the blame him stage.

Breathing deep. O how I wish this didn't hurt so much. I know I have to feel the pain now, or later, but O it hurts.

So Far Away

Started the split up discussions.

My body clock is totally shot. I'm falling asleep at 7 pm on the sofa and waking up at 3 AM.

So worried about money. This is going to take us from comfortably middle class towards the poverty line. This house is too big for me to take care of by myself, and needs so many repairs we now will not be able to afford. Not sure if going back to school is possible.
I'm losing not just financial support but the support of an adult who cares for me, who "has my back." I'm feeling so alone.

I'm grateful that I have a brain.

I'm grateful that I have a roof over my head.

I had food to eat today, and food in the pantry for at least a week.

I've been poor and frugal in the past, I can do it again. I feel whiny about losing my middle class privileges. Poor baby, she has to cancel her gym membership and netflix.

But I don't feel like I live that large. The luxuries I spend on really make life fun and worthwhile for me, and the kids. I don't own any Prada purses. I get to the spa maybe once a year. I wear LL Bean, and Coldwater Creek when it's on sale. The kids don't do that many activities; they just like pricey activities like pottery and gymnastics.

Thinking about options: renting out rooms, part time jobs (retail, music teacher, barista . . .) the head is whirling around. Not enough hours in the day to watch the kids, take care of the house, work AND go back to school.

This too shall pass. I don't know that I deserved it; I tried to be a good and loving partner and mom.

Who is the Stranger in my Bed?

Close to 15 years of marriage. Three kids. He's "unhappy." Has "been unhappy." Wants to separate.

Things I do not want to forget right now

1) In the counselor's office yesterday when I said I was worried about emotional scars for the kids, he said they'd be scarred by something. The financial drawbacks of separating would be "good for them and help them to not take things for granted."

2) He's asked for counseling twice before. The first time, he told me to set it up. I was at home with three children 5 and under, no childcare. It meant finding a counselor and a babysitter. During the day. And finding the money in our family budget to pay for it. The second time, I told him if HE found the counselor I would set the childcare up. He didn't. As he looks back he says that maybe it wasn't important to him.

3) In a passing discussion of children, he suggested that he take them and hire a nanny to watch them. He also said they didn't all need to stay together.

Where is the man I loved, and who is this a-hole in my bed?