Hey Mags,
I personally think that the occasional PITY PARTY can be constructive
as long as there is a defined beginning and end

a time to wallow in the hurt
identify it
embrace it
tell it what you really think with all the raw emotion you have
embrace it again
and then say goodbye to it.

PITY PARTIES if used as a learning time are far more constructive than pushing everything way far back and pretending that we are bigger and better than that
sorry
WRONG
we are all human
emotions and all
even the raw ugly ones

can't have the really really up's with out the really really downs

faking it never did anyone any good
it is one of the more dishonest things humans do

besides
what better excuse to have a few girl friends over
eat too much icecream
watch sob-story romance movies
hugs
cry
rant rave
listen to heart breaking tear jerking music
hugs
wallow
eat more icecream
and maybe at the end of the allotted time for the pity party
ritualistically burn a picture of the one you are letting go of or "I love you's" written on paper to the one you are letting go while visualizing the smoke carrying that part of your past away

then have one more really gut wrenching cry
pass the tissues
hugs some more
dry your eyes
and say
fare thee well
done

it is worth a try, Spider
can't hurt and may be worth a few laughs

hugs to you

H

quote:

Oh you were once that someone
Who I followed like a star
Then suddenly you changed
And now I don't know who you are!
Or could it be
That I never really knew you from the start?


Did I create a dream?
Was he a fantasy?
Even a memory is paradise for all the fools like me!

Thanks, mags. I liked these parts of the lyrics. Well, I liked them all, but these stood out to me. I woke up this morning with the thought in my head of Acceptance. I do believe I am approaching this last stage of grief, intermixed still with some depression about it all. The denial and the anger are gone. I don't remember bargaining this time around. I did bargain the first time he left. And he came home. You know the saying, "Be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it all..." That happened to me.

He is more closely and regularly involved with CW than I had thought (hoped). I know until that ever changes, he will continue to be the stranger to me that he is now. Maybe if they can ever get themselves away from each other, X can begin working on accountability and honesty. Until then, though, I think those two will remain stuck in their rationalizations and justifications. I still have faith that in time, X will turn back towards me, if only for a moment, and acknowledge the harm he brought to me through his own personal struggling, through his inability to turn inwards to figure out our M and turning to other women instead.

Until that day, though, I must accept exactly who he is right now. And who he is right now is not good for me. Because what it comes right down to is: for him to be OK where he is, there must be something wrong with me. That is the only story he has for himself. And even though he probably doesn't intend to project that onto me, he does. And I probably project a lot of wrongness onto him as well.

The other thing I have faith in is the Universe's way of maintaining balance and teaching us what we need to learn. I know that the Universe has orchestrated perfect lessons for me, and I have to believe it has done the same for X. Nobody can escape the lessons once they know they are there to learn. They just come in more and more difficult packages the longer you ignore them.

I am proud of myself for allowing my grief. For being able to post about it and not feel weak or like a failure. It cannot be ignored (believe me, I tried) nor gotten around (also tried that). It is what it is.

I had lunch with former MIL yesterday. I knew it would be hard, and it was. We only talked about him and the M at the very end. That is how I knew about CW. He says they hang out every once in a while, because she wants no-strings-attached until her DD graduates high school and then college, too, I guess. That it has been nice for him to have such a close friend to help him get through this thing. That he doesn't think anything will ever come of the R besides occasional comforting. I don't know how accurate my former MIL's memory is, and how much of her own opinions she put in there. He does still care for me, and probably still loves me in some ways (this is what I used to say about him before I went back to IC). That he is proud of my accomplishments, and thinks that I do better when he is not in my life (which I do). And on the whole, she thinks he isn't as depressed as he used to be, he likes his new job (that he got last August) and that CW still works at their old employment.

What I think is this: for all our differences, us humans are remarkably the same, hence the 5 (to 7) common phases of grief. I also know that X's love for me was as strong as my love for him, however unhealthy it all was. Those feelings do not just go away. I know, I tried. They can get covered up well, though, or relabeled. My experience from doing that myself is that those feelings tend to begin seeping out into other areas, causing all types of angst and trouble. It can be very confusing and exhausting. My fear for X is that he has gotten so far into a story about what happened with CW that he cannot recognize that he might need to process more. With his mental instability, and his inappropriate ways of handling such things, it does make me worry for him.

But, I can do nothing for him. Coming from me, these worries would seem unconnected to him. And maybe they are. They ARE my worries, after all.

I am grateful that I went to IC, and that I am as far into my journey of recovery and healing that I am. It is difficult to find my new role of caring about someone whom I still love, while not being able to do so directly, and still struggling with disrespectful judgments that I have of him. Loving someone from a distance ~ a distance so great that I cannot be concerned with his daily living, his choices, whom he chooses to spend his time with and invest himself in. Keeping the door open just that little tiny much so that if he ever can be accountable, that there is a space left for me to be able to hear that and release it. I will never turn him away as a friend. I think he stays away because he knows it is better for me. He also told his mom that it is uncomfortable to do things together with the boys, because we have our old R that doesn't fit anymore, and we don't know how else to act around each other. Finally, he noticed that at least. I think a new R with him could be born (just friends, with the boys) if and when we can have an honest and compassionate conversation about what happened. Which IMO, is years down the road. Because if he starts spouting off right now about how him and CW view the whole thing, and expect me to buy into it, I will tear his head off (not literally, hopefully).

It is going to take some serious time before we can both tell a story that doesn't involve our own stories and justifications, myself included.

Ramble ramble ramble. Apparently this all had to come out....

And the pity party should end with this song..

Last Tears

And with that you can move into a friendship that doesn't involve what was lost.. only what is now.

Loui

Thank you, Loui. That song is perfect for me right now.

I just got this thought in the shower: Am I living my life right now as a competition that I'm right and he's wrong? I keep trying to live by the tennants that I thought him and I had agreed on after he came home the first time. For all the pain that time was, there was a while in the beginning where everything was magical again....not sure what changed it. So, I find myself living the way we both agreed we wanted to live. Meanwhile, he's living the way he thinks is best for him and me and the kids. I believe I am living the way I think is best for me and him and the kids.

Like, I am still that involved in attachment with him!!! If he has just moved on, like he says he has, I am making this whole thing up! Living my life as a thumbed-up nose to him, and he's not even paying attention!!!



That's why it always feels like a competition to me, why I keep paying attention now and again. I want to win!!!

Win over something that isn't even real. Or not win over something that is real. Whatever. My reality is what I make it ~ I know when I stop finding fault with X is the day I stop finding fault with myself. Yet knowing that doesn't make it any clearer to me how in the heck that is supposed to happen....and this is where Faith enters from stage left......

hey Spider,
with out mentioning anyone but yourself
why do you think you felt(feel) as though you had to be the winner/right?

quote:

why do you think you felt(feel) as though you had to be the winner/right?

Because then I (and he) would know that the way we had agreed upon to live our lives the last time he left was right. And that the way he chose to live his life when he left was wrong.

And why was/is it so important to you to be right? and him wrong?

Loui

Because it means that he did the wrong thing, and I did the right thing. Even though I feel like the big loser.

Good Morning Spider,


Keeping the answer to only YOU,
at each leg of the journey thru the last .... say...three years
keeping in mind the skills you had at the time and no more,
did YOU do what you felt was best and do it to the best of your ethical/emotional/mental ability?

quote:

at each leg of the journey thru the last .... say...three years
keeping in mind the skills you had at the time and no more,
did YOU do what you felt was best and do it to the best of your ethical/emotional/mental ability?

Yes.

I also believed I would be rewarded for my hard work with peace and happiness, with a healthy strong marriage.

???

How does that reconcile?

Is that not enough to know that you did your best, learned, grew, learned more and there fore ARE a winner and right for you and your life?

Yeah. And that is what is so messed up with me lately, or feels messed up. I am very grateful of where I am compared to where I was. When I read my diary I kept during the last year of our M, I know getting the D was the right thing for me and the boys. We couldn't be dragged through his chaos anymore of him trying to find out "who he is." Now he can do that without me having to know about it. Yet, I still push my nose in to know!!! Then get upset. It is so stupid. I got a D to NOT KNOW. So that I could Move On. I get irritated with myself when I feel like I've gone backwards or am stuck.

This last time has felt different, though. And maybe I say that after each major episode I go through. But each time, the grief and sadness get a bit more intense, are more intermittent, and I have cleaner breaks in between. And when I do talk about him now, and about our old M now, there isn't a lot of sappy crap that comes out. It is more of an intellectual processing of emotions that no longer seem to fit their scenario.

What a strange time in my life!

Last night a friend came over and had gotten me a book for my birthday. He always gets me gifts that really mean something to me, because he really pays attention to me. While he was here, two former residents from my work called him, and one we even went and met and hung out with and drove him home. I really like that. My boss, whom I thought was like that, has turned out to be not like that. Like other people I know, he wants to be like that, maybe, or wants the perception of him to be like that, but his actions do not match up. I have a hard time with that.

Anyway, it was a nice way to spend an evening. The boys like him, we all ordered pizza and watched whatever our DVR was recording because until Tuesday we have no control over it (remote is officially dead). Hee hee. I couldn't make my own veggie pizza last night because my oven is broken! It is cracking me up. I gotta figure out how to fix my toilet, too.

This weekend is yard work (I have been sorely neglecting my yard commitments...) and seeing the new Batman movie. HA! A movie I get to take the boys to First! Not that it's a competition..........

Isn't it a gift to have a friend of the opposite gender that is comfortable where there no expectations involved. What ever happens happens and that will be good. That says alot about the inner safety of both people involved.

oooooo the ups and downs of home ownership.
I have to admit i do miss it, even the fixing of toilets.

The "episodes" that you are experiencing now could be more intense while in them because you are bravely allowing yourself to really feel each and every emotion and thought that they trigger. You may be finding they have a more definite beginning and end because you have learned better and/or more efficient processing skills along with enough inner security to know that this too shall pass. It is just a place of learning.

You may never have all the answers about the past, especially as time takes you further and further away from it. The only perspective your are guaranteed of is your own.
It is hard to remember that you are looking at the past with the eyes and heart you have NOW instead of the eyes and heart you had THEN. A whole different perspective. It is not fair to the then situation or the people involved according to your NOW perspective. That is not where you were THEN. The best a person can do is take all that they have relearned with the new set of eyes and heart and help nudge the future.
It IS a sad thing when people we love, care about and traveled a path with then choose a different path than the one we have chosen to travel now. It can be so hard to say fare thee well and let them go.

Winning and loosing
Right and wrong
both sets of scenarios imply the need of a judge to determine the outcome of a competition.
This works in sporting events, formal debates, elections (HAH! ), math and science tests, anything black and white with clear cut rules and codes of conduct accepted and respected by all involved.
Unfortunately
it does not work very well in every day life

who are any of us to judge others in everyday life?
and
who said life was a competition?

nobody wants to be deemed the looser or wrong as we make our way thru life, not even the wayward spouse. Often times they are doing the very best they can, as are the rest of us.

proclaiming a winner or looser, right or wrong almost sounds like BLAME to me in cases like this.

Have you ever thought about the possibility that your x-husband dealt with the former marriage the best he saw fit according to the tools and perspective he held at the time? Your x-husband made choices of his own free will. What he did may very well not have been the way you would go about things, but he did what he did and it is in the past now. Only he knows what he has learned and how he has grown. Perhaps in his eyes and heart, he is a winner and he is right, for himself and maybe even for the children the both of you brought into this world. He may not approve of the life you have chosen or the code of ethics that you live by.

Have you ever thought of the possibility that maybe the marriage you shared was not right or the best fit for your former husband as time went on? The infidelity was not the huge indicator, but the symptom, how he may have chosen to express it and/or end the marriage. That BTW is not something to be taken personally. That possibility has nothing to do with you, but everything to do with him.

Just because we may feel that the person we are involved with or looking at as a possibility for a good life partner does not mean that they hold the same idea(s) about us. No matter how much we may love them, how much we like who we are when we are with them, how admirable they are, how witty or just plain drop dead great they look when they get out of the shower. Both people really should be fairly close in mind set to travel together toward a common goal.

Spider, can you let go the idea of the outcome of your marriage as a competition? Can you let go of there needing to be a right AND wrong? Can you let go of the idea that there MUST be a winner as well as a looser?

Doing this would NOT mean that you are giving up, throwing in the towel. It would simply mean that you would be putting the focus back onto yourself and no longer comparing yourself to what your x-husband did and is doing, who he was and who he is, etc. It would let the dust finally settle so you can look more clearly down the path(s) ahead of you and choose what is best for you and your children. It would allow you to better be right for you and your children and have a more winning life.

OOOO
the creatures and over growth in the yard
that IS a competitive sport

Spider 1
creepy creatures-ZIP!!!
May the best woman win!!!
Have a great day M'Dear!!!
and many many hugs to you and the boys

Hypatia

After mulling it all around, I have realized that I need to stop mulling it all around.

I made my choices for my reasons. When I specifically remember those reasons, I am filled with peace. My reason is that what he offered me was unacceptable to me. I know I deserve more in a R that is supposed to involve trust and intimacy than what X was willing or able to offer.

My friend came over the other night, and I told him I thought I was in the last parts of my grief ~ depression. He thought I was just coming out of my Denial! The first step!

Thinking about my physical symptoms, though, I think depression might be accurate. I am not normally a depressive person. I tend more to the annoying anxious area. But I realized this morning. I am out and doing what I love doing early morning, working in my yard, organizing my shed, drinking my coffee, boys still in bed after a late-night sleepover (can't wake them up to the smell of cooking canned cinnamon rolls! Dam*....). And doing this has made me LESS tired/lathargic/wholly-unmotivated, which is good, but not up into the cheery-Life-is-A-Great-Adventure Sunday-morning-dance.....

Plus processing all the stuff I might have skipped over in other phases of grief because I kept myself so busy for over a year....

Just over a month until my Graduate program starts. I am excited for it, get to see exactly what I'm in for for the next 3 years. I am also really enjoying (yes, even enjoying this still in my possible-depressed state), really really enjoying, you all cannot possibly know how MUCH I am really enjoying ~ not having something due besides just home and work stuff. No papers, projects, research, READING....Really Enjoying that.

And yet, when one is not very busy, one has lots of time to let their undisciplined mind run wild. It is a process of bringing my mind back from where it strays, into unanswerable and unknowable ~ back to what is known. What is known is that the way I was living with him was unacceptable, and still is. From that point on, it really is none of my business.

Feel my feelings, understand my grief. Understand my grief from the perspective of ~ something that I'd hoped would work out, didn't. Now I'm starting over ~ whatever that means. ;-)

Spidey,

I just want to say big ole hello to you. I wanted you to know I read this. You do so much internal work....wow....and I hope you realize how special you are.

One thing that strikes me is that I still get a sense....and I could be dead wrong....that you still have some nagging doubts about why you just weren't "enough" for him. Intellectually, you know it's not about you....but each time you visit that place....you get that sinking drop in your core. I want you to know that's okay....because what makes you unique and fabulous is not that you're immune to those feelings (because none of us are) but that you DON'T drop anchor there!!!

And you don't.

It's still hard.

But you carry on.

Maybe you think being truly healthy means NOT feeling those things. But me....I think being healthy is more about dealing productively with being human.

SpiderSlayer is like Spiderman to me....a superhero.

quote:

you still have some nagging doubts about why you just weren't "enough" for him.

Yeah, and other things in other scenarios, but the common denominator in all is that sinking drop in my core....

quote:

SpiderSlayer is like Spiderman to me....a superhero.

I am deeply touched and I have much respect for you and this statement means that much more to me for all of that ~ but, me thinks you are going over-the-top. I certainly don't feel very super at all in this healing/personal-recovery stuff. I feel like a big-fat-loser that simply refuses to let go and move on.

Maybe I am too close to it ~ maybe I am slowly letting go and moving on. Thanks for stopping in and letting me know you look me up now and again. ;-) Hope all is well with you.

I was thinking about how I so casually called myself a big-fat loser in my own personal recovery and healing. So, my intention is to be a big-fat loser in my personal recovery and healing??? That sucks *ss! I want to be successful! In a positive feel-good way! Successful to me means reaching acceptance of all that is, and being at peace with it (I'll start with >50% of the time and work my way up ). Opening myself and my life up for new relationships of all kinds. Defining myself, by myself, only as Spidey.

I woke up today with dangerous amounts of anxiety. Right out of the blocks, er, the bed. I had to consciously 1)first recognize what I was doing and not just react off of it and 2)redirect my thinking. My mind was firing off a thousand questions at one time, internally I was getting frantic.....then I remembered ~ He is not someone I can be with right now. Everything after that is noise.

And so what if I am just now hitting the denial phase of grief??? Hey, that's a phase! An indication of movement. And in my opinion, movement in the direction I want to be traveling.

And my yard looks nice after the boys mowed yesterday. Lucky it's finally getting HOT here and the grass isn't growing as much. Just two small bags of clippings.

For my birthday, I had to leave the house for "several" hours (it said in my card). So, I did. Both the boys worked together and CLEANED D15 son's room!!!!!!! It took them both 3 hours. They rebuilt all their star wars that were strewn around, put all the figures where they go, plus organized transformers and army men and everything else on the floor of a boy's room that hasn't been cleaned thoroughly in about 3 years. And I am not kidding. And DS15 proudly beamed at me last night ~ "And I vacuumed in here, too, Mom."

With proper motivation, anyone can do anything.

quote:

I also believed I would be rewarded for my hard work with peace and happiness, with a healthy strong marriage.

???

How does that reconcile?

(I'm a little pressed for time so I can't read everything just yet..) but this caught my eye..

and I just wanted to say.. what makes you think you won't be?

It may not be the marriage you assumed it would be.. or the one you focused on.. but look at it this way.. when the time comes, no matter if its with X or with someone else..

hopefully with all you've learned and how far you've come in your own journey.. you may very well indeed HAVE a healthy and strong marriage.

and.. to comment on the

quote:

Spider, can you let go the idea of the outcome of your marriage as a competition? Can you let go of there needing to be a right AND wrong? Can you let go of the idea that there MUST be a winner as well as a looser?

There is no winner or loser in marriage, in divorce, in relationship. Both parties in any situation do the right things and they do the wrong things. Its not a win/lose competition. Not in the beginning, the middle or the end.

There is an adage somewhere that says something to the effect of "which would you rather. To be right or to be happy".

In the end.. being right or wrong is just a judgement call.

Loui

Ah....see Spidey....big fat losers don't raise boys like that!! So maybe you think I'm over the top with my superhero comment....but I've always thought you had exceptional power. Even great superheroes are very conflicted you know, and full of angst.