Mr. Rogers Neighborhood

It's a beautiful day in the neighborhood. Wouldn't it be nice to live in a place where Mr. Rogers lives? A place where cats give sound advice, doctors live in tree houses and a little train talks to you? Sounds like a cool place to be. But here is cool too. Especially when the weather is as beautiful as it is.

I love the sun. I love water too. And fire... Guess I love it all. But the sun seems to help when you're crying on the inside. It makes you realize there is a new day, a more positive future, a happiness in store for you. Even if we don't know what it is, the sun reminds us to smile.

I love to smile, to laugh. I'm doing so much more now. The girls and I have so much fun together. I know H feels like crap because we don't include him but he refuses to leave so he gets what he gets. Not to be a bitch or anything but he's torturing himself. We have fun and that's ok. We don't rub his nose in it but we don't hide anymore either.

I told him today how they have been feeling. How they have seen the way he has treated their Mom, how they want him gone too, how they are hoping this marriage is over, how he has been a jerk to them too and it isn't just me that he's going to have to make amends with. I think that took him by surprise.

He honestly didn't realize how much they had seen and experienced. When the girls and I got back from a fun afternoon, he was sitting in a chair on the deck with a forlorn look on his face. I asked him what was up. He said this whole thing could have been different if he had just listened sooner. He may not have lost everything if he had not been so arrogant. That was good to hear.

He's right. It could have been different if he had earned my heart. But he didn't. He took it. He got a ring on me and took me for a ride. My friend asked me to think back to the beginning. Did I love him? Was I eager to spend every moment with him? Did I want to jump his bones every chance I got because I thought he was the sexiest thing on two legs? Was my heart empty without him near? I wish I could say yes but I can't. I was resistant from the beginning. I didn't even want to date much less get married again.

After my last divorce, I wanted to heal. Much like now. I wanted to be alone. I looked forward to the challenge of it and the time with my girls while they were still in the house. I wanted a clean start. And I was broken. Oh so broken. I tear up thinking about how broken and vulnerable I actually was. I wish I would have trusted myself. I wish I would not have let my parents guilt and shame me. I wish I would have taken the time I needed. But I didn't. I went along with the flow assuming my parents knew what was best for me. Wow, was I wrong. But so were they.

No one wins in a divorce. It hurts everyone. The exes, the kids, the families, the friends. Absolutely everyone is affected. Amazing the ripple effect of this kind of life changing event. But some of those ripples can be good if allowed. He can have a better future. I can have a better future. The married friends in our life can see this as a chance to remind their spouses how good they are and thank God for the relationship they have. The kids get their Mom as she was intended to be thus having more peace and security. It can be good. I hope it is.

I hope that his recent realizations help him to see he needs to leave. I really don't want to get the police involved. I hope his understanding and apparent acceptance that this is over, will motivate him to walk away with dignity instead of fighting for something that isn't mutually there. I hope we can do this as friends and not get stuck in a legal battle over stuff and possessions. In Mr. Rogers Neighborhood we could. But that's not where we are...are we?

Little sore

I have this small cut on my finger. I don't know where it came from or how it got there. But I noticed it when I felt a little bit of stinging. It was actually deep enough to bleed a little and split open. Again, it's origins are a mystery.

I imagine that is how friends and family are feeling right now. This random sore pops up, they don't know where it came from but still have to deal with the stinging. I feel bad for that. I wish I could shield everyone in my life from the pain of what's happening with me right now. But I can't.

I want to be able to say all is well. To keep lying about my marriage and what happens behind closed doors but I can't. Eventually you have to look down and see the festering wound and take care of it. If you ignore it, it will become infected.

I'm trying to take care of this wound in my heart. It is definitely infected yet I'm totally at peace. Could it be because my shit-o-meter is pegged? Is it because I am so arrogant that I think I know what is best for me? Or perhaps I'm in a delusional state of reality and I'm clueless to what is actually happening.

I suppose it could be all 3. But does it really matter? I'm angry yes. H has been a dink. However the longer time passes the easier it gets for me. I doubt less often, I see the path ahead and am not afraid, I'm eager for the change, I'm ready to focus on me. Selfish I know, but I need to be a little bit. I'm worthless to my kids if I don't take care of me first. Only took me 40 years to figure that out. Lol!

So here I am with this wound on my finger, recognizing it's time to clean it out, sterilize it and wrap it up...much like my heart.

Leaving my fantasyland

I'm still pondering yesterday's post. I find myself totally wrapped up in all the men around me. G has  a lot of qualities I would adore in a man. So does T and even H. How delusional I am to think that the "perfect" person is out there. But am I really saying that there is a perfect person?

I don't think I am. I think I'm saying that I have preferences. And yet, I'm so messed up in the head right now I can't honestly make a sound judgment call when it comes to relationships. I do get concerned though at myself when I read yesterday's post and see how vulnerable I am. I have to be sure to keep my head out of that place or I'm going to do stupid things. No, I'm not saying with L even though I realize it could have been interpreted as me having a crush on him. It wasn't about him per se, and more about what I would want in a man.

Truthfully I shouldn't be thinking about the qualities I want in a man. I have one. If I'm looking to make my life complicated, that would be a good way to do it. I really don't. My brain cannot handle one more anxiety to process. Trust me, there wouldn't be enough legal drugs out there to manage the kind of episode it would cause. And yet I'm back to an earlier post about hope. Hope in a better future. Hope in a different life. Hope in a chance to do things right and make life the way I feel like is should be. But I can't afford that hope right now. It is that hope that has led me astray.

Even though I'm moving in a direction of independence and the chance of life being different, I cannot be distracted from healing by the hope of a rescue. I need to rescue myself. I need to be okay sharing those intimate things with my therapist and my best friend. I need to be okay as a woman without a man at her side. I need to like myself without the daily affirmation of a husband. I need to focus my energy on me and my girls. Period.

So I will wrestle back the urges to think ahead to life with a man that exists only in my head and focus on the here and now. I am blessed with beautiful and amazing children, a beautiful home, I live in a great town and community, I belong to a church that has incredible people in it, I have friends that love me like I love them. God has even blessed me with sons. :) The life I have right now is exactly where I need to be. So no more fantasy talk for now. Back to reality...and it's a good one.

Band aid?

So today was actually ok outside of the stupid conversation we had today. What I forgot to mention is that he took my wedding ring from me on Saturday. More punishments. Not that I should care but that's my back up plan. It's been appraised at $8,000. I could get at least half of that. It would buy me time and give me money to get us out of this financial bind we are in.

He refused to file taxes for this year so we are illegal right now. We are behind in our house insurance, we owe our energy company almost $2000 from the winter, besides the Lexus payments and the insurance for it. Oh ya and he spent any money I had set aside to pay our property taxes which are due in may.

The ring won't cover it all but it will help. I still have to find a job and to make our monthly bills manageable I have to get us caught up. He keeps digging us in the hole. I think because he plans to take equity out of the house to get caught up. But I won't let him do that so it's going to be just another fight.

I'm so tired of fighting. I needed to nap today because I hardly slept at all last night but didn't want to be in our room, in our bed so I went to the guest room. I think that's where I'm going to be from now on. Until I can have the courage to ask him to go.

Maybe it will make things manageable for now so I can make it another 399 days to next June. But I know we wont. Why I keep hanging on I don't know. I think it's the bandaid principal. I'm usually a rip it off kind of person but in this situation I'm trying to soak it so it just falls off on it's own. Ugh.

Partially I'm doing that because my therapist has reminded me there are more than just two solutions. There might be an option that works better than getting divorced. I just don't know if I care about any other option. I should to be fair but really is it about fair? Who am I being fair to?

Me? My friends and kids would tell you I'm not taking care of me. And I know I should be. And I agree with them. I'm waiting for him. Because I want him to be ok. That's pretty naive of me to think he will be ok with this. Like somehow he will just say, "yes Amy you're right. We should be done.". And yet I totally expect that. I totally think I can make it happen.

Make it happen. How manipulative. I can make it happen. How stupid. I can't make it happen the way I want it. It's a control thing. I need to give up control on how this happens and just focus on the outcome. I want to be happy again. I want to trust. I want mutual care and attention. I want peace, joy, hope. That can happen with him hanging around but it wouldn't be easy and I hate how my kids are being affected. I hate how I'm being affected. It's like living with an alcoholic. I can lovingly detach and make it work or I can end it and have it over.

I want it over. I cannot handle the control. I do not deserve to be treated this way. My kids, family and friends do not deserve to see me treated this way. If there was love between him and I, I would do anything I could to make this work. But I'm holding on to something that never had what it should have in the first place. No love. It's always been controlled. To the actual extent, I'm finding out daily but none of it changes the fact this isn't meant to be.

Then again, maybe I'm having a midlife crisis.

You just know

I asked a friend how you know if you've found the "one". His response was you just know and you know because you just want to be with that person. I'm paraphrasing here but that was the gist. If I accept his answer as truth then I shouldn't be blogging at all. Since I'm questioning my marriage among other things, he is not the one. I don't really like to spend time with him and I find myself preferring to be alone. I shouldn't wish he had somewhere to be all the time. I shouldn't feel like I have to be a buffer between him and the kids. If I didn't have all this water under the bridge, would I want to be with him? Would my perspective change?

 

He will tell you I'm the one. He fell in love with me the moment he saw me, that I'm a blessing, that he doesn't want to live life without me. Even as I write those things I find myself rolling my eyes. If this is love, then I want hate. No that's not true but if this is his view of love, then we are certainly not going to work out. However as the more seasoned Christian here, should I be the one to set an example and learn to love him as he is? Does he continue to hold on to something I think is awful because he loves me beyond the circumstances? Can it work if only one side has that kind of love?

I complain about him but clearly I'm the verbal one here. I'm the one with the problem. I'm the one putting my foot down and I'm the one saying it's not going to work. Am I the problem? Is my twisted upbringing tainting my perceptions? I am the problem here but I can't help but wonder if it's because I'm just not easy to please or live with. What are my expectations excluding love that he cannot live up to them?

 

I expect honesty, faithfulness, dialogue, companionship, respect, kindness, gentleness, affection, sex, laughter, sharing of interests and passions. What of that list am I getting or think I'm getting: sex, sharing of interests and passions, some affection, faithfulness. What I'm missing: dialogue, companionship, respect, kindness, gentleness, laughter and the other half of affection. I omitted the honesty one because he can't be honest with himself much less with me or anyone else.

A few weeks ago we were hanging out with a friend in his garage and I had a few beers. Not good because I babble and my secrets are not secrets anymore. So I casually made a comment about the physical abuse. How he wouldn't know if my punches would hurt because I've never laid a hand on him but that I know his hurt. Well our friend asked him really and h just avoided the question until our friend let it go.

 

The husband and I had a conversation about it afterwards because I got in trouble for making the comment and almost revealing our secret. Huh, our secret. It shouldn't happen at all much less be "our secret". Grr. Like I said, the honesty thing isn't happening with him.

 

And I'm not being honest with him by writing these blogs. When talking to him, I sugar coat the truth out of fear. I avoid telling him what is truly on my mind, how I have no hope in him or in us, how I am unable to see a future with him, how his attempts at change will never be enough to save this, that in my mind one year is one year too long. He doesn't know those things. I continue to smile, try to do what is expected of me, live a little my own way when I'm around friends or when he is gone.

I guess I didn't realize how resolved I am until just now. I just know we aren't suppose to be together. Guess my friend was right, you just know.