I would quit spending one ounce of energy on how he feels
his feeling are so unimportant in relationship to his actions....

I would stop all your energy and focus on him and turn it ALL towards your daughter....

my greatest concern is that your continued pursuit of contact with him comes at the expense of your daughter...

that he will construe and warp your acceptance of his time with you...both the physical and emotional contact as permission to not see his daughter...

if YOU don't and haven't made a big deal over it why should he...

and even more concerned about what YOUR actions of seeing him says to your daughter...

who is at the exact age to feel rejected and not lovable enough for him....and if you must be very wary not reinforce those feelings by seeing him as if all is OK and fine.
and you rationalize and enable him in the sense that you give him access to you without discussing the real issue the abandonment of HIS daughter...

I am also concerned over things you say....

I know he loves us. I know he doesn't love her.

shul...you said that...it as illogical as they come...

none of his action are loving....

his history of drinking and DUI's scares me because the truth is that whether on alcohol or not...some of the underlying personality traits...
(now the just wants to come home and smoke a joint.... <img border="0" title="" alt="[Roll Eyes]" src="images/icons/rolleyes.gif" /> )
traits that are
selfishness
blaming others
probably remain dominant and in full taker force...

and you still see and worry about your actions and how he will react to what you do...
while you have little to none reaction to his grossly disrepectful ones...

I have known all along that he was still seeing her, and it didn't change anything. I still love him and want to be with him.

But we couldn't go anywhere because he was hiding from me. If he had said "I don't love her but I still want to be with her once in a while" or even just said that he didn't know what he wanted...if he would just be upfront with me...

shul you need to step way back from this chaos...
basically that says..
you can have us both...
is that REALLY what you want...
really???

I don't want to push him into her arms.
stunned by that comment...

and all the rest of this post...where you talk about relationships with no strings attached and yet that's exactly what you have been offering him from you..

shul...you need to step way way way back from this...

you are in too deep and at a point where you would take this man anyway you can get him...
and he aint' offering a thing of value...
and you can't have that in your life and your daughters...

you need to establish visitation with daughter..
and you need to choose out and away from his chaos..

his chaos is what it is ..

your rationalization and excusing of and acceptance of his chaos ...
is a whole different can of worms...

ark

<small>[ August 01, 2004, 08:47 AM: Message edited by: ark^^ ]</small>

This hurts me so much to say, but once when he was here he said something like"when I am with you, I am with you", and I took that to mean that he was comfortable being with both of us.

You are right Arc, I have to let go.

He has made this choice and I have taken away the guilt, the consequences, made it easy for him to feel ok with what he is doing.

But it is not ok.

What he is doing is wrong.

I don't want to share him with someone else. I don't want the leftovers. I don't want to go on like this forever.

I thought in time, if he was free to do whatever he wanted he would eventually get sick of the lies and the double life, and make a decision on his own.

He complained of feeling trapped, suffocated in the marriage for so long...obligations, responsibilities...so I thought ok, I will relieve him of those obligations , those strings...(just as the ow has), and see if he chooses to come back on his own.

And I thought he did.

I hoped that he was starting to get tired of her, and tired of the complications.

That the strain of being with her, then lying to me...missing us...feeling guilty...would be consequence in itself. That he would eventually drop her.

I thought this weekend might even be the end of them.

Anyway, I think these are my boundaries:

I will not prevent him from seeing his daughter, but I will tell him not to bother if it is just to make him feel better, or because the ow says so, to make her feel better.

(For the time being I think I am going to get D out of harms way, send her to her sister for awhile if I can arrange it.)

I won't let our daughter be exposed to the OW, or go to her house. She is not to know that he is with them.

I won't sleep with him anymore, or let him stay over.

There is something I haven't mentioned. There is another woman he was involved with also. I don't know if he still sees her or calls her- I don't think so. (she lives in the other city)

I think what I want him to realise is that it is not me who is making demands on him, or manipulating him...it is her.

I am not his prison guard. She is the master of him now.

Maybe it would be simpler all around if I just tell him not to bother with us until he is free.

Gray,

Yes, I hear you about the ow. My faith does tell me to love her, and the truth is I can put myself in her shoes. I know what it is to have needs.

But I have no illusions about her. I know that she is the enemy.

I actually pity her, because she has made an enemy of God.

I see her as Pharoh, in a sense. I recall that God gave him several chances to repent , but in the end he lost what was most dear to him.

God will deliver my husband from this Egypt, one way or another.

I would not want to be in her shoes. I anticipate some very nasty things happening to this woman before the end of the day.

I am not going to play nice. I am praying that she will repent. I am praying that God will give her someone else to be with, but however this plays out she is going to pay. Either now, or in the afterlife, for what she has done.

In the end, my agenda is not my marriage, or my life. It is Gods will.

I signed up with Him a long time ago, for better or worse, and my first loyalty is with Him. I am his servant before anything else.

God loves this woman, and wants her to know him. That is more important than whatever I may suffer in this life.

I could say that she is not my problem, but I don't get off that easily. I am instructed to pray for my enemies, to love them.

In this case, I think at some point a warning might be in order. I will continue to pray for her. But we will not be friends.

I will tell you a story. The man I lived with many years ago, the father of my older daughter, went to jail for a couple of years. When he got out, he took up with another woman.

They used me as a babysitter sometimes, and over time I got to be friends with her. He eventually died. Her daughter and mine were like sisters, close in age.

I was able to lead this woman to God eventually.

Whe my husband was involved with a woman on the net a couple of years ago, the woman found out he was married, that he had lied, (she called our house one day). She and I talked.

I felt sorry for her. We became friends, of a sort, and I was able to witness Gods love to her. She still emails me, and asks me to pray for her.


My life hurts. But if God can use any of this to accomplish his will, to reach someone, so be it.

I put my hand to the plow and I am not looking back.

Shul, don't know what to say but just wanted you to know that i continue to pray for you as you do for me. God's giving you some clarity and i think you are starting to see it. God Bless, RR

Proverbs 3:5-6

RR,

Yes, I agree.

This morning when I woke up, I had the thought that I want to make it clear to my husband that I love him, and that unlike OW, I DO want commitment and honesty and monogamy in a relationship.

I want a partnership, someone I can trust and respect and look up to , to look to for guidance , who will lead, protect and care for me. Who will treat me with respect, and love our daughter and help me raise her to be a woman of character and integrity.

That I am willing to pull my weight, and I am offering the same- love, faithfulness, honesty, devotion to his wellbeing.

But that I am looking for a mate to walk beside in the cause of doing Gods service.

And I know he has the potential, that he is the man I chose, that he has shown me over the years how strong and courageous and kind and sensitive he is, but right now he is not acting that way.

That I am praying for him and I know that he will get sorted out when the time is right, but that until he does, I will let him be.

There was a time when my husband and I did some minstry type things together ,(we ran a hostel) and that I believe is something we are called to do together.

He was a different person. I looked up to him so much, had so much respect for him.

I pray that he will have a vision of Gods purpose for him, for us.