mimi,

you are right...I am in plan B what do I care about that e-mail.

I feel very free at this moment...The e-mail hit me for about 10-15 minutes, then I started feeling fine. I actually find this whole sitch amusing in a way...because I am feeling whole and happy and I know that I am going to be ok.

sdg,

That is correct about CA. I will not offer him any $$$ for this point. In an odd turn of events (becaus ein the past, this was my hugest issue), the only thing that seems to rile my WH right now is money. I said that to him as well on the phone and he said "I never used to be like this"

So, I say hit it where it hurts.

I will not force my children to go for a visit if they do not want to. I am happy to let them go when they want to but will protect them when they don't feel they have the strength to do it. He can take me back to court if he wants to fight me on this...the same as for the overnights.

Most of the time when I don't budge, he gives up...so I hope that will be the case here as well.

Mimi, I agree with you on the darkness, I was just letting IHC know that breaking plan B is something that we RATIONALIZE for one reason or another, none of which bear any merit. Dark is best, and it WORKS.

I'm dark again, and I'm glad for it. I really would like a recovered marriage, and Plan B can get me there. I am also able to focus on ME, and my son. Outside of talking over wayward thinking here, I don't WONDER about what he is thinking; his brain is disengaged right now.

silent,

I am headed that way...not to even think about what he is thinking. In reality, his last e-mail was like that of a stranger. I have NO idea who this person is that sent that e-mail to me. I don't recognize the thinking or anything to do with it. So, I will continue on in plan B until it is no longer necassary.

Thank you for the quick 2X4's there are much needed and appreciated.

I know I said this before, but it really did help ME in that I unloaded everything that had been weighing me down...so now I am free, even though it meant a set back in my bigger goal. I will not make this mistake again, but I can't change it so I am going to focus on the positive that it brought and not kick myself tooo hard.

Thanks guys!!!

Hi, IHC.

Just checking in. I haven't ever been where you are, so don't really have much advice.

Thank goodness for your LSA being worded the way it is!

Now you have some teeth and can just not agree to any overnight visits. Nice and easy, your intermediary can handle it (did that e-mail come throughyour intermediary?).

How are you with the IL's? Maybe you can arrange a night or weekend for the kids withthem -- but make it clear to the IL's that these visits can only continue to happen if there is no OW or OW's house allowed.


I'm pretty mixed on the idea of letting a child decide if they will visit the other parent. While OW is an issue, I can understand it ... but as far as deciding to not see dad ... I think this is the time when you have to make really good decisions for the kids, not necessarily bending to their wishes. Like making them eat vegetables. They may not like it, and may wish they could have desert or play video games instead, but YOU choose whats good for them.


You sound like you're doing really well. Glad to hear that!

-AmI.

I don't ask the kids if they want to, I tell them they are going to their dad's on such and such day. When I have allowed them to stay home is when they come to me and express (usually emotionally) that they do not want to go.

Personally, I could use some me time so it is not benefitting me at all. It is hard to tell your child who is in teard and visibly upset that they have to do something they are very clearly stating they do not want to do...

Food analogy...not gonna force my kids to eat liver, when I know that they prefer chicken, probably won't even make it to start with....lame analysis I know!!!!

LOL!! Great point. I hate liver, and wouldn't make my kids eat it, either. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I didn't mean to imply that you were making bad decisions or doing anything wrong. So I'm sorry if it came across that way. I'm a little over-sensitive in this area having been on both ends of some fabulous "don't want to go with (whichever parent)...." tantrums.

What I really meant was that those decisions are hard, and even harder given the ugly A sitch ... too complex and emotional and guilt-inducing for a kid to have to deal with. If they "get" to make that decision, then they are put in a place of having to choose sides, "betray" one parent in order to have a relationship with the other, etc.

So I feel very strongly that the adults are the ones who have to be smart and make those decisions for the kids. In this case, that's you, since your WH is obviously not making good decisions right now. The kids need to know it is an adult decision, that their thoughts will be considered, but you will decide what's best for them.

And I do think that sometimes that could include going to see their dad even if they don't want to.

I never wanted to go see my dad, even though he was a Disney dad and all about fun and excitement once we got there. It was an interruption of my social life, it was uncomforatble to stay at a different house, weird to not really know the rules there, I figured my mom would be mad at me if I DID want to go .... I had lots of reasons and could come up with great excuses. I'm still glad my mom didn't let me make those decisions.

-AmI.

WS's e-mail (unlike Mimi, I enjoy dissecting WS babble) <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

WS:....IHC after talking to you I don't agree with you! When I have my kids it is my time not yours. You cannot tell me what to do. I DO NOT BELONG TO YOU ANYMORE! Please keep your opinions to yourself. You have the right to raise the kids your way on your time and I also have that right on my time. I'M NOT AN ALCOHOLIC, NOR A DRUG-USER, the way that you express yourself about me makes everything seem as if this is totally my fault. I have a new focus on my life and it is primarily for the kids. Everything that I do from now on is for there benefit. You may think that I don't care about them, but I do very much and when it is my time to be with them I would like them all to come. It is not fair to them or to me. It is not up to you how I live my life, you think that just because I'm not with you that I have abandoned my faith in God, think again. I will no longer bend to your will or to your decisions IHC.

Here's my type of response:

WS,
Very interesting e-mail. Your style of writing has changed. Gone a bit feminine?!!?!?? Hm....

Ok, well since you have babbled on so, here's real food for thought:

1. Raising children with different standards is harmful. You do realize this right? If so, reconsider what you wrote.

2. As for 'telling you what to do'....don't be juvenile, you should KNOW what to do.

3. Why do you feel the need to say you are NOT an alcoholic and a drug user? Are you giving people that impression?

4. As for what is your fault, seems you are already condeming yourself. So you can see it also but don't want to admit it? Hm.... very interesting way to go through life. Whose teaching you to be like that?!?!??

5. You think you are doing all this chaos for the primary benefit of your children? Where are you learning having an A, abandoning your family is for their benefit? Is it the drugs, alcohol or the OW that's making you babble such stupidity? Hm....... You realize most of those who have seen you just can't see your actions as benefiting anyone's family. You do see it right?

6. Fair to the children is hard to do when their own father is having an A. So stop whining about needing to be fair and learn to do what is right. ALL THE TIME!!! Think, what will _______(insert WS' name) do in behalf of their family that is actually good for the family?


7. As for the 'bending' issue..... you don't know how to bend so don't try. The WS will snap before he will bend. My real H on the other hand was quite flexible since he knew how to put the interests of others ahead of his own.

Now here's something to chew on..... if you were to get a letter sent to you like what you wrote to me....would you buy all that stuff?

Bye,
BS

Ok, that's my take. I did a similar response to my then WS.

L.

AmI,

I think that you are right in some respects with the whole sending the kids issue. I did not take your comment in any way except the one in which it was written, so thank you!!!

I can see how for my younger ones this is very true. They often complain about doing something but once they are there, they enjoy it. the older ones are different a little to me in that they do not always choose to stay home. Sometimes they just seem like they don't have the strength to go...I can understand that and want to respect them for that. I know that if they get enough courage up to call their dad and say they don't want to go, that they really know they don't want to. So far, it has been randomly spread out. No one has not gone more than once in a row. Not like they go often anyway, but it hasn't been extreme absence of visitation.

I see both sides of this though...I really am thinking hard about what to do. I really do have thier best interests in mind.

I feel like their dad has forced a lot of growing up on them and I really want to be respectful of their feelings during this time. If I were to see a pattern developing of someone not going regularly, then I would step in and talk with them.

My WH doesn't even have beds for them. Lives in a 2 bedroom place where they had to sleep on the floor...so 5 kids on the floor? Not great! Luckily kids aren't picky!

IHC

Orchid,

I like your thinking!!!LOL

If I thought one bit of that truth would break through the hold that stupidity has on him, I would send it!!!

One thing I find odd is that when WH speaks to me, he hears truth and recognizes it. then he walks away and lets his head get all clouded up again and he sounds like a different person. This is why he doesn't like to talk to me. I am calm and rational and the things I say make sense. His world does not.

It clearly shows that he is deep in the fog...and in a way that is reassuring to me...that he is not lost to me forever.

IHC

Signs that your H is still in there are great. That's one of the challenges of Plan B, I think, is that you don't get to see them (and aren't supposed to look for them, either).

When WW dropped off the kids last weekend, "they" brought me a box of my favorite kind of Girl Scout cookies. I said nothing about them (but still ate the cookies).

How observant your "children" are. That's amazing...mine couldn't tell you that info to save their lives!!!

I am finding plan B a teeny bit scary right now...

I feel in control for the first time in this whole thing (short triggers aside) which makes me feel more confident. I feel like there is such a thin line between letting go and holding on. It's almost as if you do plan b right, you can move on. So, keeping yourself from moving on then becomes the challenge.

I really want my M restored, but I am still not feeling "emotionally" attached to it happening right now. And contact with the WS is the worst thing to have right now. It just makes you angry which make a LB withdrawl.

IHC

Enjoy the feeling of control so that you can remember it when you get triggered. It will happen.

I think the feeling that you're having, of being ready to move on, may serve you well in RECOVERY, if you choose to try. You will be in a place that your boundaries will not be budged. You will not come straight from an emotional place into each conversation. You will probably be level-headed and REAL. It could be a good thing.

I know!

I am learning that just about the time I get everything all lined out and undersatnd where I am going...poof another curve to the road.

I usually have these secure points for about 2-4 weeks, then slump to the other end and then back again...

But, at least I am learning to take it all in stride. I know that another down time will be coming, so I am just waiting and when/if it comes, I will be ready...and then I will post here like a sad little girl!!!

Then I will feel amazing again...maybe for a longer time, then another trigger, so back to the whining, but again for a shorter time...

Eventually, I hope to just be me, ALL the time!!!

IHC

sl,

I hope that will be the case as well. I know that when I spoke to him last week, I was very calm and resolved and knew exactly what i wanted to say and how to say it.

If recovery were to have been tried sooner not that there was this option), I don't know that I could have held my tongue and not LB'ed all over the place. Now I know that I could have that control over my tongue.


I really hope that the conversation did not blow my chances for recovery. I know I felt ok about the contact, but not at the risk of losing recovery.

Hopefully that will not be the case. I am dark again...no response to the e-mail (not sure that he wrote it anyway!), he cannot draw me out again. Or so I tell myself right now... LOL!!!!

I like the dark...it's quiet and relaxing!

IHC

Ok, so because I am not going to respond to WH latest rant, I am going to post the thoughts that have been ringing through my head since I read it.

1. How on earth did you even come to the conclusion that this conversation had anything to do with me wanting you to "belong to me" Nothing I said had anything to do with wanting you back. In fact, when you tried to talk about "us", I clearly redirected the conversation.

2. Since when did abandoning your family, taking up drinking, smoking, and sleeping and living with a woman that is not your wife become part of the "Christian faith" ? Last time I checked the Bible still held these things as no no's...especially the "sleeping" part. (drinking...only as an excess) I think there might be quite a few more Christians if these are the new standards!

3. Since when is leaving your children for another woman making them your "primary" focus. Last time I checked it was not highly recommended! In addition, neither is introducing that person as your friend and then 2 weeks later living with her easy on the kids, nor in their "best interest!!!!!

But what do I know, I am just the person who made your life miserable for the past 13 years. God, what am I thinking acting like I have a right to say what my kids can and cannot do. Shame on me...

PS maybe next time you can type it yourself

AHHH, I feel so much better!

IHC

AmI,

I have missed you...you should come back to GQII...

IHC

Sooo, the WH is angry...very angry. I put my foot down and said NO to the overnight at his and OW's apt. He doesn't get it...

Told int. that I the kids better be there when he comes to pick them up.

I had her call back and say they would not be unless he agreed to my condition of staying at his moms. Reiterated the fact that our visitation plan is "mutually agreed upon visitation" and that I do not agree to the place he is taking them. He stated he would take me back to court.

Then he called back a few minutes later to say he would pick them up at 8 on Sat.

He really thinks this is about me controlling him, when it really only has to do with me caring for and protecting my kids.

I know once we go back to court, things will change and he would be able to do what he wants, however I will not allow it until then. Even at the expense of not getting CS until it is garnished.

Am I going overboard on my point...will it help to send info to WH (thru int.'s) that shows the effect of what he wants to do on his kids...do they see it ever?

I at this point don't care what he does, except as to how it affects my kids..


IHC

I wish I knew. You've probably read my thoughts on this elsewhere. I think that, being both BS and mother, you may have better luck than I would. CA courts, right?

With respect to spreading info, I don't think it will accomplish anything. In my case, I was really hoping that the ILs would do some of this, but they appear to be spineless.

How are you with your MIL? Can you explain to her that you'd love the kids to stay over there this weekend, and be able to spend time with them and their dad. But it will only happen if the kids stay there .... and will never happen again if they stay with the afairees?

I think you're doing the best thing you can to stand your ground on this. It's such a core principal. Kids can't grow up learning that adultery is ok ... heck, dad did it, we even went and spent the night with him and his girlfriend .... gag!!!! You aren't preventing him from seeing them. And your REAL H would be thanking you for defending you kids from a sitch like that.

You probably need to explain fully to the kids .... Dad will spin this like crazy once he gets to them.


BTW .. thanks for the sweet thought. Sorry I missed it until now. <img src="/ubbt/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> I'm around here a little more now ... was gone & out of town for a while.

I liked your rant to WH ... wish they would listen to stuff like that!

Has he been paying the CS like he's supposed to? And what happened with the paperwork -- where you filed for LSA and he wrote D on the papers? Kept meaning to ask you what came of that?

What have you been doing to take care of YOU recently????

-AmI.