Today I fly back to home. I’ve had an amazing trip visiting with my family. It was good to go take a break from all the crap.
The Process Begins
I have a little bit of a pit in my stomach about going back because now all the work begins to plan our new lives. It’s gonna be expensive, emotional for me, and hectic to do while we have to maintain our daily lives. While I’m embracing us moving on from our marriage, I’m still not totally convinced that she is clear headed but maybe because we were together for so long, she’s gonna need this trial by fire to figure out who she is as a person. I’m happy for her growth and look forward to us having a more up front relationship as friends but I’m not convinced yet that she doesn’t have a ’special someone’ waiting in the wings and that she’s keeping her eye on that prize/fantasy, and protecting it.
At this point though that stuff doesn’t even matter and learning and accepting that is the work I have to do to start detaching myself from the past and growing personally. Unfortunately, with all the stuff we now have to take care of this summer to start our new lives, it’s gonna be at least a couple months before we can truly start the new path and have our own places. I can’t begin the healing process until that happens.
She already *appears* to be happy and moved on but I think that will change a couple months into this, once she starts working (which will be a lot because our area is expensive), if she ends up dating this guy from the martial arts studio right away (I have feeling she will), it’ll be very clear to me where her head is at. Frankly, I want no part of that. If she starts dating him right away, I don’t want to know about it, what she’s doing, when, why, etc. It’ll distract me from working on myself and won’t be healthy. I’m not in a space yet where I’m ready to hear about her new relationships and feel ok about it.
I started a divorce checklist and sent it to her and stated that I really want things to be mellow and smooth for the kids. The interesting thing is that her response is very direct, wordy, and responsive. She’s extremely motivated to make this divorce happen and with the most amazing attitude. I’m happy about that for the sake of the situation, but as someone who does care about her as a friend, I question the fact I haven’t seen any grieving or sadness or real emotion from her about this whole thing. She’s a very emotional person and this is just one of a few red flags there that stick out to me for her sake. That’s the only reason I think she has her eye on a prize right now and *nothing* is gonna get in her way. If I find later I’m full of shit with what I just said, I’m cool with that. It just feels like something is on the rebound.
Even after 15 years of our marriage and going through all this, I have no desire to date right now. I have no one or want to have anyone in the wings. I need to just work on me for now. I hope she’s truly focusing on the same.
Heading Home Shortly
I’ll be hopping on a plane shortly to head back and start facing all this. I had a sit down with my uncles, cousins and grandparents explaining the situation as well. Of course they’re all very understanding and sad but have my back 200%.
Tonight we have our first meeting to discuss the plan/details moving forward. I have anxiety about it but also look forward to it so that I can start working on a game plan. I’m just scared of what emotions it will bring up. I really want to stay calm through this as much as possible. My wife is still overly bubbly and jovial about this stuff and it’s burning me a little. I think I need to tell her that this is, as I mentioned before, not a happy time for me, I’m ready to do business with her on this divorce but I’m not ready to be good friends yet. I haven’t had time to heal from this.
My mom said that when she went through her divorce, it took them a few months to be able to be friends. I think for me it will take at least that.
End Of The Day
Well it’s been interesting since I got back. I stopped by a friends house for her birthday and hung out to unwind. It was nice.
The wife and I had our first meeting today and it went fairly well. I had to break the news to her that I’m not in the phase where I’m capable of being her friend right now. I told her I intend to be good friends with her at some point, but it’s too early for that. I’m still in the healing/recovery phase of this so I’m not liking her very much right now. That’s just how it is. It kinda caught her off guard.
Anyway….I’m happy with the breakdown. She appears to want to be as reasonable as me with little negativity.
Now off to bed…
