Mrs_C quote of the decade:

Mrs_C said it a couple more times, slightly differently each time, but the core words are here:

"I thought you loved me so much you would never leave me, so I didn't ever consider what I might be doing to you with what I said and did."

did you miss that everyone?

let me repeat it in bold

"I thought you loved me so much you would never leave me, so I didn't ever consider what I might be doing to you with what I said and did."

Christmas Travel

We're going to visit my parents over Christmas.

I look forward to the travel. To going places with my children. I'm pretty knotted up inside about travelling with Mrs_C.

We have been civil but somewhat distant.

The trip is over some distance (air travel), and I am not sure how Mrs_C will make it through the "stress" of airports and plane switching and so forth.

I travel and have travelled, she hasn't done much of that.

Mrs_C gets stressed about anything out of routine. She gets stressed about special occassions. She gets stressed about any situation where someone might "judge her".

God knows how this will work out.

One of our really big fights this summer before we had the first "conversation" was her trying to tell me how to pack and travel.

I finally had to say: "You know, I've been around the world a few times without you telling me what to do, and I made it through all by myself. I think I'm competant enough to decide what to pack."

(yes, I really have been around [whole way] the world a few times)

My kids are pretty excited and Mrs_C and I have agreed to make the trip the best we can for them, and for my parents.

This trip is one of the elements that kept things from flying apart totally in our marriage. We didn't want to take it away from our children. I could have gone with them without Mrs_C, but it would have put quite a damper on things. At one point earlier this month she was saying she would stay behind and prepare the house for sale while I went with the kids (see post: Monday, November 28, 2005, So, I got played - again). Not ruining the trip and Christmas for the kids was what made me buckle then.

I'm about to puke my stomach is so knotted up. Not from the trip, but from whatever fucking bizarre off the wall shit Mrs_C will spew.

Or maybe she won't. Maybe she'll be contained and constrained in her reaction.

Either way, I'll be warm for a few weeks and that's a good thing.

I'll get to show off my newly more svelte self to my family.

I'll get to go on a plane trip with my kids.

They're excited and so am I.

OK, Cadbury, so what are you doing about it all?

Lara wrote (about me and her husband):

"The only person you can change is yourself."

"I can't force him to change, or to treat me like I think I deserve. But I can call him on his unfair comments. I can refuse to accept the undeserved slams. It is hard for me, as I tend to just take whatever he says & does... but I think the only way to fix things is to change myself to make the way he has treated me not work any more. For too long, he has gotten away with it."

One of my other friends said to me (when i decided to stay after the first go 'round):

"If she doesn't like who you are, maybe she'll like who you want to be."

---

As I whine on in this blog (yes, i know i shouldn't typify it as whining), I want to let you know about some of the things I have been doing. Since late September I have been:

1) losing weight - about 35 lbs so far
2) taken up daily exercise
3) undertaken a martial art

I am also:

1) going to a counsellor (being a guy who has always tried to deny emotion for logic, I think that some reflection of how I REALLY feel instead of how I SHOULD feel is in order)
2) writing down the things I think and feel (outside this blog)
3) making an EVEN STRONGER effort to do things with my kids (I have always been there for them, but I want to be there extra during this time)
4) i have begun learning piano (my kids are teaching me)
5) i have begun learning more than the pidgin french i currently speak (my kids are teaching me)
6) i have begun planning some of the travel i want to do and how to do it

---

I am focused and dedicated to becoming the person I want to be.

Not because it might attract Mrs_C - i'm pretty much done with that.

I want to live a life of exuberance, joy and travel, not a life of endless home renovations, chores, and hedge trimming (I like building things, just not endlessly, and to the exclusion of living life).

I want to greet each day with the freshness, enthusiasm, energy, and possibility of first light on a spring morning.

Oh, and one more thing, I'm going to be one of the muscular toned hard body guys the ladies at the VW CBB always pant over.

My daughter says she undertands it's not her fault

The other day my son [14] and daughter [10] and I were talking about things. In response to their questions, I had told them that it was still up in the air whether things would work out between their Mom and I.

My daughter said "Well, either way, I'm OK because I know that it's not my fault, and you guys need to just work out your own problems and make your own decision."

That is a siginificant change.

She used to believe she could impact our relationship and do something that would keep us together.

I was always worried she would feel guilty if we split - that she hadn't done something.

She's a real card-making, craft making, colour between the lines, teacher's dream child.

She has guilt issues and pleasing authority figures issues in my opinion...

She is my precious gem, but I can't relate to the please authority figures thing. Maybe scurry to please loved ones, I guess, but teachers? But she loves her teachers and her school and I'm pleased for her - she has had some just amazingly nice teachers (not my son, let me tell you. sorry if I'm dissing teachers buddha_girl - I suspect you would a teacher I would like. Did I mention I teach? [adult computer education])

Anyway,

she said she would be OK even if we did get a divorce, and that she knew it wouldn't be her fault or responsibility.

That's a big step, and a huge hurdle out of the way for me.

The impact on her was my largest anxiety subset.

Pending...

We had another "conversation the other night.

It always seems that Mrs_C has to find her courage in a bottle.

When we were dating and first married she drank a lot, and would often rip into me, but that tapered off when we had kids.

It was weird how she would drink a bunch, chew my ass off and then want to have sex. When we first got married it was bit of a pattern - she used to complain that I didn't want to have sex with her. I tried to explain at the time that I didn't want to have drunken sex with her after she had ripped me a new asshole. Psuedo-submissive play sex is one thing (or possibility), but actually being a doormat doesn't turn me on

SO anyway, the other night (around 10 pm), she had a few drinks and decided to broach the subject of why I was mad at her and why I would be thinking of leaving her. She then cut me off every time I tried to say anything - that's a standard tactic of Mrs_C - don't let the other person actually say anything. Mrs_C also knows that once I get going, there is almost no possibility of derailing my logic (underlying assumptions, maybe, but not the logic).

I got to listen to roughly three hours of lecturing about how I'm a lazy shitbag, and have been through most of our marriage. I had it explained to me that I have done only three nice things for her since we met, and that she has spent our whole marriage doing nice things for me, and I should be grateful - but instead of being grateful I'm just angry - and isn't that just a fine how-do-you-do... She also reminded me that I was unemployed and living a somewhat marginal existence when we met (no job yet after university - high unemployment in the area I lived in at the time) - her words were "Think about where you were when I found you...".

After I was actually allowed to speak - after she made several trips to the wine bottle and a couple of smoke breaks outside with appropriate slamming of doors (waking up my son [14]) - I explained that if I had been unable to do anything right in the last 17 years, maybe it was futile and I had better just be good about cutting her losses by getting out of her life as anything other than co-parent.

I proceeded to list all (well... lots) of the things that I have done to be apologetic for - and invited her to add any that i missed. I apologised yet again for my transgressions. I then asked her the same question I asked previously and cited when we had our first conversation:

Link to previous post: Wednesday, August 24, 2005: So, Mrs_C and I had "the conversation"

I once asked Mrs_C to name one thing she believed she had done wrong during our marriage, or one problem that was her fault or that she was responsible for.

once again the answer was the same:

She was unable to name a single one. I guess she's perfect.

I said that it was impossible that I had only done 3 nice things for her in our whole relationship. I then went on to cite a couple of dozen examples of me doing something nice (this barb/attack of me "never having done anything nice" has been thrown at me before, so i actually have a list that i have compiled and memorized for this situation)

I then asked her if she found it a reasonable proposition that any married person would have made no mistakes in 17 years in

their relationship. I asked her to just look inside herslef. She didn't have to name one, she just had to be honest with herself.

She couldn't rebut.

I described how I cared for her but felt an absence of passion. Physical desire, yes, attraction yes - but passion for the marriage or relationship - no.

She told me that I was the love of her life and that she would never love someone as much as me. She again said that if she

had known that what she was doing would drive me away, she would have never done it. Other special excerpts:

- "i thought you loved me so much that you would never leave, no matter what i said"
- "I don't want to grow old alone"
- "that's real nice of you, i'm a 46 year old woman, my youth is gone, and you're going to leave me now after 17 years, after you've spent me"

Things went in circles for awhile and I went to bed at around 3am because I had to work the next day. Mrs_C called in sick.

When I got home she told me that she had been thinking all day and that I had done plenty of nice things for her - she cited a bunch of additional ones I hadn't even thought of.

She said that she would wait for me to either find passion in our marriage or make my decision.

And there it sits this week.

Less hostility, more amiability.

Pending...

"WHY does she maneuver you to say you'll stay??"

Lara asked:

"I just don't get it. WHY does she maneuver you to say you'll stay?? Why does she want you there? She certainly doesn't TREAT you like she wants you there, so why not just let you move on? Does she just get off on being manipulative?"

---

I want to make sure that you are all aware of the following basic premises and starting conditions to my relationship with Mrs_C:

1) I dated a LOT. I was fully sexually active during my dating years.
2) I had no intention of marrying anyone when we met.
3) I had no real desire to have children (they are now the light of my existence).
4) On our second date I was sitting across from her sipping some wine and suddenly the thought raced across my brain "This is the mother of my children"
5) As I sat there pondering the improbability of the thought I had just had, this overwhelming yawning chasm of anguish at having to spend even a moment apart from this woman hit me. I waited over two years of dating to see if the feeling would go away - it didn't until just before Christmas 2004. It just vanished. I woke up one morning, and for the first time in some 17 years, the first thought on my mind wasn't wanting to make love to and hold Mrs_C.

Here's where I get really brutally honest:

I am not sure Mrs_C really loved me from the start. I have never been sure why she said she married me in the first place.

On good days I like to think she loved me.

On bad days I like to think that I am a pretty darn reasonable (more than reasonable) person and generally likeable guy, and that no-one else would put up with her shit, so I seemed a good choice...

I know that she cares for me - but is it really love in the passionate crying out sense? I don't think so.

I have had the following suspicions since we got married:

1) I was the only guy she had ever dated that would put up with her shit
2) I was so completely pleasant, benign, courteous, and friendly that she couldn't assign me to the same shithole all other men belong to (in her mind)...
3) She convinced herself that she loved me because I didn't frighten or upset her that way that all other men (except her father), frighten and piss her off.
4) Mrs_C was just looking for an appropriate party to have children with.

The above may sound weird, so it requires some other background:

- Mrs_C suffered abuse as a child
- She is attracted to men, but has a permanent hostility and distrust for men in general (with good reason, I have to add - she's been treated pretty shitty by a lot of men - not just in relationships, but professionally as well).

---

More as I think about the answer to Lara's questions.

Republished note to Briar Rose

This is part of an email sent to my friend Briar Rose. I think it is relevant to this discussion.

----

i apologise for involving you, even at this distance, in my pain

but it is what is happening

the thoughts and feelings of my friends let me know that i'm not alone

when it is over it will not be so bad

being stuck in the interim is the worst part - no moving ahead, the past withered

the thing that provides me with the most fortitude is this:

i say that i would die for my children. will i live for them as well?

they understand - they can see - that there is an undercurrent, but they are shielded from most of it. i can live through this time and see to it that their birthdays (clustered around these three months) and their christmas [we are all going on a trip togther] are not a time they remember with pain - i don't need them thinking of a break-up every year on their birthday. i don't even need mrs_c thinking about it every year on her birthday (same 3 month period) - that would be unkind.

----

again, i am sorry to expose you to my pain

Won't Get Fooled Again

Well, I've set a timeline in my own mind.

I have made up my mind that late february or early march will be departure day.

Let's see whether I can stick to it.

So, I got played - again

Had another conversation with Mrs_C on Friday night.

I had no intention of having such a conversation.

You see, on Tuesday night I made some advances toward her and got turned down flat. I don't just mean flat, I mean flat.

Mrs_C has been nicer in interpersonal dealings for awhile. I have been moody as shit (inwardly), I try to be pleasant and engaging (Mrs_C is quite sensitive to such things, I'm sure she knows I'm not quite the way I'm putting on. She doesn't mention it) in interpersonal relations. I am engaged and involved in family life and in Mrs_C's activities and interests.

My son asked me "If you're really mad at Mom, why are you being so nice?", my daughter asked "Does this mean there aren't any problems anymore?". Then she proceeded to tell me how I should take her mother on a dream date (daughter has been watching too much MusicTV, I think...).

I figured: if I'm just hanging around waiting for enlightenment or inspiration, it probably won't come. I'm going to adopt an obnoxiously pleasant attitude and demeanor, and see if it makes a difference.

I was interested and involved and paying for yet more fucking renovations, I gave her complete autonomy over our joint investments because she's into that now (after years of ignoring it, now she's become a stock market "expert" after reading a book, and making one good trade)

I don't give a shit about the money really. I have enough pension that the investments are more just pay off the house early funds.

So, anyway. Has it made a difference?

nnnnnoooooooottttttt (buzzer noise)

So, I get turned down bad the other night. Yeah, I know, but a guy gets worked up/horny and Mrs_C is still an attractive lady... I had myself steeled for never asking again. My steel melted.

I was just choked. It's not that I have a problem with being told no, it's just being told no every time. I sucked it up and just went to sleep that night, but was just bloody owly for several days. I was ready to leave on the spot. It just wrapped up all the whole deal for me.

She wants me as a companion, and a co-parent, but not as a lover and romantic interest.

She won't go out on "dates", she won't go on trips with just the two of us, she won't have quiet evenings at home.

I demand romance!!!!! (yes, really, I'm a guy)

I can't even get her to watch a romantic movie - all action and shit blowing up with her. Fuck. She cited "Once Upon A Time In Mexico" as a romance one time when I challenged her on it.

God Damn It!!!

When I raise going out I get told:

1) We cook better than restaurants do (true, but that's not always the point of going out)
2) There's no place to go (wrong)
3) It's too expensive (but we can spend hundreds and thousands continuously fucking renovating)

----

On Friday night we're in the vehicle going to rent a movie and she tells me that she's got her period and that if it hadn't happened we could have "gotten together" that night. I said "Oh, yeah..." She says, "No, really".

She then challenges me on whether or not I had been mad at her for the last few days. I said yeah.

I really can't figure out how the conversation went after that. I'm a really straightforward guy. I start in one place and move forward in a straight line. You can see me coming from miles away.

Mrs_C has expounded on her joy in maneuvering in arguments and disputes.

She got me to a place where I 'fessed up and said that I didn't think things were working. I did that because I knew she was maneuvering me, and even if I wasn't up to countering it, I wasn't going to have her pin me into saying I wasn't going to leave...

(To skip ahead, she got me to say I wasn't going to leave)

So, when I said it wasn't working, she wanted to know when we should split. I said January.

She said, Then I'm not going on this trip (over christmas) to visit your parents that they just paid for (many thousands of dollars for the whole family to go).

I can see her point in not going, but in my mind it's still just a maneuver for time - she got me to say I'd give our marriage awhile longer.

She knows that I don't break my word easily. She knows I am fanatically loyal, and that once committed to a course of action it is only mountains or immoveable objects that stop it.

So, I got played.

Again.

The above may not make much sense, but it's late, and I've just wrapped up a database query/report testing run I was waiting to finish, and I want to go home and sleep. Ask questions if you like. Maybe I'll elaborate on something after reading this again tomorrow myself

FEAR

This post was sitting for over a month in the can - I just didn't get around to publishing it because there was so much shit in my head that I couldn't express right - so I left it. Now it works as a stand alone (Nov. 28/05)

Before I begin, I want to say thank-you to buddha_girl for your words [comments on: Well, agreeing to stay was a waste of time.]

There is such a huge difference between what my head tells me and my emotions.

A huge part of what I am dealing with is the feelings (derived from Mrs_c's accusations) that a) I am actually entirely responsible for everything that is currently wrong in my life and my marriage; b) even if I leave to try to make things better for myself, my children will eventually come to despise me because their mother is right about me...

Yeah, I know in my head that it won't probably happen.

I know something about crafting language. I worry that I with my real world friends and with people here, I am just "smooth talking" everyone, and that I really am the untrustworthy, irresponsible bastard my wife has described me as.

I know in my head that she was abused as a child, both sexually (a male extended family member) and physically (beatings by her mother). I know that these sorts of behaviours are often multi-generational and that I am just a convenient target lots of times. But after 17 years, my teflon coating is worn down. I can't actually say that I ever had teflon coating, I had a place where I could put it. Now that place is all used up.

I know in my head the whole checklist of why I'm an OK human being, and who thinks I'm an OK human being.

When I become fearful. I try to think about the people who like me.

I think about the fact that I am the most selected (by parent vote) chaperone for school trips. I think about getting elected chair of various school projects.

I think about the fact that I actually have friends, and Mrs_C doesn't... (except for her sister).

----

I have fear that this is all just going to turn to shit

That I'm going to make a decision that will destroy everything

There are four lives involved. I don't care that much about how I might end up stuck in the mire. I worry about my kids. Yeah, I worry about Mrs_C.

And I did actually make a committment to stay with her for better or for worse.

So I stay.

So I wonder.

I think about might be's every day.

Well, agreeing to stay was a waste of time

The conversation described in the Thursday, September 29, 2005 post Apartment hunting: the aftermath ocurred on the last weekend of August.

It is now the middle of October.

Staying was pretty much a waste of time.

It worked better from a financial standpoint - two more months of shared expenses, not having to buy all the inevitable items for independent living, and god knows whatever other unforeseen expenses.

It works for the kids, I suppose - a couple more months of everyone still under the same roof.

Mrs_C has stopped ripping into me regularly. For someone who said she had no idea that she was constantly berating me, it sure stopped in a hurry when I said I wanted to leave - like a light switch it stopped.

The relationship is now almost without substance - except for parenting. We have always done that well.

Have you ever been on a business trip or something where you are temporarily sharing accomodation with another adult whom you are not friends with, but are on polite terms with? That pre-naturally calm, polite, over-polite consideration you give to your temporary roommate so as to not cause any offence.

That's what it's like.

I still don't think she wants to be with me. I think she just wants to see if we can be adequate companions.

She avoids discussions about us, or about feelings.

However, the home renovation express just keeps on rolling.

I have refused to pay for any of the stuff related to the new renovations. In the past I rang up credit cards and lines of credit to pay for it. Now I'm paying down debt and hoarding cash in the event of a split.

This sucks.

It's empty, and it's hollow.

Apartment hunting: the aftermath

My daughter (10yrs old) came upstairs as I said I had been looking for apartments and heard. Mrs_C said "Well you've accomplished your goal in hurting me. Why tell me that? Why tell me while we're getting ready to go out [ETA 2 hours later]? Why tell me that when we have people coming over for your birthday tomorrow? Why couldn't it wait until Monday? Why couldn't you have lied?"

(FYI: Ironically, I had previously been told that lying about any subject would be cause for divorce)

Our daughter was quiet as her mother walked out the door into the backyard.

I waited for a minute and followed.

As i went outside my Dad arrived with my son. Dad's timing has always been impeccable...

I had to send him away quickly.

I sent my son into the house.

I went to the backyard to talk to Mrs_C.

She refused to talk about it and said we would just get ready to go out and deal with it later.

Fine

----

We went to her sister's place for an immediate family only event. While we are both good actors, the folks there could tell there was some tension between us (you could see it in the way they looked back and forth between us trying to get a read on the situation.

After about a half hour Mrs_C, her sister, and her mother decided to go for a walk before supper (the men were cooking [BBQ]). Mrs_C said to the ladies "Let's go and I'll tell you all my troubles".

When they arrived back they all looked daggers at me. However, decorum was maintained. We generally socialised separately that evening.

----

Mrs_C has always had an issue surrounding alcohol. When we first started dated she always got sloshed and got really weepy (Even her Mom said once "oh, yeah, she's drunk and weeping again...")

I haven't the same desire to have a drink that she does (no, I've raised the roof a fair bit in my day - I'm no tee-totaller - but i have control), so I weaned alcohol out of our lives for the most part. Mrs_C followed my relatively abstemious lead (and silent disapproval when she got hammered) and didn't drink much throughout the last 15 or so years (having kids to be concerned about also reduced her propensity toward alcohol).

Did I mention that I can't stand the drunken Mrs_C? She isn't a fun drunk. Her emotions wheel out of control, she becomes maudlin, and then starts inevitably crying.

I can't stand it. I can't stand it. I can't stand it. I can't stand it.

----

Mrs_C got maudlin and drunk. Didn't say a public word at her sister's about the situation, though.

At the end of the evening I got her and the kids home. Got the kids to bed and went to face her where she was sitting in the family room.

We talked.

I explained that what I really wanted was someone who wanted me.

She told me that there was lots of guys who would have her, and that I was looking for someone I should just go.

I said I believed she thought I was a bother and a pain to have around. I said that I couldn't live that way anymore, thinking that she was only tolerating me. I tried to explain that I had used the word "someone" because I was already under the impression that she had no interest in me, and had therefore not used to word "you", already having discarded an appeal to her as pointless.

Mrs_C said she had no idea that I thought she didn't want me, and said it was a foolish and unbased impression.

I listed about 2 dozen examples of when she had told me to "et out". Yes, those words: "Get out", "Either its you or it's me, but one of us is moving out" - the examples go on. They were all pretty much to the point - no mistaking intent...

I pointed out that we had had sex very few times in the 8 months previous, and that she had gone to the point of telling me not to even touch her.

I listed a substantive number fo times that she had directly told me she would be better off without me, and the times she said that except for the children, she would have been better off if she had never met me.

She first said that if she had made me live that way, and that if she had put me through that kind of stress, that she understood why I would want to leave, why I have the stress related condition I have, and that "as a friend, as someone who still cares about you - if you are in a marriage that makes you feel that way, you should get out."

She then said that given the number of examples I cited, she understood where I got the impression she didn't want me around. Then she said she didn't really mean it and only said it in anger. Well, she meant it at the time, but it went away with her anger each time. She said she would have never said it if she thought I took it seriously.

She started to cry.

She let out a wail of complete anguish that slipped deep into my soul. She said "I don't want to grow old alone."

She then told me she really did want me to stay with her. I agreed to stay and to try to work through things.

As my queasy stomach turns

I went out on the weekend after my last post. I looked at apartments.

I picked one near our house so that my son could go home to care for his pets after school (he wants to move out with me).

I went home and Mrs_C asked me where I had been so long. I thought about lying to her, but chose not to.

I had the suspicion that she thought that telling her where i had been was an expression of anger, not an expression of intent. I wanted to underline the fact of my intent for her.

There might have been a subconscious desire to hurt her in there someplace (her opinion), but my real and largest motivation was to not lie.

----

I have lied to Mrs_C in the past. I have regularly lied about my feelings - being hurt or angry or whatever (I truly hate discord and fighting [part of the reason I've rolled over for almost 20 years with Mrs_C]), and I lied about the state of my business (about 10 years ago) - we had a rough spot in the business and Mrs_C was on my back every day because I was working 14-16 hours a day and cash was tight. I negotiated some financing and tax issues without discussing them with Mrs_C until after the fact (BTW - she was not a partner/employee and had told me she didn't want to be in the operation). The deals allowed me to spread some of the costs/lost revenues of my business partner's non-delivery of some work over a few years.

I have been told that not telling her in advance was an error of biblical proportions. It probably was. I was pretty freaked at the possibility of being sued and took the easy way out (easy in the interpersonal/marriage sense). I was trying to avoid having her on my back as well as the clients. When Mrs_C gets stressed about something (even if it is not my fault - like something her boss did to her at work) she will spend a lot of time (sometimes days) ripping into me. At the above mentioned time I just couldn't cope with more on my plate.

Since then Mrs_C has brought this situation up again and again as her example of how she can't trust me.

I said then, and I say now, I was trying to avoid the pain and suffering of having to explain the situation to her (and the lengthy diatribe that would have followed) and having to explain how this "failure" could have happened and why hadn't I listened to Mrs_C's plan for the business.

Her plan for the business usually involved re-telling me my own analysis of my own mistakes that I had told her a few days before.

I was in a highly technical computer/internet business. She didn't know shit about the business - still doesn't.

My business partner had some skills I didn't. We worked on mostly separate elements of our projects.

I found out he wasn't doing some of his work for some clients and had missed a bunch of deadlines (he subsequently had a nervous breakdown).

I hired out, fixed the problems, negotiated the abrogation of some of the contracts where the relationships had deteriorated to the point of no return, and wound down the business and the partnership. I was going to continue in business on my own.

Mrs_C had been instrumental in driving out a third partner when the business had started, and had been instrumental in driving away some contract employees as well - she was highly aggressive toward them and all but accused them of stealing from us.

She had been telling me to get rid of my remaining business partner since pretty much we started the business (At the time we started the business he was one of 3 people in our entire province that had the specific skill that was needed - the other two were already employed, and he happened to be a friend of 15 years).

----

No - there was no bankruptcy. Yes, there was financial pressure on me, and it left me paying off some debt for several years. Mrs_C's cash flow was not disrupted. My take-home income was exactly the amount I had predicted and she had agreed was adequate when the business plan was created. It just wasn't enough to deal with Mrs_C's newly enlarged spending plans on our house, and didn't allow the vacation she had decided we needed to go on.

I know it may sound like I am gratuitously bashing Mrs_C but she has a history of moving targets throughout our relationship.

I folded the business, mostly because she couldn't cope with what she felt was the lack of certainty of income, and got a salaried job. My job income was higher than I was making in the business and was adequate to make my payments and have enough to finance the expanded spending plans as presented to me by Mrs_C when I wound down the business.

Her new plans got upgraded further. My income was then short of the new plan/target. My inadequate contribution to the family and our finances have been subsequently pointed out.

(oddly enough, whenever my income goes up [as i got raises and better jobs], the new spending plans always just outreach my new income)

----

Back to the present:

I didn't feel like lying.

I told her I looked at apartments.

She looked like I'd punched her in the stomach.

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Soon: the aftermath

So, Mrs_C and I had "the conversation"

This will be potentially a little incoherent.

I have no idea why I'm posting this.

Well, actually I do know why I'm posting.

Myssa wrote:

"Well you can use it to post your own stuff as well..."


Lara wrote:

"Hope you post some of your own stuff as well!"

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I'm in pain, and you ladies showed me a moment (actually, have shown me a whole history) of kindness. And I'm taking advantage of it (and you, I guess).

So I'm talking/typing/blogging - diarizing I guess.

We had "the conversation" this last weekend after returning from traveling. You know - the one about divorce and separation.

I have been thinking about this constantly since before Christmas - you know, the one with the leather coat for her, and the sweater for me (read my post on Lara's blog here).

We had a bad patch at Christmas and she told me one of us would be out the door once the holiday season was done. Things became half-assed civil, but have been strained since then.

* Mrs_C thinks I'm always angry.
* Mrs_C tells me I don't do enough around the house.
* Mrs_C is constantly telling me what to do, because I "can't seem to do anything correctly".

My children tell me that I'm not always angry - that I'm usually happy - and other friends and family (including hers) say I am calm and polite at almost all times.

My co-workers think I am funny and gregarious.

My wife's sisters say they wish their husbands would do as much as I do. They base their comments on both observation and on what Mrs_C tells them I do. Mrs_C says I am only nice to her and do things when there is an audience. I tracked my daily activities for several weeks one time. Before telling her about the results I asked Mrs_C if I had been doing more than usual that period. She said that my activity level was normal. She blew a gasket when I presented the activity report and told her that I thought she was wrong about me only doing things for show. All I asked was that she stop accusing me of that. I was in the shithouse for weeks after.

I have a responsible job. I am considered highly competent by everyone else I know. Mrs_C constantly tells me I'm not doing things right.

Mrs_C has been known to recite for hours (on one occasion for 4 days straight - waking 'til sleep) my shortcomings as a human being and as a partner in a relationship.

I once asked Mrs_C to name one thing she believed she had done wrong during our marriage, or one problem that was her fault or that she was responsible for.

She was unable to name a single one. I guess she's perfect.

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When I am in a state of emotional turmoil, my defense mechanism is to be very neutral and measured.

This drives Mrs_C up the wall.

I have been very civil, but um - "pre-naturally calm" since Christmas.

I have expressed my feelings in a level and calm manner since Christmas. I have expressed my unhappiness with the lack of passion in our marriage, the casual disdain with which I believe she holds me, and the constant nit-picky criticism. I have expressed my feelings about the fact that we had sex a grand total of 3 times since November of last year (2004).

In June I asked her if she found me attractive any more, and why she never wanted to be intimate. Her response was to pull off her top, pull off her bottoms and tell me to go ahead if that's what I wanted. I said no, that I actually only wanted an answer to the question. She became very aggressive physically to engage in sex. I walked away.

After that very bad scene between us, I decided that I would wait until the end of summer to tell her that I believe it is over and that I should move out.

Our children are aware that there is trouble and are expecting a divorce or separation (they have talked to me, and tell me that their mother is oblivious to the potentiality - I think they're kids and don't recognise the denial their mother is in).

My son will be moving with me, my daughter will be staying (or so she told my son - not me). Mrs_C is unaware of this.

We didn't end up setting a move out date because of logistics and being unsure how we would approach the kids on the subject.

We are currently in a weird state of "suspended animation". We are terribly polite and accommodating.

I am tired all the time.

I'm up because I needed to think about this, and now have typed this up for you to read.

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During the conversation about separation, she told me that if I would just get my shit together everything would be OK.

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I feel like shit.

I'm a little overweight and have some male pattern baldness issues, but am otherwise a thoroughly charming and engaging person.

I feel passionless inside the marriage.

I can be excited and animated other places. People like me.

Why not my wife?

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I keep asking myself if she could be right, and I'm really the problem.

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I have friends.

My wife has co-workers she gets along with, but no friends.

She will only hang out with her sisters or mother.

We have had non-family members (other than kid's friends) over 4 times in the last 6 years.

I used to love to entertain (still get what joy I can from family visits).

Mrs_C gets out of hand anxiety when people are coming to the house. No matter how clean, it's never clean enough. No matter how much food I buy, it's too much - until the moment it needs to be served and then it's not enough.

I just gave up.

I told her in the spring that I insisted we were going to entertain more. She has found excuses every time.

Birthdays and Leather Coats

transcribed from a comment on Lara's Blog

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To commiserate, my wife and kids forgot my birthday for the last two years...

hmmm (further thought)

"And the husband? Well... he told me he was going to get me one of those kneeling computer chairs for my birthday. That's great, because I have some back problems and I know it would be good for me. Plus I had it on a list of gift suggestions sitting around on my desktop, so he knew he was getting something I wanted. Only then last night he told me I could order one."

Sounds familiar - you're husband may have genetic material or psychic space in common with my wife.

Last Christmas season, my wife had been extremely regularly saying she wanted power tools for over 8 months.

Being the swift guy I am, I took this as a hint

So, 2 days before christmas I said something to the effect of "Well, i'm off to pick up the most interesting of the power tools" (I hadn't mentioned my gift purchase prior to that, but she had made some reference to me buying power tools [I wanted to show I was an attentive and responsive mate/male/husband]).

My dear wife then said (with a hurt tone in her voice) "You mean you didn't get me a leather coat?"

I said "Oh. I thought you wanted power tools."

She said "Well, that's OK, I suppose."

I left. I returned all the power tools. I bought a full length insulated (she always feels cold) leather coat - a REALLY nice one - full price (didn't have 6 months to shop around for a bargain).

It was a hit. I couldn't afford it, but I knew it needed to be as good or better than the ones her sisters had.

I also bought other clothing items, and a plethora of gifts with/for the kids to give her.

As for me, I got a sweater that she had puchased from a designer discount store (I saw it there one time while standing around waiting - she had asked me if I liked it) - $25.

My daughter gave me a hand drawn card - it is still on my bulletin board. My son felt bad he hadn't thought of getting me a gift. Mrs. didn't seem to notice about the kid gifts.

Come spring, it was nearing our anniversary. The winter insulated coat was now too warm - I heard about this a lot.

Another expensive spring/summer weight leather coat later my anniversary giift was an astounding success (price only mentioned, because while I am doing decently financially, I am not rich. With kids/lessons $700-$1000 is still a chunk of change that requires thought before shelling out).

Mrs. also loved the kids gifts (reminders and shopping trip for the kids courtesy of yours truly).

I got a shirt from the same discount designer shop ($20). Did I mention that my wife makes about 10% more than me? We split household bills equally. She has no car payment, I do.

My daughter made me another card. I pre-emptively told my son it was OK.

My birthday is this weekend.

We'll see.

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transcribed from a comment on Lara's Blog

I created this blog to post on Lara's blog as something other than anonymous

I created this blog to post on Lara's blog as something other than anonymous