Yeah, so I've been venting mostly to small groups of friends... but this really got me this morning.
G has M this week because I feel that M is belligerent, disrespectful and reacts violently to consequences that I impose on his behavior and actions. And I react badly in turn. So I figured we needed a break and that G needed some "real-time" parenting - not just one night mid-week or a fun weekend or a vacation.
Well, it turns out that he's not thrilled with having to bring him back and forth to school, or with having to get Emma organized in the AM.
Today he called to check on the weekend schedule - mind you we've gone over this several times, but with regards to his children's schedule, he has a mind like a sieve.
So I remind him that I'll bring M over after sports practice and will bring E too (why not? They're a package deal and I have to leave at 7 AM for a training thing I'm involved in) and that he needs to bring M to sports practice Sat. morning - probably when he's on his way to the house where he's planned to do more cleaning out and packing. I figured he'll be involved in that for the day while I'm gone.
He tells me he'll be busy packing and moving... I tell him welcome to my world of parenting in real life, and that he should get used to it.
He tells me I "have to take them once in a while"
Really?
OMG, I didn't know whether to guffaw or just call call him an asshole. I reminded him that I've had them for 9 months. NINE MONTHS! And did he even ONCE ask if his *not having them was inconvenient for me? Did he even ONCE ask if the weekends he went to another state to see his gf or travelled on business or went out of the country were convenient FOR ME?! no. of course not.
Then he told me I should get a full-time job. (which is an inevitability, but that's not the point) The point is, if I have a full-time job, and he is SO BUSY with his Very. Important. Job. and Busy. Schedule.- then *who will take the kids to their sports practices at 4 PM, and pick them up after school, or get them again at 6? (Yeah, I know there are friends and neighbors to trade off with - that's not the point here) The point here is that HE is NOT AVAILABLE to do that. I am. At least for now.
And this is the guy who wants equal custody. Right.
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So...
I've been thinking about this a lot this past week because I was frankly puzzled by your behavior last weekend.
What were you thinking coming up to me and shaking my hand and saying "How are you?"
Ours is not a social relationship.
The only reason I need to know anything at all about you is because my children will be spending time around you.
You might be a nice person, but since I don't know you, the only basis I have to form an opinion is that you are a woman who is okay with being in a relationship with a married man. And you are a mother willing to bring her 14 year old daughter into that relationship. Frankly, I have no respect for someone like that.
I don't know what you've been told, but despite problems in our relationship, I loved him. I begged him to go to counseling and to work together to repair our marriage. We were married for 18 years and friends for 7 years before that.
I was not invited to the high school reunion. I know now that he was having an affair with a stripper from North Carolina, so it makes sense that he was pulling away from me. I drove back to [our home town] with our son so that he could participate in a wrestling tournament. I thought I was giving my husband time on his own to enjoy his high school memories. Silly me. I wonder what he told you? That he was unhappy? That I didn't understand him? That I neglected him?
Did he tell you that he put me down, called me a loser (and worse) in front of our children? That he was verbally and emotionally abusive and physically threatening? That he removed himself from our family life in so many ways - extending his business trips, traveling out-of-state to go to concerts, sleeping on the couch, working late, going to movies by himself; and that despite that - I was faithful to him. I was sure that if we went to counseling we could find our way back to each other.
Meeting you definitely removed that possibility. Once he emotionally opened up to you, it's no wonder that he picked fights with me in Florida, pushed me away when I tried to reach out to him, and slept on the couch during our family trip to Florida at Christmas and our couples trip to Vegas in February.
He lied to me and our children, saying that we just needed some time apart to stop the fighting and heal - he was already seeing you and not interested in reconciliation. His trips to massachusetts not only took him away from me, but meant that he was unavailable to our children as well - and he missed out on many of their activities.
So when you ask me "How are you?", I can tell you that I am sad that the man who was my best friend; who I thought would be my family, my husband, my partner, forever; has lost all of his integrity. I am sad that he got lost in his unhappiness and couldn't see a way to weather this storm together.
I am hurt, and disappointed that he chose to leave our marriage this way. I am sorry that he has put his own happiness before thinking about what's bet for his children.
I think he should have waited until we were legally separated/divorced before he introduced his [adulterous] relationship with you to our children. I think it sends a lousy message to them about marriage and commitment. [and character]
I also think it sucks that instead of spending a week of uninterrupted time alone with his children, he (and you) thinks it's okay to bring you along on vacation.
Don't get me wrong - I know our marriage is over, and I don't begrudge him future happiness; but how do *you live with your choices? You're sleeping with a married man, going out with him in public, at work events, and introducing your child and mine into the mix. What kind of reaction did you expect from me? That this is hunky-dory? I certainly wasn't going to act inappropriately with my daughter there, but I was taken aback.
None of this is okay. I never imagined that the person I loved, the person I committed my life to, the person I was raising a family with; wasn't similarly committed. Things were rocky yes, but I thought they could get better.
It's been devastating and unsettling, and sad. It would be all those things at the end of any relationship, but adding you into the mix makes it that much more hurtful and sad.
So that's how I am. "I've been better" just didn't really cover it.
And I really don't have any respect for someone who doesn't respect marriage. [Either of you]
by
PS. Is this one of those letters better left unsent? I'm itching to mail the handwritten version. What do you think?
I know I skipped a lot, but I just need to get this little bitch out...
G and I agreed that since my flight to Florida leaves at 6 AM on Friday, the kids would stay at his house on Thursday night and he would take them to school.
Now, he's taking a friend to see Little Feat on Thursday night (for J's bday which was Jan 1 @@) and can't have them sleep over.
Really? The one friggin weekend that you agreed to take on kid responsibilities, you can't follow through?
And you can't see your kids this weekend "because you'll have them all next weekend" and coincidentally, you'll be out of town on Sat and Sun (trip to see girlfriend@@), thereby missing the wrestling tournament on Saturday and the pasta dinner fundraiser on Sunday?
Stellar, just stellar.
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