So I did a class at a local church for a few months called Divorce Care...it was really good. I walked alongside of an eclectic groups of folks and we discussed our trials, our pain, our hopes and our fears. There was a video component and a curriculum that we walked through that helped me prepare for the emotions and feelings that I have and will continue to go through. One of the add-on's to this group is a daily encouraging email that you receive for a year. I am at day 166. The emails kind of run in weekly topics. This week ironically was about moving on into another relationship. I have mentioned here that I do not feel prepared for this in any way. Yet, these emails seemed very timely considering the recent news from my ex highlighted the fact that I was not moving on or even considering it at this point.
The theme is that you must get to the point where you feel content and joyful in your singleness before you are probably healthy to join in a relationship. This feels right to me. I have an old friend, I guess an used to be friend, who got divorced this past year and yesterday got married. That may be right for him? And my ex dating may be right for her....But I feel as if they will both be bringing an unhealed soul into their next relationship. Maybe I say that because I still feel so broken and I cannot imagine how someone could not be broken still after only a few months. Truth be told they both initiated their divorces so maybe that is different? I don't know?
Here is one man's theory on the topic of healing, time and moving on: “It takes one year of healing for every four years of marriage. Some people have control over that in terms of working it through, and different people heal at different rates, so it’s a general statistic. But I’ve found over time that it’s a wise statistic. One of the great tendencies of humanity is for us to say, ‘It’ll be different for me. This doesn’t apply to me.’ It really does.”
So I was married for 12 years this July 20 would have been 13. According to this statistic I will be 41 before I will be healed. In some ways that feels like a long time away, in others I know how time can fly. I understand that things like this move slow. There have been a whole list of firsts that have happened but the list is not complete yet. First Thanksgiving, my birthday, Christmas, oldest daughters B-day, New Years Eve, Family Vacation, Easter, Memorial day, a graduation party, other birthday parties, Mother's day, Father's day, to name a few. These each brought with them a slew of emotions, pain, new struggles, and continued adjustment. All this and my divorce has been final for not even 2 months. Now I moved out/was thrown out on Thanksgiving so there has been more time for some things but still. In that regard I understand how healing takes time. Each first will bring new struggles. Also the choices I make about my own life that I am founding with my part time girls takes time to develop too.
I talked a little about what makes me happy in my last post. This was in today's email: Whatever you depend upon for your happiness will always end up controlling you; therefore, if you feel you have to get married in order to be happy, then the approval of the opposite sex will control your self-esteem. How other people view you will dominate the way you view yourself.” I think that this sums up how I lived the past decade or so. I allowed the outlook that my wife had on me, my career choice, my identity, my passions, etc. control me. I placed her in a very unhealthy place. I made her responsible for my happiness. Now I understand that there is a place for a spouse to affect your happiness. But I do not believe they should ever be responsible for it. I think she did the same thing to me, and then when she deemed that I was not cutting the mustard providing her happiness she pulled away slowly. First, if she wasn't happy she wasn't going to provide me with any happiness. So the first thing to go was the physical contact...five years ago. Then she refused any date ideas or most alone time outside of our house. Then she became more vocal about my job, my friends, my family. I responded to her not fulfilling my happiness by judging her. I decided that she was cold, that she didn't care a lick about me, that all I was to her was a servant to be bossed around. That and I tried to reach her by writing her letters, emails and very few words.
It wasn't all like this I guess. I tried...I spent hours thinking up ways to create an environment where she would be content and happy. I built extravagant things, created beautiful landscaping, remodeled bathrooms, bedrooms, etc. Spent time investing in her likes, passions, supported her in her career and creating strong bonds with her family. With each improvement there were smiles but not happiness. She probably tried too. I have a harder time seeing that from this side of things, but I am sure she did.
This has been a lot of words to say this. I have a friend who says, "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." He is quoting Matthew 6:21 out of the Bible. I believe that I was created to do life best when God is my treasure, where he is where the responsibility of my happiness lies (not worldly happiness, contentment with my place in the world), and where my heart is His to cherish. Then and only then will I be able to selflessly love another with unconditional, wild abandon. Truthfully, I thought I was doing just that in this failed marriage. So now I walk the journey to figure out just what that means for me.
Sunday, June 28, 2015
Thursday, June 25, 2015
Daddy why?
So I was dropping off my daughters the other night and my youngest jumps up in my arms looks at me and then back at the house and her mom and says, "Daddy why did you and mommy get divorced?" "Just because." I said. "No, I mean it, why did you and mommy get divorced?" She asked me 4 times the last time I said, "I didn't really have a good answer for you, it just happened." Then I told her it was time to go inside. She gave me a big hug and kiss and ran inside.
I get it. I ask that same question, but from a much different set of logic. To her I was standing in the driveway of "our" house, there was mommy, and mommies and daddies are supposed to live together. She didn't want me to go, but she knows because of the divorce I have to. But why?
What I wanted to say is "Ask your mom." But that does no one any good. Then I wanted to say, "It's complicated sweetie, but know that I wish we weren't divorced too...that our family wasn't cut in half too." But she is 5, she's not asking a deep question, just being honest that she wants her normal back. I do too dear, but we are going to have to find our new normal.
I wish I could tell her everything will be fine and this new normal will have it's wonderful qualities too. But I'm not sure about that. She wants to have Daddy there or Mommy there at bedtime every night. She wants to vacation with the whole family, she keeps asking me over and over if I am coming on vacation with them. She misses me when she is with my ex and my ex when she is with me. She knows that all is not as it is supposed to be. The truth is little one that no matter how hard we wish for things in life that doesn't mean they will come true, in fact most things we have to wish for don't and won't ever come true. I won't tell you that now, because I don't want you to have to grow up any faster than you already are.
For now I don't have a good answer, but notice the look in my eye I echo your question. And know above anything and everything that you are loved, so deeply and so completely.
I get it. I ask that same question, but from a much different set of logic. To her I was standing in the driveway of "our" house, there was mommy, and mommies and daddies are supposed to live together. She didn't want me to go, but she knows because of the divorce I have to. But why?
What I wanted to say is "Ask your mom." But that does no one any good. Then I wanted to say, "It's complicated sweetie, but know that I wish we weren't divorced too...that our family wasn't cut in half too." But she is 5, she's not asking a deep question, just being honest that she wants her normal back. I do too dear, but we are going to have to find our new normal.
I wish I could tell her everything will be fine and this new normal will have it's wonderful qualities too. But I'm not sure about that. She wants to have Daddy there or Mommy there at bedtime every night. She wants to vacation with the whole family, she keeps asking me over and over if I am coming on vacation with them. She misses me when she is with my ex and my ex when she is with me. She knows that all is not as it is supposed to be. The truth is little one that no matter how hard we wish for things in life that doesn't mean they will come true, in fact most things we have to wish for don't and won't ever come true. I won't tell you that now, because I don't want you to have to grow up any faster than you already are.
For now I don't have a good answer, but notice the look in my eye I echo your question. And know above anything and everything that you are loved, so deeply and so completely.
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
When you give your heart away and they give it back
Value.... What gives a thing value? I have been thinking about this a little lately. I have never really been enthralled by what the world assigns value to. Don't get me wrong I like nice socks, good tools, great food and beer. So I am not saying that I don't appreciate things that have quality. What I am saying is I think that I don't hold to the same standards of success that the world tells me I should. Do I need to have power, do I need to have the things that give me "status", do I need to have people "think" I have it all together? Not really... I don't say that to toot my own horn, or to talk like some millennial, post- whatever person who doesn't "need" the intrinsic things but then when you try to take them away scream and throw temper tantrums. It is just true.
I have a closet full of clothes...most of them I didn't pick out or were given to me. I wear the same pair of shorts or jeans 90% of the time and rotate a few tshirts or other shirts in there and I'm good. I could probably donate 80% of my wardrobe and be fine...maybe I will. I have a descent car in the garage but it have 140K miles on it..runs fine I'm good. I have a nice house, it's small, but updated, clean and nice basics(furnace, water heater, etc). It has one bathroom and two bedrooms and it works great for my girls and I. I have enough furniture to sit on and a bed to sleep on. I have a computer with which to type this and enough money to afford Wifi. So like I said it's not that I don't appreciate some of the things the world assigns value to.
I think where I draw the line is do I need that stuff to be happy, or maybe the right word is content? I get to redefine contentment for me. I think it starts where it has always been and that is with family. So for me know that means the family that I have left and the times that I get to see them are success, are a privilege, and are a top priority in my life. When I am with them I need them to know they are loved beyond measure, beyond reason, to infinity and beyond. If I get to the end of my life and I don't have any money to leave them, if I leave them with this heritage of loving courageously I will be content. After that what makes me content? Doing a job that I can be proud of, no matter what that is, when I do it to the best of my ability and give my all that creates a product with which to be proud. To exude the very aroma of Christ where I go, that will be success. To be able to find joy in the ordinary, everyday moments and not have to rely on the fantastic or fantasy to find and model joy. This list could continue.
The point of this is this is one of the gifts of this situation. Before I was so laser focused on trying to create an environment that would bring contentment to my ex that I didn't blink an eye when it was counter-cultural to what I would choose for myself. Now I get to figure it out by myself and with God. There is a freedom in this, that is refreshing and lonely all at the same time. You see I like being part of a team, I like that feeling, accomplishing something great together. Even if great is simple things that the world would never notice or mark. For now and the unforeseeable future I need to figure that out by myself and not have the benefit/blessing of having a team to have my back or rally with if the chips are down.
When I really think about it, this may be a permanent situation. Like it or not July 20, 2002, I was joined in a holy way with another person and although that other person has abandoned me and that bond...I am still in it. This isn't a biblical thing, biblically I am fine moving along. It is a Ben thing. I gave my heart away so completely, now even though it has been discarded it still doesn't feel like mine to take back and for sure give to another.
So yes, I need to identify what keeps me content because then I can set my goals and priorities accordingly. I need to be okay doing that alone, and be aware that this could be life long.
I have a closet full of clothes...most of them I didn't pick out or were given to me. I wear the same pair of shorts or jeans 90% of the time and rotate a few tshirts or other shirts in there and I'm good. I could probably donate 80% of my wardrobe and be fine...maybe I will. I have a descent car in the garage but it have 140K miles on it..runs fine I'm good. I have a nice house, it's small, but updated, clean and nice basics(furnace, water heater, etc). It has one bathroom and two bedrooms and it works great for my girls and I. I have enough furniture to sit on and a bed to sleep on. I have a computer with which to type this and enough money to afford Wifi. So like I said it's not that I don't appreciate some of the things the world assigns value to.
I think where I draw the line is do I need that stuff to be happy, or maybe the right word is content? I get to redefine contentment for me. I think it starts where it has always been and that is with family. So for me know that means the family that I have left and the times that I get to see them are success, are a privilege, and are a top priority in my life. When I am with them I need them to know they are loved beyond measure, beyond reason, to infinity and beyond. If I get to the end of my life and I don't have any money to leave them, if I leave them with this heritage of loving courageously I will be content. After that what makes me content? Doing a job that I can be proud of, no matter what that is, when I do it to the best of my ability and give my all that creates a product with which to be proud. To exude the very aroma of Christ where I go, that will be success. To be able to find joy in the ordinary, everyday moments and not have to rely on the fantastic or fantasy to find and model joy. This list could continue.
The point of this is this is one of the gifts of this situation. Before I was so laser focused on trying to create an environment that would bring contentment to my ex that I didn't blink an eye when it was counter-cultural to what I would choose for myself. Now I get to figure it out by myself and with God. There is a freedom in this, that is refreshing and lonely all at the same time. You see I like being part of a team, I like that feeling, accomplishing something great together. Even if great is simple things that the world would never notice or mark. For now and the unforeseeable future I need to figure that out by myself and not have the benefit/blessing of having a team to have my back or rally with if the chips are down.
When I really think about it, this may be a permanent situation. Like it or not July 20, 2002, I was joined in a holy way with another person and although that other person has abandoned me and that bond...I am still in it. This isn't a biblical thing, biblically I am fine moving along. It is a Ben thing. I gave my heart away so completely, now even though it has been discarded it still doesn't feel like mine to take back and for sure give to another.
So yes, I need to identify what keeps me content because then I can set my goals and priorities accordingly. I need to be okay doing that alone, and be aware that this could be life long.
Tuesday, June 23, 2015
sometimes a good meal can help change your focus
So my posts have been a little dark. That has been the way this journey has been going. I have had some moments when things seem to be going alright, then something happens. It has been a different thing every time. I can't list them all, but this last one was the tsunami, whatever ground I had gained I feel as if I have lost it all. Well that was the reaction to that news, the truth is that's probably not completely true. I am sad, I am hurt by this new news, I am lonely... Yet, I am moving forward. New house that I like, good neighbors just down the road, I work with guys that I like and my church is supportive for the most part, my family is constantly present and willing to listen and love, my daughters are seeming to do pretty good through all of this... tonight since I couldn't be with the ones I loved I cooked really good food.
It was delicious!
I am not healed, I am not ready for a new relationship, I am in the middle of a very stormy existence, but once in a while the sun peaks through and reminds me there is hope, there is love, there is more to this world than the rejection and pain that I am feeling now. This is a good thing.
In hope I believe anything is possible. Because for all intensive purposes hope really is just a version of faith.
God bless!
Sunday, June 21, 2015
Hard journey
This journey is interesting for a reflective person which I believe that I am. The healing that needs to happen, the forgiveness that needs to occur, the closure that I am forced to accomplish, the pain, the sadness, the other raw emotions; they all ebb and flow. It would be easier if they went in cycles or set time frames. I would be in the depression phase and that would last for 3 months and then I could move on and be done dealing with that. Or I could forgive my ex and that would be the end of it. I could heal from the wounds caused by the: words that were spoken, the betrayal that occurred, the judgment that was so freely passed down, the holistic rejection, etc. And those wounds would just fade away perhaps leaving a small scar. Yet this doesn't seem the way it is occurring.
Every day is a new adventure in what is going to rear its ugly head. Just when I feel like I have moved past a feeling something happens or a memory surfaces and I am plunged back into a reality where the emotion is raw. They truly feel like un-healing wounds. I can cover them and hide them, but they do not really seem to be healing. The realistic/scientific part of my brain assumes that this is just because the healing journey is rolling along much slower than I would like.
(And much slower than my ex's is occurring. Maybe we just deal with pain in a different way? I believe that I had a much different pain to deal with than her. She for the most part inflicted pain, (not that I am innocent I am not claiming that) so she had to deal with the shame of what she had done. If indeed there was shame or pain felt deeply. I believe there was some type of remorse, I know her too well to believe that she is not remorseful for causing such catastrophic pain to me...a person she claimed to have loved once upon a time, when we were much younger and dumber I guess.)
I am frustrated by so much of this journey. Everything seems to be a one step forward and two steps back kind of thing. I hate this. I want to blame someone, I want to have a scapegoat, I want to escape it....but I know better. It is my journey, these are my set of problems, this is my life. There is no escape, there is no one else that will complete me/heal me/help me forgive. I must walk this road alone and own each step and each choice along the way.
In dealings and conversations that I have with my ex I have been asking two questions: where is God's love/heart in this? and What would be best for the girls(my daughters)? This has helped me keep my focus. I am trying to ask myself and thus be lead in all of this journey by similar questions.
Sidebar: Friday I had a sad day. My ex emailed me and told me she sort of introduced the girls to her new boyfriend. She introduced them just didn't tell them he was the new bf. I went to pick them up after work in our old house and my ex was happy and.... it just came crashing down on me. I am so alone, so rejected, so lost...I took the girls to this fun night thing at school but they were with their class for about 40 minutes and then performing for 10ish so I was alone for about an hour. My ex had gone to her father's 60th bday party, a man that I love, a man that I respect, a party that I wanted to be at, and as far as I know the new BF went. It was just a lot. So on the way home, I hadn't eaten yet so we stopped at mcD's which I hate, but I didn't have much in the house and got some food and my oldest asked me what was wrong. I thought I was hiding it...I was wrong. I could have lied, instead I told her I was having a sad day and left it at that. They proceeded to give me their Father's Day gift when we got to my house in hopes it would cheer me up. It was a nice sentiment and so sweet, but it was just another reminder of the hole, of having a wife that found me so detestable she wouldn't even try to stay married to me, who was so ready to move on that she couldn't wait to get me out of her life. It was reminder that the family that I helped create no longer exists. All in all not a great Father's day weekend, although I spent it with my daughters and I cherish those minutes and it was good to have them here...it was just all wrong.
Holidays at least how I have experienced them are a time for celebrating family....mine is gone and not just gone but intentionally destroyed. Add this to the list of pretty shitty holidays this year. I moved out/was kicked out on Thanksgiving, one week later was my birthday. I didn't really get any Christmas presents, and desperately missed the family traditions that were ruined. I spent New Years Eve with my girls and some families who were all whole, husbands and wives kissing at midnight and laughing and telling stories that they stop in the middle of because I am alone. New years day I spent alone. Easter I was alone. Without fail during each of these I was visited by a text or personal wish from my ex to have a nice _______. She doesn't know this but that just digs the dagger in deeper. Today when she was picking the girls up her last words were I hope you had a good Father's Day...as she drives away with my girls leaving me alone in the driveway.
There are days when I feel as if I am not going to make it, days when I feel like I should have listened to that little voice that just told me to step in front of one of the cars when I was running or twist my steering wheel a little to the right on the highway. I am glad I didn't, my daughters need me. But this pain is almost to much to bear at times. I met a guy in my divorce care class I took, he has a very rare disease that was once labelled fatal and has since been downgraded to chronic. He body grows masses that are sharp and like concrete and they cannot be treated. They crack ribs when he coughs, they cause his eyes to bulge, they have lots of side effects but the worst is constant pain. I asked him what his hope was? He said to live long enough to get his youngest through high school and then be able to let go and die, because every day was agony. And here I write a post about how unbearable my pain is... I feel like a wuss compared to him, yet this is my story and my reality and the truth is that life is just painful and wrong and nothing this side of heaven will ever be whole or right or complete again. That was always true I guess, but now I understand the depth of that a little more. I know it goes much deeper, but this is as deep as I can understand now.
Father how would you use this pain in my life to minister and walk alongside others. How will you use this to mold me into a better man, a better father, a better co-worker and friend. I know you will not leave me here as despair's doorstep and that you are with me now, but I hope for better. I hope to find the smile I was born with. You made me in a way that my smile will never look like anyone else's and it literally had to be crafted. When I remember this I remember that my joy comes from the relationships with the people around me. Joy feels forced these days. It used to come so easy, I am the proud bearer of wrinkles at 38 from all the time I have spent smiling and laughing in my life. Now they are fading, along with the memory of what real joy feels like. Help me find that again.
Every day is a new adventure in what is going to rear its ugly head. Just when I feel like I have moved past a feeling something happens or a memory surfaces and I am plunged back into a reality where the emotion is raw. They truly feel like un-healing wounds. I can cover them and hide them, but they do not really seem to be healing. The realistic/scientific part of my brain assumes that this is just because the healing journey is rolling along much slower than I would like.
(And much slower than my ex's is occurring. Maybe we just deal with pain in a different way? I believe that I had a much different pain to deal with than her. She for the most part inflicted pain, (not that I am innocent I am not claiming that) so she had to deal with the shame of what she had done. If indeed there was shame or pain felt deeply. I believe there was some type of remorse, I know her too well to believe that she is not remorseful for causing such catastrophic pain to me...a person she claimed to have loved once upon a time, when we were much younger and dumber I guess.)
I am frustrated by so much of this journey. Everything seems to be a one step forward and two steps back kind of thing. I hate this. I want to blame someone, I want to have a scapegoat, I want to escape it....but I know better. It is my journey, these are my set of problems, this is my life. There is no escape, there is no one else that will complete me/heal me/help me forgive. I must walk this road alone and own each step and each choice along the way.
In dealings and conversations that I have with my ex I have been asking two questions: where is God's love/heart in this? and What would be best for the girls(my daughters)? This has helped me keep my focus. I am trying to ask myself and thus be lead in all of this journey by similar questions.
Sidebar: Friday I had a sad day. My ex emailed me and told me she sort of introduced the girls to her new boyfriend. She introduced them just didn't tell them he was the new bf. I went to pick them up after work in our old house and my ex was happy and.... it just came crashing down on me. I am so alone, so rejected, so lost...I took the girls to this fun night thing at school but they were with their class for about 40 minutes and then performing for 10ish so I was alone for about an hour. My ex had gone to her father's 60th bday party, a man that I love, a man that I respect, a party that I wanted to be at, and as far as I know the new BF went. It was just a lot. So on the way home, I hadn't eaten yet so we stopped at mcD's which I hate, but I didn't have much in the house and got some food and my oldest asked me what was wrong. I thought I was hiding it...I was wrong. I could have lied, instead I told her I was having a sad day and left it at that. They proceeded to give me their Father's Day gift when we got to my house in hopes it would cheer me up. It was a nice sentiment and so sweet, but it was just another reminder of the hole, of having a wife that found me so detestable she wouldn't even try to stay married to me, who was so ready to move on that she couldn't wait to get me out of her life. It was reminder that the family that I helped create no longer exists. All in all not a great Father's day weekend, although I spent it with my daughters and I cherish those minutes and it was good to have them here...it was just all wrong.
Holidays at least how I have experienced them are a time for celebrating family....mine is gone and not just gone but intentionally destroyed. Add this to the list of pretty shitty holidays this year. I moved out/was kicked out on Thanksgiving, one week later was my birthday. I didn't really get any Christmas presents, and desperately missed the family traditions that were ruined. I spent New Years Eve with my girls and some families who were all whole, husbands and wives kissing at midnight and laughing and telling stories that they stop in the middle of because I am alone. New years day I spent alone. Easter I was alone. Without fail during each of these I was visited by a text or personal wish from my ex to have a nice _______. She doesn't know this but that just digs the dagger in deeper. Today when she was picking the girls up her last words were I hope you had a good Father's Day...as she drives away with my girls leaving me alone in the driveway.
There are days when I feel as if I am not going to make it, days when I feel like I should have listened to that little voice that just told me to step in front of one of the cars when I was running or twist my steering wheel a little to the right on the highway. I am glad I didn't, my daughters need me. But this pain is almost to much to bear at times. I met a guy in my divorce care class I took, he has a very rare disease that was once labelled fatal and has since been downgraded to chronic. He body grows masses that are sharp and like concrete and they cannot be treated. They crack ribs when he coughs, they cause his eyes to bulge, they have lots of side effects but the worst is constant pain. I asked him what his hope was? He said to live long enough to get his youngest through high school and then be able to let go and die, because every day was agony. And here I write a post about how unbearable my pain is... I feel like a wuss compared to him, yet this is my story and my reality and the truth is that life is just painful and wrong and nothing this side of heaven will ever be whole or right or complete again. That was always true I guess, but now I understand the depth of that a little more. I know it goes much deeper, but this is as deep as I can understand now.
Father how would you use this pain in my life to minister and walk alongside others. How will you use this to mold me into a better man, a better father, a better co-worker and friend. I know you will not leave me here as despair's doorstep and that you are with me now, but I hope for better. I hope to find the smile I was born with. You made me in a way that my smile will never look like anyone else's and it literally had to be crafted. When I remember this I remember that my joy comes from the relationships with the people around me. Joy feels forced these days. It used to come so easy, I am the proud bearer of wrinkles at 38 from all the time I have spent smiling and laughing in my life. Now they are fading, along with the memory of what real joy feels like. Help me find that again.
Friday, June 19, 2015
Daddy I miss you
I wrote about missing an emotionally connect, of feeling loved and respected in my last post. I do feel the desire for this and understand how it is missing, but the thing I feel much more strongly is the hole of being forced to be a part time parent. With what happened in the days leading up to our divorce, I probably have the right to be angry and for sure the temptation to be bitter. But for the most part the anger I feel has little to do with those circumstances anymore. I have forgiven her and to be honest have forgiven myself for the way I responded. Yet, the place that I still am harboring anger and extreme sadness is the parent thing.
I love my daughters, I am an active father and I always have been. I cherish the time I get with them and one of my most consistent prayers is thankfulness for being allowed the privilege to be their dad. Now I see them twice a week and every other weekend. The worst time of my week, every week, is dropping my daughters off at our families old home and driving away alone. It is heart wrenching. I will admit to stopping a little ways away from the house and weeping until I could see through the tears enough to drive safely.
Their are parts of this divorce that aren't so bad, our marriage relationship was so toxic at the end that I constantly felt ignored, judged, insulted or condescended. But to have this constant ache inside of me of knowing that my daughters are weekly ripped apart from me is horrible. I would change anything to not have this reality. Anything....Everything....
To have to hear from my daughter as she is getting ready for bed, "Daddy I miss you." I despise this and I am heart broken by those words. Happy F*&^ing Fathers day to me!
I love my daughters, I am an active father and I always have been. I cherish the time I get with them and one of my most consistent prayers is thankfulness for being allowed the privilege to be their dad. Now I see them twice a week and every other weekend. The worst time of my week, every week, is dropping my daughters off at our families old home and driving away alone. It is heart wrenching. I will admit to stopping a little ways away from the house and weeping until I could see through the tears enough to drive safely.
Their are parts of this divorce that aren't so bad, our marriage relationship was so toxic at the end that I constantly felt ignored, judged, insulted or condescended. But to have this constant ache inside of me of knowing that my daughters are weekly ripped apart from me is horrible. I would change anything to not have this reality. Anything....Everything....
To have to hear from my daughter as she is getting ready for bed, "Daddy I miss you." I despise this and I am heart broken by those words. Happy F*&^ing Fathers day to me!
Wednesday, June 17, 2015
Can't force love
What does it mean to be alone? How do we define loneliness? I am an introvert so I don't really need lots of crowd time. Yet, I do need to have folks in my life. I still find myself behest to Maslov's hierarchy. I need meaningful interaction with other folks. This is far beyond the physical, although it has been years since I have received even a hug in a meaningful, intentional way from someone other than a blood family member. What I am talking about is much deeper, an emotional connection.
One may think this is in response to the "boyfriend" situation that I mentioned in my last post. I don't really think this is true, in fact I know it isn't. I have felt this way for a long time. I tried very hard to have this kind of connection with my ex-wife: I hoped, I prayed, I talked, I wrote letters and emails, I cried, I raged, I read books, I tried to improve myself, to make myself more lovable.... I also made mistakes. I tried to motivate my ex through passive-aggressive means, this was a mistake. I guess I was desperate, for a long time, years even, I felt "us" slipping away, I was willing to try anything. I wanted to be known, I wanted to be loved, I wanted to be respected....
I now know that I can't ask for love and respect, I can't hope for it, pray for it; all I can do is receive it. I can only send love out and then it is up to someone else to choose to return it. Love is a free will sort of thing. This is an old truth...as old as the world.
All this being said I am still lonely. I have been reading about what it means to be whole...on my own, with God's help. I think this may be possible...but that is just conjecture at this point. I do realize and recognize God in my life these days. I really enjoy the people at my new job and I am getting to know them, but we really don't "know" each other. All they know is used to be a pastor, now I am not and I am divorced. This is an interesting foundation to get to know people from. My family is good and good to be around. My old friends are great too, but they are busy, like I used to be. I guess there are nights that I am busy, but for the most part, especially in the summer I am not. This leads to interesting places. Now that I have a house, I can work around the house a bit, but my house is updated and I am not sure about budget so I'm not going out and spending any money yet.
People have seen this and the sadness in my eyes and they have someone else in their lives that they think would be good for me to meet. I have been telling them thanks but I am not ready...I am healing and time is my friend right now. It has been my party line. And it's not just a line. I am healing and I do need time. The truth is I am not sure how to undo a marriage relationship, not legally but at a soul level? What do I do with the feelings I have for my ex? I assume they will fade or change.... but how does that happen? Is time the only component? Maybe someday I will be whole again. Until that day though I refuse to endanger someone in the wake of my journey.
So for now alone....Hopefully this journey leads away from loneliness.
One may think this is in response to the "boyfriend" situation that I mentioned in my last post. I don't really think this is true, in fact I know it isn't. I have felt this way for a long time. I tried very hard to have this kind of connection with my ex-wife: I hoped, I prayed, I talked, I wrote letters and emails, I cried, I raged, I read books, I tried to improve myself, to make myself more lovable.... I also made mistakes. I tried to motivate my ex through passive-aggressive means, this was a mistake. I guess I was desperate, for a long time, years even, I felt "us" slipping away, I was willing to try anything. I wanted to be known, I wanted to be loved, I wanted to be respected....
I now know that I can't ask for love and respect, I can't hope for it, pray for it; all I can do is receive it. I can only send love out and then it is up to someone else to choose to return it. Love is a free will sort of thing. This is an old truth...as old as the world.
All this being said I am still lonely. I have been reading about what it means to be whole...on my own, with God's help. I think this may be possible...but that is just conjecture at this point. I do realize and recognize God in my life these days. I really enjoy the people at my new job and I am getting to know them, but we really don't "know" each other. All they know is used to be a pastor, now I am not and I am divorced. This is an interesting foundation to get to know people from. My family is good and good to be around. My old friends are great too, but they are busy, like I used to be. I guess there are nights that I am busy, but for the most part, especially in the summer I am not. This leads to interesting places. Now that I have a house, I can work around the house a bit, but my house is updated and I am not sure about budget so I'm not going out and spending any money yet.
People have seen this and the sadness in my eyes and they have someone else in their lives that they think would be good for me to meet. I have been telling them thanks but I am not ready...I am healing and time is my friend right now. It has been my party line. And it's not just a line. I am healing and I do need time. The truth is I am not sure how to undo a marriage relationship, not legally but at a soul level? What do I do with the feelings I have for my ex? I assume they will fade or change.... but how does that happen? Is time the only component? Maybe someday I will be whole again. Until that day though I refuse to endanger someone in the wake of my journey.
So for now alone....Hopefully this journey leads away from loneliness.
Monday, June 15, 2015
Boyfriend?
So today I found out that my ex-wife has been dating someone for 3 months. She started dating him before our divorce was even final....I'm not sure why or if that is relevant but it is true. The fact is I am not sure how I feel about this. It is weird. I had asked her to let me know before she introduced or told the girls she was dating someone. I didn't want to have to hear it from them or process it in front of them. So she sent me an email late last night, that I got this morning at work, explaining that she has been dating a guy since April and now he is her boyfriend, and she is planning on introducing our daughters to him some time this summer probably.
I spent the work day in a very weird place....as I said I am not sure how I feel. I am a bit jumbled. Maybe I should be mad, but after everything that has happened, I don't really have any mad left in me toward her dating. Plus, it's not like we are together; she is free to do whatever she wants with whomever she would like. Maybe I should be sad and maybe I am.... Maybe I should be shocked, but truth be told I kind of assumed she had been dating. Maybe not to the extent of boyfriend. I think that's the word...boyfriend. Yep that's it.
I'm not sure what to do with that. My wife of 12 years, the mother of our daughters, the woman whom I loved...who I still love I think. The person God joined me together with in a holy union. This woman whom I share so many memories with, most of them good. This woman has a boyfriend. Not some secret, but someone whom she is willing to tell me about and is considering telling our daughters about. Yes this is the reality I am struggling with.
My ex-wife and I have remained amicable through this whole divorce journey for the most part. There have been a few touchy moments about money and the kids, but we have managed to keep our focus on the goal of being the good people we are and staying amicable for the girls. That is why I believe she felt compelled to tell me, to honor my request and probably also because it is good for the girls. This reality is probably the thing that makes this so confusing.
The easy thing would be to hate her, to write her off, to rage and wail. But I can't. I mentioned it above I still love her. That may make me ridiculous or weak or something like that but I don't think that is the case. What I am is aware of me, my feelings, my emotions. However, this new reality complicates things for me. Sure this is painful. But pain has been my constant companion for the last several...what months, years...I'm not sure. Pain just travels with me. So pain would not change anything. Finding out this news is indeed painful, but nothing I haven't experienced before. So it is something different, something new...
I'm not sure what it is...it is unsettling. But perhaps, just perhaps this is the beginning, the beginning of closure. The beginning of allowing the love that I have to fade into whatever it will be from here on out. I hope so.
I spent the work day in a very weird place....as I said I am not sure how I feel. I am a bit jumbled. Maybe I should be mad, but after everything that has happened, I don't really have any mad left in me toward her dating. Plus, it's not like we are together; she is free to do whatever she wants with whomever she would like. Maybe I should be sad and maybe I am.... Maybe I should be shocked, but truth be told I kind of assumed she had been dating. Maybe not to the extent of boyfriend. I think that's the word...boyfriend. Yep that's it.
I'm not sure what to do with that. My wife of 12 years, the mother of our daughters, the woman whom I loved...who I still love I think. The person God joined me together with in a holy union. This woman whom I share so many memories with, most of them good. This woman has a boyfriend. Not some secret, but someone whom she is willing to tell me about and is considering telling our daughters about. Yes this is the reality I am struggling with.
My ex-wife and I have remained amicable through this whole divorce journey for the most part. There have been a few touchy moments about money and the kids, but we have managed to keep our focus on the goal of being the good people we are and staying amicable for the girls. That is why I believe she felt compelled to tell me, to honor my request and probably also because it is good for the girls. This reality is probably the thing that makes this so confusing.
The easy thing would be to hate her, to write her off, to rage and wail. But I can't. I mentioned it above I still love her. That may make me ridiculous or weak or something like that but I don't think that is the case. What I am is aware of me, my feelings, my emotions. However, this new reality complicates things for me. Sure this is painful. But pain has been my constant companion for the last several...what months, years...I'm not sure. Pain just travels with me. So pain would not change anything. Finding out this news is indeed painful, but nothing I haven't experienced before. So it is something different, something new...
I'm not sure what it is...it is unsettling. But perhaps, just perhaps this is the beginning, the beginning of closure. The beginning of allowing the love that I have to fade into whatever it will be from here on out. I hope so.
Backstory continued...
I think I may have sounded like it was all my wife's fault in my last post. As far as the willing to try and rescue our marriage or resolve our differences that probably is true or seems true to me. But getting ourselves to the point where our marriage was so stressed that ripping it apart, making our daughters have to try to survive a divorce and so on. Well I was a part of that.
I lied to myself, I told myself that we were strong enough to be countercultural. I believed that although it wasn't ideal it was our situation and we were making the best of it while we had to for the best of our family. You see my wife made twice as much money as I did. I had a job, at points I had two. I made a decent living, yet nothing compared to her's.
True it made me feel poor, like less of a man, and I see now that my wife felt the same way...that I was less of a man. She didn't say it out loud, she said it other ways. I can count the dates we had in the last 8 years on two fingers I can count the other "things" we did together on the same fingers. You may think I am throwing a pity party. Nope I am saying that I was blind to what my choices were doing to me wife. How in the world could these things, these huge red flags, be ongoing and I miss them? Or be able to excuse them?
Because of the choices that we made buying bigger and nicer houses, etc. we both continued to feel trapped...then we began drifting apart. I thought we were on the same team, I thought we were running a very difficult marathon getting to appoint where our girls were both in school and then I could find a different career that fit me...yet what it turns out we were doing was existing and slipping. We both made choices to perpetuate this downward slide.
I think it starts, well at least it did for me, as a little voice. It's so small and deep inside that you dismiss it. Then it persists. "You don't deserve this." "You work so hard...." "Look over there, their marriage/relationship/life if so much better than yours." "She shouldn't treat you like that." And the voice goes on and on and on. Pretty soon it is hard to dismiss. Then it starts to crack your defenses.
I ashamed to say that it cracked mine. By the time I found out she felt the same way, it was too late. Even though I was certain, I still am, that even with all the crap we had in our past we could have overcome, she was too far gone. The little voice had convinced her that we were finished, that we were fatal.
So....yes is there blame enough to go around yep. But...the heart break is still palpable, no matter who is to blame or which percent of blame they are responsible for.
I lied to myself, I told myself that we were strong enough to be countercultural. I believed that although it wasn't ideal it was our situation and we were making the best of it while we had to for the best of our family. You see my wife made twice as much money as I did. I had a job, at points I had two. I made a decent living, yet nothing compared to her's.
True it made me feel poor, like less of a man, and I see now that my wife felt the same way...that I was less of a man. She didn't say it out loud, she said it other ways. I can count the dates we had in the last 8 years on two fingers I can count the other "things" we did together on the same fingers. You may think I am throwing a pity party. Nope I am saying that I was blind to what my choices were doing to me wife. How in the world could these things, these huge red flags, be ongoing and I miss them? Or be able to excuse them?
Because of the choices that we made buying bigger and nicer houses, etc. we both continued to feel trapped...then we began drifting apart. I thought we were on the same team, I thought we were running a very difficult marathon getting to appoint where our girls were both in school and then I could find a different career that fit me...yet what it turns out we were doing was existing and slipping. We both made choices to perpetuate this downward slide.
I think it starts, well at least it did for me, as a little voice. It's so small and deep inside that you dismiss it. Then it persists. "You don't deserve this." "You work so hard...." "Look over there, their marriage/relationship/life if so much better than yours." "She shouldn't treat you like that." And the voice goes on and on and on. Pretty soon it is hard to dismiss. Then it starts to crack your defenses.
I ashamed to say that it cracked mine. By the time I found out she felt the same way, it was too late. Even though I was certain, I still am, that even with all the crap we had in our past we could have overcome, she was too far gone. The little voice had convinced her that we were finished, that we were fatal.
So....yes is there blame enough to go around yep. But...the heart break is still palpable, no matter who is to blame or which percent of blame they are responsible for.
The back story...or a bit of it anyway.
Going through a divorce.... getting kick out....being left....the list goes on of descriptions of what I am going through. About a year and a half ago the dull ache of an unhealthy relationship became a roar as my then wife told me she didn't think we were compatible. We had several conversations some were full of emotions and some of them painfully detached. We addressed some historical content, but most of it seemed to be laser focused on the present and the impossible future.
I suggested counselling so we went, we began with two solo sessions each. Then my wife was in a serious car accident. She had some internal injuries and a broken ankle. I sat with her in the hospital and brought our daughters up to see her. I carried her into our house and helped her with the life activities that are difficult with a broken ankle and bruised and injured body. After a period of time we tried to go to counselling together, it was.... uncomfortable, painful even. We went three times. Then my then wife said she would not return and said if we were going to make it we were going to have to do it on our own. So we spent the summer avoiding any real type of interaction for the most part. We tried to meet once a week and have a conversation, that proved too much for us. So then we tried vacations. Escape from reality, try to see if she could find some motivation to attempt the long journey to restore a sense of normality. Not health, but probably the best word is a truce. A truce to be able to begin to work on finding common ground to be able to establish what needed to be a new foundation.
I believed that God had truly united us into one flesh, but through several personal choices on both our parts we had grown apart. We had been happy once, we had been infatuated with each other when we were young, and we even made the dream we both had of having a family come true through very hard circumstances together. Yet, we both fell prey to expectations.
I hate that word expectations. I believe that expectations lead to believing you are owed something, that you 'deserve' something....more. It is an open window or an open door that allows temptation's whisper to float in. For a while I believe you have an inner battle. I believe we are inherently equipped to know deep inside of ourselves what it takes to love another person unconditionally. Temptation works like a water flow, eroding away at the foundation of what you know to be right. At first, you have a strong defense, then slowly but surely you begin to fall prey to the whispers. And if you don't do anything to fight them they begin to win a few battles, not the war, but here and there. And inevitably those whispers are working on the other person too. Well you get the point. You can see how easy it is to drift apart.
Well that was a bit of the back story anyway. I will pick up more later. The idea behind this blog is a place for me to process this transition. The transition from being married to being single.
I suggested counselling so we went, we began with two solo sessions each. Then my wife was in a serious car accident. She had some internal injuries and a broken ankle. I sat with her in the hospital and brought our daughters up to see her. I carried her into our house and helped her with the life activities that are difficult with a broken ankle and bruised and injured body. After a period of time we tried to go to counselling together, it was.... uncomfortable, painful even. We went three times. Then my then wife said she would not return and said if we were going to make it we were going to have to do it on our own. So we spent the summer avoiding any real type of interaction for the most part. We tried to meet once a week and have a conversation, that proved too much for us. So then we tried vacations. Escape from reality, try to see if she could find some motivation to attempt the long journey to restore a sense of normality. Not health, but probably the best word is a truce. A truce to be able to begin to work on finding common ground to be able to establish what needed to be a new foundation.
I believed that God had truly united us into one flesh, but through several personal choices on both our parts we had grown apart. We had been happy once, we had been infatuated with each other when we were young, and we even made the dream we both had of having a family come true through very hard circumstances together. Yet, we both fell prey to expectations.
I hate that word expectations. I believe that expectations lead to believing you are owed something, that you 'deserve' something....more. It is an open window or an open door that allows temptation's whisper to float in. For a while I believe you have an inner battle. I believe we are inherently equipped to know deep inside of ourselves what it takes to love another person unconditionally. Temptation works like a water flow, eroding away at the foundation of what you know to be right. At first, you have a strong defense, then slowly but surely you begin to fall prey to the whispers. And if you don't do anything to fight them they begin to win a few battles, not the war, but here and there. And inevitably those whispers are working on the other person too. Well you get the point. You can see how easy it is to drift apart.
Well that was a bit of the back story anyway. I will pick up more later. The idea behind this blog is a place for me to process this transition. The transition from being married to being single.
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