Grumble..Very astute you are!..A friend of mine has divorced the very same way, however another buddy has had to spend $180,000 in legal bills to fight the ex-wife..I have been tempted to divorce/separate but, the benefits of staying together out-way the other..Having 2 beautiful children, a great home, you get the picture...But the relationship is why I'm still here....When a child is used a s a pawn in a larger game of Life, the players really need to give their collective heads a shake...And so should the F*&cking lawyers!!!...

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Am I waking to this magic, Am I seeing all is Human...All is Human after all..- Jon Anderson

aww, sweetie i'm sorry you're having to go thru this too. i'm also in the process of getting a divorce. next month will be our 10th anniversary. he had a choice between me and his drug habit and apparently it won.

i'm finding there isn't a statute of limitations on when people will stop asking you how you and your husband are doing. you just have to keep telling them that you're no longer together and watch their faces as they try to figure out how to remove the foot from their mouths. information on things he was doing behind my back keeps surfacing...still. even though i threw him out the first week of august - his bad decisions are coming back to haunt me. i've found if you are the partner who was financially responsible, don't be suprised if the other has been robbing peter to pay paul and you're going to be the one left under the pile of bills once his tricks and money games have been played out and everything just collapses. i'm discovering there are too many "what if's..." and if you let them play over and over in your mind, you'll eventually drive yourself nuts. it's not your responsibility to shoulder all the blame, or to think you could have singlehandedly "fixed" your relationship.
feelings were hurt. mistakes were made. these things happen. we're human. try not to beat yourself up over it, and if you need to talk to someone, PM me or work it out with yourself and your friends here on the board. this doesn't have to follow you and drag you down for the rest of your life. it IS possible to cut the ties and move on, and that's what you should do. it hurts, but it's over and there are all kinds of new friends to meet, new experiences to be had (no matter how old or young you are) and a life that YOU have a right to live and enjoy. i feel for you honey, hang in there. you're definately not alone.

luv ya
-ck

Oh man....I've never been divorced, but I was at ground zero for several other very ugly ones. I have to echo everything Lou said about the kids.....they're gonna suffer through this. Your job right now is to minimize it, you can't emilinate it. Just remember that they love you both, they can't help it. They also see themselves in both of you....anything negative you say about their mom, they'll hear as a criticism of themselves. You can't help or control what she does, let that go. If they bring it to you, just remidn them that she's hurting too...and sometimes folks say things when they're hurting that they wouldn't under other circumstances. Be the grownup...it sucks, but it has to be done.

Also, make sure they know that it's OK for them to love you both. That they're not betraying you by loving her, or vice versa.

In the end, I've always believed that having two happy parents in different houses is infinately better for the kids than two miserable parents in the same one.

But I kinda know that's not the part you wanted to hear. Because to be good for your kids, you gotta figure out how to be good for yourself. And that's even harder. I distinctly remember phoning home from college to tell my dad that some days he just had to keep breathing. On the bad days, just get through the day however you can. Ask your friends for help, cry when you need to. On the good days, smile when you can, laugh when you're ready. In time, the good days will outnumber the bad ones. With enough time, the bad days will just be a thing that happened. But time is the only way to get there.

Time, and letting go, I guess I should say. The part my Dad never figured out was how to let the past go. Whatever it was, good things and bad things, is gone. That's the part you have to grieve. But to get out of the limbo I imagine you're in, you have to build a new life. And the more you manage to focus on that (when and only when you're ready), the more control you'll have over what that new life is going to be like.

But it's ok if you're not there yet. Stick with just getting through more days, and getting hugs from friends if that's what you need right now. And on the days you can't believe there's going to be an end...have faith in your friends, let them know it for you.

All my best,

G