The Divorce Whisperer
“Am I happier now?
Am I better off?”
Does the divorce of someone near us cause us to consider divorce as a viable option? Did my divorce encourage my ex’s best friend to leave her husband too? The green grass thing… Yeah. Not so much!
Here’s what I want you to know about divorce, especially when you have kids: IT SUCKS.
All this positivism I preach here. All this self-improvement, dating, love poem bullshit is really just my new part-time job since I have all this time on my hands. It might have been harder to write a love poem to my ex when we were still married, but I was trying. Love songs? Check. Love letters? Check. Love advances, requests, seductions, pleadings? Check.
There was a survey I found before our divorce process was in full swing, that showed a majority of divorced couples reported 3 and 5 years later, that they WERE NOT HAPPIER after their divorce. Hmm. Something is out of whack here.
Top Reasons Not To Get A Divorce
- The kids, the kids, the kids.
- Money gets even crazier. And even harder to talk about.
- Your best friend is still there, they are just scared and angry. Work through that and…
- The shared history is hard to come by and impossible to erase.
- Finding true-connected love is a long shot.
Maybe things have gotten hard. I mean really hard. Maybe sex happens once or twice a year. Maybe the loving feeling was lost and now you’ve got more of the tolerant roommate vibe going. Maybe you’re craving something to liven up your life, to wake your ass up.
All that shit is workable. You, waking your own ass up is all that is required.
Oh, wait… There is the other person too.
Top Reasons To Get A Divorce
- You are waiting, have been waiting, continue to wait, for the other person to change.
- Things have gotten abusive.
- The kids are suffering under the lack of joy and love in the house.
- Infidelity.
I remember having a friend come over for dinner with the ex and me, while we were deep in the discontentment part. And this loving guy, who’d just recently split from his live-together relationship of 17 years, was going on and on about this new younger woman he was dating. And the amazing chemistry (mostly about sex) that he was getting from being with someone “so new” and “so fresh” and “amazingly creative.”
I felt like a cuckold. My then-wife was in some sort of freeze-out period going on two months, and I sat at the table listening to my friend’s joy and enthusiasm, thinking, “I am in hell. This is what hell must feel like.”
See I still adored my wife at that time. But her attention, her passions, and her vibrancy had moved elsewhere. I could understand at that moment, why someone might choose to leave a marriage in search of greener bushes. But, even then and there, I knew in my heart that my friend’s joy was not where I wanted to go. I was still determined to work it out with my then-wife. I adored her. I needed her. I ached with the raw absence of affection that my friend’s descriptions pointed out, so clearly.
So, at that time, I dug in deeper. I began to express my dissatisfaction with our relationship. I started telling my then-wife that I needed things to change. “I need to be let out of the box of isolation.”
I’m not sure how differently men and women are wired, but I learned about Love Languages pretty late in the game. And my language (touch) was not the same as the ex-y’s (do something for me). And to be starved of touch, even the little touches, was unbearable. And I got more clear on that miss in my life, and I wanted to reinvent my relationship with my wife.
The problem was, I guess, she didn’t want to change. While I was feeling solid in my marriage enough to question the relationship, she was already thinking about leaving. She was seeing the answer outside the marriage. I was still trying to create and revive the marriage I wanted from the sad house we had created.
What I know from Al-anon, you cannot be waiting for the other person to change. The only change you can affect is your own. I had to work on myself and my commitment. I had to invest time in my happiness and not count on the other person to make me happy.
But without cuddling, hugging, and simple touch, I was starving to death, right there in bed, next to a woman I still considered my “match.”
Over the course of the next several months, I began to get more and more vocal about my dissatisfaction. And what I learned as we entered the end-game of our marriage: both partners have to want to continue. My ex-y’s heart had already been packed away for the next opportunity at love. There was very little I could do to get her to unpack and reinvest in loving me and keeping our marriage alive. I was no longer a priority for her. The priority was figuring out her options and making a decision about when and how to leave the marriage.
In my mind, I was coming from a place of confidence and commitment. I wanted this marriage. I wanted my family. I loved my house, my life, my wife. And I was confident that my joy and hard work would re-warm her heart, and we would see bright days again. I was wrong.
Today, looking back, three years later, I ask myself, “Am I happier now? Am I better off?”
Two hard questions. I’ll take the easy one first. Am I better off? HELL NO. The financial hell is partially a result of our divorce. Now we’re trying to afford two houses, cause we’re certainly not going to live together, and the economics are hurting us both. We are floundering. We will find higher ground, but at the moment, I haven’t been in a lower place financially. And still…
Am I happier now? This one is much harder to parse.
Emotionally, I am much happier than I had been in the last two years of my marriage. What changed that turned the whole enterprise sour, I don’t know exactly, but it had a lot to do with money. And when you are tossed into the void of alone time following divorce, you’ve either got to figure out that relationship with yourself again or rush to try and fill that void with another relationship, as my ex did. I have been thriving in the alone time. UM… After I got over being terribly depressed. But today, I’d say, in spite of the financial crisis that is looming, I am happier than I remember being for a long time. Ever? No. But I’m happy.
Happier as a parent? Sure. Now, my kids get a fully-focused dad. When they are with me, it’s a bit like vacation-dad, but that’s more about the imbalance of time, rather than my approach to being a dad. I am back to my joyous-self. And my kids see this. They tell me how happy I am, how they notice my joy, all the time. And I am rubbing off on them. I think their balance is pretty good. They are both a bit freaked out by any type of conflict (the ex and I didn’t really fight, so they don’t have very good examples) but good and smart kids, making their way in this new two-house reality.
But happier? As in happy? I don’t think so. I had the belief that the ex and I could regain our initial joy again. I still had glimpses of it. And I still desperately wanted to be with her. (Note: I don’t want to be with her anymore, but this is due mostly to the ongoing damage she continues to hurl in my direction.)
I believed until the day she revealed that she had already consulted a lawyer, that I was fighting to SAVE MY MARRIAGE. I didn’t know the other half of my marriage had already left.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
< back to The Hard Stuff pages
related posts:
- Waiting for the Other Person to Change
- Divorce is Not About What’s Fair, Let’s Get That Straight
- Getting Angry, Reaching Forgiveness, and Moving On After Divorce
- Zen and the Art of Love Making
- Easier To Be Quiet
resources:
- The Divorce Library (reading list)
- Songs of Divorce (free listening library – youtube sourced songs)
- Laugh It Off (building a resource library of funny videos and other diversions)
- Facebook (follow us on Facebook and keep up with all the conversations)
- The 5 Love Languages (a book on love styles by Gary Chapman)
image used via creative commons: girls whispering
Better Off Divorced – 3 Years Later Celebrating My Independence
I have to say, I am flourishing with the creative and self-development time the divorce has afforded me. Now, looking back over the three years since it became official, I can say I’m better off divorced. For a long time, I was not sure I was ever going to be able to say that. But it’s true, today. It was not always true.
In the initial storm of divorce, your emotions will take over all negotiations and adversely affect your judgment. In my case, I was set on demanding 50-50 parenting schedule and joint custody. It seemed FAIR.
In the month or so of negotiation with the ex and a wonderful child psychologist who specializes in divorce, we came up with… guess what? … the Standard Possession Order. Even in my happy state, I’m not sure giving in to this demand, and advice, was the BEST option for me and the kids, but it is certainly what the ex wanted, and would likely get were we to enter the Texas court system. (80% of all divorces in Texas end up with the mother getting primary custody and enforcement of the SPO.)
On days when money is tight, I feel like I was ripped off. And occasionally I feel like I should FIGHT and enter the courts again, and go for 50-50 and reducing my financial obligation to my ex. BUT… I don’t. And here’s why.
Today I crave time with my kids. There is never enough time with them. SO, when we are together, I am 110% engaged. There is nothing more important than being an engaged father. Occasionally I am sad about not having them with me, but I’ve been on the UP side of creative for a year or so, and that makes my alone time quite productive rather than sad.
The ex has a very different situation. She craves time with her boyfriend. And occasionally offers the kids to me (mostly too late for me to actually accept) for an additional night or day. If I’m reading that right, from her self-centered approach to everything dealing with me, she is asking for time off from having the kids. Or more accurately, time with her boyfriend. That must be a strange pull. The desire to have time away. When I am on the exact opposite polarity, I crave time WITH THEM.
It’s neither good nor bad, but it’s very different.
And I can understand. During the school year, she does have the brunt of getting the kids to school on time and homework. BUT, that’s how she wanted it. That’s what she demanded in the therapist’s office, that “she was the more complete and responsible parent, that she had been providing the majority of their care.”
REALLY?
In the heat of that discussion, I was furious. But over time, the therapist showed me the reality of the situation, should I want to fight this PLAN. I objected, but I did not fight. And I gave in. “In the best interest of the kids.” At least, that’s the language they use when you’re negotiating.
So I ask you. Was it in their best interest? Perhaps. They got to stay in the marital home. They stayed mostly in their old bedrooms and got to school from Mom’s house in much the same way they did when we were married.
Of course, the reality was/is, I was the primary morning person that roused the entire house and got the kids ready and fed on the way to school. Often the ex would be much more focused on getting ready and pretty. And that’s okay. That’s just the way it was. I loved my mornings. I still get up at 6 am and do most of my creative stuff in that first few hours of the day, before I had to wake the wife and kids to start their day.
And so, she got exactly what she wanted. The house. The kids (on SPO and full custody). And full child support payments, including healthcare. Seems like a pretty good deal.
But I know it’s been HELL getting her routine organized to get up and get the kids ready and fed and off to school in a “happy” and unrushed way. The clocks that have appeared in every room of the house, sort of point out the fact that I was also the “happy time-keeper” saying “Okay kids, we’ve got 10 minutes before the car leaves the station, let’s go.”
The most satisfying moment, came in year two when my son said he’d advised his mom to do mornings “more like Dad.” And he described my typical morning routine with them, as the gold standard.
“Get us up early so we’re not rushed. Give us plenty of time. Make it fun and not so rushed.”
So my not-a-morning-person ex-wife now has most of the kids-to-school duties. (grin) AND she’s working an own-your-ass 9-to-6ish job, that has her working hard then she ever did when we were married.
That’s victory enough.
So she’s craving time with someone else, other than the kids. And I’m craving time with the kids, with no other priorities or relationships demanding my time and attention.
I think I got a fine deal. Hard on the pocket-book at the moment. But overall, I’m happier than I had been in the last 1.5 years with the ex when she got terminally mad.
And she’s still terminally mad. She likes to project this anger at me. But today I no longer have to take any of it. And I’m happy to be clear from that toxic situation.
Happy Independence Day!
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
NOTE: Image is not of my girlfriend. I don’t have a girlfriend. That is a “friend” from Facebook who lives 2,000 miles away. So there! But she’s an inspiration on many levels.
Resources:
- The Divorce Library (reading list)
- Songs of Divorce (free listening library – youtube sourced songs)
- Laugh It Off (building a resource library of funny videos and other diversions)
- Facebook (follow us on Facebook and keep up with all the conversations)
- The 5 Love Languages (a book on love styles by Gary Chapman)
