Trying to Talk About Sex with My Wife: Texting In Bed
“I’m having sex, 90% of the time alone.”
This conversation happened in bed in the form of a poem we wrote back and forth between us. Texting appeared easier than talking sometimes. She seemed to need time to consider and formulate her responses. I was in a sexually starved marriage. She had other problems. Sex was not one of her issues. Once a month, if at all, was okay with her. It was MY issue, obviously. There were other enlightening moments, but it was clearly a core problem in our marriage. When one partner begins freezing out the other one, sexually, there is a disconnect. Intimacy is a basic need. When the sex dies, in my opinion, the relationship is close behind.
+++ texting – unedited +++
i’m having sex, 90% of the time alone
so financial crisis moments appear and go away
and I too feel fatigue when my trustworthiness is raised again and again
not a crisis
more of a chronic situation of the relationship
weariness of wanting to go into it
now you have to put some stuff in.
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also weary of the dialogue around sex – frequency
my time is so spoken for
i don’t see that changing
if we could actually put every moment spent on considering the vectors of the situation of not that much (together) sex
in to crafting a situation where it could happen
we would create actual sexual encounters.
i get weary of focus on my not meeting your needs for sex
pretty much feel like your framing of the issue is you want more sex
so what can we do to get me available for more sex
and that this framing is in your mind
not expressed so much by action
In my (quite open to possibility of distortion on my part) world, I am a)working, b)sleeping, c)doing a mission-critical thing for kids, d) doing some other mission-critical thing (house, etc). Not really spending any bandwidth researching the dynamics of things you are doing or not doing that don’t meet my needs. I do speak up with clear asks, but that’s all I can muster.
so it is frustrating and feels weird that you have this thing going on where I continue not to meet your needs
at the same time I have no bandwidth left to meet any other needs period.
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so do YOU have sexual desire?
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yes.
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and are you happy with your sex life?
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in the context of reality – other real, now dynamics of time etc – sure
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then we have a mismatch in desire, wouldn’t you say?
And that is a critical path issue for me. As much as money or housekeeping or kidkeeping is for the WE.
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Yes. It is a critical path issue for you to __________________?
—
Discuss with you what’s missing. What’s wrong with this situation. Evaluate what’s going on. Is it desire? Trust? Money? Work? Housekeeping?
My TXT last Sunday saying, “I’m thinking about masterbating… but I’d rather have sex with you was a good opening.” and we were successful in connecting.
We need more casual wins.
What I am curious about is… how things have changed for you from what I imagine our SEX life was like 3 years ago.
I do not buy the house, work, sleepy idea. Something else perhaps?
What has changed for me is… The “connection” that you were speaking about say 2 months ago
to me the miss or lack is due to lack of contact and intimacy.
Sex doesn’t seem to be a part of that equation for you. Now, of course I am telling you it is. (grin)
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Definitely it is a critical path issue for both of us, because you are materially unhappy (altho not in a crisis way) with the frequency and ____________ (connection?) of our sex (intimate?) life and therefore it makes the WE.
The txt was notable to me. so direct.
The not buying about sleepy and house…it’s like the conversation we had where you were asking me: what do you need? And I told you. “To see the numbers.” and that that was really what I needed was so out of range of believeable to you – you didn’t buy it – that it never occured to you to do the numbers, or engage with me to say OK, lets do the numbers now.
But it was true. I needed to see the numbers. YOU never actually need to see the numbers for that particular kind of situation. But I do.
So you ask what would help….per sex….and I nearly always come around to: house (a visually peaceful – that sensuality for me), sleep or workout (that’s body – a key to my sensuality). But you CANT BUY it. Because it’s not your experience of the world, I guess.
I’m empathetic with NOT BUYING another person’s experience. Certainly I miss on this more than rarely.
On the mismatch of desire. Maybe we have a mismatch in the desire for genital rubbing and intercourse v other sensuality. I feel like I live in a world of visual sensuality, and touch, and working out – exertion, and some kinds of foods – beautiful, fresh foods. And then there is sex, like, in bed sex.
And ? for you the sensuality of life stacks up differently. Sex straight UP gets more brain cells – loving the clean curves and surfaces gets fewer. Fresh pinapple, not so much. Ice cream – a lot!!
More pragmatically, there is a cycle we are in that at least does not help. I can’t sleep next to you. When we are spooned, the snoring is so loud – some just because of what spooning does, put your mouth in my ear, I wake up. Then, if I am awake, I have to go to another room. This was not the case 3 years ago.
I don’t have a point of entry in to that situation. Not sure.
—
You have not told me recently about the snoring and that is the reason you are leaving the bedroom so frequently. I am always happy to apply a breathrite strip. They seem to help. And I need to lose weight. I am actively working on that.
Back a the discussion about what you needed, it was not that I didn’t buy your experience. In fact, we agreed that restarting money discussions was probably critical path.
We didn’t DO the financial plans again until we were reminded by our counselor of the critical WE in everything.
+++ end of texting +++
I used to say “It wasn’t my idea,” about the divorce. And in my divorce recovery group, I was definitely self-identified as the dumpee. But what was different is I was beginning to express my dissatisfaction with the status quo. Her money-house-tired story had reached the end of my accepting it. I was tired of having sex alone 90% of the time. I was demanding we talk about it.
What didn’t know was she was already in the process of figuring out her options. Probably, in terms of her critical path issues, house and money she was beginning the process of trying to figure out what she would get if she decided to go for a divorce.
When she admitted in therapy that she had already consulted with a lawyer, I was stunned. “Well,” I said. “I guess you are a lot further down the road than I am about this.” And she got motivated to find full-time work and basically created a job within a few months. And then, I suppose she saw the potential for escape from her private hell.
I remember saying to her, once the “divorce” was agreed to, “So you think it’s me that’s making you so mad all the time? And you think I’m going to walk out that door and you are somehow going to transform into a happy person? Wow. I think you are wrong.”
The WE is the construct and loving connection of the relationship. What we learned from our time in couples therapy: everything we do together, every commitment we make and break, every communication we share, is part of the WE. As our WE collapsed under the isolation and frustration that was occurring between us, my then-wife simply got mad and stayed mad. She didn’t want to be intimate. She was mad. She woke up mad. She stayed mad all day.
Today, nine years later, she’s still more like a hornet than a rational human being when dealing with me.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
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)
Happy New Year, Ex-Husband, I Need More Money
The first day of the new year hadn’t cooled before my ex-y was laying down the law, making spreadsheets and requests for more money. It was a lot like how she was in our marriage. But I was just a bit too fresh to my new year, celebrating that I wasn’t hungover or depressed, to respond in a loving way. (“It’s just about the kids.”)
I tried deflecting the conversation.
She responded with more heat.
I took a different approach.
Another hot response.
And here’s where I had the ability to end it. And I did. I laid down my boundaries. “I will make my payments as scheduled for January. If you want to send me the spreadsheet of extra expenses you are asking me to pay, you can pause the send until February and you’ll get a better response.”
Fact One: One of the reasons we’re no longer married is our hardship in navigating such emotional and murky waters.
Fact Two: I have an obligation that I agreed to in the divorce contract. Some days I feel like it’s too much money, or that it’s unfair. Other days, like today – even, I am optimistic about my prospects and I let it roll off the proverbial back. Like a duck.
Fact Three: I can set my boundaries in a different way than I was able to do while we were married. We ARE still in a relationship, that won’t end, but I don’t have to jump and scramble to her urgency to solve this issue today, tonight, the first day of the new year.
I’m not real clear about how much “stuff” I’m still carrying into this negotiation. So for now, a PAUSE is best. I can take a breath. Stretch my mind and heart with some yoga or chat with someone else. But I don’t have to give her an answer this minute. I don’t have to give her the answer she wants.
She said something quite insiteful in one of her responses. (paraphrased) “This is not about you and me. It’s about taking care of what our kids need.”
Yes, she’s right. The request is about a summer camp tuition for our daughter. The issue will be solved. We will pay for her to go to camp. But today, with my finances still a bit out of whack, I don’t have to answer.
Did money play a huge role in the stress of our marriage and eventual divorce? Absolutely. Was the economic recession after 911 the hardest economic times for most people? Yes, and we’re still digging back out. Do we have to deal with money issues with drama or crisis-like urgency? Nope. Not gonna do it.
I have the pause button. Not to abuse or neglect her efforts to do what is right by our kids. She is not doing this to be angry, nor to attack me. It’s a difficult negotiation and discussion that we will have plenty of times over the next 10 years or more. And the best response for me is to step back, not poke out a hurtful reply, and regroup. We can try again tomorrow.
I’m learning this.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
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)
Note: Writing this post in the heat of the moment, I needed to step back and look at my intention. Here’s what I came up with.
This blog is not written to my ex-y. While she knows about it, my guess is that she stays clear of reading it. So, I’m not writing TO her, or intentionally trying to communicate to her through the blog. It is only with this distinction that I feel I can write from the hot core, rather than skim over the surface so as not to hurt any feelings.
Flat Out Broke: Money Survival Basics After Divorce
How is it possible? I’m a successful professional in my 49th year of life and I have a negative balance in my checking account and $14 in my retirement account? And even more amazing, how is it that I am not freaking out?
Since the full child support payments kicked in I have been scrambling not to bounce checks. I’m astounded by the amount of money I am now paying to my ex-y. I know it’s “for the kids” and all, but I am barely keeping gas in my car and food in my belly at this moment. Much less food in my kids bellies and the occasional splurge, eating out or going out to see a movie.
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Every other expense, bill, financial obligation, was on hold. Paused. Put in a file and forgotten about. I could not pay my credit cards for the first time in my life.
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I am lucky, too, I have a high earning potential, and even in this dropped economy I’ve made a reasonable, though severely reduced, income. And my ex-y has remained fully employed since about three months before the divorce was final. (Go figure that?)
And, I’ve got some new clients and good financial forecasts for next month. But it always takes a while for new business to ramp up to full-hours. I’m close, and I have invoices out to be paid, but at the moment, I can’t buy a Starbucks. Oh, and I forgot to mention, my three credit cards, useless burdens at this point. Another source of frustration. But I’ll get to them as well.
Of course, “the kids” come first. Of course they do. And I will say it to myself again and again, “I want my kids to have a healthy life.” And I have to believe I will rise above the cash drain with a significant uptick in my income. That’s about all I have, the faith that I will dig out from under this.
Once I got over the shock of not being able to pay all of my bills I started researching strategies to survive. Here’s what I learned.
The bankruptcy/debt counselors really only have one solution: consolidate your debt and agree to a payment plan. Um, this does not work when your income is ZERO.
The counselor did say one very valuable thing. “At some point you will run out of things to sell off and you will have to make a decision about what bills to pay.”
My decisions revolved around a few things.
- I wanted to keep my house. (mortgage payments were critical path)
- I had to eat and drive to work. (groceries and gas were non-negotiables)
- I needed electricity, water, and high-speed internet access to do my work and live comfortably.
- I committed to the child support payments and I was going to pay them. (I did negotiate a deferral on also paying the kid’s health insurance until my work re-stabilized.)
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In the meantime, my job is not to thrash, not to share the stress of this trying moment with my kids, and to carry on. It sucks sometimes.
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Other than that, every other expense, bill, financial obligation, was on hold. Paused. Put in a file and forgotten about. I could not pay my credit cards for the first time in my life. Okay, I’m over it. Ignore the calls. I had to tell my ex-y that I could not pay the health care but that I would make good on the debt as soon as I had positive cash flow. I had to negotiate the timing on my payments to my ex-y so I could make two payments during the month.
And then I have continued to work like hell to get my work situation back to full-productivity. Yes the economy is hard. I’ve had a lot of interviews but no offers. And my consulting business has kept me alive for almost a year since my last FT job.
But the bottom line is, I’m surviving. I’ve cut back to the bare basics. And today I’ve still got nothing. I can’t take my kids to the movies tonight. And the groceries in the fridge are what we’ve got until they go back to their mom’s on Monday. And IT IS OKAY. It’s not fun, but it’s workable. The clients will pay, the credit cards will eventually get back on a payment plan, and the ex-y will get her full legally awarded child support.
In the meantime, my job is not to thrash, not to share the stress of this trying moment with my kids, and to carry on. It sucks sometimes. And I’m not 100% sure being the non-custodial parent was a good move for me financially. BUT, today it’s what I’ve got.
Hi Ho, Hi Ho!
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
@theoffparent
Update: A new reader tweeted at me today about this post. It made her hot under the collar. “Paying child support is not heroic.” She said. She missed the gist of this post. Yes we are both struggling with money issues. But I was at ZERO. Not by some bad behavior or fatal flaw. Not because I was not looking for work.
< back to The Hard Stuff
related posts:
- Losing Everything In Divorce; Learning to Carry On
- On the Turning Away: Fighting with Your Ex About Money
- Tell Me Again, Why You Think This Is a Good Idea? (child support part 1)
- Can Things Get Worse? Yes, Easy! (child support part 2)
- A Fool and His Money Soon Go Separate Ways
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)
I See You – Losing that Loving Perspective
At some point in the relationship, my ex was no longer seeing me. She didn’t listen to the songs or poems I was writing. I was unable to reach her by asking for what I needed. She was gone in some fundamental way.
The most basic need I think we are all trying to fill is that of being seen. Being embraced for who we are, for accomplishing or failing at our ambitions, for our good deeds and our strengths. When two people begin the courting process, we are trying to see ourselves reflected in the other’s love for us.
A whole bunch of the courtship is our own projection and song of desire we are projecting on other person. We are self-creating the fantasy of who this “lover” is and all the ways they complete us. A feeling of fulfillment, the fulfillment of some long unmet needs, all being showered down upon us in the radiant attention of someone else’s love. And then there is the rest of life.
I sing the song of myself all the time. I project a wonderful life story on the woman who speeds past me in the black Audi with bike racks. I plug in my projection of who she is and how she will be amazed at the new song I have written her. And I’m sure at one point, my ex-y, pre-kids, pre-major-adult-responsibilities, saw me.
My mom has a picture of me at that time. My girlfriend-at-that-point-in-time and I had gotten a Boston Terrier together. In the picture I am holding the tiny dog and looking pretty pleased with my life. It was the only time in my life that I had shoulder-length hair. This is who my ex-y saw and crawled into life with. This younger me, with long hair, and ambitions to “make it” as a musician. And she was an artist too. We were artists.
As time progressed the real world set in and our first child brought more realness than we’d imagined. She took time off from work, I was self-employed and working in the garage of the new house, in the dream neighborhood, that we’d purchased for the kids. “For the kids.” Okay, it was for us too. There was a part of it, dream fulfilled, that we had moved into a sweet neighborhood with sweet schools and a sweet tennis/swim club just down the hill. It was a sweet moment.
Things got more and more real. I had to provide financially on a different level than I had ever had to before. We were happy in our little dream and we were working hard to keep it warm and fun. And of course we had the baby boy. The amazing baby boy.
And I recall the exact moment our second child was conceived. We both did. It was a mid-May afternoon, the weather was just moving from crisp to hot and my then wife, came home from her part-time work, and she was standing in the opening of the garage door, in her professional attire, looking like the very hot woman I had fallen head over heals in love with. The baby was inside asleep. It was a perfect moment. We made sweaty hot love with her on top of me, mostly still clothed, sitting in the chair at my desk. We both enjoyed it. An ecstatic moment.
Already, we were conscious of wanting another child. The baby had been so fantastic. And wouldn’t it be amazing if we could have a girl too.
This time the pleasant valley road didn’t go so smoothly. After our first proud sonogram at the regular ob/gyn’s office, we were given pictures of our baby girl [YAY] and the number for a pre-natal specialist. A few of the numbers were off.
Way the fuck off. And thus began the roughest moments in my life. Our daughter had a rare disorder, a blood incompatibility with my wife’s blood. The weekly doctor’s visits, with their go-nogo diagnostics were almost unbearable. But what do you do? You can only bear it. There is no RESET button. You can’t go somewhere else and hope things get better.
Our son was amazing. Our nanny was amazing. Our doctor and our pre-natalogist was amazing. It was all fucking amazing and terrifying.
And about this time, the twin towers were taken out and all of our lives, the entire planet, were stopped and changed. But the doctor’s visits still had to go on. And even though each of my consulting clients froze every cent of my income overnight, I had to press on with “what’s next.”
Neither of us knew what was next. But it was probably during this period in our lives that we began to lose track of each other. My spiral into despair and struggle was not a pretty one. And she soldiered on. She was amazing. I tried to keep telling her that without sounding desperate. I tried to be strong, and I guess I was, but everything was kitty-wampus and upside down. We do what you do. We pressed onward. We fought to keep our daughter, we blessed my wife’s part-time employer insurance that covered the entire 6 months of pre-natal care. We hovered around our son and each other. And we pressed on. And maybe we broke.
Our daughter was born healthy and feisty one mid-morning in November. And she was a miracle. The blood issues that might have been present didn’t show up on any of the monitoring machines. We had made it through the dark. We were through the initial shock of it all [birth, 2nd kid, 9-11] and turning the corner into the next stretch and headlong into some very dark woods indeed.
The very real work of having a family, working to keep a house and keep our sanity during such a trying time led to some pretty serious consequences. I will admit to having some sort of nervous mid-life break down. Somewhere in my fears my brain had decided it was no longer a productive part of my body. So we, my wife and I, were both in deep reality-bites mode and moving quickly into WTF mode.
My recovery was not easy. And the toll was paid on my wife, my son, and my new daughter. And the toll was taken on my life expectancy, as I continued to struggle for what I wanted to do now that my business had been blown up by 911. And the bills, mortgage, and doctor appointments never slowed down. It’s like my life had taken a stall, but the rest of reality kept barreling right along.
But as I recovered parts of my spirit, as my trusting and happy self re-emerged there was a long distance between my wife and I. We’d both been through hell. She had stayed sane and dealt with it. And I had exited in some psychological way and left her with all the work. [That’s not quite true, it’s not like I left or died or anything, but my 110% self was tucked away somewhere deep.]
And so in trying to make it forward we stopped listening to each other. We tried, but the noise the fear and the pain was too loud. And we struggled on. We both stuck it out. What choice did we have? Divorce? It wasn’t in my vocabulary. Depression. That one was familiar, unfortunately.
And our little unit survived. Scarred and weary, but we survived. And when the joy began to return, the true gut busting joy, I started feeling and acting on the hopefulness I felt. I’m imagining my ex-y never got back to that joyful trust again. She did not respond to my affections in the same way. She wasn’t supportive of the music I was creating as part of my recovery. I’m pretty sure she only listened to them when I sat with her and made her see me and hear me.
I was looking for something like a healing between us. I was expressing my ouch and my yay. She was not listening. She must have been listening to some other internal voice of her own. And the warnings and trouble overwhelmed the positive memories. Perhaps she never trusted me, or allowed the feelings of love to come between us, again. (Sad.)
We want to be seen. More than anything in the world we want to just be seen for what we are and what we have accomplished. I tried to thank her for her support and celebrate our rebirth. I sang to my kids. I sang to others. But she had lost the taste for my voice. And perhaps it was over for her, long before it was expressed as a desire for divorce. I kept singing. I kept writing poems. I kept playing and enjoying our kids. And she continued to maintain and increase her distance from me. Perhaps even from them, in some guarded way.
I writhed a bit. Our last Valentine’s Day as a married couple was a complete miss. I posted a geeky love poem on my blog. I was sure she would see it. She was working in Search Engine Optimization, so I SEO’d the post with her name and my name, thinking that might get caught in her filter. She did not see it. I kept it as a secret not as a trick, but as a way to surprise the heck out of her when she “discovered” my love poem.
I followed through on Valentine’s Day morning by letting her sleep in while I made pancakes and entertained the kids. [That this had become more and more of a pattern, might have been a clue as to her state of mind, but I was happy to give her some extra rest.] When she woke, I made her some coffee and breakfast. And I had a gift and a card for her. The kids had cards for her as well.
Her Valentine gift to me was a bit odd. She gave the me book of The Fighter. And her card said something about me being on FIRE and her like ICE. She was saying something about how our opposites were still good together. But I don’t think she meant it. I was more confused than encouraged. I wanted to understand the hint, but I couldn’t get past the pugilistic book. How that exemplified her love for me, was unclear.
I was still writing love letters and she was giving me a book about a boxer. Clearly we were not hearing or seeing each other with the same hearts that brought us together, eleven years earlier.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
@theoffparent
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image: down left up, jane rahman, creative commons usage
The Close of Business Between Us: Taking Back the Heart of Darkness
It wasn’t too long ago, six months I guess, that I was feeling a moment of pause, reflection, and doubt. During a kid drop off moment, I had the idea, “If I’m going to start completely over with someone, I’d rather start completely over with my ex.” Not to remarry, or move back into my old house (we’d certainly gone too far for that) but to actively date for a bit. She was still the one person I wanted to chat with more than anyone. And it wasn’t about sex, although at that moment I had not been with anyone else.
I wrote her an open email about where I was standing. Professed my continued love for her, and proposed we discuss, imagine, see-if something like “dating” would appeal to her as well. I was pretty sure at that point that her “other lovers” totaled about 2, but only one had been confirmed.
But it wasn’t from a place of weakness or sorrow. Actually, it was a place of great strength. I was thinking, “I’m big enough to tell her this.” And a funny thing happened when I sent the email. I was actually able to let go of any expectations of what the result would be. In fact, in many ways, I was releasing her with one final ask, “Are you sure this is what you want. Because it is STILL NOT WHAT I WANT.”
The silence was deafening. About 36 hours later she responded with, “I’m very touched by your offer.” And some more blah blah blah. It was a resounding NO.
But even before she responded I was feeling a huge lift. In a way that I had not felt since she asked for the divorce, I was feeling free of her. I clarified after her ho-hum response. I was not looking to move back in, or really change the current living or even kid schedule, I was merely imagining that we might want to spend some time getting to know each other again before we truly moved on.
It was clear from her lack of follow-up that I was the one still wanting to get to know her. Her last missive on the subject alluded to how I was a “very desirable man” and … blah blah blah… She was not interested.
A few weeks later we made plans to do the kid’s Christmas presents together in my house. She would come to my house since I had the first half of the holiday in our schedule. I could not have done this had I not had this release.
At the end of the 2nd message, I put something in there about going out on the open dating market for the first time. (I don’t know why I needed to put that in.) And sure enough within a few weeks, I was aligned with my dog-loving ice breaker.
Today, many months later, she has let me know she has been seeing her new lover since Dec. At least that gives me the idea that she was really in a place to consider my re-connect offer. Who knows.
And as she has now discovered this blog (Thanks to Google+ and Google’s advertising efforts) I now have even less to talk about. I don’t disdain her. Far from it. But there is a completion to my process with her. I don’t really want to see her when I drop off the kids. I don’t like her renewed fantastic shoe fetish, nor her recut short blonde hairdo. I’d rather not… Not even imagine.
And a helpful concept from the divorce recovery class comes to mind often in our “drop off” encounters.
“Think of your ex as a convenience store clerk. You are there to conduct business and leave. You don’t need to exchange pleasantries or ask how things are going.”
In fact, I’m best not knowing any of the details of her life.
So six months ago, I negotiated our final close of business. And now we are free to date, love, enjoy. And, as she has been in this entire process, she’s still just a few steps ahead of me.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
< back to The Hard Stuff pages
related posts:
- Marriage and Money: A Fairy Tale
- I Must Be Insane: It’s the End of the World, and I Feel Fine
- Stinging the Hand that Feeds
- Winning the Battle, Losing the War
image: I found this black half-heart stone on my walk today, it’s on top of the check I am writing to my ex for child support this month.
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)
Doing Well Is the Best Revenge; Should Be Served Cold
Money played a much bigger role in my marriage than I’d like to admit. And now, divorced, the relationship between my ex and money is about the same. With one big difference. I can ignore my ex when she’s going on about money. We’ve got a contract now. And if it’s written, then I don’t need to keep negotiating when, how, if, and the ever-present, “It would be nice if…”
Nope, as easy as pushing mute on my phone when it’s ringing.
She’s really no easier now than she was. There’s still this urgent need to know exactly when and how much. As if a day or a hundred dollars is going to make a huge difference to anybody but her.
Yes, I’m a bit more laid back about money. And, confession, I’m slightly behind on the health care part of the payments. But things are just about to change. My consulting business just booked two new clients that are going to take me to about 120% of capacity.
The good news is, I can do the extra 20% now because I don’t have my kids for most of the weekday nights. So, dear ee I’m going to catch up. I’ve told you I would as soon as I had a good book of business. And that’s true.
The part that’s fun about it… (Poignant, rather than fun.) The fun part is that money is about to get much easier for me. And that’s good, I’m middle-aged. And while I’ve just killed my entire retirement account, to keep up with the child support payments, I’m going to rebuild stronger and bigger than ever before. So I will wave at your working-your-ass-off self, the one who decided to split up the 11-year partnership we’d formed. And I have the awareness at this point that I was trying to grow a more sane business model for both of US. Now you are out of that equation. I hope you find what you are looking for.
I’m looking forward to being a solid provider again. And the ex will get what’s coming to her, to the letter of the law. But the partnership could’ve produced some great opportunities and cushion. Oh well. On to what’s next.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
“Watch out squirrel!” I Needed To Shout This Today: “Fk You!”
“For some reason I needed to tell you today, that I fkin hate you for giving up on me. And, of course, it is a blessing. We weren’t happy. But as much as I’d like to talk about the sour grapes, I’m still somewhat devastated. You bailed.”
Ah, that anger again. We’re gonna have good days and bad days. And today has been a good day. When I was driving to the store today I saw a vulture snacking on a squirrel. Why this reminded me of my own pain, I’m not quite sure. But today, with an email from you, I learned what it was about.
I am not okay.
And I am fine. But here’s the rub. We were so fkin close to making it. Sure I hid some of my desires and you pretended to still have them for me. And sure the economy has been tough, it’s tough on everyone. And then like the squirrel, I got distracted. I paid attention to your anger rather than my own. And now the vultures are snacking on my heart. [okay, that was for dramatic effect only. let me recalibrate and try again.]
As so many things are coming back together for me, after almost two years of struggle, I am sorry not to have you as my mate to share this wonderful time with. That’s the part that still has some kind of sting. But that’s my shit. And I’m working on it. [here]
In the same way WE were so close to making things work out back then, I am very close today, on both a personal and professional level. Sure, a relationship will follow, at some point, but I’m taking major life/balance things first. And before the divorce was started, when I said to you, “You know we can’t afford TWO houses in this neighborhood.” I was wrong. Sort of.
There’s an imbalance to how all this divorce stuff goes down. I’m not angered by the child support payments. My kids need a lot of stuff. And I’m happy to provide. BUT… Some how I’m now paying TWO mortgages. How did that work? How is that fair? Who’s helping me out?
There’s some statistic about the SPO being about even. But there’s a real big mistake in that logic. HUGE actually. The SPO has this wonderful provision for the working dad, primarily the one who gets the shorter end of the stick on the SPO laws. And this provision has the kids spending an entire month with dad, theoretically during the summer. Um, yeah.
QUESTION: When the fk am I going to be able to afford to take a week off with my kids, much less a MONTH? REALLY! No, Dr. Who-Knows-Best, tell me about that mythical MONTH that helps balance the schedule out the rest of the year. Oh, and before you answer, let’s talk about how much of the financial burden I’M going to be carrying, in addition to trying to scratch out a living for myself. So, really, what’s the fkin SPO percentage when I can’t afford to take that MONTH off, in fact, we don’t DO that part of the SPO, because it’d be too damn expensive.
Another big shock, if you’re on the mortgage for another house, it’s gonna be harder than hell to afford a new place. Much less, BUY something. And when they are looking at your financial feasibility, they are going to examine your SPO like frikin proctologists. Because, my friends, the dad is getting fked right up the wazoo.
Without going into numbers, let me illuminate the situation.
My child support payments, which include a percentage of my salary AND the cost of healthcare for both kids, is exactly $100 less than my new mortgage. And about $200 less than the mortgage on my old home. So how did the math come out, that we’re getting the kids 43/57 but I’m still paying both mortgages? (Here’s a link to the Standard Possession Order in the State of Texas.) Here’s what the Attorney General’s website says about our great state, to give you the full flavor of the situation here, “In Texas, about 10 percent of non-custodial parents are mothers.” – handbook for non-custodial parents.
Yeah, yeah… Men often make more than women. And yeah, yeah, women often suffer more financially than men in this situation. Fk that, it hasn’t been so in MY CASE. [sorry, i’ll try to quit shouting.]
Here’s what you are going to hear from your legal support team. (her’s and your’s) “The SPO is the way to go. Being the Non-Custodial Parent (NCP) is no big deal. That’s how it’s going to go even if you fight it. It’s just the way it is.”
And there’s going to be this, “50/50 is too hard on the kids. Too much transition. The SPO is better for everyone. It has been worked out over time.”
So what do you do? What did I do? Of course I went in asking for 50/50 and the Dr. advised that my request was more of an emotional matter, and not one that was necessarily in the “best interest” of the child. And “The SPO is the best approach.”
And I kid you not, she said this, “And she’s going to get that if you fight her or not. Most of this is about what she is willing to negotiate, knowing that she would win in court. But neither of you want that.”
And she was right. I was in no position to fight. I was still reeling from the idea of losing something much bigger than a custody battle. I was willing to put everything in the “best for the kids” column, if it meant less time dealing with the trauma of the divorce.
Besides–and this still haunts me–“what she is willing to negotiate.” The assumption, even by this neutral [ha!] third-party was… SHE WINS.
As Dad’s we just need to deal with it. Buck up and be prepared to PAY.
+++
I’ve been lucky. Even in my devastating depression, surrounding such a depressing event, I got a pretty awesome FT-job about six months after the divorce was final. And I moved quickly to purchase a house on that job.
I have nothing to complain about. I mean, I can rant here, but overall I am personally in pretty good shape. And while my first post-D job only lasted 4 months, I am poised to start some contract work that could put me solidly back in to the black. Where I get to pay both of our mortgages for way less than 50% of the time.
I’ve got a funny way of looking at it: If I had to pay for childcare during all the time I have to myself, I’d probably be paying A LOT more. So do what you can to get over the anger. And get the possession order that makes the most sense for YOU. I’m meeting a ton of parents who do more of a 50/50 thing. I wonder how that would’ve affected the amount of money I had to pay to my ex-y.
Let me be clear: I want my kids to be provided for. I want to be that good provider for my kids. But… where does it say that she gets a free house in the deal, just for starters? “Because she knows that’s what she’s going to get.”
I’ve officially just burned through my entire retirement savings. I could probably petition the court and show my REAL INCOME for the past 18 months and have the support amount reduced significantly. Heck, I was optimistic when I signed the SPO and decree outlining how much I was going to pay my ex-y for the next 9 years. But mostly I was just trying to get through the loss AND the process of the courts. And of course, everyone counseled me that she would get the SPO anyway, and I should just agree and move on.
That’s fair, right? Fk that! [don’t be a fkin squirrel or the vultures are gonna rip your furry body apart.]
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
< back to The Hard Stuff pages
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)
The Trick Is Not to Become Bitter – Signing the Papers
Signing the final documents of my divorce today I had a couple reflections on the process of moving on and maintaining a positive attitude.
First, the money that was transferred to me via SEP IRA accounts as an equalizer, since I gave her (the kids) the house, will be taxed at 20% which I knew, but I will also be hit with a 10% penalty. So, damn I just lost another 10% of my cash that I can use for buying another place to live. Not her fault.
loving everything about herSecond, as I was walking through Target to buy some new undershirts I was painfully aware of how much I miss the connection to a woman. I want to buy neat clothes, I want to look at the bras and imagine my woman in them, but at the moment there is no woman. Ouch!
Third, as Match.com and eHarmony continue to bring me less than exciting “matches” I have to be realistic with what I want. I won’t settle for just another woman. I won’t date for the sake of having sex. (Never have.) And I have to get myself in better shape to attract the type and style of woman I would like to spend time with. Again, not her fault.
So here I am, late 40′s pressing towards 50, and there are a lot of things fairly consistent about me. One of the things is my positive outlook. If I were holding on to the anger, or continuing to direct it at the ex-woman of my desires, I would only be doing myself a disservice. I do want her to be happy. Not that happy, but happy enough.
Today I am happy. I am missing my connection to the sexual energy of being around a woman. But I will have that again. And I can start with my own happiness first. And as I signed the order today “withholding” child support from my paycheck, I could only imagine how much easier it would be for me to have the money withheld rather than having to write the check every month. Yes, it’s a positive.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
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)
Stay At Home Mom: A Dream Unfulfilled
I wanted my wife to be able to attend school functions, meet the bus after school, provide the stay-at-home lifestyle that was so common in our neighborhood. And for the first 5 years, it was almost so. I went off to work with the expectations that she could provide a nurturing landing pad for them in and around school activities.
We lived in an upper-middle-class neighborhood with plenty of affluent families who could afford the one-income lifestyle. And again, we were close. But for some portions of that time she was a part-time working mom. Booking anywhere from 10 – 20 hours a week.
We could’ve lived across town. We could’ve decided that our time with our kids was more important than the great schools we were affording them. But we didn’t. I soldiered on with my big job with big benefits while she went to mid-morning events at the school, and chummed up with the other less-than-full-time moms. And perhaps that was a sore spot for her too. We were surrounded by couples that had made it. Ours was a different path.
And she was much better at school events. She handled proctoring the table of first-graders much better than I did. She was never short of ideas for kid-friendly activities. She never passed up a kid’s request, “Can we paint?” It was one of her gifts. She was fearless with the kids.
So it was a slightly dogged dad that I had become trying to support this selective imbalance. And for the most part, I was fully on-board and supportive and happy that she had the extra time to be with the kids. But there was a sadness too.
I was sad somewhere deep inside, about not being able to provide as well as my dad did, making the nice home, nice neighborhood, nice stay-at-home wife. And sometimes when I would visit the school in place of my wife, I would feel guilty, like SHE was supposed to be there not me. And somehow it was my fault that she was having to work and I was filling in.
But the reality is this: I deserve time with my kids as much as she does. I gave up my ability to proctor classroom activities for a shot at allowing her to be there. There are plenty of families in our school district who have two working parents. And we had certainly achieved an agreeable fit. At least that’s what I felt about it.
Today I visited my daughter at school for lunch. She didn’t know I was coming. I didn’t really plan it out, I just looked at the schedule and noticed that her lunch was at 12:4o and off I went. She was delighted to see me. She proudly quizzed me about her friends’ names and laughed with them as I couldn’t remember any of them. And we sat and chatted with the group while she ate.
Looking around the cafeteria there was one other man in the room. I was in the realm of women and children. But the sad tone did not creep into my thoughts. I was happy to have the time to visit, I was happy my daughter was doing well with the divorce, and I was happy to be able to know that the value I provided was over and above any income bracket or a nice house. What I provide for my daughter is a solid male example.
I left before the lunch was completely over. The table was getting excited at the anticipation of going out for recess. I high-fived my daughter and said, “I’ll see you after the bus today, at your mom’s house.” I was picking up my son and my daughter was choosing to stay at home with the very cool babysitter. And we were happy with the arrangement.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
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)
Stealing Home – “walking out of my house for the last time”
When it finally went down, when I was walking out of MY house for the last time, I felt a bit I was acting out the exit scene in The Jerk. “Just one more thing.” And with the closing of that door behind me, everything changed. Suddenly anything I wanted I had to ask for. I left with a bag of clothes a few books and little else.
The exit had been requested months earlier, mid-March. But I refused to throw my entire family (mainly the kids who were 2 months from the finish of the school year) into chaos because my ex had built up the anger and resentment to finally ask for a divorce. I said no a number of times that week and a few times the next week. We had been living as roommates for months, we could do it for a few more months to deflect the trauma until the summer when we all had more time to heal.
For this solidity I give thanks. I believe the experience for the kids was tempered as their mom and I worked through the details of custody and schedules.
When the moment came for me to actually acquiesce it was a Friday morning. My sleep had been getting more and more ragged. And I was losing my objectivity. So I agreed to leave it all behind and give her the dominion of the house. I didn’t really believe I was walking out for the last time, but I knew things would fundamentally be different from that moment on.
So now, months later, from the outside I have given the house to my ex-wife and kids. I realized at some point during the negotiations that I did not want to be in the “family home” alone. And I would be alone a lot more of the time than she was. And that was the DEAL. I could’ve gone for 50/50 time. I could’ve forced the sale of the house. But I gave the rights to the home and the 70/30 split of time to her.
And perhaps it is better for them to be with their mom more. Either way, that’s pretty much what I would’ve gotten had I gone before the courts and asked the judge. And what I got for the consolation was a chunk of retirement money that was going to be taxed at 30% the minute I needed to touch it for a down payment. But what I really got was a happier ex. I’m pretty sure neither of us would qualify for the house at this moment. I could have some bitterness that we got a cash-out or a refi less than a month before she asked for a divorce. But perhaps this too was a gift. Without it, economic times would’ve come much harder for my entire family.
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
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: The Homecoming used via cc terms
Wisdom from the trenches – “responsible separation”
“What can we do to give you the distance you need, without hurting the family?”
He kept saying, “I don’t love you anymore.” And “I don’t like what you’ve become.”
She kept saying, “I don’t buy it.”
I think the roles are reversed for me in this situation, but these words were those of Laura A. Munson writing in the New York Times about her husbands request for a divorce.
WOW.
So she committed to her happiness regardless of what external circumstances brought her, and she said “No,” to her husband’s request. And she offers some interesting wisdom that I know I need to grok more fully.
So I had become the keystone in my ex-y’s anger. And my questions regarding her rage, and did she think she was going to turn into a happy person, simply by me walking out the door? I don’t think she really ever responded to my question. But perhaps I wasn’t asking. I was telling. And I was NOT agreeing to walk out the door.
And that’s what I was striving for, but perhaps I turned it into a marital fight without meaning to. Yes I pressed, but I was exhausted about being held at arms length from the love of my life, and trapped in the box of indecision. It wasn’t the sex, it was the simple expressions of caring that were difficult for her. And a warmth that I had come to crave was being withheld.
My connection to this story continues here: Strengthening Your Core Happiness
Sincerely,
The Off Parent
< back to The Hard Stuff pages
Reference:
- This Is Not the Story You Think It Is…: A Season of Unlikely Happiness – book by Laura Munson
- MODERN LOVE: Those Aren’t Fighting Words, Dear – NY Times
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)
