Divorce, Single Parenting, Dating, Sex, & Self-Recovery

Latest

Casual Red Dresses and Hints of Victoria’s Secret Beneath

It’s not surprising that the first woman with potential has flamed out. But the beginning was so promising.

Three weeks ago she called me. Did I want to meet her at a local art gallery? She was wearing a wonderfully casual red dress and the tan straps of her Victoria’s Secret bra continued to peak at me from around the sleeves. She was perfect at that moment. She opened like a flower. She spoke of promising things. She said, “I don’t really want to fuck around with my next relationship.” Perhaps you can see where I began to hold a spark for her.

Later than night we ate dinner together. She was aching to be ravished. I could sense it. She had not worn the casual red dress as a warning, it was an invitation. As I texted her later I mentioned looking forward to kissing her, at some point. She responded in kind. And how she appreciated me being patient with her, “being a few steps behind you, in the relationship thing.”

And then, over the next few weeks, we spiraled into conversation upon conversation about what our dating might be like. And I could feel the life draining out of the hope of the casual red dress. And in describing her to a friend I found myself explaining too much. Why hadn’t we kissed? Over the next 5 dates and encounters. Why had the “time” equation run aground?

I am a bit ashamed to say that she reached out to me on Thursday, seeing if I wanted to make plans for the weekend. I didn’t. I have not called her back. I’m sort of dreading it. I know she’s already received the message of my silence. I have a voicemail right now, but I don’t want to listen.

What am I to say? “I’m sorry, but I can’t separate your lack of passion from the memory of my ex-wife’s lack of passion. While I was hanging around waiting for you to catch up, or show any sign that “touch” might be important to you, I lost interest. I can’t change you. I think I’ve seen your relationship DNA and it’s very different from mine.”

Yes, that’s exactly what I need to tell her.

Do I have to do it in person?

This time the answer may be yes. But she’s a very smart woman. Perhaps I can let her know my sentiment above in an email and see if she wants to pursue and persuade me. But, even that feels silly. I’m already gone. When I wrote the over-thinking post I knew I was no longer interested. My craving for her, became a light shining on the complete lack of affection coming back from her. There were lots of words and ideas and thoughts about how it might be. Or, more clearly, how it would have to be for her to be involved. And I simply opted-out of the negotiation.

I re-edited my online dating profile as well. “When it happens, it should be easy.” I said, as my lead sentence. I’m not going to beg or tussle when trying to find time to be together. BUT the same goes for “touch.” If that’s simply not part of their casual show of affection, then I’m NEVER GOING TO GET ENOUGH.

I guess I should read the Love Language section on loving someone with a different language. But I don’t really want to. I want someone with my same need for TOUCH as a point of reference.

Touch is what was lacking in my marriage. I am happy to negotiate time and energy and schedules. But if we don’t speak the same language, then our translations are always going to be a form of compromise.

UPDATE: She responded to my email saying something similar. As if she was having the same idea. No need to carry that spark any further. It’s great to have energy and time freed up. But I’d like to have someone to spend it on.

Sincerely,

The Off Parent

< back to On Dating Again index

Resources:

May 19, 2013 | Categories: dating, kissing, love, online dating, sex | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave A Comment »

Promises and Lies In Online Dating Profiles

I’m beginning to get tired of online dating. Like “real tired” of it.

okcupid and online dating

Here are a few observations I had while checking into my online dating profile this morning.

Thumbnails can tell a lot about a person.

  • Too plain (maybe they don’t have friends or advisers who can help them spruce up)
  • Bathroom mirror shots (maybe they don’t have friends or a modern smart phone to make a proper selfie)
  • Too radical (if they are trying really hard in their profile picture, they are hiding something)
  • Too glam (too much makeup and flash and that’s how I’m going to think of you – puffed up)
  • Too many tattoos (I find tattoos kind of sexy, but if it’s your lead story, you’re probably a dancer or a roller derby star)
  • Too Annie Hall (it was cute back then, but frumpy is just not sexy or intriguing)

The rest of your pictures.

  • There’s usually that one picture that’s a bit more realistic – like what you really look like. You can either hide these or show them as a way of weeding out the misses. Cause in person, the real you is going to show up. You can’t keep your profile in perfect perspective in real life. I currently am employing the “here’s a wakeup photo” method. When we finally meet, you’ll already have a good idea of what I look like. As in RIGHT NOW.
  • Pictures that are from ancient times. You can tell when someone’s using a picture from college. It’s obvious. Make sure your photos are real, and up-to-date. If you’re trying to inflate how you look now, you’re going to spend a lot of time in disappointing first dates. When I see you across the room and notice you look nothing like your photos. Um, is that really what you want?
  • Pictures of your beautiful smile that show little or nothing else of your frame and figure. (Um, what are you hiding, exactly. The answer, actually, is often quite a lot. I was a few dates in with a woman, before I really got a good idea of what the rest of her body looked like. OOPS. It was an uncomfortable situation. I’m not saying you should show your flabby whatevers, but don’t present yourself as a runner and “thin and athletic” if you haven’t worked out since high school.
  • Pictures with kids are okay. I’m sure they will weed out the non-kidded prospects, but that’s probably a good thing, if my experience is any indication. If they don’t have kids and you do… There’s a disconnect immediately. They simply won’t understand about half of your life. They can say, “I love kids.” But they didn’t put them as a priority in their lives. And they probably won’t understand you putting your kids before them.
  • Pictures with drinks in your hand. Fine, we all like a (some of us) like a drink ever now and then. But if you’re leading with you interest in drinking, well, you might be indicating more than you know. I am happy to share a glass or bottle of wine. But it better not be the formative activity in the relationship. That leads to disaster.

Language in your profile.

  • Stay away from Jesus references, unless that is the only type of guy you are considering: the Jesus guy. Because I am spiritual and believe in God and some-variations of Jesus, might not mean I’m ready to be with a Jesus-girl. It’s okay if that’s the priority in your life. And if that’s the case, be sure and be up front about it. But if you’re simply saying, you like to go to church and pray. Leading with your faith, is a bit of a turn off.
  • The words “drama” and “easy-going” are antonyms. But you don’t need to disclaim your dislike of drama. Who really looks for a “scene?” We’re all looking to make life a bit easier. And for some reason we’ve each turned to online dating to try and fill that last little, but critical, tidbit in our lives. The drama, or easy-going-ness will be apparent as you begin to engage with a potential date.
  • Too recent in your divorce trajectory  If you indicate you’re “recently” divorced, I know a lot of us are going to avoid getting involved. Who wants to experience all that turmoil. Call me when you’ve got a few years under your belt. I supposed the contrary is also possible, opportunists who see “recently divorced” as vulnerable and potential objects for bootie calls. The opposite is probably more likely. But if you did hookup with the newly un-married be ready for a lot of drama. The emotional roller coaster is real. I prefer for things to be a little more even keel.
  • Too much “follow your bliss.” Yes divorce is a HUGE opportunity to re-invent yourself and rediscover your priorities in life. But if you’re too far out there in the “exploration” mode you’re probably ignoring some of the basics. Like: do you have a job, are you happy with your job, are you happy with your life, and what else do you do for fun. Too much “ready for the stars” language sets up an expectation of fireworks and flightiness.

Again, these are my opinions. I’ve stripped my OKCupid profile of a good portion of my story. I have the “telling” picture in my set. I’ve decided this time around NOT to answer any of the questions. This creates a 0% match, 0% friend, 0% enemy. And that’s okay. Often I found myself getting worked up, or intrigued by women’s answers to the questions. Really, I just want to get a good picture of who you are, what our potential might be, then I’d like to move towards meeting in person. All this dance before meeting is exhausting and not all that productive.

Finally, my current approach is to only pursue 100% awesome. If there are obvious flaws or misses in the categories above, then I’m out. NEXT.

And that’s also a problem. There are currently ZERO women of interest on my OKCupid radar. That’s okay, I’m more interested in the current rising star. (see: It’s About Time) But at the same time, I know it’s important to keep farming, keep looking for options and information about what I do and don’t want in my next relationship. That’s my part of the equation. Putting all of my eggs in any basket before the hatching begins is just bad farming.

Sincerely,

The Off Parent

< back to On Dating Again index

Resources:

May 18, 2013 | Categories: dating, love, online dating, single parenting | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave A Comment »

endless running

[from Making Love To Other Women – poetry]

she opened her mouth like she opened her mind
i could not stay there
a language i did not warm up to
running, all this endless running
she was fit and pretty
and must have heard a similar discord
she paid, but didn’t return my texts

5-17-13

girl in running shoes

May 17, 2013 | Categories: dating, online dating, p1, poetry | Tags: , , , | Leave A Comment »

Breaking Up and Getting Over It: Someday We’ll Know

bw girlTonight was one of those nights when you see your ex, and you think, “Thank god I have been released.”

It’s not that she’s suddenly become unattractive. Or that she’s doing a bad job at being a co-parent. (Hammering me for money is another thing altogether.) But there’s a hardness that I hadn’t noticed before. She’s gotten too thin. And kinda mean looking. (This is not meant to be a rag, sorry.)

She also looks very professional, and I am grateful that she seems to be thriving in her current job. As we no longer combine forces, she no longer has my sympathies, but I respect her hard work. She’s always been a dedicated worker.

But tonight, watching our son perform in orchestra, I was glad she came to sit next to me and then decided, “I need to be closer where I can see,” to move towards the front. I had a nice side view of her intense face. She was staring into her phone. (Seems to have become more and more the mode for her.) Perhaps she was exchanging chats with her lover. Perhaps racy emails with her girlfriends. Who knows. But what I saw was complete disinterest in what we were doing at the school. It was a checkbox. A task that needed to be completed at the end of the school year, like so many other tasks. And it was the last event that was keeping her from her night with her lover, before a weekend where SHE HAS THE KIDS.

It really must be odd, and I don’t know the feeling, of wanting to be elsewhere when your kids are around.

My daughter said something tonight, about how there was never any food in the house. “L the babysitter always goes to the store for dinner stuff, and there’s never any leftovers.” Now, my daughter, who was saying this, has a tendency to be dramatic. But she was sharing a glimpse into the life that my ex has constructed.

I know it well. When she got on the work train, while we were married, there were many times when it was assumed I would feed, read, and put the kids to bed. I was being her “wife.” Well, I was grateful again, that she was employed. And I would do whatever I could to make a nice house, a nice leftover plate for her, and a bunch of smiling (from bed) kids for her to return home to.

And, god knows, there were even more times when she was performing this type of 100% parenting for me, while I was working late. But there was some different tone about the entire thing.

For me, it was more acceptable. Like the man at work, the wife at home making dinner. While I spent a number of years at a large corporation, it was a lot easier for her to work less than full-time, and spend a lot of extra time with the kids, at their school, doing projects at home.

When she was working late, by contrast, it was kind of dramatic. Like there was some great urgency that was keeping her at the office. And some sense that it was quite unfair for her to have to be working so hard.

WAIT A MINUTE!

That was MY INTERNAL VOICE saying those things. It’s dawning on me — right this very minute — the resentment I was feeling was not about her attitude, it was about mine! WTF? Seriously? I should have been the one working late, not her. If I had been a better provider, she wouldn’t have to work so hard.

Maybe she played into my shame, a little. I don’t know. But I can now see this was MY SHIT, not hers.

I’m wondering if my scoffing at her taut looks tonight is also a product of my shame. I’m asking myself, “Sour grapes?’

I don’t think so. BUT, she was the best thing I’d ever had up to that point. She stayed with me through the toughest times in both our lives. And then she gave up on me.

No, for that I won’t be forgiving her. For the release from a sexless and joyless marriage, I have to thank her. I won’t be putting up with that again either. Ever.

And that’s the wonderful thing about the story. Even if I don’t know the ending, what I do know is the possibility is out there. GF #1 showed me what it feels like to really be adored. I CAN HAVE THAT AGAIN. And I actually deserve it.

In the discussions with women, of our age, about who they are meeting in their dating lives, what I get is that most people our age are cynical and bitter. I am always complimented on my POSITIVE ATTITUDE. “You’re so positive.” or “So much positive energy.”

It’s not exactly the same thing as irresistible, but I’ll take positive right now. And that’s the side I’m showing my kids.

The ex also asked me if I would let the kids know about the money shortage as well. As if she needed me to fess up to my own contribution to whatever struggles they were having about “stuff.” I spoke to them tonight about my current situation. I said we could not go to the BBQ place for dinner, because I didn’t have the money for it, and I had plenty of food at home.

“Why don’t you have any money?” my son asked. It was just a point-blank question, no real emotional inflection.

“I have three clients that owe me money right now. And it’s not like I don’t have any money, it’s just that when things get low, I really don’t spend money on stuff like eating out when I have food at home.”

That satisfied both of them. My daughter, who has become somewhat obsessed with Starbucks, was quiet.

I am positive. I am certain I will continue to dig out of the financial hole the divorce and my subsequent low-times wreaked on me. All systems are go, the work is ahead, the clients are happy. (Affirmation: no low-times this summer.)

And I am positive I will find a more compatible mate. Now that we have this kid thing sorted out, there is only the relationship between me and this new person to sort out. I don’t need anything from them but adoration and the opportunity to adore them back.

Sincerely,

The Off Parent

< back to The Hard Stuff pages

related posts:

resources:

image: creative commons usage – medusa

+++

Someday We’ll Know – The New Radicals

May 16, 2013 | Categories: anger, dad, depression, divorce, hardstuff, health, kids, love, marriage, money, self-care, separation, single parenting, summer | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Me, Deadbeat Dad? Um… (Problems with Custody and Child Support)

 

I cannot seem to get a handle on the triggers for the ex-y’s money demands. I know they often happen on Sunday nights. Perhaps she’s paying bills, or just planning for the week ahead, and up comes the check box, GET MORE MONEY.

I understand. I understand all to well. But… This message from her, in a typical escalation of demands involving the words “collections” and “attorney”:

“The frame is that we have to pay kids expenses before we cover our houses and cars and bills. I am paying my part. I won’t sell this house to pay your part while you take the stance that your child support stands in line behind Wells Fargo.”

Um, it’s actually backwards in my book. Of course she’s not struggling to meet Wells Fargo’s demands, she’s talking about the incidentals, the nice to haves, the keeping up with the standard of living we have come to expect. And thus out kids have come to expect.

Hello! The facts are clear. And I stated them when she first demanded a divorce. “We can hardly afford one house in this neighborhood, do you think we’re going to be able to afford two?”

Of course, the truth is, she didn’t. She expected SHE would be able to stay in the beautiful house in the beautiful neighborhood with greenbelts and tennis courts. She didn’t care too much about what I was going to do. She still doesn’t.

But the reality is we cover our housing and food needs before the incidentals.

Another thing she doesn’t seem to factor in, she’s got zero debt (I took the CC debt) and she’s got in excess of 30k in retirement funds (much of it paid in while I was the one bringing in the excess income that afforded our 100% contribution) AND she has the house that easily has 60k in equity after costs.

She was going to sell it. At the end of last year. She decided not to, claiming it was easier not to have to gamble on our daughter being transfered to a different elementary school. Probably the move could’ve been averted with a petition to the school board.

For what ever reason (maybe she’s going to get married soon and they want to get a house together) she’s decided that she’s done “affording” the kids what they need because I can’t pay.

What I keep saying, “It’s a delay, not a default.” But she doesn’t want to hear it. She doesn’t have to hear it. And she doesn’t care.

I guess in the eyes of the law I am in default, I am a deadbeat dad, who is two months behind on his child support. And when she rattles the Attorney General’s office or the threat of lawyering up, I laugh. I can’t do anything else.

“You are in default on child support. It’s your responsibility to give ideas and plans for how to cover your part of their expenses. You can’t opt-out of supporting your kids, and telling me you won’t tell me any information about support moving forward is opting out. “

What I keep trying to say is:

“Whatever. You’re escalating again. My frame is we pay for shelter and food then other stuff.

I’ve given you every bit of information I have. If that is defaulting to you, so be it. I am delayed in my ability to pay. That’s quite different than defaulting or you needing to hire help to “collect.”

All I can give you, still is an agreement to pay 100% of my share and a willingness to give you all information as I have it.”

It’s never enough. In fact, in our marriage, it was never enough. She’s not going to be happy with me even if I was paying extra. But she’s happy to point the daggar at me and threaten me. She doesn’t have to be nice.

But am I a deadbeat dad? Am I failing my kids?

Maybe so, if you consider that child support of a woman in an affluent neighborhood in a nice house without debt should be paid before my mortgage company and electric bill. I guess without a house I could go live with my sister again. But the only relief selling my house would bring is about two months of catch up. What about the next 8 years?

I’m not aware that this pattern is something that is very familiar to me. Women giving up on me.

I won’t stand for it. I cannot pay her incidentals (summer camps, new shoes, fancy clothes) before I pay for my own shelter. I’ve never indicated that I would not catch up. But I am also not responsible for her cash flow issues.

She wants to plan a trip to DC with the kids. Great. She wants to buy plane tickets in advance. Great.

I want to keep my house, keep the lights on, and occasionally be able to take a date to dinner.

Here’s what I have to keep repeating. “I am making enough money to catch up over the summer on everything.”

Beyond that, it’s drama and escalation  There’s no reason I have to buy into that, and no reason I should start feeling bad about myself and my deadbeat approach to a difficult situation.

Sincerely,

The Off Parent

< back to The Hard Stuff pages

Resources:

+++

lyrics from Helpless by Sugar

Another time time after time
You make me feel so helpless I
I never tried to change your mind
I keep it to myself it’s

Sometimes I’ve got to tell you
Is it this time I’ll tell you
We’ve got to go to places
Somewhere I don’t mind it’s special

And now you find as time goes by
You’re left with nothing
Meaning much
The meaning I will have to try
To take your mind to places

I wish that I could help you
But you seem less than helpless
I always tried to tell you
Someday that it’d seem so special

Time after time what’s on your mind
You make me feel so helpless I
You never tried what’s on your mind
You make me feel so helpless I
I feel so helpless I

You’re left alone with something
And I hope for you it’s one thing
That something you and yours can
Hold and hold as something special

And now you find as time goes by
You’re left with nothing meaning much
The meaning I will have to try
What’s on your mind so helpless I
I feel so helpless I

May 16, 2013 | Categories: anger, d3, dad, divorce, kids, money | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »