I have been rereading the comments and the conversation created by my h's letter. It has brought some thoughts to mind, that I had not considered before. Funny, the questions that come to mind, long after the fact. Like, I have never asked my h when he began to realize I was detaching.... as I went to New Zealand for 3 mos. there were no phone calls at all and most of his emails, I read but did not respond to. (I devoured every word of those emails though, searching for any clues that he was coming out of whatever in the hell was wrong with him)
It was a wise decision though to get as far away from him as I could. Heck you would have thought, me in Canada and him in Europe would have been far enough, but I had a phone in Canada... he could and did call frequently. Keeping me hanging on, waiting and he so he could check often to make sure the anchor was still holding. Looking back it is so clear, what he was doing and how I was ALLOWING him to do it. At the time, it wasn't obvious at all, as I was desperate to hear from him and was grateful for any little morsel he threw my way.
I can see it all so clearly now. He would call, we would start out being civil, then I would try to make him see how foolish he was being. Try to force him to see what he was THROWING AWAY. Eventually, the conversation would deteriorate into an outright fight. Me sobbing, him exasperated. I'm sure he hung, totally convinced that he was doing the right thing. That I was a totally, unreasonable b*tch, a pain in the a$$ and he was better off without me. I would hang up, more depressed then ever, whipping myself for getting drawn into another "battle", knowing damn well that was not the way to reach him.... but just incapable of making myself stop. Then he would call me the next day and we would do the same thing all over again.... except for on weekends. Then he devoted every second to OW, playing house with her, pretending he was having the time of his life. Determined to forget all about us, until Monday morning, then the calls would start again. I continued to validate his reasons for leaving me and he continued to make sure, his anchor was still holding.
New Zealand was the smartest thing I ever did. When my mother passed away in February and he made it clear that he was going to work on his new relationship. I knew I had to get away from him. That the cycle had to be broken. There were no books available. There were no forums. All the sites said... "forget about it, your marriage is DONE, nobody recovers from this, how do you ever trust again?" I heard it all. I didn't want to believe them, but they sure were starting to make a lot of sense. Statistics showed that the longer a couple was married the more likely they were to reconcile, but with another person involved, I failed to see how that was possible for us. Quite honestly, I went a way to lick my wounds in PRIVATE... you have no idea how much I hate humiliation... and the idea that my family and friends PITIED me.... drove me nearly insane.
I have well honed survival instincts. I was dying, I was getting nowhere, time to get totally away from it. I was luckier then so many of you, my youngest was 19 attending university, my pets were with my h and his OW, plus we were financially stable. Even at the peak of this nightmare, I was aware of the advantages I was blessed with. So, broken hearted, defeated, I ran.
If I had not had children, I think I would have gone invisible.. hehehe. I was a mess and knew I had to help myself, whatever it took.
I went away completely, from siblings, friends and children because I knew I had to face my fears.... my fear of being alone. Somehow, that had become a huge terror to me. Odd, considering as I had spent so much of my married life alone, with the kids. Still, I was very afraid. Thought my heart would pop out of my chest as I got on that plane the day I started my race for survival. Trying to act, all cool and calm, when I was scared to death and just wanted to crawl in a hole and cry, or better yet,
die! I kept telling myself, this is going to be such an adventure.
It was so much like the first time my h went on exercise. We had just moved to Alberta, I knew absolutely nobody and I was a couple mos. pregnant. I would go to bed at night and PRETEND mom and dad were sleeping upstairs. That I was safe and secure. Hell, I was 26 years old, had back packed all over the west coast of Canada, Europe, traveled by car with my sister to western Canada, then across to Seattle and down to California, on hwy 1 no less, hehehe, yet I was still scared. He was gone for 6 weeks, we didn't even have a phone, took 6 weeks for them to flick a switch in 1978. Thought I could die there and nobody would find me until my h got home.
It was almost 29 yrs. to the day... here I was ALL ALONE again... and scared to death. Interesting twist of events. Mmmmmmmm where was I before I went off on this tangent... oh right, must ask husband when he began to feel me moving on... I always sort of thought it was after I returned to Canada but you know... I really don't know for sure... hehehe.
Bye for now...
Author
Topic: 
Stayed's H letter