I woke up in the middle of the night last night and saw a text from my soon-to-be ex-husband informing me that he has just been let go from his third-shift job, and HR will send him papers to fill out to continue with our current medical insurance on our own dime, which will be a lot more expensive than before.
I told him that this will be a good time for him to recuperate his health, and work on his emotional issues and his alcohol addiction. He then told me that he wants to move out and find a place of his own very soon.
We agreed to finalize our divorce towards the beginning of next year and then we’ll go our separate ways physically as well after that. We’ve been sleeping in separate rooms and living separate lives for over 3 years now, and I’ll always think of him as a family member, so I really don’t see the urgency for him to move out now, instead of after our divorce is final. I also reminded him that by doing so, he will be adding additional costs to staying at a different place, while his income will be decreasing substantially due to him losing this third-shift part-time job. It will be a double whammy.
He is clearly going through a mid-life crisis, which started a few years ago. When “normal” people go through a mid-life crisis and an existential crisis, such as myself, I go and dye my hair red, and sign up for community classes to go out and meet more people. Why couldn’t he just decide to shave his hair bald, and run another marathon (which he did after his ex-girlfriend of 9 years broke up with him before we met) instead of drinking and driving, and handing 6-digits to a total stranger, and getting himself into this huge debt for the next 5 years?
I told him that he has hurt me deeply by all the shady things he did behind my back last year and wished he could have just told me that he is miserable and wanted a divorce. I was feeling very unhappy and stuck in my marriage as well. If he just told me that he wanted a divorce, I would have agreed to it without any issues, and we would have just worked through the terms amicably. Why couldn’t he have just trusted me and shown me the respect to end our marriage the proper way? That’s what I have been working on this year, the extreme sense of betrayal I feel from the way he handled this entire process.
It’s like he just has to create complete chaos in his life because he’s trying to change how miserable he feels inside, yet failing to recognize that this chaos he’s creating is actually making him feel even more miserable in life. And the only way for him to start feeling better about his life is to work on his thoughts and emotions. They say that “You create your own reality”, and he is creating a reality that is heading towards even more misery while dragging me through the mud with him as collateral damage.
He also told me that I need to get the divorce process started. Since he already got what he wanted, the 6-digits to give to another woman, and we’ve already agreed on the divorce terms, things are back to “normal” ~ as in I do all the legwork and all he has to do is sign on the dotted line. That’s how things have been for the past 14 years, especially since he knows that I am a perfectionist and very trustworthy, so I always do all the legwork and all he has to do is sign. Most of the time, he doesn’t even look at the papers, and will just sign, but now and then, he’ll do an “audit” and actually look at my paperwork before he signs it. I guess I should be happy that he at least knows that I’m not going to do anything shady or harmful to him?
I told him to let’s set a deadline because it’s difficult to get things moving along without a deadline. Now that we have a deadline, I can start to plan accordingly. I just recently spoke to my therapist about this, that I haven’t been getting things going, and one of my “homework” is to look into the process of getting a divorce in MN and draw up a weekly to-do list for it.
I can feel that I have a mental block regarding this, and that’s why I’ve been placing it on the back burner all this time. I’ve been dedicating all of my time to writing articles for my online business and now I have to slow that down and start dedicating my time to filing our divorce papers, purging our stuff, cleaning out our storage unit, and finding places for the both of us once our divorce is final towards the beginning of next year. So, basically, everything is back, as usual, ~ he works, and I do everything else. But I figure, I’ve been doing that for over 14 years of our marriage now, so might as well just do the same towards the end and also use this opportunity to memorialize the good times that we’ve had together throughout our marriage.
I always like to end things on a good note. It consumes too much energy having to hold on to anger and resentment, so I would rather end our marriage knowing that everything has been taken care of on both ends. I have recognized though, that I am powerless when it comes to his drinking, and all I can do is pray that he will come to his senses and decide to do that on his own.
This song, “Hero” by Mariah Carey, empowers me to find the strength within me during this really difficult time in my life.
Hero
~ Songwriters: Mariah Carey / Walter Afanasieff
There’s a hero
If you look inside your heart
You don’t have to be afraid
Of what you are
There’s an answer
If you reach into your soul
And the sorrow that you know
Will melt away
And then a hero comes along
With the strength to carry on
And you cast your fears aside
And you know you can survive
So when you feel like hope is gone
Look inside you and be strong
And you’ll finally see the truth
That a hero lies in you
It’s a long road
When you face the world alone
No one reaches out a hand
For you to hold
You can find love
If you search within yourself
And that emptiness you felt
Will disappear
And then a hero comes along
With the strength to carry on
And you cast your fears aside
And you know you can survive
So when you feel like hope is gone
Look inside you and be strong
And you’ll finally see the truth
That a hero lies in you, oh, oh
Lord knows
Dreams are hard to follow
But don’t let anyone
Tear them away, hey yeah
Hold on
There will be tomorrow
In time you’ll find the way
And then a hero comes along
With the strength to carry on
And you cast your fears aside
And you know you can survive
So when you feel like hope is gone
Look inside you and be strong
And you’ll finally see the truth
That a hero lies in you
That a hero lies in you
Mmm, that a hero lies in you