Happy for me, sad for my kids.....getting out of my marriage, getting on with my life.

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Counseling

We have left a trail of counselors behind us.....strewn and discarded and ditched. DH saw one alone, we saw one together, we saw another together....2nd one we saw together I am now seeing alone. 2nd guy thinks DH really needs to be in therapy badly...so I asked DH to try new guy, 3rd guy, together figuring that's better than nothing. And why do I care if he has therapy or not, you may ask? Well....because I WOULD like to stay together if it is humanly possible (I realize it probably isn't), and even if we don't I'd like him to be a good father to our children and maybe figuring out why he is hell-bent on destruction would help with that. First appointment was last Monday. Could not have gone better if I'd planned it myself. DH was late (unavoidably detained at work), so I was alone for about 30 minutes. DH showed up. Talked for a while then new guy asked if he wanted to come alone, wanted me to come, did I want to come.... both of us said it's up to him, whatever he thinks is best. He said DH should come alone (which he did on Wed and will go again on Tue) and maybe I'd be brought back in at some point. New guy is very interesting....too much to go into to explain it here, but he is most definitely approaching this from a different angle than the other two counselors we've seen together. He also said that if we end up splitting, which is right now where he kind of sees this heading (gotta appreciate honesty), he'd like to bring us in together a few times to talk about how we can make the divorce as easy as possible on the kids. He talked about the kids A LOT. Told DH that there's very little more heartbreaking for a father than being rejected by a daughter....and he told DH to be assured that the girls will figure it all out.

8 comments:

Isle Dance said...

Wow. Amazing.

Trying real hard to move on said...

Which part is amazing? My stupidity?? :) Or what the counselor said?

Isle Dance said...

Your work. Your progress. Your effort. And the new counselor. You're doing great. :o)

e.beck.artist said...

i like it that the c. said the girls will figure it out ... that's a big dose of reality ....

Trying real hard to move on said...

I think it is ridiculous that someone has to point that out to him.

I guess I am just discovering that we have wildly different values. I am not this super sweet, always-thinking-of-others kind of person AT ALL. But I do try to deal honestly with people in every way. Do I tell a little white lie to spare someone's feelings? Sure. Have I lied to my kids about things I don't want them to know about? Sure. But with all DH and I have been through, I think honesty at this point is absolutely crucial. He, however, seems to more buy into the philosophy "what you don't know won't hurt you". I obviously do not agree.

But I am willing to let this guy "work his magic" and see what happens. Like I said, I am not holding my breath. I just don't think a person can be changed unless they want to be changed, and DH is unwilling to change then I am unwilling to stay married to him. It's really pretty simple.

shrink on the couch said...

"what she doesn't know won't hurt her" -- you're right, it does hurt her even if she doesn't know. for one thing, he's not as attentive or as present or as loving or as kind or as patient.

but that's best case scenerio. more typically she DOES find out and then its super painful, heart shatteringly painful. i.e, that DOES hurt BAD.

And I know I"m preaching to the choir.

I hope this counseling proves helpful.

Trying real hard to move on said...

I just think that's no way to live your life....I think I'd live in constant fear of being busted. I just prefer to be honest whenever possible. It's ALWAYS possible of course, so I guess I should say I try to always choose to be honest. But some people like the constant fear of being busted. And I think in this case that adrenaline rush is the root of all this....not the person in particular.

We have an appointment together today, after him seeing the new counselor twice alone. I'm a little nervous about it.

Anonymous said...

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