Feels better already

[VIDEO: "What is parental alienation?"]

Recently split from my uBPDw after 13 years. Two kids together, 11D and 8S. I’m here to tell you that, for me, I feel 100 lbs lighter and so much healthier in mere days.

Multiple, multiple attempts over the last year to talk, express, reconcile, counsel, or divorce amicably. She declined each one.

One of the most helpful realizations came slowly but surely over time. I noticed very clearly that I was becoming less invested in the “tornado” as I like to call it. The roller coaster. I realized that it kept spinning and spinning and destroying everything in its path whether or not I fueled it. In other words my wife’s turmoil wasn’t really about me, I just agreed to write myself into the story time and time again, in some vain effort to rescue her and fix it.

The further I backed away from it the more I realized that I really had nothing to bring to the equation. Her struggles aren’t about a solution, if you will. She’s not a key looking for a lock. I feel like the struggle *is* the solution. Struggle for the sake of struggle, fights for the sake of fights. Turn up the outside noise so loud that it drowns out the noise inside of her.

So without her knowing I made, and executed, plans to secure myself financially and get my own apartment in the same town. That happened three days ago. I started noticing the positive changes even before moving out.

For example: I had intended on having a final “conversation” with her on my way out the door. Five minutes, no emotion, just information. I figure she deserved at least that final display of dignity right? As the day came I told myself: “she’s turned down every other olive branch you’ve ever offered. There has been no lightbulb moment. She’s spared no opportunity to tell you how much she hates you. What are you fishing for this time? You think it’s gonna be any different?”  So I typed out something short and sweet and left it where she could find it and left. Baby steps.

Kids came with me for a few reasons, one of them being the fact that her schedule prevents her from getting them to and from school.

I literally did not hear from her from Wednesday-Friday. She made no attempt to contact the children even though I got her an Alexa so she could video call them. Nothing.

Yesterday she pulled the kids out of school early without telling me (I’ll get into the logistics/legal of the transition another time), so at least she’s still aware that she’s a parent.

She texted last night:

So sad and unfortunate all of this . . . Absolutely devastating
I miss the man I once thought you were. Sweet dreams to an old friend I lost somewhere along the way

I didn’t even respond. From this distance I could see what this was. The language is so provocative. Do you see what she’s saying? She’s yet again trying to put me in a position to explain or defend myself. She’s attacking me as a person. She knows where the weak spots are and she’s going for them.

I didn’t bite. I just smiled, silently wished her health, and turned the phone off.

It can be done. If I can do it, you can do it too. You’ll know when it’s the right time. And when the right time comes take advantage of it. Do what you can to distance yourself from your addiction.

I’ve found that the quiet, the literal and figurative quiet, works wonders.

Looking forward to today.

[M604V]

Recently split from my uBPDw after 13 years. Two kids together, 11D and 8S. I’m here to tell you that, for me, I feel 100 lbs lighter and so much healthier in mere days.

Multiple, multiple attempts over the last year to talk, express, reconcile, counsel, or divorce amicably. She declined each one.

One of the most helpful realizations came slowly but surely over time. I noticed very clearly that I was becoming less invested in the “tornado” as I like to call it. The roller coaster. I realized that it kept spinning and spinning and destroying everything in its path whether or not I fueled it. In other words my wife’s turmoil wasn’t really about me, I just agreed to write myself into the story time and time again, in some vain effort to rescue her and fix it.

The further I backed away from it the more I realized that I really had nothing to bring to the equation. Her struggles aren’t about a solution, if you will. She’s not a key looking for a lock. I feel like the struggle *is* the solution. Struggle for the sake of struggle, fights for the sake of fights. Turn up the outside noise so loud that it drowns out the noise inside of her.

So without her knowing I made, and executed, plans to secure myself financially and get my own apartment in the same town. That happened three days ago. I started noticing the positive changes even before moving out.

For example: I had intended on having a final “conversation” with her on my way out the door. Five minutes, no emotion, just information. I figure she deserved at least that final display of dignity right? As the day came I told myself: “she’s turned down every other olive branch you’ve ever offered. There has been no lightbulb moment. She’s spared no opportunity to tell you how much she hates you. What are you fishing for this time? You think it’s gonna be any different?”  So I typed out something short and sweet and left it where she could find it and left. Baby steps.

Kids came with me for a few reasons, one of them being the fact that her schedule prevents her from getting them to and from school.

I literally did not hear from her from Wednesday-Friday. She made no attempt to contact the children even though I got her an Alexa so she could video call them. Nothing.

Yesterday she pulled the kids out of school early without telling me (I’ll get into the logistics/legal of the transition another time), so at least she’s still aware that she’s a parent.

She texted last night:

So sad and unfortunate all of this . . . Absolutely devastating
I miss the man I once thought you were. Sweet dreams to an old friend I lost somewhere along the way

I didn’t even respond. From this distance I could see what this was. The language is so provocative. Do you see what she’s saying? She’s yet again trying to put me in a position to explain or defend myself. She’s attacking me as a person. She knows where the weak spots are and she’s going for them.

I didn’t bite. I just smiled, silently wished her health, and turned the phone off.

It can be done. If I can do it, you can do it too. You’ll know when it’s the right time. And when the right time comes take advantage of it. Do what you can to distance yourself from your addiction.

I’ve found that the quiet, the literal and figurative quiet, works wonders.

Looking forward to today.

[iquanablood]

Good luck to you man, I posted on the wrong board yesterday, I posted on the family board but I should be here.  I’m going through a split with my girlfriend of three years, whom I have known and admired for over twenty.  In the three years together, she split me about 8 or 9 times, maybe three times I got to see the total rage, all the experiences on these boards apply to her.  Some splits were for a couple of days, some weeks, some a month or two.  Three splits now since December and I can’t take it anymore.  I go through a drug type withdrawal, emotional and physical pain like I have never experienced, usually the first week a sense of relief, but then the pain, the misery that never stops, and I would then “accidentally “ run into her somewhere so we could talk.  I was always the one chasing her, I know her schedule and we live in a small town.  After every split I tell her how much I suffer,  and she never responds, she just looks at me with the empty eyes.  She is like a fantasy to me, very beautiful with very long black hair, I love her insanely, yes.  And now two weeks with no contact again and the pain building, but yesterday I fought it and stayed away from her when I knew she was only a block away at a beach bar.  The pain is overwhelming, but I want to get away.  Be careful with feeling too secure in the early stages of the separation, you are going to go through a lot of internal changes.  I hope I have the strength this time, or she will eventually kill me, no doubt about it.  I’m trying to reach out to people but I have never been one to do that, so this is a first for me, it is that bad and people who have not been through this do not understand, especially if she is a high functioning borderline like mine.   Very little sleep for me for two weeks, weight down to 140 at 6 feet tall, trying not to drink to much but it makes me forget until it makes me remember and I go through the entire relationship over and over again, trying to see the things I now understand.  And I know I’m in love with someone who doesn’t even exist, I tell myself that but it only hurts more.  I keep wondering if she was cheating on me throughout the relationship, looking back at things, then I ask myself why does it matter?  I want out, it really makes no difference what she did, but what if I can’t stand it and go back?  Stay strong, I’m trying.

[iquanablood]

The third split in three months, eighth or ninth in three years, you would think it gets easier, but it hasn’t for me, gets worse.  Day 14 this time, wanting to go NC, I’ve read the steps, I’ve read the steps in the grieving process, trying to do it.  I thought I was tough, I thought I was a cowboy, an outlaw, I played polo for years, had horses fall under me going 30 miles an hour, ‘Mama don’t let your babies grow up to be cowboys’ then Willie flips it around at the end and sings ‘Mama don’t let your cowboys grow up to be babies’, that must be me.  This is all going on in Mexico, she is Mexican, unbelievably beautiful, I’m an american, living here almost 30 years.  I want the woman I love, but she was never real.  I feel like I’m abandoning a child on the side of the road at night, her emotions are like an eight year olds.  But she is a destroyer, her ex moved to the other side of the country, I know why now.  She is destroying her 20 year old son with her jealousy, poor kid but he might have it too.  From things she has told about her mother, who died 16 years ago, I think she had it too. 

But I want her, I crave her, I want to reach down and feel her again, I want to be inside her.  I want her in my hands, in my arms, I want her hard little body in my mouth, in my eyes.  But each time I get her back, after sex the first time, I know it’s just the chase. I don’t want to lose, but I do every time I win her back.  There is a song called ‘You Can’t Lose What You Never Had’.  That’s the PLEASE READing problem, you CAN lose what you never had.  Day 14, this time.

[alterK]

Hi M604V! I lived through the other side of this equation. It's now more than a year since my uBPDw moved out without notice while I was away visiting family. At first I was shocked. Then I started replacing stuff she took, changing locks, etc. All the while kicking myself in the rear end for not having seen the handwriting on the wall. And then, after maybe 6 weeks, I began to feel as if I was out from under a rock. She left me a Dear John note and said "This will be better for both of us." Of course, she didn't really mean that, since she was obviously thinking of herself and trying to evade guilt. I don't know if it's turned out better for her, but she certainly was right about me. I am much better off without her. I occasionally fantasize about talking to her, write emails in my mind, never have sent one.

The divorce hasn't yet been completed, but it's in the works and I am looking forward to it, even though I'll have to give her a bunch of money. Fortunately, there are no kids involved. So, I hope you are continuing to feel better.

Iguanablood, sorry you are going through so much agony. No one can tell you how to feel, but maybe if you read what M and I are writing, you can at least begin to believe there can be light at the other end of the tunnel.

[iquanablood]

Thanks alterK, appreciate the words of encouragement.  I think I’m now at day 47, still having a hard time.  I just can’t get past certain things and I have no idea why.  I know I’m so much better off without this person in my life, but the bitterness of how it all goes down is just a bitch.  No other way to put it.  But I’m still fighting.

Going up to Florida in two weeks.  If I can get out of here without incident, I feel like I can turn some kind of corner in my mind.  But this has been like a horror movie, I need to just walk of of the theater, who cares how the movie ends, right?