My own bed...

[gomez_addams]

Been sleeping in my own bed the past few nights. Feels good.

Started eating healthy. No more fast food while renting out a spare room in someone else's house.

Started a budget today. Spoke to HR about renewing my contract at work. Could be doable.

Prayed for her last night. Prayed that she's happy, healthy, and good things happen to her. That's as much for me as it is for her. It's hard to resent someone you're praying for. Resentments aren't healthy, especially for those in a 12-step program.

Mailed the first of four alimony checks. There will also be a large payout from the 401k. I'll recover.

I do feel lots of anxiety. Not sure about what. Just unease. Will see my T next week.

It's a good week. Not all will be good. This week ends tomorrow and s long weekend starts. I'm going to make to do lists, cook some healthy food, sleep when I feel like it, and get some sun.

I'll be LC until all the loose ends are tied up. Then NC or damn close to it. New phone number, new email address, etc... .

In the meantime, about to hit the pillow.

Thanks for helping me get this far.

Gomez

[rotiroti]

Right on! Doesn't it feel good to take care of you? Glad to see you have concrete plans and keeping busy. I especially loved the bit:

"Prayed for her last night. Prayed that she's happy, healthy, and good things happen to her. That's as much for me as it is for her. It's hard to resent someone you're praying for. Resentments aren't healthy, especially for those in a 12-step program."

I recently started doing this and the anger and hurt is slowly being replaced with compassion.

Lastly, you also mentioned that there might be some bad moments in our recovery. I can totally vibe with that... I am having a bad day today, but I know that means I'm grieving.

Thank you for sharing your progress and giving me hope!

[gomez_addams]

Another update on how my first week back home is winding up.

Nuked the social media account.  She had "liked" an old photo of me.  Which means she's spending her days browsing my social media.

She reached out to my sister (text or e-mail) to complain that she couldn't see my social media page.  Sister is very smart, and sent a well-thought out response (divorce is tough, I'll tell you the same thing I told Gomez, break free and heal, no one is talking bad about you, no need to tell your side of the story, get a therapist and get on with life... .).

Skype sent me an e-mail that they suspended my account after suspicious activity (I'm assuming someone failed the log in several times).  I rarely use it.  Could be a random bot, a hacker, or the stbx uBPDw.  Would make sense if she was looking for evidence of an affair.  I haven't used Skype since she moved out here (we used to Skype when we were engaged).

I opened two bank accounts.  Our joint account was closed (this bank won't let you removed someone, you have to kill the account and start over).  So I reopened a new one so that I have a brick and mortar local bank to use.  That will be my emergency fund, and I'll add to it.  New account numbers, so she'll have no access.  The other account is an online bank with relatively decent interest rates for savings.  That'll be the house down payment fund.

Ate healthy all week.  Feeling good.  Walked an average of 5-6 miles each of the past three days.  That's the best I can do for exercise right now due to some arthritis in my hip.  Lost five pounds.  Slept great.  And the one night I didn't sleep great was because I was stressing about the irreplaceable items that I couldn't find.  Found them today.  So I'll probably sleep great tonight.

Started using my budgeting software (YNAB, if anyone is interested).  Rather than focus on how much money I'm out, I'm going to focus on what I can do -- budget, spend wisely, make good decisions, and sock away as much as I can.  The goal is to be able to leave my current employer in 3-4 years and go to school full-time without financial distress.  I think that all of the stuff I need to do to get ready for that is stuff that is healthy in general (setting goals, tracking progress, recovering from missteps, etc... .).

Have an appointment with my T next week.  He said that once the stbx is gone we're going to focus less on damage control and survival, and more on how did I end up missing or ignoring the red flags and why I don't set and enforce boundaries in my life.  All good things.  Won't be easy, but will be worth it.

This has been a rough road, but I feel like I'm on the right path.  I get to attend church this weekend (four week hiatus while the stbx was in town) and that will be good.  I feel I maintained my integrity and didn't trash talk (with the minor exception of getting things off my chest to two or three of my closest friends there), so I have no shame in walking in there on Sunday.  I don't know -- nor do I care -- what she said about me.  I used to worry about stuff like that, but right now I don't care if she told the universe that I kick puppies.

Gomez