Yep, I said it. Though I wonder if it means I'm really not the bigger person since I admit to how crappy it feels?
Things have calmed down, for the moment at least. I finally was able to put aside my pain and my need to control the situation and I was hit by a moment of clarity which showed me what I had to do to ever make this right. I knew that he would not be the one to do so. So it was me who had to make it right for myself and the kids.
And as he calmed down and I stopped attacking, I was able to offer a peace treaty. He goes in ready to sign at mediation that he will seek and attend therapy and be under the care and medical protocol of a psychiatrist. If he is complain in 3 months, he will be able to move in and be a room mate. The divorce still proceeds, and he will get 2-3 nights a week that are his nights and he will be here in our home with me around. Every other weekend he will wake up with the kids and do things with them on those days. If after a few months he is still in compliance and the medical protocol is not spinning him for a loop, we will move to occasional outings just himself with the children. He will continue to live here and we will share our costs and he will contribute to me via rent and bills for child support. Then in 2012 if he deploys I will remain here. After he comes back from deployment and is still complaint after 6 months (this was suggested by a friend who is a therapist so that we can watch for PTSD) we will move into our own separate residences. All of this was contingent on his visit today and how it went (I allowed him to come visit the kids under my supervision for four hours if he agreed to this plan). If he tried to leave with the children or fill their heads with anything or fought with me, all bets were off. He just tucked the girls' into bed and so far has been completely compliant and is willing to agree to the above plan.
I know many will think i'm nuts. But this is my best bet to assure that my kids are safe while under his care, he is receiving the treatment/help that he desperately needs and neither of us tank out from financial ruin while we get our lives together. It also means that our 1 year old wont have to be shipped from home to home, and our kids can first see us be friends and co-parent in a healthy manner. We have also both agreed to attend counseling together with a LMFT so that we can gain the tools on how to communicate in a healthy way, co-parent and deal with our own crap that we have between ourselves away from little ears that can be too easily scarred and is sure to rear it's ugly head as we will be cohabitating. None of this means i'm taking him back and I've made that adamantly clear. The divorce proceeds, I cannot be attached to him in any romantic/relationship way aside from parenting with him without losing my cool. I have let him know he will strictly be a room mate and father to the kids. The minute he tries something sexual or to revive the marriage, he's out and all agreements will be done and we will go back to mediation and this time I'll come armed with an attorney. I've found my ground and i'm standing firm.
But it still sucks. This is not the easy path for me. And i know i'll be covering a lot of time in therapy to deal with my abandonment issues and to learn how be a platonic parent/roommate instead of the needy/jealous wife i've been. I know that i'll still have REALLY sad days and i'm still going to have to heal. I know that this is harder because i have to get over my anger/hurt/hate and frustration with him and put on my big girl panties and remember that I loved him once upon a time and that we created and carried three children together.
We also had 'the talk' tonight with the girls. They were wondering if and when we were going to start fighting which broke my heart. And so we sat them down and reassured them that we were no longer going to fight and that if we started we would stop and save it for another time. They made us 'pinky promise' and i couldn't help but think how lovely that naivety is in their hearts to think a simply pinky promise will make it be as good as bound in blood to them. And so we explained to them the options we had. We could be 2 families, living in separate homes where we had split time away from each other. Or mommy and daddy could no longer be married, but could be room mates and they would see daddy and mommy as much as they liked as friends, under the same roof. We also reassured them that no matter what comes, THIS is our family. DD's asked questions about what happens when we find new husbands' and wives' and we let them know that neither of us would pick anyone who didn't understand the importance of THIS family and that they would be joining our family, they would not be breaking it apart. That possibly one day, instead of simply having 2 parents, they would have 4 who loved them very much and were chosen because the 2 new parents would know how damn important the three of them are to STBX and I, and we wouldn't accept anyone else who didn't want them to be the most important part of all of this. They asked a lot more questions, we seemed to field it fairly well and were a pretty united front, sharing occasional eye contact so that I think each of us knew this wasn't BS to us. It was our kids' lives and if we want our children to be ok, this is how we are going to have to go about it. But this doesn't go without saying that I hadn't locked my vehicle and hidden the keys with the carseats so he couldn't bolt or that i'm holding him at arms length and am no where near trusting him with the health and well being of our children.
This doesn't work in the vast majority of the cases of divorce and I get that. I get the risk that this could blow up in our faces and he or I may not be able to live this way, it may be too painful, I may get too jealous, he may not be at an emotional place to follow through. But our goal is through therapy (for each of us) and his own personal treatment plan that we are able to follow through with this. Because for me, if i walk away full of anger, spite, resentment, and jealousy . . .i'll have taught my children nothing and i'll have never evolved from all of this. It's hard, don't get me wrong. I have to be the bigger person and let my own heart wounds in this messed up situation sit to the side until I can conquer them through therapy. I don't get to put them on him or insist that he hear them or understand them. Instead i have to swallow them until I have time to myself, because ultimately even if i did (and have in the past) share them with him, it doesn't mean that it makes it ANY better or that i'll heal any differently or even better. This is the one thing i know from having gone down the divorce road with him before, last time i acted like the hurt spouse. So this is where I grow up. This is where I become the woman i want to be and I know it with in me. This is where i realize that what's best for my children, isn't solely about them. This is best for me. This is about forgiveness and healing and i can do it in a way I never have before. And i'm going to be ok with it all. One day my kids may just be blessed enough that while STBX and i don't share a love with each other, we share a love and joy of our children and there is no jealousy, no anger, no pain in sharing that love and knowing that we simply were meant to be friends and parents on this earth. Nothing more, nothing less. And I'll be ok with it.
So maybe, being the bigger person doesn't really suck as much as I thought?
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