Had a long weekend... Friday to Sunday. Started OK'ish I suppose. Had Aunty with us on Thursday Night, Friday and Saturday morning (joy). Weather was ok until Saturday when it rained constantly all day.
G was pretty unbearable for much of the time. She has these things to make for her 'business' but didn't get much done. That coupled with some attitude and a lack of understanding that I was actually trying to help by looking after the kids and it was, all in all, pretty miserable. Aunty looked after the kids on Friday night and we went out for Mexican, except it was me being pretty upbeat and her crying into her chilli. I've been trying to stay in "adult" as recommended by my counsellor but its coming across to G as 'uncaring' and 'blunt'. I just want to get on with enjoying my life... she seems to want to make a victoria sandwich.
Part of me feels really sorry for her. She's only doing what she thinks is best. Except its not best. She's not actually very suited to starting a business - she lacks business instinct and confidence. She rarely sells anything to people other than friends and family and she seems to do it for a warm fuzzy feeling that people give her as positive feedback, despite not making any money. She's starting to realise this and is becoming quite depressed at the realisation and has started to question herself. She talks about getting a job (and we could certainly do with the extra money) but then she is not quite sure what job she would ever want, or when she would do it.
Yesterday was particularly awful. She wanted to make stuff for some event she has next weekend. I wanted to go out with the kids - it was sunny. I made it clear that I could go out all day if needed (in fact I offered to go out all weekend) but this was apparently too long. So I offered to take my phone and she could call me when she was finished. This was somehow not good enough either so a big row ensued. I really regret getting cross and emotional - I was really angry. It was like my whole Sunday was being ruined for absolutely no reason and I was just trying to be reasonable and go out! It didn't stop there, the row went on and on and I said some things I'm not proud of.
I then took H to a birthday party and when I returned G was pretty miserable - she was cross with me, citing a couple of things I'd said and turning all the focus and attention on those. I tried to explain what I had meant but it was a losing battle so I gave up. I wanted to go to the beach and was taking the kids. I asked her (being reasonable) if she wanted to come instead of make her stuff and she did so we all went. She went on and on at me with this same argument. We walked along the promenade a little bit but it was far to windy so we retreated to the playpark. The kids played for 20 mins while G and I spoke. I was exasperated at this point.
Now my counsellor suggested I chose a point in the future to do a reassessment of my life... to check if I wanted to continue with this marriage or not. I chose a date (in October, after a family holiday) and have not been particularly inclined to think about it until then. In a way, choosing a date some time out allows all the localised marital issues to be somewhat "smoothed", so that no one issue takes emotional precedence in any big decision making process.
However, yesterday it all got a bit too much for me and I conceded that perhaps this was the time for me to break this marriage off. I have had these thoughts about getting divorced in the back of my mind for quite some time but I was putting them off until October. Yesterday I had really had enough. I said to G, in no uncertain terms, that I thought this was the end of the road for us.
She was upset, started crying and we made our way back to the car. Somehow or other we got the kids some dinner and put them to bed before we could really chat and we talked until 1 o'clock in the morning. Not argued, but talked. G was very very upset. She kept thinking about things and bursting into tears. I was not upset. If I'm honest, I was a bit relieved. I think the difference between me and G is that G has just now found out that I do not necessarily want to be with her. I found this out last year when I caught her chatting to her ex-boyfriend on the internet. So she was much more upset than I was.
She seemed to keep hoping I would change my mind but it would be shallow and wrong for me to just switch because she got upset. All night I continued to reinforce my decision, and it is the right thing to do. The practical realities will be hard, but in the long term it should all be good. We both worried about the children especially.
I couldn't get to sleep. Everytime I turned over she started to cry again - I mean really loud whining crying. In the end I spoke to her about positive ways she could look at it. I reassured her that this doesn't have to be a quick split - we can take our time. We've got a lot of stuff to sort out - and the kids - so I think a quick split may be too damaging right now. This seemed to help a bit but I didn't want her to think that it was going to be all better - I needed to reinforce the decision in the end... so again she cried.
The only way I could get any sleep was to suggest that we might both feel better in the morning. I think she thought I might change my mind in the morning, and if it helped us get some sleep that was ok, but I'm not inclined to change my view that, in the long term, we are probably better off apart.
