Sometimes I even surprise myself

These last few weeks, with divorce looming in the near distance, I have been bombarded with feelings. The anger when I receive letters from her lawyer about them not being willing to budge on the right of first refusal, which I want in our agreement, and the sadness I feel about the finality of it all.

Yesterday, I got such a letter from her lawyer, being very aggressive and trying to make me out to be unreasonable. Saying things like “Mr. Brown’s demand for a new clause…” or “not prepared to go down the pathway Mr. Brown wants her to go.”, when all I want is to protect both of our interests as parents. To remove future conflict from arising. But apparently I’m unreasonable prick with only my own interests in mind.

Until today, when I realize that my gut reaction is to still be sympathetic to Jaime. And that my gut reaction is usually how I respond to her. That I’m not this heartless jerk that always has to win… which is how I am made out to be. But instead, I still feel like someone who is trying to protect her from a world that can sometimes be very cruel.

Today her parents went on a tropical vacation and it’s my weekend to have William. She dropped him off at my place this morning, so that my Mom can babysit him while we are both at work, and then he is with us for the weekend.

What do I do when I get to work? I email her… reaching out to her, when I’m sure she is realizing how long of a weekend it can be when you are absolutely alone. And I offer for her to join William and I for a meal over the weekend or to hang out for a bit, to break up her weekend if she is alone.

When she responds, that she is finding it all really hard, I even offer her to come back after work and have him over night. On my weekend! Why? Because I know how much it hurts. I know how much you can miss having your son with you, especially when you have no one else.

I hope for just one second she realizes that I’m still that person that she fell in love with and that I’m not the monster trying to rip her son from her hands.

Sidenote: My next post will not be about my divorce... I promise.

Anxious

I am very anxious right now. I think everything is just starting to hit me that soon I will be a divorced man. Something I never saw for myself and not something I think I am even really ready for. And in reality, who sees themselves getting divorced? But me? I was always someone who followed the expected path. I graduated high school, went onto university, started a career, got married, bought a house and had my first child. Now my life is all but on track... well at least not on that track anymore.

This week I had to meet with my lawyer to prepare for the final stages before the divorce becomes final. I brought in my paystubs and my latest tax filing and we spoke of the final issues I have with the corollary relief judgement, which is supplied to the judge along with the divorce filing. While I was there my lawyer tried to call the opposing lawyer to set up a four way meeting, in an attempt to resolve the final issues. I guess we just wait now to see whether a meeting can take place, and whether anything can be accomplished. In the last two years, there has been a lot of stalling and needless attempts to bully me into giving up most of my rights. And somehow I have gotten thru it all, but being faced with this meeting is not something I feel prepared for. I know I have the strength to get thru anything, but I don’t know how to give myself a pep talk for this one, especially now that I have this feeling in me.

Sure it’s been almost two years since my wife moved out of our home, but every single day and night I think about her. I think about it would be like if we got back together. I know I have mentioned it before, and I know it’s not a real possibility, and even if it happened there is no way it would work. Surely, the last two years have damaged us to an extent that even under the perfect circumstances, we could never move past these last two years.

But I do, truly, want my old life back. I made the mistake tonight of looking thru old photos. I also started thinking about my family tree and how I don’t have the family I once did. And it’s my fault. Sure neither of us was a perfect spouse; we both had things we needed to work on, but ultimately there are three words I said to her, that will forever have changed my life. Words that I honestly wish I had kept to myself. What if that was the biggest mistake of my life?

I am sure my therapist would say that I am still in the grieving process and that the actual divorce proceedings is a marker that I should have know would cause all of these feelings to rush to the surface, but it doesn’t make it easier to deal with. So what? I’m normal... yippee!

My heart hurts. It’s Friday night and I’m alone. In order to not sit home alone all night I went to the mall for a bit. I rented a movie, to try and distract myself, but so far, no dice.

I just hope, that after the ink dries on the divorce papers, that we can somehow find a place where we can at least be friends. And I’m not kidding myself into thinking it will be a normal friendship, but at least to a degree that we are no longer reading between the lines or are being over paranoid that the other is up to something. Maybe just friends enough that instead of only texting each other, she will answer my phone calls and talk to me. She was my best friend for half my life...

Update:  It's now Monday morning, and all weekend I have thought back to this post.  I have thought numerous times of deleting it, because really, does anyone want to read some of my most inner thought?  And then I thought... you know what?  It's my true feelings, and I shouldn't be ashamed to share those with anyone, and hey this is cheaper than most therapists charge, right? 

How to take a photo of you and your son, without the aid of another person

There are many times when William and I are out and about that I wish that I had a compact camera, so that I could extend my arm and take a self-portrait of us...  this is the best I have learned to do so far... hahaha.

On this day, we spent the entire day outside in the city and when we were about to wrap it up for the day I felt the surge of panick when I realized I couldn't feel my keys in my pocket.  I took this pic of us (I'm in the sunglasses reflection) while we waited for a two truck come and break into my car.

Brings out the worst?

Here is my random thought for today... and all because I am watching the Real Housewives of Orange County (yes, I'm a reality show junkie... and wha???)

There are those people who supposedly bring out the worst in people.  There is certain situations, when we are hanging out with certain people, where our actions might be different than our norm.  Perhaps, we drink more, are more outspoken, or like on the television series maybe we don't put up with as much from someone else in some sense.

My thought is that maybe those people don't bring out the worst in us, but maybe they empower us in some way.  Maybe instead of allowing ourselves to be walked over, we see the trait in that other person and realize that it's okay to stand up for ourselves and emmulate it.

Reality tv... it makes you think (and I'm not even drinking).

Newly (Re)united

Further to my random email post...

There has been some back and forth between the former friend and I, discussing our seperations.  Our situations are different, because of the involvement we had as fathers and he has a distance issue, which keeps him from even being able to have the access I have.  But we become united as a support for each other. 

It's strange to think, based on our past friendship, but he needs me.  He has a best friend that has let him down by not offering much support.  It's surprising to me, but seeing as his wife is best friends with the ex, I guess there was probably a conversation on the subject, and he is staying more in line with his wife, from what was suggested.

I offered him my support and some of the knowledge I have gained over the last couple of years.  I don't think he realizes what he is in for, but I gave him some insight that will hopefully not leave him unprepared for when things play out.  I'm not fooling myself into believing that we'll talk all that often, and honestly it is not something I want.  But I was very alone and know what it feels like to be on the path.  I will touch base and check up on him.  And if I can help him stay focused as a Dad then it's a bonus.

Random Email

Last night, just before I slid into bed, I decided to take one final look at my facebook to catch up on what my friends were up to during the evening.  There were the usually status updates on Dancing with the Stars, inside jokes and the occasional complaint about their kids, but what caught my attention was that I had two emails in my inbox.  Strange because I had already read a couple of emails earlier in the evening and wasn't expecting any additional responses.

Initially, I thought one of them had to be from my friend who went to Mexico, sure to tell me about how much Tequila he had consumed in a challenge set by another friend, or how much food was consumed at the buffet or possibly how one day in and his roommate for the week was already treading on thin ice.  But alas, the emails were not from him.

One email was from a friend from years ago, who moved away and based on their previous actions, I assumed was in hiding from years gone by.  I had noticed a picture of her as a suggested friend and had emailed her just to tell her I thought she looked amazing and hoped she was doing well.  The email in response was a thank you and wishing the same.  No additional dialogue, which is fine, but an email I still wasn't expecting.

But the other email was very random. It was from the male half of a couple that my wife and I had been friends with in the past.  A friend I had totally written off long before my marriage came apart at the seams, because I didn't feel that I was treated well in the relationship that we had.  I was outgoing and tried to be his friend, but got nothing in return.  I had let it bother me while it happened but wrote it off as sometimes people can just be friends on the surface, and there was nothing wrong with that.

The body of his email was about how he had heard a while ago about my seperation and that he thought of me often.  That he had heard details but was sceptical about some details and chalked a lot of things up to gossip and did not let anything reflect on me.  That he wondered how I was doing in the moving on process both for me personally and for William.  Then he went on to tell me that he was currently in the process of seperation as well and that he would love to hear any insight I might be able to provide as a father and with the whole legal process.  It was surprising.

I had heard that he had seperated and though his circumstances may be different in some ways, I think they could be similar in others.  When I run home at lunch I plan on taking some time to draft an email to him and offer any guideance that I can on how to survive his divorce without giving up too much of his childrens lives and on what to expect in the process.  How to deal with his ex's emotions that might heat up fights.  How to protect himself and how to deal with the fall out from in-laws, family and friends.  And what to look for in a lawyer if he hasn't already found one.  And my opinion stays the same on this (and my ex wife will disagree); you should seek a lawyer that wants conciliation instead of fighting every issue.  Cause a couple of years down the road, when emotions are in the past, you still want to be able to have a friendly relationship with the other parent.  You owe that to your children, if nothing else.

Conscript

It's been almost a year since I was invited by a friend of mine, Jake Owens, to take part as an extra in his short film called Conscript.  That experience is responsible for me having a bit of a dream come true in being involved in a film, seeing behind the scenes and I was able to meet the majority of people who have become my regular circle of friends.

Initially, there was a child actor who was set to play the daughter of the two main characters, but when they didn't show up I got a frantic call from Jake asking to borrow William for the shoot to play their son.  He ended up getting his name in the credits and from all of the comments I heard from people who watched it, William's "performance" was a tear-jerker.

Check out the trailer and the before and after sections to see some of the experience I had.  

http://www.owensproductions.com/conscript.html

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Sleep Interupted

It's funny how I can outwardly be okay,  but stress can poke it's ulgy head out in strange ways.  And it's doing it again. 

When my dad passed away I lost the ability to sleep through the night.  It was strange... I went from someone who could sleep through thunder and lightning to someone who developed a strange habit of needing to use the bathroom every single night. 

And when I think about it, when I was overwhelmed in my first year of university my mind would race so badly at bedtime that I thought I was losing my mind and had convinced myself that I had a brain tumor.

Now I am essentially two years into the seperation with my wife and my sleep patterns are again interupted.  It can be tossing and turning  and then finally reaching that level of half sleep where you are aware of where your mind is drifting, but time is passing quickly enough that you swear you must have slept for a portion of the time.  Or it can be me waking up in the middle of the night in panic; looking around the bedroom for the comfort of my old life.  I can't shake it. 

I will always miss my life as a married man.  There were issues that needed to be resolved, but I miss my wife desperately.  I miss my best friend.  I know that time will heal a lot of what we have gone through but right now it's hard.  Please let tonight be a night full of peaceful sleep.