Anger

Hi all
A quick post (getting dinner for youngest atm) but hope to get back to this later.

Im consumed with unresolved issues and feel so much anger towards Ex. When i left him I tried to be amicable, I explained that I was going and for the last 1 1/2 years I have taken the insults, the derogatory comments, the distain and have bitten my tongue. I suppose it was perhaps easy because I had become accustomed to this through the 18 years of marrage. I thought it was better if we were to be able to work things out for the kids.

There are so many things i want to say to him. I want to ell him he was a cr*p husband, that he had no respect or real love for me, that he treated me terribly. I want to fight for my kids as I have very limited contact which he undermines constantly but my views are dismissed as "he is always right". I think i need to argue back but my conditioning makes that very difficult for me.

I am posting this after drafting an email to him which I stopped because i thought it better to sleep on it in case i did the wrong thing. Instead im posting this in the hope that someone can talk sense to me.

I think i have so many unresolved issues that I have bottled up. I never had any problem sleeping but more and more Im waking up crying after dreaming about him laughing at me, scorning me etc. Its driving me mad.

So much for a quick post. It all came pouring out. Better get back to fish fingers now.

Any advice really appreciated.

Tinny

Sorry about the spelling. Im too annoyed to check!

Tinny,

Bottled up anger resurfaces. It's easy for someone to advise letting it out and channeling into something else but the fact is that it can be deep-rooted.

You care about your kids and you care about yourself but haven't yet thrown off the effects of 18 years of what was after all a very intimate relationship; that is what is destabilising, trying to find your balance without your x and without the contact you had with your kids.

The only person who can talk some sense into you is you! Only you truly feel what you're going through, but you could help yourself by going for stress counselling to help discover what parts of the situation are affecting you the most and that is the first step in dealing with stress.

By all means tell your x he was a crap husband, you're unlikely to convince him but it may make you feel better.

Be strong, I was like this at the begining on my divorce. It will get better but you need to say to yourself that you will remain strong for your kid and most of all for yourself. I went to my GP and used the counselling services from GP surgery. They are free. In all the sessions, I pour my heart out.
Now I am having stress from solicitor but I know I will see the end of it.
Good luck. As they say 'Don't get angry, get even' LOL

Tinny,

I think your bottled-up anger is justified! (One minute you're having their babies, then they're shaftin gyou over in Divorce Hell)...

Once thing dear Oprah Winfrey said, "Your ex wasn't hatched in hell to make your life a misery"!

OK, so that's a talk-show soundbite.... but it's worth sticking on your fridge! I was in my first marriage for 16 yrs, aged 23-40. After he'd run off with Internet lady, I felt cheated of my whole adult womanhood. But, I had to take responsibility for the fact that for every day I was with him, I chose to be there!

Like you'd said, mine was a crap husband too, but I always lived with the naieve thought that someday it'd get better.

Stop looking at the 18 yrs you spent in a relationship with a cr*p husband... but count your blessings that the next 18 will be brighter without him!

I'd write the e-mail.... just so that it's off your chest, and he gets the message that you're nottolerating any more nonsense from him. (I delivered that very message today in mediation).

And get some help from the GP! Vent!!!

Thanks folks
I have calmed down slightly but I know it will surface again, Ive been aware of this anger for quite a while now and its not healthy. Its in my nature to not rock the boat, anything for an easy life, then one tiny thing will make me explode...the straw that broke the camels back. I need to resolve this.

Sera, I have only just begun to realise that it is my fault that I allowed him to treat me the way he did. It doesnt make him any more right but I have to take the balme that I didnt stop it.

Anyway i think i need to tell him a lot, but I'm frightened. What if he makes contact with the kids any more difficult? Thats the only harm he can do now. We have finances sorted, adsolute done and dusted and we have a contact order BUT that doesnt stop him alienating the kids further. Yes I know alienation is disputed and sometimes not given any merit but I feel that it does occur.

I need to think out the way ahead very carefully.

Tinny

Hi Tinny,

Your anger is entirely justified and it is not your fault that he treated you badly for so long. How could you have stopped it? People who behave that badly get away with it because we have to let them or they behave much worse, and we dread that, particularly when we have children.

I think you should write your emails but not send them, and meanwhile go to counselling to work through your feelings. I know you want to tell your ex he was a crap husband but he has your kids and if he was horrible to you when you were supposedly a partnership his reaction will be to be even more horrible now, probably, as you say, through the kids. So I would carry on biting your tongue. Your children will respect you for it in the long term, particularly as they will work out what he is really like for themselves at some point. It is just not worth the risk.

I do feel for you. It is awful coming out of an abusive relationship.

Sadie

Hi

It does not feel like it now, but getting dovorced may be one of the best things to happen to you in your life. You are free of him now, free to be yourself and when you see your children they will see the real you.

He may be trying to turn them against you, but ultimately they will grow up and make up their own minds about you and him. Just continue to be there for them and see them when you can. You have rights, you are their mother and if he makes it too difficult see your sol.

Keep your chin up, this divorce stuff is a very rocky road, and encompasses every emotion going. But it is wise to not do anything that can be used against you. Maybe he is trying to wind you up on purpose so you will do something that makes it seem that you are the unreasonable one? Your strength is you know what he is like and you need to use that strength.

Strangle a cushion, you will feel better.

Shelia