Value-add to faith

Hey Barney,

Your situation sucks and I'm sorry.

While I don't necessarily disagree with the faith-based suggestions made in this thread, since you're non-religious, I'll throw in some other options that are aimed more at the non-religious folks:

1. Grief Beyond Belief, www.griefbeyondbelief.org . While this is mainly aimed at people dealing with the death of a loved one, it has lots of advice generally for coping with emotional trauma of all kinds. There's as many tactics as there are people, but mainly community.

2. Parenting Beyond Belief, www.parentingbeyondbelief.com . Forums and so on. There is also a book they printed (of the same name) that have some advice on dealing with divorce.

3. Not really a resource, but food for thought:
freethoughtblogs.com/reasonabledoubts/20...rch-with-luke-galen/
That is a podcast about happiness, belief, and church membership. Spoiler: belief has basically nothing to do with it; it's all about community. Isolated believers are more depressed than average, as are isolated nonbelievers. Connected believers and nonbelievers do about equally well. So go connect with people! Whether it's us jerks here, or a local group, or whatever.

Bottom line: I am just providing options. You should ultimately do whatever works for you, and more importantly, your kid, no matter where it lies on the belief/nonbelief spectrum.

Thanks guys, great ideas and leads for me to explore.

Sevej, I really think you and airmarkus are onto something. I suspect I was an ignoring husband and all this sadness is the result of feeling defeated. Even though I think the misery is coming from needing and missing her so badly, I think my mind is taking shortcuts because of what happened. It's somewhat terrifying to think that I possibly didn't actually care about her. I can't accept that and I hope that wasn't the case.

I suppose time will clarify these issues for me.

I feel like I would still take her back immediately if she changed her mind or expressed regret again.

My son's mom and I split close to two years ago when he was three as well. At the time I was trying to open a restaurant that had gone wildly over budget and was really testing the limits of my sanity. Since we're co-parenting, there was no clean break like there'd been with all my other failed relationships. We had to see each other and speak to one another all the fucking time. It was the worst.

So I threw myself into work. I got the restaurant open and soon after made moves to renovate and open another bar. I also threw myself even more heartily into all the booze, drugs, and casual sex that come part and parcel with the bar business. On paper it looked great, and I should have been having the time of my life, but I was completely miserable. That whole 'go get laid' bit that your friends tell you is bullshit. It made me feel even worse. The Hiroshima like hangovers didn't help the depression any either. The days I had my son I was fine, and handled everything I needed to. Perfect father/business owner/etc., but I went on a mini bender every time I dropped him off at his mothers house and midway through would feel awful about myself. And I knew it had to stop if I was going to be the father and the man that I wanted to be.

There's a lot of well meant sentiment here that you need to be there for your daughter, and I couldn't agree more. But what I found out was that in order for me to be there for my son, I had to get right with myself first. It's like when they tell you to put the oxygen mask on yourself first, and then on your kid while the planes going down. You can't help her out if you can't breathe. So make sure you're taking time to breathe. Do some things for yourself the days you're by yourself. Get out of bed and go to the gym, or take a hike, or ride your bike. Find a therapist and talk about how sad and pissed off you are. Go out for a steak with your buddies. Watch the rangers beat the habs. Trust me man, it'll make things better all around if you remember to take care of yourself.

On the original topic, I'm not religious by any stretch and I'm not sure that I could even describe myself honestly as spiritual, but the serenity prayer gives me quite a bit of strength. I learned it as a very young man in a very dark time and since then I've never found a situation where it didn't make me feel a bit better. Assuming I remembered it at the time of course. The alcoholics start it with the word 'god,' but I prefer the 'abridged' version:

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Good luck buddy. Hope things get better soon.

Sorry, posted that twice.

Black Barney wrote: Sevej, I really think you and airmarkus are onto something. I suspect I was an ignoring husband and all this sadness is the result of feeling defeated. Even though I think the misery is coming from needing and missing her so badly, I think my mind is taking shortcuts because of what happened. It's somewhat terrifying to think that I possibly didn't actually care about her. I can't accept that and I hope that wasn't the case.

Hell no Barney, I'd never think you that way (as an ignoring husband). It's just that you need to see things objectively. I'm sure you didn't get here without plenty of considerations. And *of course* you care. But how much is it caused by you caring or feeling defeated. Ask yourself, if you hear *nothing* about her right now, would you feel *this* terrible? When you start to shed your feelings of defeat, you *will* shed plenty of your misery. Been there, done that.

Also, you should be careful not to get into the blame game. Even if were at fault in not caring or listening enough, there's responsibility on both parties to communicate openly and honestly. It's too easy to try and frame a split as being on the back of a guilty party. I fucked up my previous relationship in terms of the final cut, and I was definitely to blame for a lot of shenanigans going on while together but the root cause, the underlying unhappiness, the fact that things were just coasting and not really working, was absolutely the fault of BOTH parties, even if one ultimately got to play the "victim" because of all the other shit that went down.

This whole thing sucks. Divorce sucks. People suck, in general, as a whole.

About this faith thing, you are finally getting it. It's in the foxholes that people stop being atheists. Nothing like incoming 105mm artillery to make you pray to a God you willfully ignored until you needed him. And that's human nature.

I just look around at the things in the world...from the huge varieties of trees, the bugs, the animals, everything, and know that a God is real, and that he created all of this solely for our enjoyment. Therefore, the world is a paradise play-park that we can all enjoy if we figure out how NOT to be cunts to one another long enough, and go out into the world with the right attitude and the right perspective.

This, too, shall pass, Barney. Right now, it sucks. Assholes and dirty feet, no less. But in time, this will pass, and you'll get back to being the awesome person you've always been, but with a little less responsibility and a little more baggage. Such is life. Smoke, drink, party, game it up, and enjoy your gift. Life's waaay to short to not squeeze every fucking drop of awesome out of it. 100 years if you're lucky, and it comes and goes in the blink of an eye. Forget the bad, focus on the awesome.

That's all I've got. Take care, brother, and keep the chin up.

Oh man, I just saw this thread now.

Thanks for sharing your burden, Barney. You honour us.

Reading and thinking about your broken/beating heart is hard.

There are beautiful, caring posts in this thread.

You are not alone.

So after a few months of trying to let go of my feelings, I realize it's just not possible. Instead, I think I need to let go of hope. I need to accept that it's over and just repeat it to myself over and over until I fully realize my marriage is dead. Otherwise, everytime my ex says or does something nice to me, I'll keep falling backwards.

There's an amazingly appropriate quote by Joseph Campbell, "We must let go of the life we had planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us."

That's damn right.

Amen, Barney. That's what my ex has done recently. She's decided on a path and she's going that direction regardless of anything with us. It's made such a change in her.