new lease / big mess

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-04-2004
new lease / big mess
54
Mon, 03-29-2004 - 10:05am
Well, first of all, thanks to everyone for their support these last two weeks. I've gotten quite a few laughs and gained a lot of insight as I've spent more time here.

Friday night I went out with a friend who told me his troubles and pending divorce story. Over $100k in gambling losses from his W... made me feel like a real heel. Then I told him the entire story of mine, the A and everything. Funny, here's a guy who has lost all of this but when I told him about my M and how it's been he felt bad for me.

His advice was the last in a long line of peoples' advice that suggested my own place while getting through all of this. In fact, the only person who hasn't suggested it or agreed with it is the OW...

So I went over there afterwards to tell her that I felt really good, that I really knew I had to get my own place in order to smartly end things in my M but still have time to spend with the OW. Finally, despite being scared to death and mostly way over my head, I had a real plan I could believe in and execute.

Guess what. She doesn't like it. In fact, it doesn't appear that she's going to be happy with anything short of my moving in with her. And not just moving in, but also taking her out and meeting most of my friends and family... basically she won't be happy unless she gets to be the new W. I don't know if this is a change in her meds last week, self defense, fear or what... and she can't tell me. She just says that she isn't sure if even my moving in would be enough now, that she really doesn't want to remain a secret a minute longer.

I understand she feels hurt and upset that I'm not where I thought I'd be right now. But I now have a lease on an apartment 2 blocks from hers so I can see her even more often, and I'm not pulling away from her at all. Instead I'm still taking care of her financially, driving her around while her car is down, and basically putting myself through all of this so we can be together soon. And now she says she doesn't know if it will be enough.

Guess I'm just angry because I feel like I gave my W years to try to come around, and now she takes me serious since I've said I'm done and moving out. Then the OW gave me a few months when I've taken her serious the whole time and tried to do everything I could to prove to her that we have a future.

I'm so angry with everyone this morning. I guess the bright side is I have my keys to the new place and I'll be moving out this week, and then everyone can just bite me. I've tried so hard for so long to be good to the people I care about, I'm looking forward to sitting on *my* couch, watching *my* TV, and trying to be happy for myself.

Thanks for letting me vent. Feel free to raise your hand and chime in if you're sick of living for other people.

rain

iVillage Member
Registered: 02-16-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:17am
I was all ready to argue with you about your second to last post, but after reading your last post, I am inclined to agree with your argument. I was on anti-depressants (Wellbutrin) after the birth of my first child. I had never had a problem with depression before that time. I believe it was strictly environmental...new baby around, new activities, rearranging my life. I felt completely overwhelmed. Once I learned to manage my time and accept help from others, the depression waned and I quit taking the prescription. Perhaps not everyone gets over post-partum depression as quickly as I did...I felt really lucky. I've not had problems since.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-10-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:22am
Ahhhh - forgive me - you're in the CLINICAL field yourself - I guess that's why it's okay for you to diagnose someone based purely on posts to an internet board.

I'm simply a lay person with psychology training who's struggled with depression for over four years. Anti-depressants are what make it possible to get out of bed in the morning, to not cry uncontrollably for no apparent reason and to function day by day. To discount someone and to say that you wouldn't trust anyone on antidepressants is an uneducated response - and even more troubling coming from one who claims to be from a clinical field.

I also did not mean to turn this into a debate on depression - but only the person coping with depression truly knows what it's like and I'd guess that Rain is pretty in tune as well.

In my humble opinion.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-19-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:24am
Boston,

A lot of us ended in bad marriages just because we REFUSED to acknowledge the red flags that were up before we entered our relationships. Don't you think it’s a wise idea to not repeat the mistake when we want to start our life the next time around and not to bury our heads in the sand like ostriches and hope and wish that the problem would disappear. Aren't we just setting ourselves up for misery the SECOND or maybe third or fourth time around?

I, for one, am completely FOR entering any new relationship with our eyes open and not ignoring any personality flaws that could cause us problems down the road. If we are just to jump from one misery to another why not just tolerate our spouses? Atleast we have history and kids with them and for many of us here the spouses are good and decent people.

I very much believe it is support to tell people to be skeptical of their new relationships and not to put halos around the OW/OM's head and worship them as such.

PG

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-19-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:32am
"Ahhhh - forgive me - you're in the CLINICAL field yourself - I guess that's why it's okay for you to diagnose someone based purely on posts to an internet board."

"To discount someone and to say that you wouldn't trust anyone on antidepressants is an uneducated response - and even more troubling coming from one who claims to be from a clinical field."

I would just remind you that we are debating Rain's situation here and I think its just unwise to start taking every comment personally and then maligning the poster instead of saying something objective about the thread itself.

PG

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-16-2003
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:33am
OMG, what a depressing view of life you have! Nobody is worshipping nobody unless they are being worshipped in return. LOL It is the thing that people do when they are in their honeymoon stages of love. Oh, Cmon don't be a drag!

Anti-depressants are not a red flag in my opnion. There are stages in out life when we need them there is no denying that. If you think taking depressants can be indicative of something more bad, I disagree.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-04-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:36am
Well, the hornets' nest is adequately stirred this morn. Let's see what I can do about clearing a few things up. Just for clarity, none of my comments are meant to be defensive, justification or angry. Just in case.

"Out of the frying pan..."

Not the first to say that to me this week. That is "precisely" what the landlord said to me. For those of you not following prior threads/posts, I am renting her apartment from my old landlord, and now I'm renting mine from him too. Turns out I'm a very luck man - he's been through a similar thing and is very sympathetic. It was his advice that I have a "halfway" place.

As for finding a job... I'm sorry, I didn't mean to imply she didnt' work at all. She is working full-time but it's temporary right now (hopefully that will change too.) The last six months or so I've insisted that she pay off her bad debts and get things in line so she can go back to school if she wants (and she does.) I'm paying her rent still but nothing else, and that's really only because daycare even a few hours a day is a little expensive, she has bills she's paying off... etc. She is working and has been about 4 of the 6 months she's been here.

As for anti-depressants... to be perfectly honest, I had lots of negative opinions before I met her. I was far from sympathetic, I just figured there was some latent desire to do nothing and that caused some of the depression.

So I read everything I could, from scientific stuff about meds to psychological stuff about depression itself to how to relate and deal with it. Now I really believe clinical depression gets a bad rap because there are people who abuse the diagnosis, just like there are people who abuse alcohol, drugs, religion, and any other thing they can find to avoid responsibility for the condition of their lives.

The OW is not like that at all. She fights the depression, marches forward when she doesn't feel like it about 90% of the time, and the symptoms come and go. I've never once heard her blame *anything* on anyone or just categorically say, "well, it's the depression." She could, easily. God knows her life has been one disaster after another, at least it sounds like it has been.

For me personally, I've had lots of things pass through my life. Incest revelations within my family, suicides of friends, gun point robberies... honestly, the same kind of shopping list of issues lots of people have to get through. But nothing I've had to deal with comes close to the things she's had to deal with, and she has my respect for surviving this long with virtually no support (financial or otherwise) for her or her daughter. I'm not trying to save her; it's that when someone gets this far and has this much character and so little bitterness, that's someone I'm willing to throw my lot in with. I can learn to deal with some depression and be supportive. Small price.

"Do I really want to start a life with someone with no life...etc."

I'm married to someone who works about 60 or more hours a week. She comes from parents who are a Ph.D. and an attorney, was an A student in college and who makes a mountain of money. She's gorgeous, charismatic, and most people like her a lot. She has had every advantage in life, and is a good person in general, though for close relationships she is fairly selfish and impossible to share a life with (unless I want to be managed and dictated to.)

Yes, I choose the average looking woman who is clinically depressed, has a daughter to support, has only a little college, a terrible family, and no life right now beyond her daughter and me. She loves me more and better than anyone else ever has. I don't want to lose that.

No hard feelings, phillygirl. Actually, this has really made me realize that as long as I have some chance with her, I want it. I need to be careful and cautious, but I also want to be sure I don't lose something wonderful.

thanks everyone for your help and support


rain

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-24-2003
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:36am
"I very much believe it is support to tell people to be skeptical of their new relationships and not to put halos around the OW/OM's head and worship them as such."

I agree with this 100%. Problem is that you are doing it the wrong way. This is by no means a personal attack and please don't take offense, hon, since none is intended, but you come across as very judgmental, extremely opinionated and you tend to force your opinion on people without really caring how it affects them - people who are vulnerable to begin with. You have yet to learn to be tactful. Take it from someone who is old enough to be your father.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-19-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:41am
To keep on continuing a lifestyle that could generously contribute to one's depression and not to take responsibility for ones' own action and illness (without resorting to medications first) and not to fix that lifestyle and make one's life better is in my opinion a BIG red flag.

PG

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-19-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 11:53am
Rain,

When I say have a life, it doesn't necessarily mean to come from a wealthy family or be a straight A student with a 6 figure job, it means to be able to lead a happy and full life without being dependent fully on somebody else for one's happiness because that just indicates a "taker" personality and I believe most of us are in with "taker" spouses and are thus unhappy.

As per Boston's comment that I am judgemental I just find it ironic and unfair that if its the spouse that we are berating (it happens a lot here), its not judgemental but if one gives a skeptic opinion about the OW/OM the whole world comes crashing down.

PG

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-19-2004
Tue, 03-30-2004 - 12:07pm
NRY, first of all thanks for being objective.

PPD is a very common thing and affects a majority of pregnant women. It affected me too and went away when I was done with breast feeding. For me it was manageable and I didn't need to take meds.

PG