How does one respond to this type of insanity?

March 25, 2014

            Adam wants to discuss the parenting arrangements.  He wants to do 50/50 parenting.  I am in agreement about shared parenting.  I asked if Adam is wanting the 50/50 thing because it would mean paying less in child support.  I know that seems like a very selfish question on my part but I want to keep the kids in the same house and in the same school.  I highly doubt I could find suitable housing in the area if Adam doesn’t help me.  He said he would take full custody if he could.  He isn’t factoring in child support.  I asked why he would take full custody, does he think I am an unfit mother?  He said if I offered it he would snap it up.  Why in the world would I offer him full custody?!  I am living my dream “job” being a mother.  He is crazy to even entertain such an idea of me giving him full custody.

            He did say he does not think I am an unfit mother.  Well that’s nice.  He said I am asking about financial stuff when he sees that as a secondary consideration.  I don’t see me being able to maintain the children’s current home as a secondary issue.  He said eventually the dissolution will be complete and I will need to supplement the spousal and child support if I want to “support yourself in the house you currently live.”  I thought we were talking about the kids?  How did this become about me?

            Adam said he needs to be able to feed and clothe the kids, “As you know, they are expensive.”  Really?  Does he really think he needs to tell that to the parent that makes all the clothing purchases and does the grocery shopping?

            He also mentioned an informal separation not working.  He said there isn’t enough cooperation or trust to make it work.  He said it is a matter of fact.  I disagreed but it only takes one of us to feel that way I suppose. 

            Adam has asked to have the children every other weekend.  He said he will be fair and I can trust him to tell me what he is doing.  I told him he can trust me to not take out credit or spend recklessly or be a whore and get pregnant. 

            He said this is difficult.  He trusts me to not get pregnant anytime soon.  He said he doesn’t mind if I do later.  “If you met someone else that I could trust around the kids, then you could have a life together with that person. You are young, pretty, and charming.”  Clearly, Adam aims to not let Gary and I have a life together. 

            I asked when he plans to file the dissolution. He said we will do it together.  I need a timeline, I like to plan ahead.  He said he has a template that he is using for the dissolution but they aren’t ready for my review.  He would like to have it done by the beginning of summer so we can both be “free to move on with whatever we will do.”  He would prefer an arrangement that allows me to stay in the house.  He said we don’t have to leave it up to a judge “that could screw one or both of us.”  I mentioned that without a college degree there is not a very good chance of me getting the type of job that would bring in an income that would qualify me for a mortgage for this house.  A judge won’t be screwing us, Adam might but a judge won’t.  Now he is saying I can finish my degree by the summer.  He has said he won’t pay for anymore classes, he also took away his promise to cover the B.S. student loans.  He said to study and take CLEPs.  He said to take the money out of savings.  He also said he would like to transfer the Josie stuff back to my control.  He said his intention is not to micromanage my life. 

            I tried to explain the difficulty in trying to jam my final classes into a couple month period and study and take the GRE.  He said my struggles don’t change anything, it’s my business.  How I manage my time is up to me, he says.  Except this isn’t just about managing my time better.  I am now a single mother of seven children and attending school full time while trying to find a job.  I am moving as quickly as I can with all this.  It’s not poor time management.

            That topic is only going to cause a fight so I suggested we get back to parenting time.  I asked what day of the week he would like to have the children.  He said with having them every other weekend he would like to have a midweek visit.  I asked if he would like to switch where I get them four days he gets them three then reverse.  Transporting them to school might get tricky. He asked “How do you do it now?  You will have to modify this when you start work anyway.” He also wanted to know if we will need daycare or if the older kids can take that responsibility.  For now, I guess if I am working, the kids would take busses home, the youngest would go to daycare, and I would use my lunch break to get the oldest home since her school doesn’t bus.  Adam doesn’t know how he will manage a pick up on the school days he has them.  He said if he had a house in this neighborhood it would be easier.  I agreed and even thought every other day might be possible then. He said if we want to sell the other house then we can have that be our current goal and hold off on the dissolution.  I guess that is his choice since that is the home he is in. 

            I changed topics to the budget.  I looked at the budget I made and there is a surplus of $162.  His budget plan shows nothing left and credit cards not paid. 

            Back to kids, he wants the kids on Tuesday but he doesn’t want to visit at this house.  I said he could take them to his house but he said he needs a vehicle first.  He said until then he just wants to have them on weekends.  The Friday 6pm-Sunday 7pm schedule works for him. 

            Then he said he had a very important question.  He wants to know if I am open to building a working relationship: what I need him to do and not do and what he needs me to do and not do.  I have told him I am open to talking things over and cooperating.  He said he was asking if that was still the case.  He isn’t my husband but he is the children’s father.  I need to be able to talk to him and be a team with him.  He asked what I need to have that happen.  Is aid cooperation is a great place to start.  Having him stand by his words. He asked how he can do that that he hasn’t already done. 

            I answered honestly and openly, just likely he asked me to.  I said it hurt when he took back his promise to pay for my undergrad.  I also don’t get to go to grad school.  Over and over he said he would pay and now I am left to pay it all on my own.  He said he is still deciding whether he will allow me to use the tuition benefits he'll get when he changes to his professor position but now he has decided and it feels like he has taken another one of my dreams away.  That type of betrayal hurts. 

            Adam’s reply was a slap to the face.  “It hurt having you be unfaithful to me, even during the open marriage.  Many dreams are gone from us on both sides.” I don’t get it.  I did what he wanted, how is that unfaithful?  He said I could not have been more unfaithful after he gave me permission to start a relationship.  He said there wasn’t a rule I didn’t break.  He gave me permission? No, he begged and pleaded to open the marriage.  He pushed me to have another relationship because he thought it would make me more open to the kind of sex Adam wanted.  He said he didn’t tell me he wanted me to have a relationship but that I could.  He says he didn’t push me into an open marriage.  He says we talked about it and I decided to try it.  He is right, after him asking multiple times over months, I finally was willing to do the thing he wanted to try.  I didn’t understand how it would better our marriage but if it was the only thing I could do to make him happy I was willing to try it. 

            I am so confused.  He told me he was happy I found someone that made me happy.   He said:

“It's the reason I left and the reason I will stay gone. You were emotionally unfaithful to me. I was happy you found someone before I found out that you and him made fun of me behind my back, that you shared our marital problems with him, and that you lied to me repeatedly. None of those things embody the mutual trust and consideration and respect that we had in mind when we opened the marriage.  He only knows how to be a cheater, and I understand where he is at. But you were not like that before. “

            He has it so wrong.  My goal was to connect with someone in the meaning of polyamory.  We never made fun of Adam.  He said he read my texts so he knows what was said.  He believes we made fun of him several times and said hurtful things and I was not “faithful” as a partner.  I was disrespectful.  I lied to him about sex with him long before we opened the marriage.  He said he didn’t know I lied so much before I met Gary.  But wasn’t me learning to be open about my emotions another reason Adam opened the marriage?  So now that I am being open and honest, like he asked, that means I suck?  He said we need to get over this and move on.  He said I can make fun of him all I want now, this is the cause of our divorce.  He said, after he closed the marriage I planned to see Gary.  I apologized for hurting him when I vented, he said he wasn’t telling me this to get an apology.  He understands “much better how you work.” 

            Adam is mad that after he said we were closing the marriage that I saw Gary the next day.  I said that was because a person doesn’t generally break things off over text.  I needed to have a respectful discussion with the man I had fallen in love with.  It isn’t like Adam never chose vice over me. 

            Then he moved the subject back to the topic of what we each need.  His turn.  He needs me to “abandon lying and doing passive aggressive stuff to spite” him.  He wants to be able to tell me when I do bad things.  Um, he already does.  He also said “You hate me and resent me, and you’ve not respected me for a long time.  It’s clear.  I know it but you haven’t said it. “  He is telling me I can say it now and he won’t be mad.  I cannot trust that.  There has always been an emotional cost to telling Adam I am not happy.  He also admitted to being “a dick” because ehe resents me.  He “thinks horrible things” about me but is still turned on by me.  Then he said to stop being passive aggressive like sending a message about a 6:20 meeting at 6:10.  I sent that message at 5:45pm as I was rushing to get ready.  I thought our daughter had told him before hand.  He said it doesn’t matter because I didn’t tell him until the last minute when he couldn’t be there.  Yes, I knew before the day of the meeting, well I got an email a month ago but I forgot.  Plus, I thought he was on the school's email list.  Not my fault he didn’t make sure to be connected with the kids’ teachers. 

            I felt like it was time for another topic change.  He doesn’t want to “micromanage” my life but he does expect me to be his personal aid. 

I offered for him to have the kids tonight.  I could pick the Spring Breakers up in the morning if he took the STEMers to school.  He asked if it’s because I have a date.  If so he will.  He said I am free to do what I want as long as we are in agreement about the dissolution.  I wish he would not think of me being selfish.  I am offering him the kids because he just said he liked having them.  I can bring them any day of the week. He responded, “So yes.”  No, we can stick to the weekend.  He said I need practice at being honest so I can keep the kids tonight.  I am biting my tongue to not call him names!  Why does he turn this into me?  Wasn’t the basis of this conversation the kids? 

            I am going to be cooperative and put my feelings aside.  Does he want to kids tomorrow?  No, he has band practice and Thursday he teaches. So Tuesday is his only open day but somehow I am a bad person for offering him that day?  He aid he could reschedule band practice but he doesn’t want to mess with the schedule anymore.  Is he serious?  He thinks the band cannot handle a change?  Has he forgotten that his seven children are going without their father the majority of the time?  Isn’t that the bigger change and he has the power to make it easier on them but won’t?

            Then he went back to me having a date and it was okay that I am seeing gary.  He said what is not okay is me not trusting Adam to talk to him about it.  My husband left me about a week ago and expects me to be open and honest about the intimate relationship I have, the one he claims I was unfaithful to him with?  Is he crazy?  Then he tells me I don’t have to tell him about my personal life but if he asks and I give him the “self-righteous excuse” that is the problem.  He said it makes him not believe the other things I say.  He then promised to not use anything against me in court provided I don’t file on him and start a war.  I’m not going to file on him, I told him the lawyer said there was no need.  Then Adam said I never told him I met with a lawyer.  I did, when we met for lunch.  I told Adam I had like a 10 minute meeting, then he remembered. 

            Adam wants us to have open honest communications.  He believes feelings are not important because we are working together to create kids that are stable and healthy.  He said he will stand by his word to cooperate.  He’ll be explicit and put it all in text so I don’t misunderstand. 

            Adam admitted again to resenting me but still having strong feelings for me.  He likes talking.  He almost wanted me to come over last night but knew it would be a mistake.  From there I tried to keep the conversation very neutral.  I talked about making donuts with the kids and bonding over math with the oldest. 

            Later in the day Adam asked if I knew that a neighbor’s house got robbed.  I do know, they live across the street and the police cars were kind of obvious.  I used my incidental money to buy magnetic alarms for the doors.  I also investigated the alarm system in the house already.  It’s broken and if I arm it, it blares.  I’ll just use incidental money to buy simple alarms at HD.