117 - Another Father's Day

Another Father's Day - a year after the one that possibly triggered a complete reversal of her behaviours - https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2016/09/100-why-turnaround.html and https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2016/09/99-dramatic-turnaround.html

Once more I get a present from my son and he chooses the restaurant he wants to take me to - having picked out a specific item as well. This is in contrast to just about getting him to sign a card for Mother's Day and nothing more - though I had booked a restaurant or offered to take my wife out another day  for just a deux.

Good thing she is not taking the contrast to heart - or, at least, not obviously so.

I know last year he instigated the gift for me - this year his mother may have, I don't know. But at least he wanted to do something for me more than a scribbled card. I thanked him profusely.

Of course, whether I received something or not would have been completely immaterial - not something I would have been worried about.

As he grows into an 11 year old boy, can I keep his trust and love?

116 - Minutae again - worrying but a conclusion re-affirmed

Been a year since the damascene conversion - 99 - A Dramatic Turnaround -  but I still do not believe it and I am certainly not in a place where I have forgotten and am relaxed.

The other day she informed that our son had said something like, ‘look, my lunchbox has not been washed properly!’ To which she had responded that I had done the washing and – with joy – she reported this conversation to me in the evening. Pointing out a failure and taking pleasure in doing so.

This morning, our son’s school uniform is not ready and I have to iron the clothes, when she is obsessive about this being under her control. I, obviously, do not mention this ‘failing’ unlike her continual need to, somehow, deliver some sort of oneupwomanship!

Yesterday evening was a little like the bad old days. I came home to a crying child and an angry mother. Apparently he had gone upstairs straight after coming home and watched the a recording of the NBA Finals. Then had come down for homework which had not been done to his mother’s satisfaction. A huge lecture on how he had watched too much television and would be banned from now on and so on and so on.

I suspect I know exactly what happened. Yes, he had probably watched a little too long but she had probably been doing Facebook or something and had not imposed the discipline. And it had become late, time was 7:00 pm, she was only just starting the cooking and it was all getting stressed.

When I am looking after him, we would come back home, he would have a little rest and we would, together, fix a time when he would start homework – say, 5:30 pm – and I would make sure he would keep to that rather than get distracted myself on Facebook. My cooking would be finished by 7 pm and all clear up and done in the kitchen by 8:30 tops. Last night, she did not finish until almost 10 pm.

And when she lets rip, she lets rip. I held on to him and he said that, ‘I always do my work but mum always scolds me.’ To be fair, I had not seen this recently but if that is his impression then that is not good.

Another day I was very upset with him as he had not even acknowledged or responded to a call to come downstairs for something. I told him I had asked him a number of times, he had not even acknowledged my call and that that was very rude. He had a little cry at that too but I did not shout and we were right as rain in five minutes – I did not drone on and on and on …

 My conclusion? I remain of the opinion that I am better off alone and not with her. I need to target my life, somehow, to be a Silver Splitter; I simply cannot take the risk of being in this marriage for the rest of my life. Her anger has not gone away, the little negatives about people have not gone away – and, with age, they will only grow worse.

115 - Irony

My parents (90+ and 80+) stayed with us for a couple of weeks and all was great. Neither of them is very well. My wife was fine and helpful, we shared the looking after and cooking.

She says to me, 'Your mum is very competitive. She asked me about the size of other people's houses and whether other kids had achieved higher scholarships than our son and what this person wears ....'

This from the woman who asked me whether I was a Head of .. or just a manager, who berated me for not getting a pay rise and said I should be ashamed, whether my boss is older  than me, how are my friends doing, who has been continually critical of what I wear when going for a walk in the park and so on and so on and so on ...

https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/clearly-failure.html

https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/96-champagne-and-handshakes.html

https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/the-last-whinge.html

https://dear-confidant.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/huge-row-getting-worse.html

Well, at least life is passing peaceably now and is even fun from time to time.

Can all this resentment and anger disappear, like so many clouds? Or is it all being stored up?

The more I look back, the more I am glad I have been keeping this blog/diary. Not to hold on to unhappiness but to show the depths of despair - it would be too easy to forget.

Of course, it also had a therapeutic effect at the time of stress release.