Where now?

Since I last posted, we've had a number of talks, fights, and even one heart-to-heart!
Now we need to be moving forward, but tonight's conversations have left me feeling that we are not moving towards the same goals. That's a little uncertain, as Chrissy wouldn't tell me what here goals are, but it leaves me wondering what is actually possible.

Good morning

Well, after talking to Chrissy and going to bed around 3 a.m. feeling depressed and hopeless, I woke up this morning at 6:45 sharp, wide awake and feeling better than I have done in a long time.

Somehow, I feel that something has changed for the better, and everything is possible again. Now I need to keep this going and share it with Chrissy, who is naturally sceptical of my sudden optimism.

Have a good day, folks.

A call for help

Hmmm.... where to start.......

For some reason, I always feel that I shouldn't talk about this sort of stuff, but a couple of phonecalls in the last few days have made me feel that's a mistake. Lets see.

Well, just about everyone who knows us should know by now that our marriage is in a mess. To be blunt, it's pretty close to being totally FUBARed, and we're about out of hope. Last weekend, things came to a(nother) head, and Chrissy decided she wanted us to separate.
As is sadly normal in these situations, I found myself totally unable to construct a coherent counter-arguement, or even dispute Chrissy's take on things, so we are now separated. I'm still in the house, just sleeping in a different room, and otherwise doing all the same house&family stuff as before.

So how did we get into this mess? It's a long story (of course) Suffice to say for now that we made mistakes right from the word go. It took us quite a while to recognise them, and when Chrissy did, I didn't want to hear about it. It took several years for me to really admit that we were having problems, more to do anything, and when this is combined with two young children, Chrissy's health problems, a fixer-upper house, a talent for procrastination, and a master-class fear of responsibilty and confrontations, I haven't made a good job of anything.

Chrissy has put a lot of effort into trying to fix things - here's a quick quote from Chrissy's blog:-
I have done everything I could to stop the denigration of our marriage, I tried every approach possible from the standard to the extreme, talking, counseling, praying, begging, seducing, ignoring, waiting, leading, following and everything else I could think of. Geoff says he can not think of anything I should have tried or anything I could do now or could have done in the past. But here we are.

I don't think denigration is the right word - I think disintegration is what Chrissy means, but otherwise, that's a good statement. Chrissy has tried all sorts of things, and in general, I haven't responded usefully. Then, when I try to change something for the better, Chrissy is often too depressed to respond, and I don't keep it up more that a week before

I don't know what to do and I'm afraid of failing whatever I try and making things worse. The result of this is that I don't do enough, and that does make things worse.

Now I've heard plenty of comments alongthe lines of "it takes two" to fix this sort of thing, but Chrissy doesn't trust me to do anything about it, and for that matter, I don't really trust me either.

Well, it's coming up on 2 a.m. and I don't quite know where I'm going with this post now, so I'm going to wind it down.

Please pray for us, if that's your thing, and I would certainly appreciate any suggestions if things that might help.

Goodnight,

Chrissy's blog

Fot those of you who haven't found it yet, Chrissy has her own blog at http://cmlfuss.blogspot.com/

It's updated more often than mine....

Guitar Legend in the making

It is always said that the younger you start a musical intrument, the better you will be, so I wonder how this will end up...

Mother's Day

Yesterday was Mother's Day, and we went down to Seascale to spend it with my parents. I managed to arrange surprise cakes for both Chrissy on behalf of the kids, and my mum. I agreed with Chrissy's suggestion that we make my mother a cake, then told mum that we would bring dessert as the children were making a cake for their mum. It worked out very well, and should have given everyone their fill of chocolate for the month

It's been a while.....

But since I have a few minutes, it's time for another update.

Work on the house has been going very quickly, by our standards, and at the same time, seeming to take for ever, but we are getting there. The lounge is almost finished, just needing touchups on paint/varnish, and one more bookcase to go up on the wall, and the dining room end is coming on as well. One wall and the archway are finished, with the stair alcove and most of the next wall just needing a final coat of paint. That just leaves the window wall and corner, so hopefully it will be done by the end of March.

That's an "as was" photo - an "is now" will be along soon...


The children have been getting in on the act too. We gave them to job of painting under the stairs, and they had great fun....