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So here's a weird question. My WW is, at the moment, searching frantically for an apartment so that she can move out. She has visited dozens of places. Most she hasn't liked, and the ones she has applied to have rejected her. It's stressing her out severely, and at one point, she was close to tears over the whole matter.

Our in-house separation is tense and awkward enough without this extra stress, and I'm finding myself wishing that she would move out as well. This is an odd feeling because less than a month ago, I was still hoping for a recovery. It feels odd to want her to leave as much as she wants to leave.

Up until now, my stance as been one of complete uninvolvement in her move-out process. I told her that she wouldn't have any help from me getting her stuff out of the house, that she would have to arrange her own heavy lifting, and so on. I had no interest in making it easy for her to leave me. If she's having trouble, it's because she brought it on herself, I would reason. If she's stressed and upset, then too bad. She didn't have to do this. But I'm beginning to second-guess myself. First of all, even though it's true that she's making life difficult for herself (she's making it even more difficult by trying to move to an area she can't afford), she's not going to turn around and decide to R just because she can't find a place to live. It seems that the only thing that will come out of this will be more stress and bitterness, which she will probably blame on me, and she'll just look back on the last weeks she spent with me with even more resentment.

So what should I do? If I am serious about wanting her to move out, should I help her do it? Should I try to help her find a place? Should I help her move her things out? Should I show sympathy when she is upset and stressed out about not having a place to live?

No man don't help her. She will come back blame you for being so helpful. If she wants to go let her. My wife left me for a second time just over a month ago. She was cheating by way off her smart phone this time. She was engaging younger men for sex chats of some sort. She is addicted to it she is still carrying on. She pawned the wedding ring and other jewelery I had given her. Because she had no money or job but after checking her phone I confronted her. Same as before. She said she wants none of it I bought it all I can have it, she just wants out. Ok we been through it all in 2006 with her physical affair. Sure I want what I had with her. Just like you want with your wife. But that's over the damage is done. I have to draw the line. So have you. I just went back and read up some of your history. She is there you can talk to her. At least you have that. She can move if she wants to, don't help her. She has a place with you if its not good enough for her go over to the door and hold it open for her but that is all I would do. She can bring her family or friends in to get her dresser or what ever and she can hire someone to do it too. She wants to be comfortable in her fog as long as she can until it just goes away and lets her be. My wife left me again so she can continue her sexting. So be it. Best wishes wife that's all i could say. The song from the different strokes tv show I used to watch as a child came into my mind. "Now, the world don't move to the beat of just one drum, What might be right for you, may not be right for some." I let her go.

No, d, don't help. I know it's got to be frustrating watching it all....but she has got to fully understand the consequences of her choices. And she is going to have to understand that you will not be her backup, there to come to her aid whenever she needs you. She has to grow up.

Just try to breathe and focus on you. Let her flit about and fuss about moving. Safeguard that which you wish to keep...meaningful items or personal papers. And be there on moving day to make sure nothing is taken that shouldnt be. It will be intensely painful to watch her move out, but you really do have to sit back and watch her screw up her life all on her own.

Then change your locks and have a good cry.

Bottom line is....take any energy you have, and take care of yourself. Period.

You should do absolutely nothing. Even if she directly asks for your help.

She purposefully f*d the relationship up with no concern over the future. It's not your job to help her deal with her lack of planning and poor decision-making skills.

No matter what you do she is going to think whatever suits her own selfish motives so don't even bother to appease her in any way. That would be a lose-lose situation for you no matter what.

So what should I do? If I am serious about wanting her to move out, should I help her do it? Should I try to help her find a place? Should I help her move her things out? Should I show sympathy when she is upset and stressed out about not having a place to live?

No, No, No and a big fat NO! Why would you help your destroyer??

Your a good man. Save your simpatico for someone who really loves you.

The fact is that right now, she feels trapped. She has felt trapped in a relationship she no longer wants to be in, and she feels trapped physically in a house she no longer wants to live in. If I make it harder for her to leave, she'll feel like I'm the one trapping her. Now, I'm not actively making it hard for her to leave. I'm just not doing anything to help, but that's probably not how she sees it. And I don't want her to feel trapped by me. I want it to be clear to her that I am letting her go, that I don't want her around anymore.

I want her to feel the full impact of her decisions, but I don't really feel anymore like the physical aspect of that (like the difficulty of moving out) is really important. She's just going to see that as an obstacle to be overcome, another chance for her to assert her independence and strength, another opportunity for her to prove that she doesn't need me, and I don't want to enable that attitude either.

It's complicated. I suppose my primary goal is just not to do anything in these next few weeks that makes things worse. I know that we're not moving towards recovery. I know that she's not going to change her mind. I just don't want to do any more damage in the meantime.

I know how you can help her. Tell her to be out by X date no matter what. Stay at her parents, on a friends couch, under a bridge. WTF..ever. Not your problem.

The fact is that right now, she feels trapped.

No. The fact is that right now she is making her problems your problem.

Not your problem. She sacked you from that job, remember?

Stop trying to be her KISA. I suggest you have a read of the co-dependant thread in the ICR forum to see if it rings any bells.

She is not your problem anymore = her problems are not your problem anymore.

ETA you can't 'nice' her into waking up. All it will get you is more time in limbo. Stop being a passenger and get in the drivers seat. Right now you're giving her the best of both worlds.

[This message edited by StrongButBroken at 11:52 PM, June 15th (Saturday)]

You're not making it harder for her to leave. You are simply doing nothing- nothing to help and nothing to harm.

Repeat after me: It is no longer my problem. She fired me from that job.

Repeat as needed.

Dude, you need to find the male version of 'bitch boots'. Maybe some 'shit-kickers?'

Absolutely do NOT show her any sympathy when she pulls that upset and crying crap. Too bad, so sad....now GTFO.

You must stop worrying about how you are going to be 'perceived' because you are in a lose/lose situation...no matter what. You help? Then you're the dick that shoved her out the door. She most definitely won't be *grateful* for your help. You don't help? Then you're the dick that abandoned her.

What is happening to her right now is called consequences. Let her feel them and figure it out on her own.

Oh, she is looking for a really nice place that matches her fantasy world, and then when she applies they wont give it to her - probably because it's out of her price range and landlords aren't stupid. Uh, huh. Poor widdle ting.

She can be out tomorrow. She just has to lower her expectations and go rent something that fits her ghetto frame of mind. Don't let her tantrums get too you. Don't be her unicorn whisperer.

While I agree with everyone that you should not help your WW, I must admit rather than have my stbx in the apt once he moved out, I helped him by packing some of his stuff and telling him to pick it up when I was at work. I suppose I was enabling him but the alternative of having him popping in to collect his stuff was worse.

I didn't check your profile first, so I don't know what your wife is really like, but basically there are only two ways she can be about this whole perception thing:

A. She can realize that this is all her fault, so of you choose not to hell her, that's what she deserves, and of you choose to help her, that's more than she deserves. Either way, she gets it that you don't owe her anything and she has no right to be mad at you.

Or

B. She can be a narcissistic POS (whether she's actually disordered is irrelevant and not worth worrying about - you can be more narcissistic than average without actually being NPD) who will find a way to blame you and think that whatever you choose to do is shitty, whether you help or don't help. Either way, she thinks it's all your fault and you suck.

So basically, you have to stop worrying about what she thinks, as the others said, because you can't control it, no matter how hard you try.

It would be easy for me to jump on the bandwagon and say fuck her. But I did help my XWW move out. But it was for different reasons and I used another method. I was not living in the marital home at the time. And I was forcing the sale of the place. She naturally wanted to stay as long as possible. We had accepted a good offer prior to the housing collapse. The buyer wanted to close ASAP and the XWW was dragging her feet. Already pushed back the closing once because she would do nothing. I hired one of those POD companies and they dropped off the container. I also hired a couple of day laborers and got it done in a few hours. She did have to pack up her clothes and keep sakes. But she just threw them in contractor bags anyways.

I did it because after a year of legal bullshit all the while paying a mortgage on a house that I did not live in had me pissed. She had tainted the place anyways with her OM (plural)as it turned out. It was in my best financial interest to do it. And as it turned out in my emotional best interest as well. It severed that last bond so to speak. And aside from the kids I was free of her. Being the drama queen she is, naturally she made a big spectacle at the end. Crying and saying she never meant for this to happen. I could not resist the temptation and threw her a dig and said "I'm sure you were not thinking about this day while you were fucking OM in my home and bed" She got pissed and left. They delivered the POD to her new place and I guess her BF of the month unpacked it.

As for me, after everything was gone I just walked around looking at all the work I had done to the place. Remembering a time when shit was not so fucked up. What had held a lot of promise at one time was now just an empty shell. I sat down on what was the living room floor and cried for a few minutes. When I was done I got up, closed the door and left the keys in the mailbox for the realtor. Last thing I remembered was getting in my car and looking at the big for sale sign with the bigger SOLD banner across it. What was once a home was now just another business transaction. Should I have helped her ? I think it was in my best interest to do so. They say time heals all wounds. And I guess I agree with that statement. But sometimes you can help it along some. So in the end its what's best for you. Good luck Bro.

Helping her and trying to amp up the "nice" perception won't work. I tried it and still got blamed in the end.

I didn't help my exWH move, but I took the kids and left for the whole day. I didn't want to watch him move things from our beautiful home to his one bedroom apartment. I never said what he could and couldn't take. I gave him full authority to take what he wanted or needed. I figured they were just things and I didn't have the energy to fight at that time.

Turns out, he took next to nothing. Over the course of the D, I gave him a few more items, but then it was radio silence about all the shit he left behind. Incidentally, he left about thirty boxes from our recent move right in the middle of my basement floor. He knew he was leaving, he knew the boxes contained some of his stuff, and he never bothered to go through them or even help me move them especially since most of them were heavy.

He subsequently signed a deed over to me without ever mentioning the rest of his shit. I figured he didn't want it.

Out of the blue, almost a year after the D was final, this entitled asshole asked me if he could come into my house while I was on vacation with our children to come and pick through is stuff. RUFKM????? I told him absolutely not, I would not leave any doors open for him to take all the time he wanted to rifle through his shit, my shit and bring OW into my house. I was shocked he had the balls to ask me.

Another six months went by. I had a flood in the basement during those six months. Ex subsequently asked for some of his stuff - now nearly two years from D - and got pissed off at me that I threw out the boxes that got ruined in the flood without consulting him.

See what I mean? I gave him all the rope in the world and he ended up trying to hang me with it. Instead of thanking me or blaming himself for the fact that he was too lazy to get his shit when he should have, he blamed me.

You will get blamed no matter what. My opinion is that I would rather be blamed for doing nothing than get a bag of shit after expending all kinds of energy on someone who stabbed me right in the back and twisted it every chance he got.

This is her problem to figure out.

One quick clarification. We have a daughter and will be sharing custody, so I can't kick her out or force her to live somewhere sketchy. I want her to find a good place too because it will be our daughter's home 50% of the time. That being said, she is being ridiculous about her apartment search. The apartments she is looking at are not Camelot, but they are in an expensive area, close to the city (where she goes to school), and the landlords perceive what she ought to realize, which is that she cannot afford them. I keep telling her to live closer to the family home, where it's cheaper and transporting our daughter will be easier, but she won't listen, and is just determined to do what she wants to do (what else is new?).

The truth is that I'm not sure how to behave or why. I feel like when I manage to muster any kind of good will towards her, things go more smoothly. This seems like a good thing if we're living together, especially with a little girl in the house who sees us interacting. So I'm interested in being "nice" for purely practical reasons. Every so often, I manage to muster some "pure" good will that has absolutely nothing to do with how I want her to see me or anything practical at all, and is just a matter of me recovering my own dignity and decency. And then, there are times when I am fretting over how to leave this marriage having done the least amount of damage to an already brutalized relationship.

So when she is upset about this whole thing, I feel as though there is no right thing to do. If I'm wry or sarcastic about it, I just feel like an asshole. If I express sympathy, I feel like a pushover. I suppose the best thing to do is to do or say nothing, but it still feels like that lies somewhere on the asshole spectrum.

I suppose the problem is that she still pulls my heartstrings to a certain extent. I'm mostly emotionally dead to her, but not entirely, and her tears still move me. Somehow, after everything she's done to me, I still don't want to see her hurting.

I don't know if I buy into the whole "She fired you from that job," thing. Of course, I owe her nothing, but I feel like in all of this, I should be doing my best to be the "better man." I don't know if that means helping her or not. That's what I'm trying to figure out.

[This message edited by dbellanon at 6:42 AM, June 16th (Sunday)]

I wouldn't help her out. She got herself in this mess. What if you weren't around (like dead), then what would she do? She has to figure this stuff out for herself. Maybe after realizing that she can't afford the places she wants, she will concede to something more affordable.

I found your last post difficult to read.

I thought the same things. If I don't go crazy he won't go crazy and it will benefit my girls. If I suck it up and be reasonable without seeking 'justice' it will benefit my girls. If I play nice and make this transition as easy as possible for everyone it will benefit my girls.

I didn't make his life hard. I simply disappeared and went about making him invisible to me.

Guess what? He still went crazy. All of that 'fair' has been thrown right back into my face and used against me.

In many ways I needed these final reminders that he has no conscience, no integrity and absolutely zero intent to try to make this easier on my girls. His only focus is making it easier on himself.

Your heart is in the right place. Where you are going wrong is in believing it will pay dividends for you or for your DD. I do not believe it will.

Have you seen an L? Maybe you can't get her out even if you tried. What is the money split at the moment? Day to day.

Is she paying half rent or mortgage? You need to start separating everything. No more joint accounts, no more joint credit cards - nothing except the mortgage if there still is one. No cooking dinner for each other or doing each others' washing.

You need to NOT make it easy for her to stay. As they say around here the only way to stop some cake-eaters is to add a lot of salt.

This is not being cruel - this is what separated and divorcing people do.

As much as you want to help, if you do it, you'll be enabling her behaviour.

My WW and I are still trying R and when she threatened to move out and realized she'd lose her support system (me) she stopped threatening.

It actually helped R.

It sounds like your WW is making choices that would delay her move or force you to intervene. She's being manipulative, whether it's intentional or not.

You can feel for her and even make suggestions, but she needs to do the work of moving out.

Is there any way of her getting a short-term rental close to home while she continues to search long term?

That's what me and my WW agreed to when she said she was moving out. (she left the house for 15 minutes, then called me from the park crying -- we got our money back from the rental, minus a deposit).

Stay strong.

I find that too, bellanon. As long as I'm a doormat or silent, all is great. If I have an opinion or anything, sh hits the fan.

He teeter-totters, where will ask for something but it's not really asking, its demanding and he also sneaks stuff out and lies about it.

When I suggest taking it all and being done, he says no, yet made it all like he was living at ow's house already.

So from that experience, if it's at all possible, my two cents would be to let her deal with it. If she asks you, that's another decision only you can make, but if she doesn't, no harm done. And if you don't help her, there won't be anything for her to blame on you, in that area and you won't have to step foot in where she lives.

It sounds a lot like feet-dragging to me, also, on searching for a place to live. Like picking places too expenses because she knows they won't pick her and so maybe the process will take longer?

STBX/Perv has shown tears before and I think they are fake, FWIW. The crocodile version, complete "Woe is me" and all.

We had an "altercation" just today over DD because he is not coparenting, he is bullying.

I would tread lightly and be very careful, IIWY.

I helped my ex move out.

I also helped him sort through the stuff he was taking with him and then we went shopping for our replacement items together so all of our home furnishing basics were covered using marital funds.

I was 3 years out from D-day when we split up, and he wasn't leaving to move in with another woman. We have kids and I wanted to make sure he found a decent place the kids would be happy with. Also I really wanted him to leave, so I helped the process along when I could.

Enabling? Maybe. I really like to shop, and setting up his house was fun. I'm not his mother, its not my job to teach him to stand on his own two feet. I don't mind helping him when it's something I enjoy doing anyway.

Do what make you happy. Don't help her b/c you think you have too, don't say no b/c you're trying to punish her.

(((dbellanon)))