I was chizzled at. I fell in love with an alcoholic though I didn't know he was an alcoholic at the time. Since I wasn't raised knowing about alcoholism I wasted ALOT of years trying to change him and trying to wrap my head around all of it. Now eight years later we are still married but I am trying to get a divorce.
I got tired of being disrespected, abused physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually.....I was nothing left but a husk of a woman. I hated being alive. I hated him being alive.
Finally I crawled out of my hole and realized he was NEVER going to change. He was ALWAYS going to play the victim because that's what he was good at. I started to work on myself and I am better and I have no choice but to leave him to be the person he WANTS to be. I wish him the best.

Hi everyone!

I need your help -- and you are the experts about your experience with divorce. Let me introduce myself: I'm a graduate student at Stony Brook University and I'm conducting an online relationship survey about breakups and divorce for my dissertation. My work involves learning about divorce (including why people have divorced) and also the full range of people's responses following the end of a significant romantic relationship -- meaning I'm interested the difficulties folks experience but also any positive changes that result form this challenging life experience (such as building a new family after a breakup/divorce, strengthening one's faith, pursuing new goals, experiencing improved subsequent relationships, a greater sense of confidence, etc.). Anecdotally we may have the hunch that many people have experienced these positive changes, but we don't seem to know much about this topic in detail or scientifically, which could help others experience these positive changes too.

People who have participated in the project so far say they enjoy thinking about these experiences and sharing them, and they appreciate the anonymous, free, personalized feedback they have the option of receiving immediately upon completion of the approx. 30 minute online survey. I'll be working on this project probably through the wintertime, so any help in learning about many real people's experiences would be so wonderful!

The web address of my survey is: http://www.courses.rochester.edu/surveys/funk/relbreakup/
There there is a greater description of the project and a link to the survey pages.

Thank you in advance for your interest, help, and support!


PLEASE NOTE: This posting has been approved by the Community Manager 8/5/2008.

westernman999 wrote:

One thing that can be hard for some people to understand is that you can change someone, but they have to be willing to do the work. If they do, then you can lead. But although it takes two to Tango, it only takes ONE to wreck a marriage. There are so many unhappy people out there spending years and tears trying to change someone who really doesn't care. You have to look inside and ask, "Why am I doing this?"

Love is Blind, but sometimes we need a seeing eye dog. ~grin~

Well ilove cockteils, you sound determined. Just curious, is it due to financial reasons or are there others? It sounds like a declaration, and if so, what would you like to ask or know about it, that might make you feel better? It's okay to make a choice, and maybe need or want some justification for it, especially from others, that's just human nature.

Maybe if you are comfortable with a more in depth explanation of your feelings, you might find there are others whom have been in the same situation, and might benefit from their response.

Irregardless, I'm sorry your going through a most difficult time in your life. Divorce is never a nice thing, just tolerable at best. My Prayers and thoughts are with you in a surely difficult and trying time.

[QUOTE=tired1;685086]Hello,
I'm a newbie on this forum (though not on some of the others). I've just filed for divorce (about a week ago) to end a 27 year marraige. The abuse and controlling behavior just got to be more than I could take. I'd hoped to wait it out until Feb 2009 when my youngest child would be 18 and not subject to all that custody/visitation stuff. I have an order of protection for me and some (but not all) of the kids and jave to go to court tomorrow. It really hard for me to do because I'm sure he is very angry with me and I'm afraid. yes, I know that's because of the pattern of abuse, but that doesn't mean that I don't feel it. In any case, I hope I get through tomoorw and get out of there with an extended protection order. Then I can start working on getting over the abuse. Does anyone have suggestion sto make this easier?[/QUOTE]
Can you make a new post with this on it so we can soley focus on you?  Go register for a weapons permit and take the class and leave the certificate on the counter ;) Men abuse woman because they can. Make sure you go and get you a nice big man friend who will have your back.

Your son and you are going to have to sit down and have a heart to heart. It wouldn't hurt to take him to an abuse shelter to learn a few things so the cycle doesn't continue

Good luck in court. I wish you the best. I am an abuse survivor as well.