How do you deal with the loss of "what could have been"?

I don't have any advice, but wanted to send ((hugs)). Even though you are struggling with different emotions and issues, I admire that you seem very articulate on identifying what those are and actively seeking ways to help yourself through it. I hope you find something that helps and it gets better for you. Parenting is hard enough without extra curveballs. ((hugs))

I can give you my perspective from my experience.

First, I had to let go of caring what people thought of me. my ex told many lies as a way to try to manipulate me and the kids. I had to teach myself not to care that the former neighbors, or the kids, or his relatives, had the wrong information. I felt those who truly knew me would eventually realize the truth. My kids at first didn't know what to believe, but over time they understood. On their own.

Your kids are at an age where their friends (not their parents) are most important. Don't let yourself imagine their behavior is different towards him. My kids don't even remember a lot of what happened to me at that time because they were thinking about friendships. That's a good thing. I think once you truly accept that, you will feel much calmer.

Focus on your new husband and enjoy that relationship fully. Kids will be out and on their own very soon and all of us -married or divorced- deal with the issue of that life change. Best wishes to you!!

waxing over what might have been is pointless because what might have been will never be. things are different because you and your life are different. it may not be better or worse, it's just different. you have moved on and remarried. your children are getting older. there is a new member in the family. stop thinking about what might have been and feel good about what could BE.

I don't have any book recommendations or wise advice, but for me it's helpful to remember that even what could have been isn't necessarily what might have actually happened if all things continued. Even if you had not divorced, even if you stay in your hometown...things still might not go as you thought they might. Things hardly ever do. We just have to move forward from where we are the best we can and do the next right thing. Hopefully that influences what happens next (kids spending time with you, etc.).

I am sorry for what you are going through I don't have any advice but I do think your kids are doing what a lot of kids do. They get at a point in their life where peers are more important then family.

I am dealing with the loss of what I thought my marriage and family would be.

My 2 older sons have no relationship with me or their dad. Things started going south when they were in their late teens. They have told us we were terrible parents and have no good memories of their childhood. That was extremely difficult to hear. Our 18 yr old basically just lives here he never talks to us unless he needs something and only does his chores if we press him to do them.

It saddens me tremendously that 3 of my 4 kids have such crappy relationships with us. Do I have some fault in it sure but I am not the demon they have portrayed me as and have trashed me on FB about.

I have been doing albums for each of them and I get sad looking at all the photos of things we did as a family. I never had any of that as a kid and tried to do all the things my mom didn't but even that wasn't enough.

I had visions of holidays spent with my boys their so and grandkids and all those other things but that isn't going to happen.

We have been married 26 yrs and we don't have much in common. There is no intimacy and hasn't been for a long time. We are friends but I miss just being able to kiss or cuddle. I certainly didn't think my marriage and family life would be like they are.

We live in a rural area so ppl are constantly asking about our kids and I get uncomfortable when asked and I have started to just speak the truth.

I look at my life and think it was all just a big waste and think I probably should never have had kids and I feel awful for thinking that but it's like I dedicated half my life to a family that no longer exists.

I hope you can find some answers here. Try not to be too hard on yourself.

I've seen this same story relating to the experience of having children through adoption. Great perspective.

Agree with pudgygroundhog!  While I did go through the experience of being divorced, becoming a single mom and then remarrying - I have not had the exact experience you have had. But I do understand all too well the "letting go" of what would have been/could have been. Divorce changes everything -- sometimes for the better -- but it still alters the course of your family and their future path. 

Good luck in working with your counselor and your DH to figure out your next steps. 

It's ongoing.

DS is now 20. He is Autistic and has a seizure disorder. He is developmentally 10-12. He will not be going to college, did not finish high school and will not live on his own. He can't drive. My friends are all sending their sons and daughters to college and getting "done". Sometimes they lament that their sons and daughters have grown up, flown the coop and have their own lives. It's hard.


Have you tried journaling?

I have found that writing down the good things really helps me keep them and focus on the good.

If you add pictures it's called Scrapbooking but don't tell anyone.

I am dealing with this same emotion, but in a different context.

DH and I are empty nesters, sorta.  DD is in her jr year of college and she has spent it in China, so I have a pretty good idea of what life will be like when she moves on with her life. I don't like the life we have - it does not in any way fit the image of what I thought I our life would be like when it was just the 2 of us.

DH's health is not great. He has been diabetic for more than 17 years and for 15 of those years, he did very little to control his sugar. Last year, this neglect took its inevitable toll and he had a series of strokes. He recovered, mostly, and he heeded the wake up call to get his health under control. In all honestly, though, it's pretty much too late. Barring a miraculous recovery, we are looking at him having to go on dialysis within the next 3 years.  We are not financially ready for him to retire and I have no income outside of what we make with our company, which is based on him and his skills. Since July 2014, I have lived in a state of fear - I'm afraid to spend a dime, I'm afraid to plan anything, I'm afraid to take my eyes off DH lest he revert back to his old ways. I, who never understood anxiety, was taking Xanax regularly, and spending a lot of time thinking about how I had pictured our golden years.

I did go see a psych and she suggested that if this continues that I consider a long term anxiety med rather than the stop gap use of Xanax. To my surprise, she told me that she thought I was reacting in a normal and acceptable way to the stressors in my life and, as long as I only use the prescribed amount of Xanax, she was ok renewing my prescription.  I admit, this made me stop and think more than any therapy could ever have done. I stopped (ok, paused) thinking about how life COULD have been, and tried to see how it IS.

I realized that we are doing ok. I can't predict what will happen tomorrow, but we are preparing for it.

DH and I have slashed our monthly bills, eliminating most non essential expenses and choosing the ones we've kept with great care. We have the most savings we've ever had and we are spending any extra monies on home improvements to maintain and increase the value of our home. We have a plan in place to be out of all debt, except the house, in the next 18 months. We expect to be able to help DD with her student debt as we had always planned to do.

We are both doing everything our drs recommend to stay as healthy as possible, to the point that they regularly tell us they seldom have patients do as well as we are doing with the limitations we have. DH feels so much better now and it is showing in the way our business has picked up. I'm making plans to sharpen my job skills and I may look for an outside job. 

I still get anxious when it comes to spending money, but I'm not as panicked as I was. I am going to China in a few days to spend some time with my DD while she is in school there. I wasn't going to do this, but I realized that if I didn't, I would regret it. Not just because I wouldn't have gotten to see China, but because it means a lot to my DD for me to come.


And that's what it comes down to; living with regrets. I have come face to face with the results of many of my decisions and I regret a lot of them. From now on, I am trying to live a life that I won't regret later. I can't change the past and I can't nullify all of its effect on our future, but I can make realistic plans for a good future.  


That's all you can do, too. Look at what you have and where you are and build on that. 

Your son doesn't live with you, but, given that he's almost 17, he wasn't going to be living with you for much longer anyway. Try to establish some new tradition to keep in touch with him and stay a part of his life. MY son lives across the country and, for a while after he moved, we lost touch with each other. He and DH stayed close, but it killed me to hear everything secondhand. One day he called for some advice in my area of expertise and we went from that call to establishing a new tradition of talking at least once a month. He felt left out, cut off, from the family, so I make sure I keep a list of things that happened since we last spoke and I refer to it when we speak. We send each other videos and funnies on Facebook and they remind both of us how much fun we have had as a family.

With your kids the age they are, you were hovering on the edge of major change anyway. You can't stop it and, really, you wouldn't want to. Change is natural in the parent/child relationship. I expected my son to move away at some point in his life, just maybe not so far or under the circumstances it happened under. I think the thing that helped me the most was looking at it as being the next step in his life, not as a comment on my parenting. It wasn't the step I wanted him to take next, but it was the one he chose. Almost 10 years later, I know it was the right step for him.

Good luck.

Marcy

We've had our business for almost 30 years. During that time we've had good times and we've had bad times. I thought at first that this was just one of the bad times and, if we held on tight, we'd get thru it like we always did. My DH is a great guy and a great worker, but he requires a LOT of support to do his job, especially over the past year. When he first had his stroke, I drove him to his work sites, did equipment pick-ups and returns, and kept up with all his professional as well as dr apps, in addition to doing my own job keeping the company books.  During this time, we went from zero savings to having a 6 month cushion. My plan to get us out of debt is based on DH making his bare minimum, an amount he has surpassed every month since he had his stroke. Eighteen months is a conservative estimate of when we will be debt free; I actually expect to be clear within the next 12 months.  

I know that if I go to work outside of the home, DH is going to stop pushing so hard. He makes more in an hour than I can make in a day, so I have to figure out how to balance the possibility of extra income with the almost certainty of him slowing down his work. The looming probability of dialysis had thrown me into a tailspin. I recently came up with something that may allow me to work out of my home and still make decent money. I've already started the training necessary to make this happen.

We do have some retirement savings, just not the amount I thought I would have when we finally decided to retire. We are not currently paying for DD's college, but we want to help her with her student debt when she graduates. If everything stays steady, we will be in a position to help some. We have not made any promises to her and she has no expectation of our help.

The point of my post was that we are doing okay. We have substantially changed our lifestyle and changed the way we deal with our money and our health. We have a plan in place that we are currently adjusting to handle the dr's latest news. Still, it's not the life I thought we would have. Dialysis was never something I thought might be a part of our future if for no other reason than DH's needle phobia. It took me a while to come to grips with this major change and it will take the OP some time to adjust to her new life. I hope she reacts better than I have because constant anxiety is not something I would wish for anyone. 

Marcy