Poor boundary control

Janeway raised a question on my post from a couple days ago, and my answer began to get a bit long. (You're shocked, I realize.) By the time I hit my third paragraph, I decided to graduate it from a comment to a post of its own.

She asked:

Okay, so all you asked of her regarding her ongoing extramarital activity is not to let the boys find out that she's fucking someone else. Yet, not only has she introduced son #2 to this man, but also feels comfortable enough with son's knowing him that she can recount stories about him?

The short answer is:

Yes, that's right.

The longer version is, ... well, a little longer.

In the first place, she might not remember my saying anything. Wife has a lot of trouble remembering things she doesn't want to remember, in much the same way that she is very good at misremembering things when the altered version fits one of her ongoing narratives better.

In the second place, even if she did remember, I'm not surprised at her doing something else instead. In general I'm reluctant ever to ask her anything, because it sometimes seems that the mere fact that I asked her makes her want to do the opposite. If this were a Dr. Seuss book instead of real life, I would start asking her to do the opposite of what I want in the first place, but the pattern isn't quite reliable enough or mechanical enough for that. And maybe I am overstating it? But some days it sure does seem like that ....

Of course, you might think that she would be motivated to keep that part of her life separate anyway. Basic privacy concerns would be one reason. ("Sweetie, I'd like you to meet the man who has been banging the daylights out of Mommy every day this week while you've been in math class." Maybe not.) Then there are those warnings I read that in case of a divorce children automatically take sides against whichever parent (if any) they think has been screwing around.

But Wife has always had very poor boundary control.

• Back when she was seeing Boyfriend 2, she would meet him in a public park with the boys in tow and then she and he would talk while the boys clambered all over the playground equipment. (I assume they were only talking, in a public parkwhen the boys might come back at any moment wanting a snack. I never heard any stories to the contrary.)



• Boyfriend 3 was a relative of some friends of my parents, so she was quite open about taking the kids to go see him and his family. The sexual involvement lasted only a couple weeks before he broke it off because his wife found out and he had an attack of religious conscience. But the emotional involvement had been building for some time, and it never occurred to Wife that she needed to be at all discreet.



• Boyfriend 4 lived with us for two years, so he may be a special case. In some ways I think the boys became fonder of him (as a kind of uncle-figure) than Wife ever was, especially after they stopped fucking.



• And as for the whole Boyfriend-5/Friend drama, well of course that played out online. But Wife certainly discussed them with the boys. At any rate she discussed the parts she thought were innocuous, such as that they were terrorists, or that they bred dogs. But could she keep the romantic lilt out of her voice? I doubt it. I know for a fact that Son 2 watched over her shoulder as she signed off an IM-conversation with "ILYAAF" and guessed correctly what the initials stood for.

So no, I am not terribly surprised that she let Son 2 meet Pop, nor that she would tell him stories.

To be sure, the story that I overheard wasn't a terribly flattering one. Pop took her to lunch at a restaurant somewhere, and then right around the end of the meal had to make a couple of phone calls. So he got up and left the restaurant and was pacing back and forth outside, talking nonstop into his phone and chain smoking. The waitress brought the bill and Wife was left sitting there, alone and embarrassed, saying "My date had to make a call but he'll be back." (Yes, she used the word "date" when telling the story to Son 2.) It was a long time -- I don't know how long, but she made it sound an eternity -- before he came back and paid the bill so they could leave.

Now, Wife was telling this story in order to say what a rotten guy Pop was for being so rude. (This was Thursday night, by which time she was already pretty disenchanted with him.) But I couldn't help interrupting at that point with a theory: "He probably wasn't just rude. He was probably relying on your embarrassment being so acute that you couldn't make yourself just sit there and wait, so that you would pay the bill yourself and leave rather than wait for him to come back and settle up. He must have been very disappointed when you stuck it out like that." Wife took this as an occasion to congratulate herself with, "Well, I stood my ground." But what a sad choice of something to congratulate oneself on ... outwaiting your date in the slow race for the check!

Would you rent a car for this man? part 2

Most of this week Wife has been picking up Son 2 after school, because Leia is out of town and they are looking after her cats. But today, what with one thing and another, he walked to my office instead. Wife had an errand to run earlier in the day and didn't want to make two trips out. Then by coincidence I had to leave work early to take care of something back at the house, so Son 2 and I showed up home somewhere between 45 and 105 minutes earlier than we normally would. And just as we pulled up, Wife's car was peeling out of the driveway and barrelling down the street.

OK, that was dramatic. She called out something to Son 2 on her way out but I couldn't hear. He said she said she'd be back in 45 minutes.

Fine, whatever. I took care of the stuff I had to take care of; then since Wife hadn't gotten home yet (and she's handling dinner tonight) I decided to go to the gym for a little exercise. (I have been trying to get a bit more exercise ever since D pointed out that I have gained a lot of weight.) I was there an hour and something and then came home. Wife asked did I want to eat now or later and I told her to decide while I put my feet up in the back room.

Then she came back, closed the door, and said "I'll tell you exactly what happened in my day, if you want to know. Just so you know I'm not lying to you. I figure you are probably mad at me for asking you to bring Son 2 home so that I didn't have to make another trip out, and then I went ahead and made another trip out anyway."

"Ummm, ... actually that never occurred to me. But OK, go on." And she did.

Wife had an appointment with Counselor today just before lunch -- you remember Counselor -- and as she was leaving his office she got a text message from Pop asking if she'd like to come over to his place. She doesn't like to drive "all that way" most of the time, but it's on the way back from Counselor's office so she figured sure, why not? She repeated several times that she has decided she doesn't want to see him in her life any more, but she wants to be nice to him until she gets her money back. (Turns out it's a little under $200.) That's supposed to happen tomorrow, so ... yeah, sure, she'd love to come by.

Wife got to Pop's place and he was on the phone, drinking some icky sweet highly-alcoholic fruit punch (it is now a little after noon), and chain smoking. Wife says he smokes whenever he drinks, although his profile on OKCupid says he is a non-smoker. Wife herself is a fanatical non-smoker. (Allergic. Hates the stuff. Always has.) Anyway, Pop was on the phone, so Wife just sat there. Then he said he had a little business to do on his home computer, so she sat there some more watching TV. Then he said he was hungry, and ate lunch. I have no idea whether he offered any to Wife; but if he did, she never mentioned it. Finally he asked to come over to our place. Wife hinted that she would be happy to drive him somewhere because he had told her he "had to sell something" to raise the money he owes her ... so, gosh, a store of some kind? No, he answered, he had just sold some stocks. He did it on Tuesday but wouldn't have the money till Friday. Meanwhile, how about going over to our house?

So fine, she drove him to our house. (She's still trying to be nice to him, remember.) They sat and watched a movie for a bit. Pop suggested that they take a shower together but Wife declined. Then he suggested going to bed. She agreed that this was the time of afternoon she normally had a nap, so sure ... provided she could really have a nap. She slept for about an hour while he lay down next to her. Then when she woke up, he wanted to fuck. She wasn't feeling at all romantic (the money was still eating at her) but wanted to be nice. So what she told him was, "You remember I've said I won't have sex with you until you get tested to show no STDs, and you haven't done that yet. So I'm afraid I just can't." OK, he asked, then how about a blow-job? Same deal. A hand job? Sure, fine, ... she gave him a hand job. Then as he mopped himself up she remarked it was probably about time to get him back home, so she could be safely back to our house as if she had never left it by the time Son 2 and I got home. She had just gotten his pants up and had eased him out into the car ... when I drove up with Son 2 riding shotgun! Aaughh! Panic! And off she drove ....

So in retrospect I bet she is really glad she turned down the sex. Fucking would have taken longer, and we might have come tromping in the front door ... and then that would have been terribly awkward.

Anyway, Wife repeated several times that this story was completely true whether I believed it or not, leaving me a bit puzzled over why she was pounding on that topic so hard. I hadn't challenged her on it. And sure, hell, it sounds plausible. She added, "So no, I'm not cheating on you," which must be the most pointless reassurance possible under the circumstances. Doesn't she remember my saying that I no longer care whom she fucks, so long as the boys don't find out? (She did add that Son 2 has met Pop and doesn't like him.)

Then she went out to the kitchen to make dinner, where she regaled Son 2 with other stories of rude and unpleasant things Pop has done. And so why exactly did she get involved with him? Pretty fast too, it seems -- I don't know how long she has been dating on OKCupid, but it can't be more than a few months or so. And already she is negotiating sex, texting him wistfully (last month) that they will be together forever, lending him money, and wanting him out of her life. Quick work. Of course, I've speculated before about why Wife picks guys like this (see, e.g., here and here) but I might be wrong.

Quite a story, though.

Would you rent a car for this man?

Just before dinner this evening, Wife got a phone call. She took it in the other room, and I could hear muffled snatches of conversation: "... don't trust .... turn it in tomorrow .... what does he mean?" And then finally I heard one full, clear sentence: "I can't talk now; Hosea is home."

I didn't know what to make of this, but I assumed it couldn't be anything good. But dinner was ready right then, so Son 2 came in from his computer game (Doesn't he have any homework this year?) and we sat down to eat. Afterwards, though, I followed Wife into the bedroom and asked her about it.

"Who's turning what in tomorrow? Are you turning in the forms to file for divorce? Or signing a restraining order?" [All right, maybe in retrospect I was awfullizing. But I didn't know what to think.]

"No, nothing like that. It has nothing to do with you."

"The hell it doesn't. If it had nothing to do with me, you wouldn't say, 'I can't talk because Hosea is home.' Last weekend you gave me a big speech about how you are being completely honest with me these days. So what is this about?"

"All right. I'll tell you."

It seems that some time recently, maybe a day or two ago I guess, Wife authorized someone that she called "a friend" to hold a rental car on her credit card. (I assume that the word "friend" in this context has to mean one of the men she has met on her dating site. I'll call him "Pop" which isn't too far wrong.) Obviously this was nuts, although Wife has done this kind of thing before. Anyway, he didn't turn the car in today when he told her he would. She texted him and called him and texted him some more, and he never answered. Wife seems to have been beside herself. (And honestly, I'm shocked -- shocked! -- to think anyone could behave so irresponsibly with somebody else's money.) When he finally answered her texts this evening, it was to say, "It seems that you don't trust me. I'll make you right. Call them in the morning." Wife is trying to understand how to take that. Did he mean, "I will make everything all right by returning the car in the morning"? Or did he mean, "I will prove that you were right not to trust me by vanishing into thin air if you just give me another twelve hours"?

She doesn't know which it is, but she'll definitely call the car rental agency. She says she'll also tell them that she won't authorize any expenses past 1:00 pm, which is apparently the exact time the car is due. Now, that won't bring the car back, if indeed it's not already back by then. So in that case she plans to call the police and report it stolen. She says she knows Pop's full name (first, middle, last); also, she doesn't know his street address but can find her way to his house because she has been there "several times" already. She tells me that she assumes this is enough for the police to find him. And this is the story that she was talking about on the phone. She didn't want to discuss it with me home for fear that I would blow a gasket and yell at her.

I didn't yell. I just told her, flatly and a little stiffly, "Thank you for clearing up that it wasn't any of the things I was worried about." But of course the whole story is crazy -- letting him charge her credit card in the first place, and then planning to report the car stolen. It's sounds like bad fiction ... I don't know, maybe a poorly-written soap opera or something. Surely real people wouldn't do anything like this! Except, ... oh yeah ... this is Wife we are talking about ....

And really, she should be glad that I insisted we split our money a couple years ago. The only reason I was able to stay so calm is that she hadn't put me on the hook for this scoundrel's good behavior. As long as it's just her, I can try to be reasonably objective. If it were my credit at risk, I would probably have boiled her in oil.

Not literally, of course. But I would have been tempted ....

Wife is on OKCupid

Wife has created a profile on OKCupid. I'm not sure how long she has been there, and honestly at this point I'm not too worried about it. A lot has changed in the last three years.

Of course, this time the guys she is meeting are real people. At any rate, she has met at least two of them in the flesh ... maybe more that I don't know about. She keeps up an active correspondence with them online and by texting on her phone. (Ironically, the last time we adjusted our phone plan Wife specifically asked that we not pay the extra few bucks to give her unlimited texting because she "never" sent or received text messages. Her bill this month was not pretty.) I know she has met one of them for coffee in a town about an hour north of here, and another in a town about an hour south. One of them drove her to see one of her doctors in the Big City a couple hours away from here, when the date came up and I had forgotten to block the time out so I couldn't get away from work. Oh, she told me that her friend Leia drove her down; but the outgoing text on her phone the night before was to one of these new gentlemen friends of hers telling him what time to get her the next day and what time they had to be back. So I guess one of them must have thought it was pretty serious ... unless he's the kind of guy who would drive four hours on a weekday with a new friend just on a lark. Hmmm .... I wonder if she is putting out? That might make it worth it, I suppose ....

She doesn't deny that she is on this site, although she says she is just looking for friends in the area because I'm always telling her she is too isolated. (And we all know how controlling I am.) As near as I can tell*, she has been telling the men she's not very available right now, in the sense that she is still married and all. Interestingly, she has also told at least some of them that she will be freer next year because Son 2 will leave for boarding school, allowing us to divorce. I haven't mentioned to her that I anticipate much the same time table, so I sit up and take notice that she is saying the same thing at her end. Of course it is an easy idea to come to. But she keeps telling me that "We can't afford to divorce, so we are going to have to learn to live with each other." Which story does she believe? Is she, for example, trying to make me think she's not planning a divorce so that she can spring it on me as a surprise? I have no idea, and I'm not even sure she knows.

Other than that, she tells them that she thinks I may have a girlfriend somewhere in town, and that "of course" she wouldn't begrudge me some companionship but she wishes I would tell her about it. (Her reason for suspecting a girlfriend seems to have something to do with her belief that I leave the house late at night ... but then I have already told you how crazy that is.) She also wrote at least one of them, "I am virtually certain that Hosea has hooked up with my former best friend [D] ... 'former' not because of that, though, but something else."

I wonder if I should be more concerned? There is no longer any marriage left, to speak of, that could be damaged whatever she decides to do. On the other hand, these men are real and tangible, in ways that Boyfriend 5 and Friend never were. So I suppose there is an off-chance that if one of them were unscrupulous he could ... oh, I don't know. Come by the house and steal one of Wife's prized antique dust-bunnies? Maybe not. I guess I'm not very concerned.

But I figure it is worth my knowing that she is doing this.


* How can I tell? Pretty much like before, except I don't care enough to put as much effort into it as I used to. But if she's going to forget to log out when she leaves the computer to go to bed and a conversation is sitting on the screen in front of me, it's not like I force myself to log her out before catching any glimpse of what she has written.

"Where were you last night?"

The other night Wife asked me something so odd that I have to write it down, even though I don't have any grand narrative to frame it with, or insightful conclusions to draw.

It was morning, and she asked "Where did you go last night?"

"Huh? I went to the gym after dinner. I told you that."

"Yes, I know. But the gym closes at 11:00. I got up about 2:30 in the morning to go to the bathroom, and you were nowhere in the house. I know sometimes you go out for long walks around the neighborhood, but that's awfully late for a walk -- especially when you have work the next day. Were you seeing someone? Do you have a girlfriend in town somewhere?"

I don't remember what I told her, but I was absolutely baffled. Where I was at 2:30 that morning was sound asleep in my own bed -- our bed -- right next to her. Sure, I know that sounds like something a guy might say even if it weren't true, but hell ... I tell you guys all the juicy stuff. If I had another girlfriend somewhere, you'd know about her. Of course you know about D, but she's hundreds of miles away ... not close enough that I could stroll over there and be back before breakfast.

Actually, I take it back -- there is no way a guy would say something like that if he knew it were false, because it would be so crazy. How could any guy expect that his wife would believe he was asleep right next to her, if he wasn't?

But of course that hypothetical-contrary-to-fact only raises the real question: How could Wife possibly not have seen me? Not have heard me? The bed's only a king-sized -- it's not that damned big! Is it just that she was totally bleary and blind because she was half-asleep? Or did she dream the whole thing? Is she starting to have genuine visual delusions? (If yes, God help us ....) Or is it just that for once I wasn't "snoring like a freight train" so she assumed I couldn't possibly be there?

I really don't understand it. I am amused and puzzled in equal measure. I hope it's not something I have to worry about ....

"You could take care of it just to be nice!"

Son 2 took me to task rather sharply a couple of nights ago, but to explain why I have to back up a bit.

Last week, ... no more like two weeks ago by now ... Son 2 decided to implement a new household rule that dishes have to be done promptly (or at least loaded into the dishwasher promptly) – by the person who used them! -- rather than being allowed to pile up in the sink. One side of me cocked an eyebrow at the idea that he had taken it upon himself to legislate for the household. But in fact it is a good rule, so I have been perfectly happy to support it. It's a big improvement over the haphazard way we have handled dishes up till now (which typically meant that I did them if I fixed dinner, and Wife let them collect in the sink if she did).

So anyway, Sunday night Wife was going to make a lasagne but couldn’t find the large casserole dish. I said I had seen it some days ago in the bottom of the refrigerator with a bit of jello in it, left over from last week some time when she and Son 2 had made jello. Son 2 fetched the dish from the fridge and set about cleaning it; and he soon discovered that jello left uncovered in a refrigerator for a week hardens to an industrial toughness. So he had quite a bit of scrubbing to do. As he was scrubbing, he said (a little testily, but he was obviously trying to be patient), “Dad, I realize we can’t change the past. But the next time you see something like this abandoned in the fridge, could you get it out and run some water in it to soak so that it will be easier to clean?” I answered simply that the whole thing had been somebody else’s project, so I had done my best not to interfere. And he replied a little more sharply, “Well even if you didn’t make the jello or eat it, if you are the one who sees it first then you could take care of it just to be nice!”

I didn’t answer him then, but afterwards called him back into another room. There I explained, “When you say something like that I am of two minds. On the one hand I am glad, because what you are saying is right -- it is the way families ought to behave -- and I am glad you have learned that because it means you will be a good father when you have your own family. But on the other hand I am sad, because there is a bigger context to this picture that explains why I make choices like this.” I went on to say in very general terms that for decades I had done exactly the kind of thing he was talking about – cleaning up other people’s messes after them – because it is indeed the right thing to do in a family. But over many years I had discovered that if you do that for people consistently, they don’t learn to clean up after themselves. I then added that this larger context really wasn’t his problem so he shouldn’t have to think or even know about it, but that it did affect how I made those kinds of decisions. None of this is verbatim, of course. And I was scrupulously careful never to mention Wife individually, although it is absolutely clear to me that Son 2 understood who I meant. (Who else have I known for decades, that could still be affecting what I do in our house?)

In retrospect maybe I shouldn’t have said anything, because maybe that falls under the umbrella of saying bad things about the other parent, and all the divorce literature that I read urges "Don't bad-mouth your soon-to-be-ex." But at the time it seemed like the alternative was to let him think I was being a jerk because I didn’t know any better, and I wasn’t sure that was a good choice either.

Normalcy, part 2

It didn't really take this long for D to reply to my letter here, but I haven't gotten around to updating till now. She replied that afternoon, and we bounced e-mails back and forth for the next couple of days. And in the end I suppose you could say everything turned out all right.

Dear Hosea,

Thank you for writing and providing a great deal of clarification. It is helpful, not hurtful.

There’s no question that the last few weeks have been very difficult for me, and you have undoubtedly seen me at my worst. Yet I also realize that creating an environment that allows both of us plenty of freedom while still remaining connected is genuinely challenging.... I certainly agree that a fishbowl existence for you is unworkable. It is far better to swim in the sea, even if it means less contact and connection. It seems fine to me that you write less often and not call [both of which I had pretty much promised in my last letter before this one]. That seems more workable for you and for the most part, when I am doing what I love and I’m surrounded by others, I am not nearly so dependent on my friends for connection and support.

When we had talked on the phone (back here) I had tried to explain some of the reasons that I find frequent phone calls difficult. At the time, D had responded by saying, "Sure. But when you have a new baby in the house it's difficult to get up at 3am because the baby is crying, and you still do it." In my e-mail I had asked her if this was really the way she wanted to think about our relationship, because it sure wasn't a model I had any interest in: "You take care of a baby because he is helpless and can’t take care of himself. And taking the larger view, the baby’s very helplessness means that you assume a whole raft of obligations – lasting for years – when you first bring him under your roof (whether through birth or adoption). Is that the picture I should have of our love? That by virtue of loving you I have assumed a whole raft of open-ended obligations because you are helpless (the way a baby is) and can’t take care of yourself? Really?" Fortunately she got the point, and so she addressed this one too.

There are also times when my analogy about caring for a friend like you would a child is appropriate (I did not mean it in the literal way you understood, as incurring obligations for years), and last week was probably one of those times, but I certainly agree that most of the time—98 percent of the time--another, more liberating model should be in place. We all go through periods of intense change and difficulty when extra support is probably necessary. But honestly, it’s no more than that. All the decisions to change and the activity necessary to do so have to come from within the person; it’s not a matter of giving advice or solving a problem. It’s just presence. Managing ‘presence’, I’ve come to think, is a very difficult feat. It means being there, but just positioned to listen; a certain silence is also necessary. I call it keeping watch, and I have no illusions about how difficult it is. It really does preserve your freedom while still undergirding the other person with love. Ideally, this is what parents do for their adult children, but it’s not easy. It is way too common to either get deeply involved and offer lots of advice and activity, or pull back completely. Right now, it seems best to me that you pull back, and demand the freedom to sail on the open seas. Sailing is a good image, because when you are tacked into the wind, there is a certain delicious lightness and speed that never feels heavy.

I hope you enjoy your week in Faraway City, and you get the opportunity to see some theater. I have lesson plans to write and planning for next week. It all seems a little overwhelming, but manageable. Honestly, the worst is behind me. So take the freedom you desire, and enjoy the separation, confident that I will be fine, and that when you desire to see me, I’ll be here.

With all my enduring love,
D