One Year Anniversary

It's been a year since I moved out of the house. At the time I was hoping it was a temporary thing, that a little space would lower the stress levels enough that Brett and I could figure out how to love each other again, how to live together again. What I found was I didn't want to go back, that I was much happier not trying to share my life with her. For a while, I was conflicted, grasping at small glimmers of hope for reconciliation as if they were life preservers, only to have reality crush those hopes into the mud. Or drown them, I guess would fit better with the metaphor. I finally screwed up my courage and told her I was done trying to make it work, done trying to keep the love alive. It was clear to me that, for both of us, it was quite dead.

It's been five months since I told Brett I wanted a divorce. Naively, I thought that if I proposed terms which were much more favorable to her than what the law requires that she would see that it was a good deal, and accept before I came to my senses and changed my mind. The law in Texas is you split everything 50-50, assets and liabilities, and pay spousal support temporarily if one spouse needs some time to get their shit together and find a job. Instead, I basically proposed that she get all the cash and I get all the debt, plus I'd pay $1700 a month for nine months after the divorce, plus I'd pay for the house (which she would live in) until Taylor goes to college in six years, at which point we'd sell it and split the proceeds.

She weren't having that. It was like a sitcom episode, where the guy tries to tell his girlfriend he wants to break up, only to have her say "Yeah, that doesn't work for me. So where are we going for dinner tonight?" Brett has refused to agree to anything without talking to a lawyer first. Fine. But she hasn't bothered to talk to a lawyer. She's pretty much stopped talking about it at all. I want to be a good guy. I want to give her a chance to come to terms with this, and to find a way to decouple our financial lives in a way that allows her to stand on her feet. But she doesn't have the right to make me put my life on hold forever, and after five months enough is enough.

Before a judge will hear my petition for a divorce, we have to try mediation, with a professional mediator. I welcome this. I want an agreement with Brett, not something handed down by a judge after two lawyers have tossed hand grenades around the room. I called Brett today, and told her that this would be coming, that my lawyer would let her know when a date was set. I told her that I would be open to discussing any changes or wholesale alterations to my proposal. That I was definitely not going into this with a "not one penny more" attitude. That I wanted to give her time to think it through and figure out what would work for (quietly leaving out that she's had months already). Her response? "Thank you for the heads up."

Will she show up to the mediation session? Will she say anything? Will she use it as an opportunity to try to lash out, or look helpless? Or will we actually be able to reach an agreement so that we both can move on with our lives?

I guess I'll find out.