I Suck at This
Metalcore. From the Madness album, released in 2017. More info from Wikipedia.
Seriously, I tell myself that I'm going to update this thing on a slightly regular basis, and I end up failing in spectacular fashion. It's been a whirlwind of the last year plus, so let's see if I can type out everything significant that's occurred since my last post.
July 2022: In the month and some change after my last post, a temporary agreement was made between Kayla and I, discussing how finances would be covered in the interim. I went into the agreement with little care how it would impact me, under the premise that hopefully the inevitable divorce wouldn't occur. This agreement, while fair to Kayla and to show my honest intentions, would actually end up being a severe detriment to my own well-being (more to come).
October 2022: Throughout this entire ordeal, this month was arguably the darkest month I've ever lived up to that point. I went to see Kayla and the kids on the 5th — our ninth anniversary — and while I enjoyed seeing the kids and spending time with them, I left feeling utterly devastated.
Weeks prior, I have devised some plans to honor our anniversary despite the situation. I had done research on gifts (as was usual for every year) and with the ninth year being signified by pottery, I found an Etsy merchant that sold these little ceramic "pinch pigs". I reached out to this artist about the feasibility of making pigs in the color of birthstones, which was promptly replied to with ecstatic remarks that she would love to do so and had been considering it for some time. A couple weeks of discussion and seeing her "proofs", I was solidly set. I ordered two of her normal sized ones (all of them are handheld) in aquamarine and turquoise (a mix of modern and traditional birthstone colors for March and December, respectively), and two of the "mini" pigs in alexandrite and opal (for June and October, respectively) to represent the kids.
In the hour leading up to leaving to see her and the kids, I opted to retain the one that represented me — my original plan was to give all of them to her — and left a note saying that I had the fourth one for the set, and if she wanted it, I'd be glad to give it to her.
Feeling good about this, I took my gift (small and little intrinsic value, of course) to her. She borderline refused the gift; if it weren't for Mia grabbing it from me, she probably wouldn't have accepted it. A question was raised about the appropriateness of giving a gift, given the circumstances. Naturally, I replied that I didn't see an issue with it. Nonetheless, she "took" the gift (by way of Mia, of course), but didn't open it. I told her she could do what she wanted with it — open it, throw it away, whatever — but that it would at least mean a lot to me if she opened it before she disposed of it.
When I left the house, I lost it. I sat at the stop sign at the end of the road for a minute or two and harshly wept. It hurt worse than anything I had ever been subjected two and was the first time that it was apparent to me that she really wanted this. This was also the first time that I felt utterly defeated and insignificant; this feeling was so persistent that I opted to remove my wedding ring for about a month afterward.
This month was also the month in which I left Larry's for my sister's house. Larry had agreed to let me stay with him for six months, but after that, I was on my own. Since I knew that my wife would not let me return home, I reached out to my older (but not eldest) sister, where I've been staying at since.
December 2022: Way back when I was young and dumb (well, I still am dumb, but not as young), I thought the loneliest holiday season was when I spent Christmas and New Years' overseas back in 2009. Hello, 2022! I did get to pick up the kids and bring them to my sister's house for a little bit, but never have I ever experienced such a feeling of loneliness and a burning desire to just be with my family. This past holiday season will undoubtedly go down as the loneliest holiday I've ever lived through; I don't think anything else can top that.
Also in early December, I ended up quitting the part time job I started working in May. A couple of key factors played in my decision to leave: 1) I did not receive the raise I was promised when I first started (the hiring manager — and also the owner of the company — promised me a raise after six months of employment); I didn't take the job based on that promise, but reneging on something like that is a hit below the belt; and 2) I was growing rapidly displeased with my role. The latter is really the core reason for my departure. After feeling comfortable with my role and the process in which the work was being conducted, I identified several ways to improve the process — ways that would be far more interesting to me and allow me to truly leverage my skill set — and I made no secret about these improvement opportunities to my boss. I even offered to do these improvements as my "main" responsibility with no increase in pay, which I felt was a better use of my time as the company's only part-time employee (at least I think I was the only one, but I digress). The boss wasn't having it apparently, so I opted to just leave. I called him on a Sunday and told him that my intent was to work the next day and use the paid time off I accrued up to that point to take off the rest of the week; his response was to just simply end employment there and pay me out for my PTO. I was initially skeptical that I would get paid for that time, but to my surprise, I got paid for it; 20 hours of PTO covered that week of not working.
February 2023: I started actively pursuing houses for a suitable place for me to live. I had spoken to a home builder late December/early January about the feasibility of building a home, but never got a price. I left the consultation meeting knowing full well that it would be far too expensive for me to pursue, given the state of the housing market. There were a few homes that had potential, but nothing that was a serious consideration.
March 2023: The first home that had serious potential hit the market. This house checked off literally every box for my requirements (except one, which at the time I was willing to compromise with): it was big enough for me and the kids (but not too big to the point of being difficult to manage), the house needed zero interior upgrades (it was a tiny bit dated, but nothing major), and was in the right price range for my extremely constrained budget. I saw the home Wednesday night, two days before my birthday, sent a message to the agent I've been working with, and looked at (and subsequently made an offer on) the house. I offered the asking price, with no assistance with closing, a fairly competitive closing date — all the things that made my offer extremely lucrative to the seller.
I left my agent's office late morning on Thursday not expecting to hear anything until at least the next day (which, if accepted, would have made a hell of a birthday gift). Later in the afternoon, I opted to treat myself to a personal birthday gift by going to see John Wick Chapter Four in theaters. I got a call from my agent just as the previews started; my agent told me that the seller received two very close offers between mine and another buyer, and that I needed to make my best and final offer. On the fly, I offered $2,000 more than asking price with no other amendments to my offer.
Thirty minutes before the movie ended, I got a text from my agent, saying that the seller went with the other buyer. I felt crushed to the point where I was no longer interested in watching the rest of the movie (I did anyway, and I'm glad I stuck around). I would later find that the "winning" offer was a whopping $9,000 over asking price, with the seller paying up to $5,000 in closing costs. I would later learn that after subtracting the seller paying closing, the other offer was only about $2,000 more than my amended price. Nonetheless, I felt defeated.
April 2023: The one-year mark passed me by just as quickly as it arrived. Kayla and I had sat down in February and did a good ironing out of our final agreements (with a little extra work to be done), but nothing further came from that discussion.
May 2023: Kayla and I had one final sit-down to iron out the last details of our agreement. This was done the morning before Liam was due to "graduate" from his 4K program, to which both of us attended. Feeling a slight bit better about how things were agreed on, I was in a good mood and opted to contact the dealership I had been speaking to about a car, and informed them I would be picking up the car I ordered. I went to pick up my car, having already secured my own financing and drove it off the lot. It's a very, very gorgeous blue Subaru WRX. Brand new, 2023 model year, that had 10 factory miles on it when I drove it off the lot (I ordered the car for myself, and it sat at the dealership for about a month before I finally pulled the trigger and picked it up). I'm closing in on nearly 6,000 miles on the car already, and it's only been three months since delivery.
July 2023: At the end of last month, I opted to make a drive down to Florida for the weekend to get away for a few days. I stayed at my aunt and uncle's house in Vero Beach for the weekend and got the opportunity to see them and a few other good friends that I haven't seen in ages.
That leads us to this month. And what a month it's been! Over the last couple of weeks, Kayla and I have been back and forth about the verbiage in the final agreement, discussing what was written and making changes. We finally got everything ironed out last week, and I went to her lawyer's office to sign the agreement back on Tuesday.
Today was the final day. Five hundred days since this ordeal began, it has finally come to an end, and while I'd love to say that it panned out in my favor, it unfortunately did not. Today was the final hearing for us, to which we both had to be present in family court for. We sat in front of the judge and reaffirmed that the agreement we made was fair, equitable, was in our kids' best interests, there was no hope for reconciliation, and that we wished to proceed. It was a very bitter day, because the divorce proceedings immediately followed the agreement hearing, given that it's been over a year with our separation. At the end of the 30-minute hearing block that was allotted for our docket, we both walked out of that courtroom (which was small — it was family court, after all) as a divorced couple. She left in tears, which was a sign that she is in fact human and that this process did have a negative impact on her. I sat in my car for about five minutes looking at my wedding band (my actual one, not the silicone ring that I had grown accustomed to wearing) and feeling that, for the first time, I had failed everyone, including myself.
I took my ring off, set it in the small cubby in front of the center console, and carried on about my day, with the intent of putting the ring away. After leaving the courthouse, today marked the first day I would not actively wear it.
Because this post has gone on long enough (and because the gravity of the situation has finally had a chance to take hold), this is where I start to wind down. I can feel my emotions starting to get the better of me — hey, I've managed to make it 12 hours before breaking down — and I think it's only fair that I succumb to them and grieve.
I don't know what the future holds. I still have that faint glimmer of hope that in time, Kayla and I will ultimately come to reconciliation, that this point of time was but a mere low point in our overall relationship. Life is too damn short to squander away over things like this, especially when I know that she believes (or at least did at one point) that we could make things work. My only hope remains that she realizes this before it's too late, because despite it all, I still love the woman madly.