@drdougweiss office’s response of “your hus­band does not want to be mar­ried” sud­den­ly clicked for me at the gym today. I think it’s because of the songs being played in the back­ground. You know, the nasty stuff they play in clubs, talk­ing about he’s doing this girl, she’s grab­bing his <blank>, and he’s mak­ing her <blank>, all while thank­ing Jesus for giv­ing him the oppor­tu­ni­ty and big bank account. And I got this image of my hus­band at his indus­try conferences. 

He told me he feels like him­self when he’s at those places. His trav­els have giv­en him a cer­tain free­dom, and enabled him to live the col­lege lifestyle he nev­er had. He said his mom asked him recent­ly why he nev­er par­tied or went to clubs (because he loves to dance), or why he nev­er did drugs or drank in col­lege. I don’t know about the drugs and alco­hol, but he’s def­i­nite­ly par­ty­ing now on the indus­try cir­cuit. Over the last four years, he’s been increas­ing­ly away from fam­i­ly and respon­si­bil­i­ty. He’s been the charm­ing, charis­mat­ic, big man on cam­pus, sur­round­ed by peo­ple with lit­tle to no morals, in an any­thing-goes atmos­phere. He’s about to turn 40, and the com­bi­na­tion of trav­el­ing, his façade of suc­cess, the secret sins, and loom­ing midlife cri­sis was a per­fect recipe for disaster. 

Although pre­vi­ous­ly he told me all his rela­tion­ships before me were his search for a wife and not casu­al rela­tion­ships, I think he real­ly doesn’t want to be mar­ried. He wants the cir­cuit life to be his full-time life. Where he is a free, sin­gle guy who can flirt with all the women, and take who he wants to bed. I was just in the way. And even the 2^nd Mrs. he has in mind prob­a­bly won’t make it that far. The habit­u­al sin like­ly hasn’t stopped, and will rear its ugly head again with her. And his cycle will continue.

And the kids? Dar­by is right. They’re just his pets. He’s nev­er real­ly been around to take care of them. He would wake up 5–10 min­utes before hav­ing to take them to school. He worked late and rarely came home before bed­time. They talked to him more via Face­Time than in per­son, and when he trav­eled, he would go 1–2 days with­out reach­ing out to any of us at all in any way. He said it him­self in a mag­a­zine arti­cle he wrote: “when you real­ize you’re a stranger to your child…”

He loves them, but they’re just acces­sories. Amaz­ing, won­der­ful chil­dren who love him with all of their hearts and think the world of him. He has always been astound­ed by the pure love they give him, prob­a­bly because he knows he so does not deserve it and has done noth­ing to earn it. He takes such pride in them, and he pulls them out of his pock­et to show off at con­fer­ences. To take cred­it for their hearts, as if it were a reflec­tion of his own char­ac­ter. What a great father he must be to have such great chil­dren, right? They’re just anoth­er sales tool, anoth­er piece in his arse­nal to show oth­ers what a stand-up guy he is. That’s what he did at the con­fer­ence held the week we got proof of the mis­tress. Called the kids on Face­Time and then spent zero time actu­al­ly talk­ing to them. Instead, he intro­duced them to all the oth­er ven­dors and atten­dees at the venue… and the mis­tress was the last one he showed. Way to put her in their sub­con­scious, Mr. Psychology. 

Will he tru­ly step up and be a real father? At this point, I don’t think he’s capa­ble, because real par­ents aren’t self­ish. To be a par­ent is to sac­ri­fice your­self, but right now he’s put all the good God has giv­en him, on an altar for himself. 

Today’s Playlist: