Well, this is frustrating

[deponty]

All sounds good.

I'm interested in how this works with being close to people. It sounds to me like you work full time(?) in a job that you don't like. Then in your spare time you work more because you want to eventually be able to give up your current full time job and replace it with what is a hobby right now.

Where do you find the time to spend with your wife and your kids?

You talk about feeling abandoned and needing more people to be close to so that you don't worry so much about the possibility of being abandoned.

This last post kind of reads as if you are doing some abandoning yourself by choosing to pour your limited spare time and energy into doing additional work. Do you think that's a possibility?

I don't like having any job, but I do like having money! I've got an automated trading system set up and the goal is to have it sit silently and put my money to work for me making more money with only minimal intervention from me. It's getting close, but needs more development. In my spare time I'll race cars, or lift weights, or train muay thai, or play golf, or research fun topics, or find really good restaurants and pretend I'm a Monty Python character. My English accent is REALLY bad, but that doesn't stop me.

I've definitely been guilty of sabotaging my relationships, or creating my own abandonment. Imagine knowing in the pit of your stomach that those people who love you will - for sure - leave you, but you have no idea when or how. Every morning for about the last 40 years I wake up, facing a new day, somehow believing that I'll come home from school/camp/work/etc with an empty house and a short note, and no one else to turn to. That very thing happened to my sister when she was in high school. Imagine? Coming home from high school one day to find that your only parent packed up her shit and left with no warning? Same thing's happened to me a couple times but it's a longer story. I've always believed that EVERY relationship I've had will end the same way. Some have, and some I've ended preemptively. With Debbie I've been expecting it too, and I definitely made her prove that she's serious about staying. Not consciously of course. I'm finally starting to believe she's staying.

As far as spending time with the kids, we're happy with the amount of time we spend together. I reserve Sunday mornings for Megan alone, Debbie I see every night, and David is a teenager with his own life, though we make time to talk most every day and we play games (Diplomacy, Axis and Allies, Mage Wars, etc.) on a regular basis. He's interested in physics, but middle school isn't going to cover calculus-based concepts unfortunately, so I teach him something about that. It's kind of funny actually. We still have a Diplomacy game going on the table, and I'm shuffling papers and game pieces around over dinner last night so I can start graphing vectors and explaining differentials to him like some form of obsessed high school teacher from Hell. "Here boy, learn this!!"

 

[deponty]

Hmm, I'd be very interested in the story from your wife's point of view. I'm glad for both of you that you are working on your own issues and that you are closer now. I just found out that my own partner has been cheating since I was pregnant and I'm done. All that talk about honesty and he was just trying to have me be okay with him cheating.

Go buy your wife some flowers and be the man she deserves.

Oh, and would your wife really be okay with you having a romantic whatever with the Indian gal or is she just trying to give you what you want? Like you would have her permission or whatever, but how much would that hurt her?

I'm sorry Joanne. That can't be easy. I really hope it all works out for you.

It took Debbie a long time, but over the last few years she's grown to admire the Indian gal. Debbie's seen the conversations we've had and has been impressed with her. I am horrible at reading Debbie's mind, so I really have no choice but to believe what she tells me.

 

[SchrodingersCat]

Personally I had no interest in pursuing other women at that point in time, mostly because my new kid was fun and smart and cute and awesome and I really wanted to be heavily involved in his upbringing.

Even still, being a grown up responsible adult? That sounds awful! In my spare time I write unsupervised learning algorithms for trading currency pairs in the FOREX market. I'm like a mad scientist with computer screens all around me, typing furiously. In 2-4 years I should have enough income to where I can go to the job I don't like and tell my team they need a new boss because I'm going to spend my time travelling the world with my people finding a place to build my castle (complete with a dungeon full of mastiffs and a pool in the foyer).

I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but you're showing multiple signs of behaving like a grown-up: offering your wife help and support when there's a new baby, being involved with the care of said baby, writing software to improve your financial situation.... that all qualifies as grown-up behaviour. You don't have to have a grown-up attitude to actually be a grown-up. It's weird, I know. I wake up several times a month, observe how well I'm taking care of my life, and then laugh because I don't feel like a grown-up, but all objective signs seem to indicate otherwise.

In contrast, Joanne's (soon to be ex?) husband is doing the opposite. Cheating on a preggo wife, leaving her alone with child care and housework, and then whining because his pee-pee needs playing. Well cry me a fucking river. Don't give him a second chance.