Dear alibro991:

I tend to think, having just re-read all your posts on the other thread, that it is better that you do not move back home.

You wrote above that you are considering to “go home where I’m loved and needed”- loved and needed by your husband? Doesn’t read like you have been loved and needed by your husband, not for a long, long time.

Of course you are loved by your children, but the damage done to them by this bad marriage and separation has already been done. More of the same bad marriage, will that fix the damage done to them? Is your  husband not going to keep reaching out, inappropriately, to your daughter for comfort regarding this bad marriage…

During this separation you didn’t gain insight into what went wrong in this marriage, so going back to it does not lead me to think there will be any improvement. It may cause further deterioration in that marriage and in the well being of your children.

If during this physical separation you gained new insight, if there was an improvement in the communication between you and your husband during this separation, then maybe you going back would have been a good idea, some promise in it. But with neither insight nor improved communication, there is no realistic hope for a better marriage.

You wrote above that maybe you “just need to suck it up and go home”- well you have been sucking it up for years, in this marriage, before you left.

If you think of your marriage at this point, what has been wrong with it, and wrong for such a long time, or was it wrong from the beginning?

anita

Is there not a way that you can still do it “for the kids” yet stay separated from your husband?  It does not sound like a healthy loving relationship that you have with your husband and at ages 11 & 14, I can guarantee that your children are already picking up on this unhealthy dynamic and the nuances of the relationship and are able to tell a lot more than you think.

I would push you to consider your own motives before deciding anything.  If you are really focused completely on your children’s welfare and well-being, please do put them first and get yourself into therapy to see what is causing you to want to drink so much.  In therapy, you can also work through the issues with your husband, but maybe it would be best to sort that out BEFORE moving back home and disrupting things again.

It doesn’t currently sound like you are able to put your children’s needs before your own.  Are you dedicated to changing this and doing anything you can to take care of them?  If not, perhaps you might consider the fact that their father would be able to do that.

I understand some of the sentiment here that having a mother at home is the utmost importance, but I personally had the experience of growing up with an alcoholic abusive mother and I would have been much better off without her around.  She is finally now out of my life for good after I have estranged her, but while your children are so young I would really urge you to look into some of these behavior patterns of yours for their sake.  You can’t just “tough out” the next few decades.

Good luck to you and your family– this sounds like a very difficult decision.

Amy

Dear alibro991:

The title of your thread is: “Should I move back home?”-

Here is how you defined your home in your last post: “the prison … where my husband ignores me and watches TV all night. And my kids, stay in their rooms”.

No then, you should not go back to prison. What would be the point in you living there? Commit to your new life as a single woman, a separated/divorced mother of two. Settle into your new life, stop considering going back to prison.

You will be a better mother (my main concern) if you stay away from prison. If you find the freedom you need, the life you want.

* you wrote that you are a “functioning alcoholic”- what does it mean to you, being a functioning alcoholic, what are the advantages and disadvantages of being it?

anita