Family: ...now what?

[Amphibian]

(as a prologue: I am almost certainly going to leave bits out, including something that's probably important. Please ask if you've got questions)

The last few months of my life (since, oh, right around the winter solstice) have been particularly rough, for a whole lot of reasons stemming from, basically, that my marriage feels like it's on the tracks towards a divorce and I'm not sure if I should be trying to stop it.

We've been married for almost nine years, in a relationship for more'n fifteen, and most of it has been absolutely great. The exception has been our sex life, which has rather taken a nose dive since the kids came along (for on-the-surface reasonable reasons), and even more so since I came out as transgender and my HRT meds started really working. Turns out she's really really straight, and I don't really look like a boy anymore.

This is on top of some other general stressors about what our career trajectories look like (spoiler: neither of us have any real idea, but SOMEONE needs to work), the perpetual exhaustion of raising kids (6.5 and 3, as of this week), and just also the general...ness of Life In These Interesting Times.

And I don't have any good frameworks for how to even make a decision, let alone know that it's the right one (extra complications: i'm not the only one with a say in the process), and it's just a Lot and I don't know what to do or how to keep going. (I do have some fabulous professional counseling help, both solo and couples-flavoured). I've talked to my dad (since he and my mom got divorced when I was ~2); from my perspective as a kid they made it work pretty well but it's...different from this side of the fence and also I kinda disagree loudly with some of his Life Perspectives. But it's better than nothing, I guess?

[Silver_Lynx]

And I don't have any good frameworks for how to even make a decision, let alone know that it's the right one (extra complications: i'm not the only one with a say in the process), and it's just a Lot and I don't know what to do or how to keep going. (I do have some fabulous professional counseling help, both solo and couples-flavoured). I've talked to my dad (since he and my mom got divorced when I was ~2); from my perspective as a kid they made it work pretty well but it's...different from this side of the fence and also I kinda disagree loudly with some of his Life Perspectives. But it's better than nothing, I guess?

I would like to send you lots of support and love from this side of the screen. This sounds extremely frustrating and anxiety-inducing and it also sounds so rough and hard on the heart. I'm glad that you have support though, that you have people who are in the professional counseling world that can give you advice on what you're going through. I'm so thankful that you have it in your pocket.

I would advise asking them about decision-making skills if you haven't already. It's okay to not have that, by the way. It's hard to do, especially when you're trying to make decisions jointly. I had to learn a lot of decision-making skills both on the fly and through therapy so, I don't know what sort of techniques they'd offer but I'm sure they will help.

The technique that I was offered was to make a list.

I found the pros and cons part to be too stifling because nothing was as clear-cut as that. I instead listed all of the questions I had about the decision and answered them as truthfully as I could. I've found that by doing this, I have already made a decision...I was just too scared to admit what kind of decision it was. Whether this helps or not, I don't know, but I hope that this will serve you in some fashion. Of course, I also still take to flipping coins every once in a while but those are for decisions that aren't like the ones you're trying to make currently. That's more of a fork in the road, which direction do I go, type questions. These types of decisions feel a lot weightier than that, I wouldn't risk a coin for it.

Other than that, I will admit these aren't situations I can understand fully since I don't have those kinds of experiences, but I will gladly take a seat next to you and be there for you, however, this one can.

Please take care of yourself Amphibian. I hope you are guided to smoother waters soon.

[Amphibian]

I would like to send you lots of support and love from this side of the screen. This sounds extremely frustrating and anxiety-inducing and it also sounds so rough and hard on the heart.

Thank you.

(I don't know what else to say right now.)