Contact with the ex ohill: I have a functional relationship with my ex, meaning that we can hold civil conversation without strain. My marriage was very short (18 mos total from start to finish), and I have been officially divorced since July. She has largely pushed all emotion out of her life, and she sees me as a casual friend (and a resource for help). It's almost as if we were never married. Save for one time, she doesn't ever talk about our marriage at all.
She and I have had lunch a few times over the past few months (at her request). Always very cordial, sterile, and certainly shallow. Except for one time, we haven't discussed anything very "deep" and she avoids the subject of our marriage and divorce like the plague. Where I have wanted to deal with it and get it out in the open so that I can learn from it, she has wanted to deny that it ever happened. I enjoy the time we spend, but I'm not sure why she asks me to lunch, or even why I go. I guess I just want to be a friend to her. I mourn the loss of our relationship even now at times, but I don't want it back.
My anger toward my ex-wife has turned to pity because she lacks the emotional and social maturity to recover from rough spots in relationships. Rather than fix things, she would just rather move onto something new. There was a time in my life where I would have done anything for her, and I suppose that going to lunch with her is the least of the nice things I can do.
She recently asked me to help her out with a project she has in an accounting class. She doesn't want help doing the project, just somebody to look over the figures and make sure that she hasn't made any egregious errors. As a CPA, this is right up my alley, and it's no skin off my back to help her. I agreed....and then it hit me.
The only time she calls me is when I have something that can make her life easier. I don't think that it is a conscious thing on her part, I just think that she naturally uses people. My issue is this...I need to set boundaries, and I need to quit being an "enabler"...
If we are to be friends in any capacity going forward, I want it to be genuine...not a situation where I get used.
Has anybody else had similar experiences? How have you set boundaries so that you can be friendly, polite, etc... without being used? And without being an enabler? Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated...
Re: Contact with the ex frontier74: My wife continues to call me, whenever she's gotten herself into a jam. I don't know whether it's really "enabling" her. I guess, the way I see it, everyone needs someone to talk to when things get rough. If I wasn't there for her, I'm sure she would have gotten into what ever trouble she's in, anyway. She's not great at learning anything useful from her mistakes.
On second thought, I'm probably kidding myself. I probably don't want to tell her to deal with her own problems, because I don't want to seem like a jerk. If she didn't have someone to fix the mess, she might be less inclined to make the mess in the first place.
Hmm... I'll have to give that one some thought.
The only thing that I can say is that it would be very hard to maintain a friendship if you're forced to tell her to deal with her own problems. Then again, if the only reason she wants to keep you as a friend, is to bail her out or share her misery, then she really isn't being much of a friend anyway.
