My wife and I are becoming estranged.
ouch, dawg. what makes you say that?
The fact that she has apparently lost a great deal of respect for me, coupled with the fact that she seems to be embracing everything I can't stand in an effort to demonstrate "just how wrong I am," is getting out of hand.
I am very close to "throwing in the towel."
Keep it together if you can (I know how hard it can be) for your kids sake. If the worst comes to the worst, whatever you do dont allow your kids to get stuck in the middle, as can easily happen.
Who are you and what did you do to Hadron?
Sat on him. Nah, its just my own experience on the recieving end for goodness knows how long when it goes really wrong.
Sorry to hear it!
On the other hand ...
I know too many who are in essence killing themselves to stay in a dysfunctional family for the sake of kids, though. I need to find a new balance for myself, I suppose.
Ideally you need to find a way to make it function, but dont try so hard it turns into a bitter split. You are right, its a complex balance and a bugger to find it seems.
As for my parents, I survived it I guess, and learnt something out of it. Not to mention that its not like I dont relish game playing of sorts... :S
I'm not exactly speaking from experience, but I would guess that if both parents are mature about not using the kids as insult-messengers or emotional dumping grounds, the kids are probably a lot better off than if the adults stayed together in a hostile environment for the sake of a warped commitment. That the harm to the kids has more to do with the parents' individual maturity levels than whether or not they stay together.
As soon as you get into bitterness, 9 out of 10 times it will happen unfortuantly.