Family Drama

my hubby and i have done the "support team thing" for a few friends and family going through breakups. he learned a lot through his divorce and my background is in mental health, so we know the drill. it can be challenging.

your best bet for yourself (and for him, probably) is to let him come to terms in his own way and maintain whatever emotional detachment you can muster yourself during the process. (yeah, i know.)

our tack is always to make oursevles availble to our "friend in need" on an unconditional, 24/7 basis, but totally let them drive the interaction. meaning when they wanna talk it out, they can, when they want a distraction, we can provide that, too. and since he's far away and no doubt shell-shocked, you might wanna see if you can enourage him to hit a therapist for a while. he may need a little short-term shoring up, and possibly something to help him sleep. it's going to be a rough ride for him, but he needs you to stay in top shape so you can continue to support him. no excuses for wigging out yourself! you can do that later.

i'm suspecting that detachment factor will be one of those famous "growing experiences" for you, judging from your blog.

Don't mean that as critical, by the way. i can say this with impunity because i've very been there/done that. I've been through some similar (only a lot worse, if you can believe it) issues with my SD and her nightmare SO. makes your bro's golddigger look almost datable. seriously.

good luck, tara!

detached?!?!?!?!? LOLOLOL!!!!! Oh man, what a challange that is going to be! I REALLY appreciate the wise words though. It's a bit rough taking the 'hey you're an adult you can make your own choices' stance. I mean, I did that when he told me he was gonna marry this gal - and EEK look how great that worked out!! On the up side (something I try to point out to him in our conversations) as bad and painful as this is, it could (as you know) be a lot worse. Thankfully there are no children involved (the baby she was carrying when they married she lost - divine intervention?) - they haven't been married long AND because of her infidelity he doesn't have to worry about alimony. As of our last phone call (5 nano seconds ago) she was pulling the tears and sorry game. I did warn my brother she would (in a detached way of course!!!) - his response was "my sister said you'd try this!" Not only did that shut her up, but he further said "and she already guessed you were cheating" Yea, sometimes I even scare myself!

Again, thank you for the great advise AND the shoulder!!!

maybe you took the "it's your biz" route when he married her, but you think it would have made any difference if you hadn't? my exp is that you just get blamed for some of their problems for "interfering" any other way.

anywho, hope things calm for him pretty soon.