My wife left, my kids were taken out of state, and I’ve been trying to survive the last 97 days without falling apart
I don’t really know why I’m posting this. Maybe because I’m exhausted from carrying it alone.
97 days ago my life basically detonated.
My wife and I separated.
Then my ex-wife took my kids out of state without legal approval.
That situation turned into a court battle that completely drained me emotionally, financially, and mentally. I ultimately won in court, and my kids are supposed to be returning after the school year ends, but the damage from the separation and distance has already been brutal.
People really underestimate what it does to a parent when your children suddenly stop being part of your everyday life.
The silence changes.
The house changes.
You change.
And I’ve been sitting in the same house ever since trying to understand how something that once felt alive can suddenly feel like a museum of memories.
Every room reminds me of someone.
Her blankets are still here.
Her cups.
Her side of the bed.
The routines we built.
The little things that used to feel invisible until they disappeared.
And weekends are brutal.
During the week I can distract myself with work. I work in aviation maintenance management, so there’s always pressure, responsibility, people needing answers, airplanes broken somewhere, timelines slipping, customers stressed out, FAA compliance, all of it. The job forces movement.
But weekends?
The silence gets loud.
I’ve done all the things people tell you to do:
gym
eating better
trying to sleep
journaling
cooking
staying social when I can
trying to stay productive
And the weird part is… I am functioning.
I still go to work.
Still pay bills.
Still take care of the house.
Still answer calls.
Still show up.
But emotionally it feels like I’m dragging a collapsed building behind me everywhere I go.
What messes with my head the most is that my wife and I aren’t fully disconnected either.
We still talk sometimes.
Still joke.
Still have moments that feel familiar.
Sometimes she comes by the house.
Sometimes it almost feels normal for an hour or two.
Then she leaves again and I feel the emotional whiplash all over.
Part of her says she wants independence because she’s never really been alone before. Another part of her says she’s emotionally exhausted and doesn’t know if she wants love at all right now.
And honestly? I can understand that intellectually.
But emotionally it’s hard not to feel abandoned while simultaneously being expected to keep everything stable.
I think the hardest realization is this:
You can know someone still cares about you and still feel deeply alone at the same time.
That contradiction has been eating me alive.
I’ve learned a lot about myself during this:
I used to panic and chase reassurance
I tied too much of my emotional stability to one person
I confused fixing problems with creating emotional safety
I thought love alone could outmuscle unresolved trauma and burnout
Turns out relationships are a lot more complicated than “do you love each other.”
Sometimes two people love each other and are still drowning.
I don’t even know what I’m asking for here honestly. Maybe I just wanted to say this somewhere people might understand it.
Because some days I feel strong and grounded.
And other days I sit in the driveway for an hour trying to convince myself to walk into an empty house.
If anyone else has survived something like this — the separation, the custody battle, the loneliness, the emotional confusion, the weird in-between stage where nothing is fully over but nothing feels secure either — how long did it take before your nervous system finally calmed down?