Feeling good! ----> I started a new canvas today!
Just background work and bringing in the underpaint of the subject, but at least I got to use brushes, haha.
Took me a couple hours to get my sketch sorted but then draw it on the canvas, then... brushes and actually doing something!

Subject needs a 2nd layer of underpaint, after that I can finally get going with the real work.
Not gonna be today, maybe on the morrow :D

Ah, okay, my apologies!
It was the middle of the night (half past 1) so my brain must've been half asleep and I misread your story.
I still don't agree with spanking your kids though, nor with the bit that parenting should come with a bit of fear.
That's the old model from the time when people didn't know any better and weren't informed about consequences of their action and so on.
And in the olden days people often had a short temper because they were overworked, too tired and so on. Flogging at school etc. was also normal in those days.
But then people often worked 12-14 hours a day, 6 days a week. Quite logical they don't have time to be considerate then. They were dead tired. For me that was the generation of my grand-parents.
Over here that all changed during my parents' generation and certainly mine.
I vaguely recall being spanked once or twice by my dad but that was already odd and considered not-done.
But could be things are different over there. Different countries & cultures, and laws.

Well, what can I say... I only got some 13 years of (ongoing) intense studying of the masculine & feminine dynamics, psychology, anatomy and whatnot, and relationships, and coaching people in the subject material. Gave coaching courses about it as well. Courses I myself made. Always got excellent feedback, only had happy clients, and I have helped a lot of people worldwide.
But what do I know, hihi.

You spanked your son in front of his girlfriend's kids??? Which means he's an adult???
To me that is unbelievable and totally disrespectful. And unbelievable he didn't punch your lights out. Not joking.
My children would never ever put up with that chit. No Dutch adult would.
My son could likely easily turn it round and spank me. I think he wouldn't go quite that far, but it'd be the last I'd ever see of him in my life. He'd be livid and quite rightfully so.
And I'd never see my daughter and granddaughters again either.
I guess Americans are different.
I'm not 100% sure but I think you can even get in trouble with police for doing that to an adult/older child.

There is no quick fix to this.
The fastest fix is for him to change and you don't change by starting to beat people.
That would turn him into a creep who has no self-control.
The behaviour of the kids is only a result of how the parents behave & interact. A side-effect, not the cause.
The cause is him outsourcing his masculine power to his wife, probably thinking 'this is nice and easy. I don't have to do anything, she takes care of everything." Not realising doing this undermines his own masculinity -and health.
Now he's blaming others (wife & kids) for this which is again not masculine. It's what a weak Beta man does.
A healthy masculine would think, "Shoot I effed up! How can I change this?" and take action.

Last thing you want is a weak Beta man to start beating his family.
It would only make things worse, increase the woman's feeling of "See, I do have to take care of everything myself!! I cannot even trust him with our kids!!"
What she needs to feel & experience is relief from having to carry it all on her own. That she can rely on her man, that he is there for her, that he does support her, that she can trust him, and so on.

Doesn't mean counselling is needed. Coaching could be enough. Depends on how much self-regulation he has got. If he does have that it might not even be needed at all, he could do it himself.
But since he's already talking about the easy way out, leaving so he -again- doesn't have to do jack chit, I doubt he has interest or the self-regulation to sort this out without help.

Could be me, but I fail to see how what you say relates to what you quote?
There's nothing weird about someone having 3 exes unless they're 20 maybe.
At a certain age having 2-5 exes is pretty common.
And it also has no relevance to the OP not learning.

Reason for me to call it quits would be her calling you insecure and childish. Childish??????
And nothing much to do with being insecure either. Even if confident and secure you'd want to know what was going on.
Her reacting that way would be a major red flag to me as it says she A) doesn't take your concerns seriously and B) knocks you for asking questions and C) shows no respect for you.
That is very immature, she is actually the childish one.
And still leaves the matter of her lying to you.
This all would certainly be a reason to end it.
Sorry, Slim!
Now don't let this discourage you. Learn from it so something similar won't happen again.

A man trying to prevent the assassination of JFK.
I've seen that. I did like it.

Only thing wrong with it is the date. I assume it was November so it should be 2/11/63.
Now it says 11 Feb 63.

I agree with this UNTIL the bit about spanking. That is absolutely never no way the way to go!!
Certainly not spanking your wife in front of your kids.
But you do have to step into your masculine energy. Become a so called healthy masculine energy man.
What you're doing now is pointing fingers, blaming the situation (and thus your kids AND wife!?!). YOU are responsible here! YOU let it slip.

The thing is, when the man is gone a lot a woman will automatically pick up the slack and go into her masculine. She has to in order to get things done. That means when you get home you suddenly have two masculine energy individuals. That is going to clash, as you found out.
So what needs to happen is YOU taken the masculine energy onto your shoulders again and then your wife can shift back into her feminine energy. Problem solved.
The thing is, if this skewed situation has existed for quite some time your wife will be so stuck and used to being in her masculine energy that she will resist.
It's like quitting smoking for someone else.
So it will take some time.
That means you have to allow it time. And show up as the man, the healthy masculine man that is. NOT a demanding, needy, I-feel-sorry-for-myself man, NOR a controlling bully of a man!!

And I'd strongly suggest talking to your wife. She needs to know how you feel, she'll also need to know that you want to change things. Which will also be for her benefit -even though she may still resist and not see this!!!- as carrying the masculine load is utterly exhausting for a woman.
It affects her health, her happiness and joy. And most certainly is one of the big reasons a woman doesn't want to have sex with her man anymore. Or she doesn't really enjoy it anymore.

For you not being in your healthy masculine also affects your health! Did you know that?
Being in your masculine will raise testosterone and your nervous system will stabilise.
That in turn will raise estrogen in your wife and then her nervous system can stabilise as well.

What I would suggest is checking out Jake Woodard. He can explain it all in an easy to understand way. You can find him on FB, YouTube, Insta.
And if you really want to change things round -also for yourself and your health and so you can be a quality partner- you could consider doing his course for men. He doesn't ask top dollar and he's bloody good.
Dive into a bit and you will see exactly why things have gone wrong AND how you can change it. In turn you'll be happier & healthier and quite likely your wife will be happier & healthy & joyful again too, and wanting to have sex with you.

I see the kids and their disrespect as a secondary issue. And chances are that will improve when they see that mum & dad are working things out, working as a team again.
Kids need that!
Mothers cannot take care of everything. As I said, she'll get exhausted, likely gets short and annoyed, and so on, while a woman is the one who brings happiness, joy, warmth, playfulness into a family/relationship.
But this is impossible when she has to do everything by herself without the support of her man!
And yeah, you made yourself redundant. Don't blame her or the kids for that!! Be accountable. Women need that too. A man they can trust, rely on, feel emotionally safe with, who takes care of her, who provides (not just money!! Also stuff like emotional safety, support etc.), protects, takes decisions, takes care of chit in and around the house.
From what you say you have done none of these! And then you wonder why it went wrong?
If you still love your wife and your kids then become the man that they desperately need (even though they may seem not to, they do!!)
And in order to feel whole, like a man, YOU need it as well.

I'd flat out ask her about it.
In a nice way, not demanding, or angry or anything. But you do deserve her to be honest to you.
It could be she was afraid to tell you as she felt you'd get upset after all.
Could be the ex has shown a renewed interest in her which made her kind of question things.

To explain that... often when a woman feels good with a new man (you in this case) she exudes a wonderful vibe, has a different glow. We then often have an ex come up out of the blue with renewed interest.
That can be confusing, certainly in early stages.
So it could be innocent, but you have to know.

I'd ask, however scary that may be, and tell her you really need her to be honest and that you have to be able to trust her, especially if you're okay with her still dancing with that ex.

Depending on her explanation make you're decision.
If you want to continue with her you could possibly ask her to find another dance partner. You can tell her you're not comfortable with this situation, and rightfully so.
That way you allow her to do what she loves, just not with that ex.
If she's truly into you she will do this.

After the Statham movie I watched Grizzly Night.
Based on the 2 deadly bear attacks in 1967, in Montana's Glacier National Park.

I knew it wasn't going to be a pleasant movie in a way since it concerned people getting attacked, but what got to me, and almost has me in tears, is that they started aggressively killing grizzlies afterwards.
I knew that as well as it's what humans always do. Animals always bear the brunt for people's own FUs. Cause it was human mistakes and stupid behaviour that caused it to happen.
They hunted them down till they were almost extinct.
Disgusting.

That kind of stuff always gets to me.
Going to watch something lighthearted now to snap out of it.

Yeah, sometimes more old school is better.
There are definitely advantages when it comes to how you receive the news.


I am btw watching "Shelter" as we speak :)
So far I am impressed. Not a real fast paced movie but seeing him in action again, absolutely wonderful!
Like I can have a joygasm from watching someone ride a horse really really well, I have the same thing with good martial arts. The kind Statham serves :)

Hungry!!!
It's gone 6 and I haven't even made my dinner yet.
Did cut the veggies though :p
Best get going with it. My fave hobby...
But I'm hungry and eating is going to be bliss, hihi.

Oh well, maybe it's personal preference or not having a preference?
To me Grant is not a tv cowboy at all. He's been a cowboy his entire adult life. He's not an actor, never done any tv show before Mantracker. He's the real deal.
One of the things I liked so much is how well he can ride a horse, at one with a horse, regardless of which one.
I've always had a thing for horse riding since I always wanted to learn myself and wasn't allowed to. But when younger I spent plenty of time with/around horses as my bestie had her own pony. And I got to ride that under her supervision.
And I truly cannot recall ever seeing anyone ride as well as Terry Grant. None of his sidekicks either although most are pro cowboys too.

As for falling off... Grant was in a couple of wrecks, and a few times you can see that he very likely fell off, but then they cut the scene.
But by looking at the horse and his position on it in the last split second it is almost impossible that he could've remained in the saddle.
I think either he himself or the producer didn't want that stuff on tv.
He didn't always ride well trained horses either, and some he couldn't rope off of, which is what caused one of the wrecks when he did use the rope.

But again, probably personal preference or not having preference.
Like most fans, I simply didn't like the 2nd dude.

What I have learnt in the past 15,5 years of no news is that if it's truly important and I should know, I always find out about it one way or another.
Then I still do NOT watch the news as that has an emotional load (if that's the right word).
I then Google it to find an article about what's going on which I then read.
Reading printed/typed text hasn't got the emotional load (think voice, body language etc.) it's basically neutral.
Then I'm up to speed without any emotional coercion from the external.

I did the same when I heard that something was going on in the US.
When it matters, I always find out one way or another and then I can decide for myself whether or not to look into it.
Way better than being overwhelmed plural times a day when the radio is on or the telly. Hearing it once is enough for me, hihi.

The Statham movie sounds interesting! I'm going to look it up tonight :)
I too like Jason Statham, seen many of his movies.

Thank you so much for the encouragement! Very much appreciated!

I've never had the opportunity to watch the progress of someone's painting, except for watching a (semi) pro painter on YouTube.
Must say I do enjoy that!
Like watching Bob Ross. So captivating and almost meditative, hihi.
So I can kind of fathom what it's like.

And getting something as personal like that from your grandchild sure as heck must be special!
Mine are too young for such things, nearly 3 and the other turned 1 yesterday.
But who knows in the future... :)

Thank you, Zee. Does me a ton of good to hear!
And yes, I will keep posting :)
Not certain yet what the next one is going to be. I want to do another horse & cowboy scene, hihi, but also feel drawn to painting a buffalo/bison.
Not certain what I'll do next yet.
Haven't had the time yet. Yesterday was shopping for pressies for my granddaughter's 1st birthday...
Today visiting my girl to celebrate the 1st birthday of the wee one :D

Canvasses for either one have been prepped though, so if I feel like it I can start right away!

Joyful!
Going to my daughter in a bit so I will see my 2 li'l granddaughters as well :)

The youngest had her 1st birthday yesterday!

Thank you so much, Zee!

TxsGal3333, that's kind of what I meant by how often and what etc.
What you say is not really very often and can be just phone calls.
With the father of your kids I can totally understand as well.
I too was in touch with my ex, father of my kids, for quite some time after the divorce.
NOT because there was still love there. Over is over for me. As in 100% over.
But it had to do with the kids.
Every other weekend the kids were with him and sometimes he picked them up at my new home that I shared with my new partner. Sometimes his new partner came with.
Then we drank a cup of coffee, chit-chatted and after that he was on his way home again with our kids.

Having spent a long time with each other and having kids together can mean you still get along after divorce without any desire for getting involved again.

For me personally that's where contact with exes ends. And I wouldn't like a new men to still check in on an ex either. I should be his new responsibility as a man, not an ex.
But that's my personal view & feelings.
This stuff will be different for everyone.