From Exit Math to Drawing Out Her Heart

I caught myself saying it would be fine if she left and I just retired at fifty-nine and a half to raise our daughter. The numbers lined up too neatly, like I was already sketching an exit that kept me steady while everything else fell apart. That plan sat there quietly until I noticed how much it let me stay in control without ever having to ask what she actually fears.

Then she called me by name instead of babe. It felt like a test, a small withdrawal I didn’t choose. I kept saying babe back anyway, and eventually she came back to it. The shift made me realize I’ve been listening for the surface instead of the fear underneath. She was checking whether I’d match her distance. Staying steady was the right move, but it still left me wondering what she was afraid I’d do if she stopped performing the usual names.

Owning the twenty-year broken marriage and what it did to the three kids is the piece I keep circling back to. That history presses on me when I think about raising our daughter. I want to earn the right to keep showing up for her, yet I also sense how easy it is to hide behind patient waiting and call it trust in God. Sometimes the waiting is just me avoiding the harder work of speaking what I see.

What came to mind was the counsel in a person’s heart being like deep water. An understanding person draws it out. I need to stop guessing and start restating what she says before I answer, especially when she asks me to talk. That restatement feels like the concrete step I can bring into mediation—listening until I can say back what I heard and let it land. It won’t fix the priors we don’t share, but it might let her fear show itself without me rushing to defend or retreat.

I’m not there yet. The habit of calculating my way out or waiting for her to see first is still strong. But naming the brokenness we already carry and choosing to draw out what’s underneath feels like the only direction that doesn’t keep us circling the same distance.