Wise words from Erebos.

DadFMF - That texting thing just doesn't strike me as a big enough deal to have generated as much marital collapse as has occurred, if there just wasn't all that solid a foundation there before. Somehow, I don't think you two knew each other very well when you tied the knot. Then deployment kept you in different worlds. Along the way, you haven't really figured her out. She, on the other hand, seems to have thoroughly concluded that she likes her life better with you out of it.

As far as giving her space goes, she's had 9 months of you being gone. She's set up a new household that you are locked out of. This gal has provided herself with all kinds of space. She doesn't need you to give her any. Whatever she wants, she'll take. But you do come in handy as a babysitter. She seems to like her free time without the kids, when that suits her.

What seems very clear to me is that she has already ended this marriage. I'm sorry, but it really sounds to me as though she simply does not love you. She has moved on and she is not coming back. She has a vision for her future that does not include you. I don't believe any amount of counseling can put it back together. This is not about her being hurt. This is about her having already resumed living single, and she likes it just fine. She wants to date other men and that's what she's been doing. She's tested the waters, and she has decided that she likes the options that she'll have free of you. It's horribly hurtful for you to get hit with this in the way she is doing it, but she doesn't sound to me like she has a big problem with hurting people. I mean she was hanging out with a married man.

But I don't know how it is legal for a woman to just tell a man that he can't live with his own children - when the two of you aren't even legally separated. Give her space!??? Are you kidding me!? What happened to the place where you were living before that last deployment? Look what she did when your deployment "gave her space." Now she says you can hang around, or do what you want, or whatever . . . but she's not filing for divorce. ???

Get to a lawyer and ask: "How can my wife take my children, set up a household of her own, forbid me access to it and just tell me to go do what I want?" Get into that lawyer's office NOW. If the lawyer is any good at all, he/she will know more what your wife is up to than you have any idea of yourself. I'm not saying you should pursue divorce. That might be the last thing you should do at this point in time. But you've got interests to protect - the welfare of your children and control of your financial resources.

She is leaving you. She has already left you. She has taken your children away from you (except when she needs time away from the kids.) She's got a plan way beyond what she's told you about. A lawyer can possibly figure out what she's angling for . . . and she's angling. Stop letting her make your plans for you. Go get legal advice about this whole mess. Nevermind feeling guilty about this or that in your past. Explain to an attorney that you had no earthly idea about leaving your wife, but came home to find she has left you. Ask what your options are and what implications pursuing them will have. Get any money you have as much under your own control as possible. Ask a lawyer what you should be concerned about financially. She's thinking way faster than you, and you need to catch up.