HINHF,
-Have you taken off your ring?
-Who is sleeping in the master bedroom? Hopefully she should be in a guest room since she blew up the marriage.
-Stay busy, avoid lounging at the house... take walks at night by yourself or with the kids instead of just watching tv where your WW could "join" the family and pretend everything can go back to normal. Hit the gym if you have a 24 hour gym in your area. Helps if you're a night owl.
-What's the status of the house? Are you going to have to sell it during/after the divorce? Are you going to buy your wife's interest out? If selling, start preparing for the sale. Start decluttering, start on improvements that you can handle to increase the sale value in the house. Keeps you busy and keeps your end goal in mind and helps with detachment.
If you're planning on buying your wife out- consider having a remodeler or interior decorator come by your home (obviously, during the day when your WW is there) to consult with you about what you want to do to the house after the divorce. May cost you a couple of hundred dollars or so for the consult, but it's not like your sinking thousands of dollars into it. Obviously, ignore/gray rock your WW during the visit, dismiss any 'suggestions' if she tries to insert herself...she should get the hint pretty fast. Maybe it's a redo of the kitchen, remodel of a room for a potential man-cave, or just new landscaping for the yard;
-Any pics of you and your wife hanging up in the house, on the fridge, in frames around the house? Take those down today.. Box up the photos for you and your WW to go through later. Keep up the photos of just the kids but if your WW is in one, take it down;
-Who is cooking the evening meals? You should talk to your wife about alternating nights about who is responsible for evening meals. When she cooks, you don't eat there... also you cook for just you and the kids. You can't/never cooked, you say? Find cooking classes for beginners in your area in the evenings.. You're about to be single, need to look out for yourself to be independent... also you're going to need to develop a couple of meals for two that you can confidently whip up for future potential date nights... Yes, you're probably not even thinking about dating at this time, which is good, but no reason why you can't start preparing and women love a man that can handle themselves in the kitchen;
-Talk to your kids about a future trip you all would want to take.
-Also, and I believed I asked you this last week or so... has your WW started looking for a job? She -NEEDS- to do this ASAP. Talk to your attorney to see if you can remove her phone and phone plan from your account unless she is willing to pay for her share. She wants to contact her APs on her phone, she can damn well pay for it. Again, talk to your attorney.
All these small steps have a purpose... first, keeps you busy and avoids downtime (where your WW can get to you to 'talk about us'), to help you with your detachment, to help you plan for the future and any goals you want to accomplish, hell you may just find yourself looking to the future with excitement and anticipation, and finally, your WW needs to face the stark reality that she is not going to part of your day-to-day life for much longer.
Also, if you take any of my suggestions above, do them with a smile on your face, act almost 'giddy' about the future, act excited about the future, even if you have to fake it. I know it's going to be hard, this shit is nothing that you wanted to go through in this stage of your life but keep taking action, keep looking ahead. Avoid (as much as you can) conducting the 'autopsy' of your marriage, and dwelling on the what-ifs... stay strong. Keep up with your children, but it's ok to start acting a little selfish when it comes to your life.
