Weeks 28 & 29 of 52 – Cherish

Oops! For very,very busy last week helping get the house ready for guests:

This weekend was quiet so these pics are from last week..
1- lots of mega block towers
2- walking to church (we took my cousins’ daughter)
3- painting help
4- the hallway I didn’t let them help paint on. Trying to decide what color to buy after the first one is terrible!

Week 27/52 – Cherish

Here are my images for this week
1-excitedly trying on uniforms for first grade
2-wearing costumes at a local historical reenactment (her and her cousin!) I finished them the day before 😉
3-birthday for “baby”
4- drawing of “home” at church complete with furniture on the upper porch!

Well… I’m divorced.

Got a thick envelope in the mail today. It was the official papers with a note saying that the court accepted them and I was officially divorced as of last Wednesday.

What a weird system. I can’t think of anything else important in life where you find out after the fact like that… Well, the court system is not a recommended way to get divorced, so as my daughter’s camp says “you get what you get” to which the girls last summer modified to “and you don’t freak out about it” (Since there was a LOT of freaking out last summer….oh… I wonder why? 😉 but I digress… )

It took exactly 1 year and two days from the day I asked my husband to move out until this. 5 lawyers. 3 judges. I don’t remember how many trips to the court house. And I don’t want to know how much $$$$.

But no trial. I didn’t clean up, actually I gave away quite a bit financially to get this settled (“Monied spouse” and all that) but the kids are more important than money. I can always earn more money. They are safe and happy and I did my best to ensure that they stay that way.

The odd thing is that I was just thinking yesterday if it was time to start a different blog… Maybe one more parenting focused or craft focused (or both)… Odd. Very odd. But as a divorced person it seems inappropriate to blog under the title Struggling for happily ever after.

Besides I want to share my blog with friends and I haven’t been able to. Partially because this is anonymous and with all the legal stuff I wanted it to stay that way. But also because so many of my posts are really personal and raw… It would be too much to share with a new IRL friend or acquaintance. Total TMI. {i can just picture it: “hi, normal happily married person…wow, you are a blogger about your knitting and homeschooling? So cool! I’m a blogger too! Here’s a link to my blog…. “. Next time I see them they edge away and refuse eye contact… Lol!}

I haven’t decided… But I think I will start one and decide if I keep this blog going for my crazy ex stories. Email me at strugglingforeverafter at gmail or comment below if you are interested in following my new blog incarnations …..

D

Week 26/52 – Cherish

Here are my moments this week:

1-Mud!

2-bob the builder

3-Diving into a stack of hand-me-down books from a coworker (her daughter just graduated from college!)

4-my cousin just moved in below us. She has a daughter near age to my son. Here she is “reading” a book to my son.

In-law family pressure

My soon-to-be-ex’s family is having a big family reunion this summer. In four weeks, on fact.

Since hubby doesn’t have overnights and it is about 6 hours away, this event would not be allowed by our current parenting plan. They asked the children’s attorney and he feels that this event is “not conducive to adequate supervision” of him with the children.

Since they didn’t get what they want from the courts (and they didn’t take up my offer to bring the children to the event), they are now asking other family member to call me and basically pressure me into letting the kids (or at least my older daughter) go to the reunion.

What I find more fascinating is that they aren’t making any promises or offering anything different (like someone else volunteering to supervise). Nope. They just feel like I should give in. And if they ask enough (and talk about how my daughter will miss out, insinuating that I would be a bad mother if I didn’t allow this) that I will give up and give them want that want.

I guess I might feel better about it if they took the supervision seriously. But hubby continues to drive the kids unsupervised. God only knows if he is supervised the rest of the time. Remember this is the man who had seriously angry (scary)outbursts just 3 1/2 weeks ago…. On a day where he was having parenting time and “supervised”.

In reflection, it is pretty insulting. And it makes their opinion that the supervision is unnecessary legal bullcrap pretty clear.

Do I attempt to raise this concern? Do I negotiate and ask to someone to take responsibility for my daughter?

Or do I just say No?

Perplexed….
D

Ps: linking up with Shell Pour you hear out… Hoping for some advice!

Week 25/52 – Summer solstice

Vacation week! So tons and tons of pictures…

Here are some high points for cherish this week:

My son loves it when you play with him. Lots of sandbox time.


Appreciating nature (a slug!)


Tastes of summer


swings!

My yelling triggers

I have been reading a lot about yelling. And criticism / nattering at your kids. As well as guilt vs shame. It seems that the universe keeps sending me messages that this is a issue I need to pay attention to.

So I have been trying. And boy, oh boy has it been trying 😉

My first lesson is that nattering is what I do when I am trying not to yell, but I feel I have to DO SOMETHING… So if I can stay away from feeling like yelling then my nattering will be better too.

So why do I yell? What are my yelling triggers?

Here is the list I have come up with (so far):

• Being hot or cold or hungry.
• Allergies
• repetitive noises. (This is a problem with being hot since the room air conditioners drive me a little crazy. So I avoid turning them on then I am hot)
• Feeling rushed or late
• When my daughter doesn’t listen to me. By about the third time, I get fed up and yell and THEN she responds
• When I feel powerless over my children, such as when they are both running amuck
• When I feel overwhelmed by my children, such as when my son is melting down and my daughter is talking over him, demanding my attention for something (typically something stupid!)
• When I am upset (angry, guilty, etc) at something else in my life, such as when I just received a unpleasant email from my mother-in-law

It all comes down to taking care of myself and MY emotions.

But the most sobering realization is that I don’t know how to parent “bad” behavior without yelling or nattering. If the kids aren’t acting the way I want, I don’t have any other tools in my tool box. I feel like I have to do something or I am a Bad Mom. (Shame! Did you read this Mothering article about shame vs guilt?)

Wow. Where do we get these thoughts? And why do we tie ourselves up in such unkind judgements?

Week 24/52 – Cherish

I have taken 242 pictures in the past 6 days! Dance open house, dance recital, teacher presents, last day of school, kindergarten graduation, grand father in town, summer party prep & party, and Father’s Day presents… Yikes! Busy week.

Here are some ordinary moments to cherish for the week;

Hiding items in play dough and then cutting them out

Week 23/52 – Cherish

Here are my images for this week:

Yes we got to EAT some strawberries (only a couple had bunny bites)

Pretending to be a doggy

I worked hard for years on the side yard to have blooms… “Fruit” of my labor

My son has discovered Legos!

check out him looking at the plan…and reconstructing the mini figs

Besieged (not really, just feels that way)

I had a great post all planned out today. I was going to talk about all the great advice I have when your Ex (or soon to be ex, or significant other) is behaving a bit crazy, angry and stalker-ish.

But I can’t finish it.

I realized that I was stressing myself out and thinking about the situation while trying to write the post. So, for my mental health, that post is going have to wait a little while.

Today I still feel besieged. I think it is a little PTSD and waiting for the next crazy to hit. I am trying to breath… To stop thinking about HIM and just be present in my life. But it is so HARD.

Why?

Divorce trial was prevented by 30 minutes on Friday when he signed the papers (Yeah?!?). Two nasty texts and a voicemail that afternoon. Saturday was quiet. Sunday – several nasty texts. (No, I don’t read them, just a quick glance to see “yup, nasty message” and I turn the phone off.)

Monday (yesterday), my mom received nasty phone call, voice mails, and a broken former-present hung on her mailbox with nasty messages written on in.

I received 10 calls in two hours. When it became clear he wouldn’t stop until I talked to him, I called and let him rant for 4 minutes. Which he wouldn’t start until I said “I am listening to you”. (!). (When it became clear that the rant was an intimidation via anger, I recorded the rest of it, if needed.)

Last night, he sent a text at 10:30. While, the content was fine (he thanked me for listening) it was after I went to sleep and just got my fight-and-flight going again. I didn’t get back to sleep for more than a hour. (Which, actually, was pretty good, considering)

And now I am stressing about the THREE school/dance events that my daughter has early next week that will require both of our attendance.

I changed the lock again yesterday.

I am going to talk to my mother-in-law about her doing all the pickups and drop offs without him for the next while.

I called the kids schools to let them know what is going on.

And I am going to keep breathing. And reminding myself that I am not in danger. And my kids are not in danger. There is not need to have fight-or-flight.

Just breath.

Just breath…

D

PS- all has been quiet for the past 36 hours! Yeah! Yes, if it continued I was going to contact the authorities. Luckily that was not necessary, because it actually would have made him MORE angry. :-(. Linking up with Shell’s Pour your heart out