I'm back and I'm gone

Okay, It has been a long, long time since I posted, but If you have read my blog before, you surely know that I was formerly in an abusive relationship. On that front, I have started going to group sessions to help to re-learn my coping mechanisms, deal with my fears that are getting in the way of my life, and to truly heal from that time. As I write this, I am aware that I will have been out of that relationship for 9 years this July. After some time floundering as a stay at home mom I am learning to value myself again and to be proud of what I do even though it isn't a paying, outside of the home, " real" job. I am changing my blog, though, so don't expect to see more posts on here for a while ;)

Cleaning house

In effort to save my marriage, one thing I have to do is get my house in good shape before I get my husband home from his operating center tomorrow. I've put it off too long, so I have a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it in. This is Crisis Cleaning at its worst. Fortunately, I have plans to do a massive de-clutter on Sunday. My mom is watching my boys and we are hitting the basement and getting stuff out of here. You can't clean clutter. It has gotten bad. We are holding too much junk. This is also true with my emotional junk. I am in the process of trying to sort out some things and clear them out. (I have body clutter too, but pregnancy is not time to lose weight, just to try not to gain too much again.) I am going to start my baby steps over.
It isn't easy realizing that you've been holding a grudge against your spouse for 4 years, but that is exactly what I've done. When I was expecting our first son he moved someone in with us that I clashed with at every turn. She is the mother of a friend and she had lost her apartment after her mother passed away. Part of me wanted to help, but I knew that she lied. She lied a lot. She lied about things that didn't matter to us, and she lied to get pity and attention. She had no income and no desire to get a job. She had a horrible sense of entitlement and expected us to pay for all of her expenses for an undefined amount of time. She also spurred fights between me and my Superman. He has a big heart. I love that about him, but I couldn't stand that he was putting me in such an uncomfortable position. Situations changed, the woman moved out before our second child was born and got a job. Superman changed, he realized he was hurting me, but the damage was done. I didn't trust him to have the best interests of our family at heart. I have been moody, depressed, anxious, unyielding in my way of doing things. I got lazy. I was afraid that if I changed, if I let him back in, he'd hurt me like that again. We got married in 2011, but I wasn't myself. I have been a bitter shell holding on to the edge of what I want but afraid to take it into myself and lay myself bare to the fact that I was mad at him.  Now it is definitely time to forgive him. To forget the hurt, but remember the lesson. To stand up for myself and to show him love and respect in ways he understands, and to let him love me again. I have found another resource to help me too. Hearts At Home (hearts-at-home.org) is an online community and forum for Moms. They cover topics from marriage, faith, and family to home and organizing. I would love to be able to attend one of the conferences. That would be an awesome experience.
 
I highly recommend the Fly Lady method for anyone struggling with housekeeping. (www.flylady.org)

Return of an old problem

I have been dealing with a lot. My in-laws' health problems, effectively being a single mom because my husband is an Over -the-road truck driver, my own issues, a crisis of faith, the fact that my boys are typical two and three year old boys, and more. I started another blog ( www.blogspot.com/countingbless ) as a way to try to make myself look at the positive things I have going for me. Today I am struggling with a feeling that my ex is trying to hurt me any way he can. U e once threatened that if I had someone else's baby, he would kill me and my child. I have two children with my dear, awesome hubby. My ex now has a little girl with his wife.  Still, I am scared of dealing with him. The point is, my dad called me yesterday with news that the house my ex and I owned together was being foreclosed on. This was news to me. I was beyond angry. He was supposed to have refinanced the house and taken my name off of it almost 6 years ago. I haven't been able to afford an attorney to take him back to court, so I was waiting, apparently I may have waited too long. Now I fear my credit will be damaged. This situation stinks. I will be in contact with my local legal aid tomorrow to see if I qualify for help. Honestly I just want to throat punch the sick, sadistic, sack of manure for not doing what he was supposed to years ago. Lesson learned - anyone who is 4 quarts of stupid in a 3 qt container is a mess that no one needs in their life.

What a great day!

Today was a great day. I had some errands to run which the boss and I got done with minimal fussing. We grabbed some lunch and took it to the park for a picnic. The boss were super good and ate at the picnic table really well. Then we went for a walk down to see the lake.  We drove out to my dad's new place. On the drive, Turtle- bug fell asleep. After a small spat, Stink-bug took a nap, but the little guy wouldn't go back to sleep. They ate the sweeter- than-I- usually- allow snack, and let me watch one of my favorite shows. We are having my mom over for dinner, so I may actually get to clean under my furniture too. All in all today is adding up quite well, and we are adjusting to Superman being out on the road, though him being with us would have made it infinitely better.

I didn't do it.

In my "recovery process" trying to move beyond the past and fully enjoy the wonderful life I have now I have had occasion to reflect on my past relationship and why it didn't work. Don't get me wrong, I know I'm not the perfect partner and I am not fully innocent in the ultimate demise of my first marriage, but I didn't make him that way. I did not imagine it and I didn't make him become that way.

This is something that I have discovered is a common thread in women who have survived an abusive relationship. Blaming yourself or wondering if you "made him do it" or if you just "created the monster in your head" is not uncommon, but it is not what happened to me. I thought about it. What I decided was this: Look at his history! He was not innocent before the relationship in question. In my case my ex had molested his cousin when he was 7 (he admitted that to me when we were married), he had chased his sister through the woods and tried to stab her on the hood of an old car that was dumped down there (I saw the slash marks on the car he'd  have killed her), and another ex girlfriend had pressed charges against him for assault. I didn't create the monster, but I did a good job of ignoring it.I am guilty of putting myself in a bad situation and thinking I could "fix" someone, but I didn't make him that way  and I won't be turning my current husband into a monster because he wasn't one before I met him.
The bottom line is that my life is wonderful now because I have built it that way for myself. I do deserve it. I deserve to be happy and I deserve to have people in my life that want me to be happy. Learning that has been a challenge, and it it something that I still work on and affirm daily, but it is true!

Keeping my mouth shut is not something I've ever been good at

Don' t get me wrong, if I'm trusted with a secret it'll go with me to the grave. I just can't keep my opinions to myself so well. Just heard some news the other day that almost made me physically ill. My ex-husband is going to be a father?! There are lots of people in this world who would make excellent parents who can't have children, but this! I don't know for sure that he will abuse the child, but all of the warning signs are there! Anyone who has done the things he has done or collected the things he used to have could not have changed so much. If anything he is hiding what he truly is and it will come out. I truly fear for that child. The worst thing is that there is not one damn thing I can do to protect it. I don't know why I feel like I should other than that no child should ever have to live with someone like that.
The whole thing has got my mind going to dark places that I usually try to avoid. The only thing I can do is to focus on the fact that I got out and luckily my babies have a WONDERFUL father who wants nothing but the best for them and would protect me and them to the death. It makes me want to move out of town. I don't want my children to have to associate with any child he has. I had seriously hoped that he couldn't have children, but now I find myself hoping that his new wife will wise up and leave him and never ever let him be alone with that baby. I think if I move away I won't think about it. I won't ever have to deal with the situation of my children asking me why they can't go to a party at so-and-so's house. It is a small town. I am feeling helpless. I just need to let it go. I need to focus on me and my family and what I have here. I need to stay out of it, but I can't be totally silent. (which is why I'm subjecting any readers of my blog to this rant).  Seriously some people should not be allowed to breed.

Daddy's being a soldier

When I was trying to find a way to tell my oldest that his daddy was gone for drill weekends I came up with this phrase to describe it. He isn't "playing army" there is not much play going on where he is right now. This weekend is one of his three day weekends and it isn't easy to have him away. I'm really not looking forward to the upcoming deployment (I've been told I can't expand upon that at all). It will be our first one since we've been together if you don't count the almost-deployment that happened when I was pregnant with Stinkbug. He re-injured himself in training (but still completed the training with one working arm). He has healed up back to his old self and the next one ... well we don't expect they will taser him this time. I've come up with ideas to help the kids get through a year without Daddy. We plan to get him a laptop so we can Skype, a recordable story book so he can read to the kids whenever they want, and I may make them "Daddy dolls" if I can get a good full-body picture of him in his ACU's. I don't know what I'm going to do for me though. I'm going to miss him like crazy. Daddy's being a soldier, my husband is a soldier. It isn't what he does it is who he is. It is part of what makes him who he is (the man I love). It won't be easy, but millions have been through it and we'll make it too. I have some time still before this happens. I am an independent and strong-willed woman and Superman is as strong-willed and independent as I am. He drives me crazy in good ways and bad. We compliment each other though and we make each other stronger. If I can put up with him being here I can put up with him being gone, and I will be all the happier when he does come home.

My Superman!  I <3 You!