I try to live my life in the open… mostly.

I try to be open to myself, open to the world, open to people.  I try not to hide who I am here.

But I still have been having a very difficult time getting to know other people in my real life.  In the past I have often felt very disconnected, cut off, unwanted, unloved, and unworthy. In short, I often felt LONELY.

Loneliness is not necessarily being ALONE

In the past I believed (wrongly) that my worth as a woman was determined by my ability to get a man. When I was with someone I gave up everything I was to try and be who that person wanted, whether that was “me” or not, and this often led me choosing men that were not compatible and with the men I was with treating me poorly (or maybe they wanted someone who would put up with their bullshit and they looked for the compliant, people-pleasing girls who would do ANYTHING for them??).   When I was not attached to a man I didn’t feel like I fit into the world – social life was very much a “couples” arena where the single people were gawked at as there was something “wrong” with them – and I would become desperate to find SOMEONE to like me.

I was pretty and lively and wonderful, but I believed boyfriends (and husband) who told me that I wasn’t – ugly, plain, boring, bitchy, frigid, slutty, fat, scrawny, flat-chested, stupid, moron, useless, unlovable… — because I based my worth on what the men in my life told me, and with how much I pleased them.  I was TERRIFIED of “ending up alone”.

I’m not going to go on about the hows and whys of getting into abusive relationships here – if you have been unlucky enough to find yourself involved in an abusive situation you know how hard it is to explain why you not only didn’t SEE it but why it was so freaking hard to get OUT of once you were in – but I do believe that the isolation that was caused by being involved in domestic/partner abuse helped solidify the pattern of jumping from one man to the next to the next in hopes that THIS relationship would magically be different, that it would be that perfect thing that fulfilled me.

Instead I went through one relationship after another that just left me HURT, confused, unloved, and profoundly LONELY. I put up with being called names, being told I was unlovable, useless, frigid, unloving, unkind, and that I wanted to be abused*.
*the ironic part was that while he was telling me that I WANTED to be abused, I was trying to get away from the “perfect” way he was treating me that I thought was abuse and HE thought was how a real loving, respectful relationship was supposed to be!

I would go from ONE abusive relationship that left me feeling lonely and unfulfilled to ANOTHER abusive, lonely, unfulfilling relationship… filling my life with the trying to make someone else love me enough to make me believe I was worthy.

And then something CHANGED

It’s hard to pin point WHAT exactly changed. I was with TheNoodle (R ), so it wasn’t like I was really a single woman who learned to be happy with her singlehood.  All I remember was a gradual sense of dissatisfaction with the way things were going with TheNoodle and trying to determine if this was really what I wanted in my life, if this was going to be “as good as it gets” was it gonna be better than being alone.

A radical change happened there, did you see it?  I was looking to see what I wanted out a relationship, and I actually balanced the idea of being ALONE against being stuck in yet another unfulfilling relationship!

I started to look at what I had in my life, my goals, my dreams… my potential. For the first time in my life I looked at how the relationship I found myself in with TheNoodle and placed it against the life I wanted to make for myself. And in EVERY aspect of my life I was better off WITHOUT TheNoodle — financially, socially, physically, sexually, spiritually, emotionally, with my family, with friends, with the kids, intellectually. He wasn’t abusive, he wasn’t violent… but he wasn’t worth the time and energy I put into him.

I started to realize that I was truly FREE to make my life my own, and to make it all I dreamed for myself and my children. I was no longer held back, I could make things HAPPEN if I wanted them to…

But not with TheNoodle holding me back.

I wanted to own a home.

I wanted to travel.

I wanted a good relationship with my kids.

I wanted to explore my spirituality.

I wanted to try new flavours, recipes, activities, experiences.

I wanted to be active

I want to LIVE my life. I want to EXPERIENCE. I want to PARTICIPATE in my life. I want to CONNECT, SHARE, and EXPERIMENT.

And when I stood back and really LOOKED at what I had gotten myself into with TheNoodle? Well… it was not gonna get me anywhere near the life I wanted.

And after thinking about it for MONTHS I came to the conclusion that I no longer wanted a relationship with him:

He wasn’t good enough for ME, it had nothing to do with me not being good enough for HIM.

He wasn’t worth my time and attention, my care, or my money. I could no longer JUSTIFY the mental, physical, emotional or FINANCIAL burden that he (and his kids) had become on my life.

My attitude changed for the better

Instead of focusing every night on how lonely I was and how upset I was that TheNoodle wasn’t honouring my feelings and needs in the relationship, I was actively doing things that I enjoyed. Instead of worrying about talking to him I was happy about being left to think for myself. Instead of wanting to see him, I found myself unhappy when he and his kids asked to visit and take up my precious free time.

I let it go.

I let go the idea that to be happy and fulfilled i NEEDED a relationship with a man.

I let go the idea that I couldn’t do things for myself, with myself, and by myself and feel “right”.

I started to focus on becoming comfortable with me.

I made a commitment to MYSELF to change the things in my life that I wasn’t happy with, and make them MINE again.

I’m not always SURE… but I know a few things right now:

• I am taking a sabbatical from dating/relationships to work on finding my OWN light
• I am focusing on my relationships with myself, my kids and my Gods
• I need time ALONE to focus on my own private work
• Sometimes the best thing I can do is housework or solitary chores
• I know when I need to be with others, I know when I need to work on solitary things
• Its okay to be a “Heartless Bitch” and enforce healthy boundaries

Some days it just feels like I am not fully equip to live in normal society.  There are a LOT of days where I feel IMMENSE and IMMEASUREABLE (although, let’s admit it I still TRY to measure it, I measure everything) guilt over the decisions I made in the past few years – right OR wrong – and how horribly I have “broken” things.

Every SINGLE day I deal with a litany of complaints from ALL arenas about my children. Either theEx is complaining because of expenses associated with the children or having to deal with some issue with that the kids are having, or it’s GirlChild’s teacher complaining about how GirlChild BEHAVES. And a lot of the issues are placed squarely on ME.

Yes. My children have some issues.  But they are fucking CHILDREN, they are going through a fucking LOT of crap in their lives, and it is NOT 100% MY FAULT. And the sooner people realize that blaming things on their mother only makes things worse for EVERYONE the better off we will all be.

Because of the pressure of trying to make EVERYTHING the way EVERYONE else in the world wants it to be, I have started counseling. There is just SO much pressure to make the kids “perfect”…

You know what? I wonder what they mean by PERFECT.

My kids:

BoyChild is a sensitive sort that has been dealing with issues surrounding not feeling like he belongs anywhere. The first 4 years of school he attended 4 different elementary schools, so he’d make friends and then we’d move… and so more than ANYTHING he wants to be part of something, to fit IN with someone. He’s a child that wants to be loved and cared about and ACCEPTED. 

It’s been hard, for sure.

BoyChild has definitely been desperate to fit in. He wants to be accepted by everyone around him – adults and children alike – and the problem is that some of the people we find in our lives will just NEVER accept him. That’s a hard thing for a child. Hell, that’s a hard thing for a lot of ADULTS. And its VERY hard for me, as his mother, to watch him struggle to be liked and accepted and still fall short. There are just some situations and some people that you can’t gain acceptance from… hard truth.

GirlChild is an anxious child. She has a lot of trouble focusing and following direction, especially when she doesn’t feel secure with the adults in her environment. That’s partly what her counselor seems to think, and I can see it being close to the truth. She isn’t WILLFULLY ignoring the “rules”, she’s asking for attention without knowing what she needs. Unfortunately, breaking the rules gets her in trouble, and getting in trouble with the adults makes her feel LESS secure and MORE scattered and LESS sure of her abilities and MORE likely to break the rules because she needs to feel SECURE.

There isn’t much I can do.

Or is there?

My counselor put this belief to the test: 

Do I validate their feelings? Sure I support them, but I really LISTEN to how they are feeling and teach them that how they feel is ACCEPTABLE?

I don’t know that I do.

Yes, that’s a HUGE failing on my part. But I believe it is something that I can recover from.

In January I mentioned things that I wanted to change in my life, and one of them was changing my parenting style – not to something that fits what OTHER people want from my children,  but to the parenting style *I* always WANTED to follow (but was prevented by the situation in which I lived and survived up until this point).

So far, I have been making slow changes in this area… but obviously there is more I can be doing.

My children, by virtue of their lives, need more acceptance and care and less strict, harsh, discipline. They are still hurting from things. And trying to “make them LEARN” through recrimination, disapproval, and spanking doesn’t work. I know this.

I know that BOTH my kids flourish and behave better when they are praised for the good they do, rather than being told they are “bad” or being spanked. When they are praised they bloom, they want more, and they REACH for it. When they are told only how bad they are being, how much they do wrong they wilt, they give up and they quit caring about the rules and the consequences.

I know how they feel…

It’s the same feeling that I had in my marriage, where I felt nothing I did RIGHT ever mattered, so why should I try? I was gonna get in trouble, no matter what I did, nothing I did was going to be rewarded, I was stupid, ugly, useless, a bitch, cold, unlovable, dumb, unwanted…

I don’t want my kids getting THAT message.

I have been uncomfortable with the idea of spanking my children for a LONG time… and yet, for quite a while I bent to the wills of those around me, those people telling me that if I didn’t want my children to become “brats” (or other hideously nasty labels) I needed to spank them to get the message through to them.  I don’t believe this. I have never believed that spanking was necessary. And yet, I spanked, and (worse) I allowed other people to spank my children.

When I had my babies I wanted to be an attachment parent – I breast fed, on demand, until they self-weened; I co-slept with them (BoyChild until  he was  1, GirlChild until she was 6 months); I wore them; I was anti-ferber/cry-it-out; I made my own babyfood; I delayed bottle feeding (pumped milk) and introducing solids – but I was vetoed on some things (cloth diapering and homeschooling) that I wanted to do.  TheEx did not agree about the attachment parenting thing. He was more than willing to leave the kids with his parents for hours (or days),  he objected to the kids sleeping in bed with us because he felt he was disturbed more with the fussing and feeding routine when we were in bed with him, and he definitely did not want the “stink or expense” of cloth diapering. The idea of homeschooling was completely out of the question since I had to agree to work outside the home when I had GirlChild.

But I let the opinions of other people, even people who really had no real right to a solid opinion on my parenting or my children, influence me.

Everyone seems to have an opinion about raising kids, and they don’t hesitate to share that with you whether you want it or NOT.

No more.

I have decided that I am going to try to focus on my OWN parenting, and not listen to what I need to do to be a “good” parent or what the kids need to be like to be “good” kids.  I am listening to my heart.

Yes, my kids have issues. Yes, they don’t always listen, they don’t always pay attention, they don’t always OBEY… but they are small people who deserve to be encouraged, not discouraged.

I am committing myself to finding the way that is right for US to be a family, to be HAPPY.

I’m gonna try not to stress that people don’t like my kids. I’m gonna find people who DO like them, and surround myself with family-positive people who will encourage me to parent positively and accept my children for who they are NOW instead of withholding love until they meet some artificial ideal.

The ideas of my ex – punishment, control, obedience – are being left behind…

I missed doing a Check-in last week because, well… things were crazy (and I was crazy exhausted because my neighbors woke me up SUPER early (4am) and I wasn’t well (UTI))… anyway here I am again…

The Bad Stuff

Still Exhausted

Just plain exhausted.  It seems that no matter how early I go to bed at night (I try to be in bed by 10pm, which is “early” since I get home from whatever activity I had that night at 8:30pm or 9:30pm and then I usually need to wash dishes and sweep floors and do some housekeeping) I don’t seem to be able to get a RESTFUL sleep.  With my anxiety over everything right now, and worrying that at any minute something unexpected will catch me off guard, I tend to wake up 4-6 times during the night.

Too Much to do

While I know I will get it done (I really have no choice with this) I am also keenly aware that this time I am completely on my own.  This is the first time in my life that I haven’t had either a partner OR family to help me move. And its freaking SCARY, because I feel like I am leaping out there and risking everything without any support. And I know that even when I was married I didn’t have support. And I know that I didn’t have support from R at all. But it FEELS different not having anyone at the end of the day… you know?

I just HAVE to get everything out of the old place in order to clean the place completely for the landlord. I might not like the way he treated me, or the fact that he never did any upkeep of the property once he left, but it is basic respect to leave the place clean…

I will do what I can to get it done. That’s all I can do.

Hard times in my head

I have been attending a group for women who have been involved in domestic violence situations AND have started seeing a counselor as well this week. This has been bringing up a lot of feelings that I had stuffed down for so long. I have been feeling LESS safe in my suite, with the partying going on over my head at all hours of the night, strangers coming and going and slamming doors, and having to call the police several times a week to get the neighbors above me to turn their music down so it doesn’t rattle the windows and pictures. I have been remembering all sorts of nastiness with theEx, theStalker, and ColdBlood that I thought that I had forgotten – outbursts, feelings of intimidation, fearful feelings – and it hasn’t really made it easy for me to deal with a lot of the things that I have going on in my life.  I have it on good authority, though, that I am, in fact, NOT crazy to have felt that these men treated my badly and that I DO have the right to have distanced myself from them.

Still… I think it’s gonna take time.

Haven’t been doing the journaling/tarot thing

I sorta dropped the ball this past weekend when the UTI and exhaustion caught me off guard, and the stress took over when I got LESS done than I wanted to (because of the feeling of ICK)… and the overwhelm took over when I got overscheduled and realized that I had only 3 weeks left. What that has meant is that I seemed to have dropped the 5 minute journaling/tarot card pull from my daily routine.  And I have realized I have felt… um… less grounded lately too. Although that COULD be that there is a deadline  or two or three bearing down on me right now…

I think maybe cutting the reading before bed by 5-10 minutes and putting this back into my routine might not be a bad idea.

The GOOD Stuff

Almost FREE

Although the stress is likely to do me in this next 3 weeks… I am almost free from the daily stress and pressure of living in a shared dwelling with people who do not know how to respect differences and needs of others. Maybe it’s wrong of me to expect them to have some sort of idea of how to respectfully SHARE space and do things like:

• Clean up after their dog when she messes in the laundry room
• Clean up the yard after she deposits dog-logs all over EVERYTHING
• Not leave garbage on the back step where their dog will rip it open and SHRED it all over the yard
• Remove their laundry from the laundry room when they are done
• Turn their music down when asked politely, or by 11pm as per the general noise ordinance
• NOT slam the doors when they go in and out
• NOT allow their friends to try to get into my suite (or not DARE their friends to do that)
• NOT smoke drugs (or actually ANYTHING) in the house

Anyway… it’s just a matter of DAYS before I get away from having to live with them and they become someone ELSE’s problem.

ALMOST DIVORCED!

After 2.5 years away from theEx, I have FINALLY signed the affidavit for dissolution of marriage. According to the MoronLawyer, now it goes to HIS lawyer and then to the Court of Queen’s Bench. Depending on how busy the courts are, and how many holidays fall in the middle of the process, it could be anywhere from 4-6 more weeks before I am finally granted the certificate of divorce.

It was an expensive milestone, but I needed to be free from ties to him.

My own STYLE

With my own home comes the ability to decorate in my OWN style. Sure it will be a while before I will be able to afford to replace my living room furniture, but over time I will be making my new home MINE.

This is the first time in my life that I will have a space that I don’t need to get permission to do what I want to my own space. I don’t have to be accountable to my parents, a boyfriend, a husband or a landlord!! I can (and will) paint the walls whatever colour I want. I can put down whatever kinds of rugs I want! I can hang up my needlework and my degrees. I get to decide what I want to do, and I get to make it happen… WITHOUT ANYONE ELSE SAYING I CAN’T!

I can (and will) put up an altar. I can do a house blessing. I don’t have to account for ANYONE if I want bright colours or dark colours or even WHITE all over the place. It will be MY place.

It’s the first part of my independence!

Making my friend Sunil come to visit

Yes, I totally intend to make my friend Sunil visit… and help paint things garish colours (and likely help pack a few things, and do a house blessing ) and you know why? Because I have a house!! And because he totally needs to visit and celebrate with me! HOUSE!! YAY!! DIVORCE (almost)!! YAY!! BEING SINGLE !! YAY!!!

Yes, I like to make up events to make Sunil visit – like throwing myself a baby shower when I had GirlChild and throwing myself a birthday party when I turned 35 – maybe its kinda sad that I throw so many parties FOR myself??

 Whatever.

Being SINGLE and LOVING it!!

It has been about 3 weeks since the breakup with R and I feel like I have really blossomed as a single woman.  Other times when I was single I was looking for ways to get into another relationship. Yes, there are certain benefits to being in a relationship (*ahem* you know what they are… but also having someone to lift heavy stuff for you or get things off the top of things is good… and killing big bugs), but I am starting to realize that I am fine alone.

I am actually LESS lonely now than I was when I was with R. And that is how I know that the relationship wasn’t really meant to go any farther than it did.

More amazing to me is that I am not really that interested in trolling more dating websites and trying to find “Mr Right” through online chat sessions. Not right now, anyway. I might go back to wanting to find someone to go on dates with or talk to on the phone, or to share special events with… but that’s a someday kinda thing. Because when I seek again I will be looking for someone who gets ME and who will treat me RIGHT and not just whomever will take me without too much whining complaints.

I am happy to be alone right now. I can make a mess doing my scrapbooking thing if I want to. I can spend hours doing needlework WITHOUT having to watch football. I can try out new recipes. I can WRITE. I can explore my spirituality. I can learn to love the ME that is ME.

And I am gonna give MYSELF and MY KIDS a special valentine’s day – I’m gonna make chocolate pancakes with strawberries (for them, because, dudes I can’t do chocolate before NOON) and maybe we’ll go see a movie after dance class (well… after SUPPER after dance class, because I don’t want to fill them up with junk ALL day)…  I am hoping we get some packing and cleaning done as well… but I think that this is something WE need to do as a family.

I know that when I do start to seek love again I will have a MUCH different attitude about how I want to be treated and a MUCH lower threshold for “men behaving badly”…

CHANGE IS GOOD

I think if I keep saying this to myself I might come to believe it (laugh). But I know that this time it is true… this change will be for the better and the stress will be totally worth it, if I can just keep it together for another few weeks.  

I will be getting my OWN internet (connection) and a home phone (part of a deal to try it out for 3 months) and that will be different. I haven’t had a home phone system for 2.5 years… and I have gotten used to not being able to call anyone outside of my city. And to have a (sorta) phone line for even 3 months with UNLIMITED long distance will feel SO good! I can CALL people and not worry that my cell bill will be astronomical… Don’t know if I will KEEP it though.

Part of the plan is also a free 3 month trial of cable tv. Which is odd because I am also keeping my satellite tv system (rather than paying $200 to cancel it with a month remaining) and a PVR rental system. I have 3 months to see which system I prefer, satellite or cable, and then cancel the other… and make any changes to my existing internet and phone systems as well…  

But I will need a phone handset AND a wireless router.

Oh, and curtains

That is all

I am starting to panic

No, seriously, I’m not sure if I can “get ‘er done” and get everything moved.  It feels like there is SO much to do and I don’t know if I can get it all completed in time.

This is the first time I will be moving on my own with minimal help.

The first time without a “partner” to assist in packing and cleaning and arranging things (although I did all the logistics)

The first time without family assistance

The first time I need to deal with 2 homes at once – moving stuff out , doing repairs, and cleaning the old place while painting and setting up a new place.

The first time I will OWN a place on my own

And I haven’t even started packing

You heard me, I haven’t started packing yet.

I intended to do a bunch of it this past weekend… but things didn’t work out that way. Friday found me exhausted from being kept awake late by the neighbors and then woken up AGAIN by same neighbors at 4am when they decided to turn their music UP… I was a walking zombie Friday at work.

Added to that, the stress seemed to finally catch up with me and I ended up with the beginning of a UTI. I plain didn’t feel like trying to find boxes and drag everything out and pack it up.

And then I had to run out to the Scout camp on Saturday night to go to campfire for my BoyChild because his father had only agreed to let BoyChild GO if he didn’t have to do anything other than drop him off and pick him up (and BoyChild wanted to go and for some reason hoped his father would care enough to come and participate with all the other parents at the campfire event… he doesn’t know his father very well, does he?). So in order to not make BoyChild feel like no one cared about him, I trucked my sorry (and SORE) ass out in the snow to the middle of nowhere to be there for my kid.

That’s how I roll, yo!

And Sunday… well… I wanted to REST because I hadn’t slept well and I hadn’t felt well…. I just wanted downtime.

I should have booked myself off from all other obligations and found boxes and packed. But I didn’t.

So I have to find a way to find boxes between my full time job, evening activities and obligations, housework, and parenting this week. Which I am thinking won’t be easy to do because this week I have something each evening – Scouts, Dance,  counseling appointment, support group, kids – so unless boxes fall from the sky or I purchase banker boxes I will have to wait until the weekend to start packing…

And that’s not ALL I have to do, I still have to:

• Change my address for all my accounts and things
• Get my satellite service moved
• Get internet hooked up in my house
• Choose paint colours
• Figure out when people can bring deliveries
• Disassemble things which can’t fit out the doors of the old place
• Fix doors and paint issues in the old place

And OMG taxes need to be done… and things need to be dealt with.

I don’t feel qualified to do this stuff on my own. I don’t feel like I should be solitary, but I am. I feel like I need family,  I need care and love and being part of a group that will actually work with me. Sometimes, in the dead of night, I realize that I am truly alone in a world that is dark and scary. Where I thought I would have someone to have and to hold, I have cats who only want to be fed or to trip me in the dark.

I am glad to be single right now, don’t get me wrong. The alternatives would be theEx (abusive and distant), the Stalker (hoarder and clingy, also live the cycle of abuse), or Reg (totally tuned out of life), and I am happier without any of them. I am happier without being told what to do or think or say or be or eat or feel. I am happier doing my crafty things and being active (when its not too cold out) than sitting around gaining weight and watching tv. I am happier spending my time and energy on my children, rather than on being the perfect little wifey . I am happy with my mild clutter and clean spaces rather than facing the potential of dealing with a hoarder on a daily basis.

I look forward to having a home of my own and having MY tastes and style front and center. I want to explore who I am and what I am, and have that show in my space.

But sometimes, late at night, I wish I had someone to hug. I wish I had someone to help haul crap with me.  I wish that there was someone out there who could accept me for me…

I wish it didn’t feel “too late” for a 35 year old mother of 2… sometimes its just 2am inside my mind.

In the light of day I know it will all be okay. Not because I am stronger than I think (I am) or because there will be something magical that happens to pull it off at the last minute (there might be)… but because it has to be.

I just can’t seem to slow down time to give me more space …

Some days are hard

 Last week, knowing my current relationship was in the toilet, realizing that I would have to have “the talk” I found my stomach in knots and my self esteem tanking. I was avoiding his calls, I was not at all interested in talking to him online or in person, and I was finding myself RELIEVED that he had found something better to do than waste my time by deciding that he and his daughters would come and stay with me.  I was soundly in denial about how BADLY this relationship went and why I allowed it to continue on for SO freaking LONG…

Last week, I was feeling alone and unwanted… and more than a bit scared to admit to myself that  I wanted OUT of my relationship. I am a 35 year old single mother! I work full time hours! I volunteer ! I take classes! I write! I am a great person!! Why was I so afraid to start over and try to find someone worth my time, energy, and my warm generous nature?

Last week I was GLAD that R “manned up” and told me he didn’t want to see me anymore (not in so many words, mind you it was more like “we’ve been drifting and… you know where this is going”) after me asking him, after me asking him for 6 months just to be honest with me about whether he was still interested or not. For the record, I knew that he lost interest in me almost the day he first said “I love you” to me… his actions spoke of neglect and fear from that point on, making me feel confused and insecure.  But he would never tell me that he wasn’t interested in a relationship anymore.

A week ago I found relief in the fact that R finally admitted that to him this had been “casual”… and that the feelings that I had been denying for so long had been RIGHT if I had only listened to them a year ago!

Still the hard won out that night, the feeling of relief was washed away by the sting of FINALLY knowing the truth of the situation. I felt lied to. I felt deceived. I felt… USED. I felt like once more I had allowed a man to walk all over me for acceptance and companionship. And to realize that, in reality, I had not gotten even the most basic companionship with R, he had only stayed with me for what he thought he could get out of me:

• he gave things only grudgingly out of obligation
• In a year we went on maybe 4 dates, tops.  
• I was a hotel and daycare centre for him.
• He rarely contributed.
• He rarely showed any thought about my feelings.
• He freely took from me and never gave in return

Why did I stay with someone who used me as a hotel and daycare service? Who only called when he wanted me to do something for him? Who never complimented me? Who ignored me constantly? Who never once did something nice for me, just to let me know they cared??? What the HELL was I thinking?

I excused his thoughtless behavior over and over – he was stressed about his ex-wife wanting custody of HER children back; he was stressed because he didn’t have as much money as he wanted to have; he was stressed because he wasn’t getting child support; he was stressed because he was going through a hard divorce; he was stressed because his daughters are horribly behaved – and I took his word that he never meant to be thoughtless it just never occurred to him to that he was not doing right by me.

Until the night he told me that, this whole fucking year of my life HE considered our relationship “just casual”…

 I didn’t MISS him, because there hadn’t been anything to miss!

There was remarkably LITTLE change in my life. There were no mementos to throw away. There was no jewelry or trinkets to remind me that R had shared this period of my life and very few pictures of us together. And I knew that he had even LESS to remember me by! I felt that he had missed out on a great person, but that neither of us was in the ideal situation to create a relationship on our own.

He had given all indications that he wanted to be left alone… and now he would be.

I had heard it from his friends, I had witnessed it in the way he acted to his friends, his children and to me. I just refused to acknowledge it.  Didn’t matter who the person was, he didn’t want to deal with anyone other than himself. He preferred to spend huge swaths of time tuned out watch tv or sleep while his kids were gods-only-knew where doing gods-only-knew what, and he was perfectly happy to do that no matter what anyone else thought about it.

 That night that all the turmoil, all the fight, all the RESPECT I had for this man whom I thought was “doing the best he could given the stress he was under”  just washed away and I saw just how little RESPECT he had granted to ME.

 And I sat in the dark, and I thought about these things. I thought about how I had seen the relationship and how I had tried to be there for not only R but his children. I thought about all the times I reached out to help him, but he didn’t return the favour. I thought about how often I asked for just the bare minimum, but that was too much. And I thought about all that I had given up (financially, physically, emotionally) to build a relationship with someone who saw me pretty much as a “place to stay and girl to fuck” and nothing more.

The realizations POURED out of me, the bitterness I had held back within myself for so long;  I was ANGRY about how I was treated!!!  And GODDAMMIT, I DESERVED TO FEEL ANGRY!! For once, not really caring about how other people would label my feelings, I felt ANGRY at R, I felt USED, I was BITTER, I believed I DESERVED BETTER!!

All the feelings that “good girls” don’t admit to coursed through me and out, cleansing me of this relationship.

Within 24 hours I realized how LUCKY I was. I took his numbers off my phone. I deleted him from my MSN. I took “I’m in a relationship” off FaceBook. And I still wasn’t sad.

 By Friday I was feeling like a NEW PERSON.

I dropped my kids off with theEx for his two weeks and I went out and bought myself a bottle of white wine. I came home and I cooked myself a meal that I wanted to try, with new ingredients and a bunch of new flavours. I poured myself a nice glass of cold white wine, put in a movie *I* wanted to watch, and ate my supper.  I made myself a cup of tea, ran a bath, and read a book. I wore my favourite pj’s, I watched another movie, wrote in my journal and chatted with a few friends. I went to bed when I wanted to, feeling SO happy with my life! I got up and had a shower and PUT ON MAKEUP!! I went out and purchased things for my new home. I went out for lunch and socializing with a writing group. I did my needlework. I took care of myself.

 I DID MY OWN THING

 For the first time in a year I wasn’t thinking about R or if he would call or when I would see him again, I knew he was out of my life! I didn’t care if he would disapprove of me drinking, because he no longer had the privilege of having an opinion in my life. I acknowledged my bitterness and anger about the way he handled my heart, but vowed only to be more aware and cautious “next time” I put myself out there.

 I spent time being HAPPY with myself, indulging MYSELF with the things that made my happy:

• My favourite movies
• Writing
• Reading
• Needlework
• Having a bath
• A cup of tea/ a glass of wine
• A tarot reading