Finding the Balance then Tipping the Scale (3)

[neffer]

You are right Adam. It´s about learning to honesty love ourselves. Just not in a selfish way. We need to love ourselves to be able to love others. Easy to say...

Keep shining there man!

((((A))))

[Adam04]

Today, W discussed the options on the buyers and I listened and chose one so now we have the ball rolling. She discussed a possible contingency with temp leasing. I agreed and she brought up that I can move in the new house for a while if the funds are tight. I didn't say anything. I've decided to be unfazed and show her that nothing of our sitch is bothering me.

That all sounds fine. I just wanted to add a quick comment that while getting out of the house can be emotionally draining, in the long run it's probably the best scenario. My brother dug in his heels and refused to leave their big house when he and his ex got D'd. They've been D'd for 10 years or so and that house has been an albatross around his neck. He's deeply in debt because of the big bills and property taxes and basically stuck there because he can't afford to fix it up to sell and he's upside down on the mortgage thanks to cash-out refi's. Just do what you can to live within your means, we've been through enough without adding financial woes on top of everything else!

Hey AS, thanks for the reassurance. For a second, I thought about what if I stayed back, but it’s not ideal; it’s quite a ways from the new place and where the kids will be.

I remember seeing you post about your bros sitch. Sorry to hear about that. Sounded like he was cutting off his nose to spite his face from what I remembered between him and xW. It seems really easy for the LBS to get hung up with dealing with the emotional baggage that it can stunt any forward progress. It’s a choice we must make though to let go of theirs, own ours, grit down and keep going.

Definitely will plan to live within my means. It’ll take some adjusting and making things work.

[Adam04]

You are right Adam. It´s about learning to honesty love ourselves. Just not in a selfish way. We need to love ourselves to be able to love others. Easy to say...

Keep shining there man!

((((A))))

Yes Nef , I know where you are coming from, always easier to say and harder to do. Each day I have to be mindful of all the DB things and doing my best to live as a decent, respectful human being, father, and still H under these circumstances.

[Adam04]

Journaling,

Its start of Spring break and I have off Monday and Tuesday with the kids. W has rest of week with the kiddos. In another month it will get crazy but for right now I'm not going to worry about that, spending my time with the kids.

Yesterday I was going to take the kids out to dinner so I called W after work to let her know but it was a last minute decision on my part. She had already ordered pizza for them and had them home by 5:30, early. This morning she shared that she went by the new house to check on the progress and picked the kids up afterwards. Last night after we ate dinner, I took the kids out for some shaved ice. S6 asked W to go so we could go as a family. She went with us and the kids enjoyed their shaved ice. Neither of them got a brain freeze, if it was me, definitely would have gotten a few. W and I had small talk about the house. I noticed she had her phone face down and was checking the texts on her watch. I reverted back to the kids and also continued to talk to her about the house. She's got a tankless water heater so we discussed getting a softener and were looking into if the build up would be an issue over the years. I think it would be. She showed me something on her phone when she grabbed it and a text from her sisters came through. In the moment, I chose to not let that suspicious behavior get to me. I could have been vindictive and hooked up my phone to the car when I was driving back home. I had some texts from my "friend" from work that Friday night. We were talking about working on Saturday but I declined to spend time with the kids. If the phone was hooked up, the alert for incoming texts would pop up with the name.

Got home and put the kiddos to bed, S11 has been sleeping earlier than usual. I am keeping an eye on him and open communication with him. I'm not pushing or prying, and I don't want to project anything that is not there. This is a slight change in his normal behavior though with wanting to stay up late before, especially on weekends. I do pop up to his room every now and then and initiate convo about his day, things going on, music, anime, youtube and once I find a topic he's interested in, we start talking for a while. With S11, if he's not feeling good or something bothers him, it's been easy to tell. I'd ask him if something is bothering him and if he says he doesn't know, then something is but he's having a hard time to process it. Sometimes he is able to open up. We've got to where if he just feels cranky and whiney about doing something or not getting his way, then he knows he needs to straighten up but he'll let me know he needs a minute. We've gotten better with that. I let him know it's okay to feel a certain way if he doesn't want to do something but he'll need to learn how to get over it and still do what he needs to do. Eventually like in 5 minutes he's up and running and smiling. It clicks with him. S11 knows if I use a certain tone or say now, he has no choice but in some other cases, we have wiggle room to negotiate on timing if he needs to take out the trash that night or needs to get himself ready within the next hour. I am re-establishing certain boundaries with S6. He sometimes thinks everything is a game so I told him we can play and its fun BUT if he hears my tone and certain words, I need to know he understands where I am coming from with being serious. I also expect him to drop all the joking and acknowledge with a yes sir. For the most part, my kids are well-mannered, disciplined, and obedient. If a person comes into the house, my kids should greet them. Also with saying bye. Sometimes they may forget but its my job to re-enforce or remind. Wow, dont know what made me go off on a tangent there... guess its been my mindset right now to spend time with them and share a little more about them and where "WE" are at, the boys and I or is it me? /shrugs, lol.

So this morning, I take the boys to their favorite breakfast place and ask W if she wants to join. She has an appointment at 11:30 with her lashes person. Then she said she will go shopping for the new house. She asked what I would be doing so I took a bag and filled it up with a basketball, football, and the kids baseball stuff along with my S6 metal detector. S6 has been wanting me to take him to the park for treasure hunting so I promised him this Saturday morning I would after breakfast. We enjoyed breakfast. I had a turkey, spinach, and feta cheese egg white omelet that's like 500 calories for the whole meal. It's my second time having it, really good. Everyone else's breakfast looked way more delicious though like pancakes with bacon, biscuits and country gravy with sausage in it. And a southwest skillet of eggs, potatoes, meats and topped with all kinds of cheeses... with French toast. W left to do her thing. I ventured out with the boys to this HUGE park nearby that is adjacent to a golf course. It happened to be raining on and off this morning. We got to the park, drove around and parked. We had a scavenger hunt. Had the boys look for different things like a nest, mockingbird, newspaper, bottle, bee, spider, red flower, 4 legged animal, and S6 asked to include cow poop. We went exploring in the woods a bit and I broke some long sticks and showed them how to prod the high grass ahead to make sure everything was safe before moving ahead. Saw some dead trees and was fun to hunt for stuff. When it started to rain heavy, we dropped everything and ran for the car. We laughed and had a good time. We then drove to another side of the park with animals, and a hill. We were by a pond and the kids were having fun rolling down the hill. Drove out to another section of the park and S6 used his metal detector and S11 and I played baseball. S6 quickly stopped what he was doing so he and S11 took turns at the bat and also catching. Both are left handers like me and the glove was a left handed glove. It was fun though. Kids kept saying how fun it was to go exploring in the woods. It's one of those things I remember so much of when I was a kid. They passed on playing at the playground this time. They were pooped... speaking of, we never found the cow poop.

Got the kids home and bathed. S11 takes care of himself. I still bathe S6 but he gets himself rdy. He's pretty self sufficient with taking his clothes off, cleaning his ears, putting his clothes up and putting his clothes on. Although, he usually puts his clothes on with the tags inside out. If he's at home, we'd let him wear his clothes however he puts them on. W wasn't home at this time. She got home later and said she went jewelry shopping with her sisters after shopping for furniture. She said her sister who doesn't wear earrings finally got a pair. We both shared a laugh about it. Asked her if she had any plans for the kids tonight since she usually has something with her side of the family. She said no except her sister and husband now asked the kids to come over to swim. She told them no since I told her I was planning to cook dinner. I told her since they don't have plans I was going to grill up something in the back. Asked S6 what he would like, I made a suggestion and he jumped up at the idea. We were making hotdogs/boudin and tator tots. After that we would make smores. Took S6 with me to get the groceries and came home to cook. I got everything ready and W helped pop the tots in the oven and cleaned the dishes. S11 had taken a long nap after playing all day. He woke up to eat and when he got done it was time for the Smores. Didn't work on the grill so I moved everything for Stove top Smores. Worked well because we used chopsticks. Stuck the huge, fluffy marshmallows on the water soaked sticks and put them over the open stove, worked like a charm. Then microwaved the smores for like 5-8 seconds and everything was perfect. Of course I had to make sure S6 knew the rules of the fire and the stove to never do it alone since he asked to make another one and was just a little too eager to run up to it before I got there. I've been known as a child to burn down the living room so I know first hand the dangers, then there was the other time my friends garage got burned... but that's a different story.

Tomorrow I am (( was going to ))) going to watch Captain marvel with S11 and then afterwards take S6 to Chuck E Cheese again. Sunday night we may play it by ear. I was wanting to watch a movie with them and cozy up and make us some pop corn. Probably create some starter MTG ( magic the gathering ) decks with S11. He's into Yugioh dueling decks and said he was interested in MTG. I still have a lot of my old cards along with my old comics in storage.

I want to take them to a comic store/book store and then to a go kart place. Don't have a fishing license for us or the fishing equips. That will be in the works soon. it is time...

Overall, enjoying time with the kids. W is doing her thing and I am not concerning myself with her or trying to get myself worked up to be spinning for nothing. I've made that decision some time back to let it go and I think I am doing that.


(sources say the movie isn't worth watching so I'm checking reviews tonight and checking for alternatives)

[FlySolo]

You are an awesome dad Adam. Don't ever let anyone tell you different.

I took the girls to watch Alita last week. They both thoroughly enjoyed it. Always a hassle finding something that a 12 year old and a 9 year old will watch. There is one swear word in there, but the kids had a bit of a giggle about it after so no harm no foul.

Take care.

[lost8]

Hey Adam, sounds like things are going good. Keep it up and hope you are happy at this point in your life. I am sure it can be difficult but I know I am always happy when I see my kids happy.

[Adam04]

Hey FS and lost, thanks for chiming in.

FS, Alita is a movie I’d watch. There are so many movies I want to watch on the horizon. Also Game of Thrones soon too, can’t wait! I hear you about the age difference with S11 and S6, although S11 was nice and agreed to watch How to Train A Dragon with S6.

Lost, as for happiness, that’s a tough one. I’m making the best of it, considering all things. There are some nights I toss and turn, I have bad dreams of the sitch. There’d be days I’m doing something And out of the blue I miss the old us. Thoughts just pop up from anything causing a past memory to surface. So when I have the bad dreams, the memories, the feelings, I try to move on and keep busy. I’d like to think they don’t change anything but they can, if I let them. I don’t want to dwell in the past or in sorrow so I suck it up and keep going. I don’t want to have a negative outlook on life because of this and I need to work on preventing that from happening.

Last few days I spent time with the kids individually and together. I took the little one to Chuck E. Cheese, had fun with him and dropped him at home and picked up S11 and went to play laser tag and hit the arcade. S6 too short for laser tag. That night, grilled ribeye steaks per S11 request. S6 was content with sausage and rice. W ate boudin. Then next day hung out with BIL and SIL, had lunch at a Korean bbq place. Got my fishing license. Took the kids out to fish at a park, didn’t catch anything. They did pretty good casting on their beginner rinky dink poles but the cheapo lines kept tangling up. Then kids played in the park for a while. Went to watch Captain marvel with BIL and S11. Then had dinner with the in laws and W. I was out with in laws all day so W asked if it was okay to come along. Yesterday kids and I had lunch with SIL from day before. Then went to see How to Train a dragon. Wife Ordered in last night and we made more Stove top s’mores. My SIL’s son was with us all day. He’s a teenager with Autism spectrum disorder and also has been questioning his sexual “identity” if he’s gay or not. SIL was worried that after his therapy yesterday he wouldn’t want to watch the movie with us, but after he ate with me and my sons he came around to wanting to watch it. She however ditched the movie idea saying she had later plans to go to a concert with other people so he ended up with us for the evening.

Did a few things around the house as fixed uppers and the other night the closet clothes rack came off the wall right before inspection so that will need some attention.

This weekend I’m going out to the apartment and start with the lease. Need to get it done ASAP.

I’m tired today. Feel drained.

SIL said if I ever need to talk, I can talk to her. Told her thanks for the gesture but I don’t want to discuss anything about the sitch. She said she understood and she’ll always help with the kids. S11 went to her house last night and spent a night with them.

I told my female friend from work my sitch and how I want to stand for my marriage. Appears that she understood. She tried to offer advice from her perspective and was trying to coach me on pursuit.

Not much else going on. Hope to sleep early tonight.

[Twofeet]

SIL as in W sister?

[Adam04]

Yeah, sister-in-law, TF.

This is the older SIL.

[Twofeet]

You seem to be handling her family well. Just remember to be careful. Blood is thicker than water. I still have a relationship with the ex-inlaws, but we do not talk about XW or the D. They are now just good friends