Countdown to New Year, and fresh start?

[istherehope]

Going to just do a quick journal update this morning.

First though, thanks for writing Jen!

It's great to hear from you! I really like your definition of being assertive. I think at this point this is what I need to work on. Now that I am more comfortable with things, I have been sometimes falling back into just acting annoyed or being sarcastic when I don't like something that H is saying.

In terms of taking some time to be myself, H has school 3 nights this week, so when I get home from work I'll be able to veg and watch bad TV on my own. I think this is what I want to do to relax as I have been "on" for 2 weeks now, and during the days I will have to stay alert at work. At this point with my jet lag, really all I want to do is sleep!

So journaling...

All in all the vacation was a complete success. It wasn't relaxing in any way though, as we stayed in 3 different places together, 3 nights each, and spent a lot of time traveling. In each of these 3 places we were visiting H's family, all very nice, but still exhausting for me as for the most part conversations were in Spanish, and it takes a lot of effort for me to focus and be involved.

The best thing about this vacation is that in many ways it felt "normal" again. There were some tense moments where we bickered or where I was not happy with H's behavior, but for the most part it always felt as though we were happily married. He kissed me a lot, not just in front of his family, but even sitting on the plane etc. He complimented me many times too, something I haven't had much of lately. There were still no pure "ILYs", but in fact there were a few times where he said it while we were joking around with each other. He also kept referring to me loving him, being "stuck" with him etc. In fact he used the word "marriage" a whole lot on this trip, and the last time we had been to Mexico was for our wedding, so the wedding came up multiple times in conversation, and this was not awkward at all.

As I mentioned before as well, we are now talking about where to live in the future. We bought a book on "places rated" in the US, and last night H started looking at it on his own. I am keeping my guard up here for a while still though as H has not formally "recommitted". To me planning the future together is recommitting, but what I really want is for him to be wearing his ring again. It is painful that he is not wearing it by this point, but I am not ready to bring it up. I think I will wait until after our trip to Brazil in March before I even consider saying anything.

We also have future plans now that go beyond our lease ending. One of H's cousins is going to visit this summer, and we are planning the trip. H also asked where I think we could get my dad to meet us again for another vacation. This is incredibly significant to me as the 1st bomb was dropped on the last vacation with my dad. Needless to say that ruined the vacation completely for me, but we kept things from my dad so to this day he has no idea of what happened.

Finally and quite significantly, last night H spent some time reorganizing his shelf and closet space. Because I had been out of the house, he had taken over completely. He has more clothes than I do! I had kept a lot of my stuff to small, cramped spaces as I was always afraid of being too obvious with reclaiming my space. I know it sounds silly, but as we never had a formal discussion around me moving back in, it never felt like a sure thing. Last night H moved all of his stuff off of "my" shelf and mentioned this to me. This means a lot. I am no longer worried that he is going to move out. I am not saying that everything is perfect, because it is not, but I feel a lot more secure than I have for a very long time. H also kept mentioning our "pet family" last night. Somehow this seemed very significant to me too. I feel like he is finally accepting our life together again, and realizing the good things that we have.

So that's it. I'm still very much on my guard, but a lot happier than I have been in a very long time. Now I just need to make it through this week at work. It is going to be hard to jump back in after such a long time away!

Hope everyone is doing well!

ITH