Making Strides...

[mishka422]

Heavens BBJ. You have had a really rough night. I'm so sorry.

It kills me that you are doing all of this work to get your H out of your house when he is the one that left. Why? Is it because it is giving you peace of mind to see his stuff gone? I'm just curious.

I hope you got some decent sleep.

[rinserepeat]

Hi BobbiJo
That's some pretty heartwrenching stuff going on w/ your kids. Sorry you are experiencing it.
I think it's possible that they don't understand what's happening and that's why they are making these kinds of comments. I wouldn't trust your H to expalin in a sensitive or proper way. I think you should set them straight. Kids are resiliant, they don't have a sense of what normal is and sho they are willing to accept all kinds of situations. I'd be very frank with them, I bet they can handle it.
Just to share my experience: I split with my D Father when she was 3. We went thru a bit of that too. I remember telling her she would always have her mom and her dad but that they would be a 2 houses. When she missed him, I would be sympathetic and understanding, telling her it's normal to have those feelings. I would then let her call him. She did adjust rather quickly. By the time she was 5, she used to whine and complain that she didn't want to visit his house on the weekends. I explained that it wasn't optional. I said you have 2 parents who both love you and want to spend time with you and going to Dad's on the weekend is important and whether she felt like it or not, it just is. She accepted that and even bragged about how she had 2 houses. Her Dad & I also continued to do things together with her a few times a month, whether a holiday, a movie, dinner or a trip to the park. Although it was difficult for us, we knew it was important that she retain the impression that her parents and her were still family despite the fact that we weren't living together. She knew her parents put her first and were unified in at least one issue - raising her. When she was about 7 my brother & his wife split and when talking to her about it she asked what would happen to her cousins. I explained that they would live with auntie and uncle, and would have 2 houses. I told her that her little cousin may feel very insecure about what was happening and suggested she talk to her about the experience of coming from a broken home. She replied, 'I don't have a broken family. I don't know anything about what that's like." At that moment I felt so proud that she had no idea that her family situation was not normal or that we were broken. She didn't identify with that phrase whatsoever. It was very hard at times to put feelings aside and spend time with my x, but I knew then without doubt that it was worth it.
Anyway, that's my experience. I am not familiar with your situation in all so I don't know what issues you are dealing with. But I do know it's extremely painful to see your kids hurting and it's hard to make them understand a reality that you yourself find difficult to accept. Daddy is missing out. He's losing.
Maybe you could try explaining it with a very light heartheartedness or humor so that it goes down easier. I don't know your kids, you know how best to communicate with them. But I wouldn't leave it to the crazy parent to do and expect it to get done right! When my DD was 9 I split w/ my H when he was cheating. I hadn't told her it was happening yet, but he decided to tell her. Sensitive bloke - he said oh my phone's ringing it's my girlfriend. She said, you mean Mommy? He laughed, No I have a girlfriend now.
Can you believe it! When I got home she was a mess sobbing and saying Mommy, s. is a cheater. She was hysterical to find out like this. I was so sorry that I hadn't explained the situation to her myself so she didn't have to suffer this insensitive blow.
Hard as it is to see the little peanuts struggle to comprehend the bad news, they are a great source of strength and the need to care for them and make them happy does help one from falling into pits of despair. I remember saying kids are great for preventing any rash behaviors like jumping off the bridge!
Best of luck to you in this painful situation. I think you should do damage control yourself. HUGS

[BobbiJo]

I appreciate the sentiments, rinse, I hear where you are coming from...

I just feel at this point it is his job to do damage control and if he will not then I will, but I am putting it on him first.

For some background since you are new to my situation, my husband and I have been spending ridiculous amounts of time together with the kids. He comes to my (formerly our) house probably four nights a week unless he is out of town for work. We have been eating meals together, going to the kids' practices together, we just went on vacation together! We go to the movies, sit together at church every week, etc etc

THIS is most likely what is confusing the kids. Heck, it confuses our pastor, my son's counselor, our families, and honestly, it confuses me. We spend more time together than a lot of 'intact/happy' families. Although you never know who else is keeping up appearances, do you?

See that is an example too of the impact. I am quite a bit jaded on some of these things now where I was the girl who bought the princess stories hook line and sinker as a child. That bothers me that I can see a couple now and wonder if anything lurks below the surface where before I only saw a sweet family.

So anyway in my case my kids are well aware we are still a family as we have never really broken that part of things off. So actually unfortunately for me, and I think for them, we need to do much less together as a family, at least for now. It muddles things for me and has them seeing connections that are no longer really there, at least from Dan's side.

Yes Mish it was a long night. I know that it could be viewed as enabling to pack the rest of his things up. But in reality, I am not helping him move into his new house. I am taking boxes of his/my things from college and old jobs, which were already boxed up together, and separating them out. I want his things in the storage unit so that he has no reason to come here to get them himself. Which he wouldn't anyway, a lot of it (college textbooks/awards, old work binders) has no tangible use at this point so there would be zero sense of urgency to come get them.

I just think it is important for me as I clarify my boundaries, to re-claim my home for me and the kids. If he is not interested in being here then his things do not need to fill up my basement and garage.

[BobbiJo]

On a lighter note, from midnight-2 I watched "Bridget Jones Edge of Reason" I think, it was the second one. I hadn't seen it before...the 'fight' scene between Hugh Grant and Mr. Darcy was hysterical!

[mishka422]

That is my favorite scene ever! I love that movie and watching Hugh Grant and Collin Firth attacking each other was like a dream sequence. Especially when it looks like he's going to walk away and then Hugh Grant makes a comment and he runs back and attacks him again. Fun movie!

[BobbiJo]

Thank you! I could not think of Colin Firth's name, all that came to mind was Clive and I knew that was wrong!! Yes, I laughed out loud watching them fight...

[Tomato]

Hi there silly country sis

Not that you solicited my insights on your present swirling hot lava cumulonimbus cloud BUT .... I think I may have some that I don't feel that I can contain.

for 1) Oh to have the innocence of a child as evidenced by your own gifts from God. WHat they are spouting from their young minds perhaps is not the fairly tale that perhaps you are categorizing it as me thinks.

Take a lesson or two or three. Amazing how there are times when Kids can be the teachers fro the adults. The faith that they don't even knowe that they posess. You need to adopt that faith. The faith that as a fellow follower of Christ Jesus we need to trapse out onto the proverbial skinny tree limb with even as a still louder voice than the one coming from our inner one tells us it is not wise to do so.

This is a test of faith. ANd I think your kids in what they are ushering forth from there mouths ahve the unjaded true vision of what is to come. Fortunate for them they know very little of the insane earthly stuff that you and I do.

Maybe they don't need correction at all. Maybe you do BBJ.

Strive to adopt a "faith" that is like those kids of your's. Unbridled faith by anything of this fallen world. All things imaginable are within His reach. His timing must be waited on if you are to see the perfectness of His plan for you.

My prayers as always you will have directed to bust the evil one's grip on the family that is to be for you BBJ. It will be magnificent.

Ted

[Tomato]

since I only hit point 1) before tiring ....LOL

2BC!

Ted

[Tomato]

oh and I understand (only to a degree though) the highwire act you are having to play about forwarding on the childrens comments to you involving his return to the home.

I would not advise adding any more fuel to that fire right now.

Dan is in the stew pot atop Bugs Bunny's blazing campfire right about now. I am rather certain. And the only one feeling good about it is Bugs Bunny since his butt was kept from the dinner table as Hazzenfeffer or however that spelling is.

Ted

[BobbiJo]

Thanks T. I know he isn't really mad at me at all. I know the tension & frustration in his voice on the subject of the kids/his (non)return home, etc, comes directly from his own guilt and ambivalence. As he has said many times, "If I knew I was making the right decision I would have filed by now"...

So he can sit and stew in it all he wants, I just hate it when the kids get pulled in. And maybe they know better, maybe there will be a reconciliation down the road, but right now he is not at home so certain privileges he has held no longer apply. Like keeping all his things here and having full access to my house. I am sure he doesn't plan on me having a key to his house and dropping by whenever I feel like it...

Food for thought, though, T...Thanks!