You can't have everything, where would you put it?

[ClingingToHope]

Kerry, I'm back at anger stage right now. Eventually I believe I'll be at a place where we can spend that time together. It's just not right now.

Funny thing is the whole orientation thing took care of itself. D11 doesn't want to go and D8 definitely wasn't going to want to go so D11 asked me to go because STBXW won't be able to.

On parent-teacher conferences. I hear your advice but I'm going the separate conference route. Last year STBXW just blathered on and on about how great things were. How they are doing sooooo much better.

When I would ask a question that indicated that what I was seeing wasn't so rosy I'd get the accusatory look.

So no ... I won't be doing parent teacher conferences together.

This is how I explained things to D11. I asked her to imagine a toy or thing she loved most in the world. Then I asked her to imagine me telling her she could never play with it again. She can look at it, she just can't touch it or ever use it again.

I said right now that's what it's like for me. Right now I need to be by myself right now and get used to not being together. She said that makes sense.

I've been doing lots of thinking on why it's such a struggle for me and I think I'm just not happy with my situation yet. I should be. I'm miles ahead of where I was a year ago. But the money is still a struggle. The living situation is still a struggle. The social situation is OK but could be better.

Part of that, probably, is that the D is not final. I have plans for what I'm going to do with my settlement. It angers me that I'm buried in credit card debt that was mostly not of my doing. It angers me that I have a car payment and she doesn't. I want my grandmother's wedding and engagement ring back. I want to not have to have a good day ruined by the latest letter from her idiot attorney.

I read here once that you let go of the past when your future looks better. I'm just not there yet.

BBJ, one of the problems with the marriage was that we both fought over who was in charge of the kids on schooling. I said at mediation that I don't need control I just wanted time.

So I guess what I meant was each day I go through their backpacks to see what needs to be done. I tell the after school sitter what I've found and then I let it go. They stay with their mom during the week (except for Wednesdays) and I'm not going to overstep the bounds.

Every day the girls and I talk about how the day went. If there's something I'm concerned about I'll step in. Otherwise, I stay out of it.