The last few days have been good overall. Busy too. Saturday night (late) my H texted to tell me he has a different schedule and we could work it out when he came by the next day. I had been going over the schedule with my girl for over a week by that time, and now it was changed. Ugh.
Sunday we went to church, and then H came by for his visit (about an hour late). D fell asleep on the way home, so I let her nap till he got there. He brought lunch and we had a good visit. D got to show him her new park down the street and he helped me set up some free games on my new phone for D.
Anyway, it turns out his schedule change was pretty big. Instead of having our girl Monday night thru Thursday morning, he could only have her Thursday afternoon till Saturday morning.
D took the change well enough that it seemed to hurt H’s feelings. Having gotten a visit probably helped though.
He waited (again) till the day before he is scheduled to have D to say he has to change the schedule. When he is telling me he wants to take her Thurs & Fri, I said I would need to reschedule a play date for her. H said he didn’t want her to miss seeing her friend, but it sounded like he was hoping he wouldn’t have her that night. Of course my passive-aggressive martyr of a H would NEVER say if he needed a break, so I’m just mind reading.
Once the restaurant opens he will be pretty unavailable. H has been telling me he didn’t know how often he would even be able to see her.
His restaurant won’t close till 2 am and he will be there most nights and weekends. Even if he gets out at 3, home by 4, and goes straight to bed, he won’t be up before noon. That takes out the possibility of keeping her most mornings, even if I were to bring her to him. Oh, and he is back at the store working part time again too. He plans to work just enough to stay on their minimal insurance plan, but even that will knock another 8 hours a week from his available time.
He believes this will be temporary, maybe a few months. I have my doubts about that. Everything I know about the restaurant industry tells me he will be up to his eyeballs. His plans to eventually have 3-4 days off every week sound like pipe dreams to me.
I am starting to get a bit concerned. His schedule is going to be brutal, but that isn’t really what has me worried. My spidey-sense is tingling and I am remembering feeling this same sense of unease before bomb drop. What I fear is that H is starting to pull away from our girl. It is little things, but they are adding up to a pattern I have seen him play out many times. I am worried by the fatalistic attitude I see and hear from him about our girl.
Overall we did have a nice visit with H on Sunday. I have been filling this week up with some extra holiday activities, and we have had a really nice time together.
I just keep thinking about him pulling away from our daughter, and it makes me sad for both of them. I’m not sure what I can or even should do. I don’t even know if there is anything I can do. sigh…
