That little engine that will ...

[MeMyselfandI]

Been a while since my last post and busy busy but thought I’d take some time to post an update. So, communication remained pretty steady last week but the joking and flirty stuff has gone away completely. On Wednesday, I received word that my dad was not doing very well and made the decision to cancel my trip to Mexico which was scheduled to start following my kid’s hockey tournament. It probably isn’t the best time for me to go out of the country and work is really crazy right now too so although I’m kind of disappointed, no point going all that way just to worry about things.

Now, on to the other stuff … Thursday evening, we all flew to the kid’s out of town hockey tournament. H and I were friendly, his grandparents showed up to the kids games and we all spoke. H would check in with me pretty regularly after the games to find out what we were doing and we met up with him and one of the coaches who he was rooming with a couple of times. This coach is also a friend of H’s and plays on his hockey team and I’ve never really said too much to him but we ended up joking around quite a bit … all started with a conversation on politics and we are on completely different sides in that regard LOL. On Thursday and Friday evening, we ended up socializing in the same room with a group of other parents and I had fun.

Saturday evening turned into a bit of a disaster following a fantastic team dinner. When we got back to the hotel, my D ended up getting into trouble. To make a long story short, she got angry at her brother and picked up a phone in the room all the kids were in and dialed 911. She never put the phone to her ear or said anything and hung it up right away but of course, 911 called back to the hotel to check on things and the front desk ended up coming up to speak to the parents. My D was there when they arrived and she immediately starting crying and fessed up to what she had done. I took her into the room, discussed it at length and grounded her while the rest of her team went swimming. She also went to the front desk to apologize and apologized to the Dad that belonged to the room where she made the call.

I’ll try to keep this as short as possible … H was upset. I think he didn’t like the way I handled it. After D calmed down a bit, I called him to see if he wanted to come talk to her to add anything and he told me he was too embarassed and ashamed of our D to come out of his room and for me to send her to his room. Well, of course, she was also embarassed and ashamed but I made her go down there. After about 15 minutes, I get a text from H asking me to come to his room. When I get there, D starts telling me, through her tears, that Daddy thinks she should be grounded and miss her gold medal game the following day and she should not be allowed to do anything but sit in the hotel or car until our flight takes off at 8 pm. I said I would think about tomorrow and let her know. H went on to say if I wanted to go anywhere, like for a drink across the hall, to please send D down to his room as he did not want her left unsupervised, he didn’t trust her.

D and I went back to my room and she starting crying really hard again and starting saying that she was going to be a failure her whole life and a loser and that Daddy was embarassed and ashamed of her. Took me a while to settle her back down and at this point, it dawned on me that she was more upset that her Dad was embarassed and ashamed of her than she was about the mistake she made in the first place. I explained to her that people make mistakes and although she has to face the consequences of her mistake, (i.e. the grounding), that she should not worry about her Daddy being embarassed and ashamed. I told her that was not her problem, it was his to deal with. In the meantime, H has sent me another text, this time saying he’s worried about her and doesn’t want her left alone so if I want to go anywhere to please bring her to his room. He also texts that he has breakfast planned with his grandparents for 10 am. I responded saying fine on both accounts. H text sasking me what I’m mad at him for; (obviously he sensed it).

I waited for quite a while and then I responded saying that I was upset that he managed to make this all about him. I went on to say part of me wants to say I’m sorry but I have nothing to be sorry about. The biggest worry both his D and I had tonight after all of this was the fact that he didn’t want to leave his room. Eventually I realized that this was not our problem but his problem, that kids make mistakes, that she owned up to it and took her punishment and that I will never be to ashamed or embarassed of our kids to walk out in public and further, that I would never put that on them.

That was the end of the conversation and I’m sure I screwed up royally but honestly, I didn’t care at the time. My one and only concern was the well-being of our D.

I have more to but this is getyting long so I'll carry on later.