WHG: And Alice goes down the rabbit hole...

[workinghardguy]

Tonight was interesting... we had S's sixth birthday "party". It was W's night with our S so we had it at her house. We did a joint thing. Back to my civility vs. dark post above. I did a joint party because that's what my S wanted and that's what his counselor recommended. Is it the right DB strategy? Probably not. Or maybe it is... I don't know. I tried to walk a finer line tonight.

It did go fine. I did my best to not be around my W, thankfully her house is big enough for that. I prepared a dish for the event as did she and as did each family member. My mom and niece came, her family came as well. It was surprisingly unawkward during the whole thing. I just treated it like what it was... a party for my S and let that be the focus. I said hello to my in-laws and talked with them. Played with my W's niece and talked with family, both mine and hers. She did the same. We had potluck then cake and presents. S had a great time. I do have to admit it was nice not having "mom presents" and "dad presents". S had an absolute blast and that was really the goal after all.

I arrived 30 minutes before it started to help get things set up as we had agreed on. I did my best to work on stuff separate from my W. I then had to leave right after presents for a board meeting. I stopped by after my board meeting to pick up my stuff (my S had asked me to bring over the XBox and I had bowls and stuff there). I was surprised to see that she had packaged up some of the leftover food for me to take home. I had assumed she'd keep it all. I told her thank you for hosting and left.