I'm back, on my own.

[canadianMrs.]

Augh! Another wake up call about H today. I don't even know why I'm surprised but it just reinforced where I stand with him, and where I need to put some more boundaries. (I do need advice per situations from this board)
My inlaws came to my D's soccer tonight. I got a job a month ago and start this summer(part of GAL, first job in 11 years!) At the time I asked H to talk to his parents about looking after the kids for a week this summer. He said he had and would get back to me about the details. I hadn't heard anything so I brought it up with them. They hadn't even heard I got a job! Self centered H again. You would think child care for his children would be a priority even if I'm not.

My 2nd part of this is about boundaries (the above incident got under my skin to remind me of the following). I think I've done really well putting them in place in the last month or so. Before when H and I were talking/going to counselling we spent a lot of time together as a family and my house started to become like a 2nd home of his. That came to and end! However, he still calls me when he has a problem. Last week it was his car breaking down. When I picked them up after the weekend, he asked me to drive him to the mechanic to pick up his car. It was on the way so I did, although I wasn't happy about it. I'm getting the feeling he uses situations where the kids are present to put me on the spot. I don't want be the bad guy in their eyes with him, but at the same time, he has treated me so horribly why should I do him any favors? Why not call one of his gf's? While hes gotten better about not contacting me unless necesary like I asked, when we do talk he acts like were the best of friends! Text messages with happy faces still, little jokes. I keep it business. When & how do I draw the line with situations like this. This one is a grey area for me. I don't want to be a "witch" but I refuse to be a doormat/taken advantage of again. With anyone else (and him before) I would jump to help.

(One side note, I was with H when his car initially broke down, at another soccer game. He has alienated himself from almost all his friends. Although, as he sees it, they've just been busy. He was going through his list of contacts of people to help him and he was struggling to find one person he could call. A sad reality of MLC.)