Needing some guidance... 5

[jks]

I have been reading these boards a lot today and just trying to get my head in a good place.

I went to the gym this morning and picked up the kids at H's parent's house directly after. As I was driving there my hands and arms started to get really tingly. I was getting SUPER anxious. My mood was very disappointed and tense. I decided that today I'm not ready to "act as if." And I felt like that was ok.

I need time to recover from this. When I arrived at his house the kids were already outside but H was not. So I hurried and put them in the car as fast as I could. He came out with their bags and put them in the car while I as walking around to the other side to put S4 in. I hurried and got back in the car and drove off. I never looked at him.

I was in too much of an emotional state to say a word to him, let alone look at him. The kids were happy and upbeat and I was monotone the whole drive home which was a 30 min drive. They offered the information that OW was there with them last night. It never stops hurting. Never.

When I got home I started reading some advice from fellow DB'ers. It was enough to flip something inside of me. The whole rest of my day was AMAZING! I felt like a completely different person. My interaction with my kids was meaningful, fun, and loving.

My D6 and I normally have very conflicting personalities. She is my hard one. I'm realizing more and more that her behavior is the way it is because of ME. I don't give her the attention she deserves. Today was different. And when I felt her starting to act up... my approach was not to yell at her or reprimand her. I decided to put a smile on my face and act silly towards her to help her forget that she even wanted to misbehave. It worked every time!! She respected me so much more because I respected her. I felt like I had conquered such a hard battle that I've been fighting for so long.

I know there is still so much more work to be done in making these changes so they just come naturally from me because I had to be very conscious of my efforts all day. But if I have days like today, EVERYDAY... then those changes are well worth the effort.

I've decided to continue to have as much space from H as possible. This also involves not going down to his city as much as possible. The temptation is too high to want to do drive-by's right now and I literally feel my stomach turn every time I'm even close to that area. So I'm going to try to plan more playdates and activities closer to where I live. (For those of you who don't know... H lives in our old town and so all of my friends and a lot of the things I do are down by him. Including the gym I workout at.)

I'm in recovery mode. I hope and pray that I can stay strong. Sunday was a very weak moment from me and I do not want to have another situation with H like that again.