NEW LIFE / NEW ME

[Fartiltre]

LTH,
Once again – THANKS! I keep stating that and the meaning of it keeps rising!

F, try not to be too rigid

I am trying but let me paint the picture!

3 children in three different classes means more than one birthday a week.
S10 plays football Monday, Thursday, Friday and then match Saturday and/or Sunday.
D6 is GS wedneysday and one day some weekends
D4 will properly start gym in a short while. One weekday and every other weekend.

I want my children to know each other out of a car – and I want to know them.
I have S10 from Friday afternoon to Wednesday morning every two weeks and some Tuesdays. I have Ds Wednesday afternoon until Monday morning.
You 2x4 me on this one earlier on and you was right in doing this! Since then I have been thinking and calculating. If I go with all birthdays and sports (now and to come) they simply wont see eachother. You have to take in to calculation that S10 is living 45 min away and so is soccer and birthdays. Ds is 15 min away.
Scouting Wednesday is from 17.00-18.30.
Soccer normally ends at 19.00
My normal working hours are 8.15-16.00 (45 min tranport in both end have to be added)
I also would like for them to bring a friend here once in a while.
Also add them visiting friends.

I am having a hard time on this one – I want to do good for my children, I wan't them to have friends and do sports, I want them to know eachother and I want to spend time with them!
This will get harder when all of them joins something and their social life expands! My family is gone and I haven’t got any help around.

I am not trying to be punitive or inflexible (and I am not sobbing allthough it sounds like that) - I properly just want it all and now I have to do some prioritizing. I simply can’t do it all, keep regular eating times, get D4 into bed at a reasonable hour and so on. I do hope you understand.

F, I can't help but think that your with/without time is very long. Is this the norm in your country?

Nope, norm is much worse! H: every other weekend (Friday – Sunday) W: the rest! – Crazy, but true.
I will work on seeing one of Ds alone some days and I believe W will see this as good. I just need a few weeks then I will ask her about this.

Is 50/50 each week an option?

Not at the moment! I will any day of the week lose trial!

I can understand your concern on not having any "family" time with D's. Sandi is right, this is your family now. Yes, there are times where parents will spend bdays and major holidays together for the kids, and that is great. What Sandi is trying to help you with is the fact that your W wants this family time regularly to ease the consequences of her actions. If she gets all of this family time, she will be less likely to miss you. Christmas is a long way off in DBland, maybe by then it will be okay to spend some time together that day.

I get this totally! I will meet up on Bdays in the mornings but only W, children and I. Likewise the other way around. Bdays is not until spring so let’s wait and see. I will wait deciding on Christmas until then – I have all 3 this year and I will look for a nice place to spend the evening. We celebrate Christmas in the evening on the 24.

If you really want to talk them, yes, call. You don't have to have a schedule, that suggestion was to ease your concerns about W misunderstanding why you are calling. You don't have to be rude/abrupt either (and only this), you can be friendly and say what you want without worrying if a few other words are in the conversation!

I have done this but I feel good reading that this is OK! – Thanks!
I am getting there, LTH!

One question:
Was is you writing about how your happy posting on FB tricked something in your H. I did post 2 things on FB yesterday and got a lot of likes and comments. I have never done this before but I am thinking about being more active on FB but this seems to go opposite of all I read in here.

All the best!

F