Becoming PatientMan IV - It Is Well With My Soul

[PatientMan]

Also,

I invited XW to Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow. She says she will stop by to say "hi" to my parents and my sister, but doesn't have any intention of staying for the meal. She intimated that the old house brings back bad memories. My wise older sister thinks it's events like these - family ones with the kids gone - that may have an impact on her perspective.

XW also invited me to spend the night on Christmas Eve so we could all spend time together and wake up on Christmas morning together. Her dad and her brother are coming into town.

Once school for me is out in a week, we are going to start alternating weekends with who has the girls, but she'll still bring them to me on Sunday mornings of her weekends so the girls and I can go to church. Also thinking about a M/W/F visitation schedule where I head up to her house after work to spend time with them (homework, devotions, maybe a game of chess with my 10 year old, tuck-in & prayers.)

I've been running myself far past capacity for the last two years trying to earn this graduate degree, while going through a long, drawn out divorce, while working on improving myself, combating 18 months of depression, while trying to minimize the impact this is having on my children. So XW and I agree that standardizing some visitation schedules will help us both.

She'll feel less like a single mom and I'll feel more like I'm providing a home for my ladies.

A big problem I have is a no-win mental situation I put myself in:

If I take some time for myself, I impose upon myself guilt for not spending time with my girls. And if I spend all of my spare time with my girls, I don't take time for myself or get projects done around the house.

So either way I lose: mentally. And it's a hurdle I'm trying to get over. I know intellectually that I have to take time for myself, but I just want to be with my daughters as much as possible and I can't seem to escape the guilt I inflict upon myself if I don't.

Any thoughts on visitation and holiday arrangements? It seems pretty amicable, but is it too amicable? Should we be separating households more?

-PM