melissa, continued . . .

[melissag]

Kinda journaling here, but would welcome any thoughts/wisdom.

So the kids came home this morning. They did immediately tell me that my H told them he would be gone for another year. (Good God, do they think he is coming back after a year??? Are we going to have to have this conversation AGAIN in a year?)

I suggested that we talk about that, and my S7 said, "no, I don't want to talk about it because it makes me cry."

So we talked about how it's important to honor your feelings and allow yourself to feel them, and that if you ignore them they never really go away, and then it gets worse. That it's OK to cry, and that sometimes it even makes you feel better afterward.

I didn't ask them the details of what H had told him re: the reasons. I let them know that it's important to me that they know that H and I both love them and want to spend time with them, and they can always talk to me about anything, and I will not be offended if they want to see Dad or talk to him or whatever - that them having a good R with him is very important to me.

I asked them how they feel things have been going so far - are they OK with it, or do they want to change things up? D9 said she thinks it's fine. I asked if she wants to spend more time at H's and she said no. S7 said yes. I asked if they would rather see H several nights in a row or one night at a time, more often. They said the latter. My D9 doesn't want to spend any more time at H's at all (she was very adamant about this, not sure what's up with that, maybe just that time in her life when she needs Mom? Should I pursue this and try to find out why?).

My S7 said he wants to spend more nights with Dad, but only if he can be with me during the day. (My heart breaks for this kid. ) I asked if 5 nights in a row with Dad would be cool and they both said "NO!" I let them know that they didn't have to worry about this stuff, that it is for adults to figure out, but that Dad and I just want to make sure that everyone gets what they need.

I'm not sure whether to share this info with H. Like I said earlier, I am pretty much just afraid to have any kind of convo with him aside from "I hear it may snow tomorrow," because he has been so volatile of late. This is why I keep coming back to wanting some sort of third party present to talk with him. The thought of not communicating at all bothers me (in terms of wanting to have a decent co-parenting R with him), but I am honestly just afraid to talk to him without a referee.

Apparently H signed a one year lease. It's not that I think he is a sh!tty person, I just think that he doesn't really THINK about this stuff. He wants the kids 50% of the time, but he signed a lease for another year for his two bedroom apartment in a high rise downtown? I really thought that his L would have told him that he needs to move to a place more suitable for children (at least one with three bedrooms - it's not like he doesn't have the financial means to do so).

Working on changing my lens . . . D9 told me that she made dinner at H's place last night, and H helped with breakfast this morning. They both did homework there and took showers. It is sounding like H is making more of an effort not to be Disney Dad, so I appreciate that.