Back but for a different reason

[ClingingToHope]

I found out last night that the X finally got remarried. She took the girls on a trip to Michigan at the end of summer. I got our old dog for a week. A few photos popped up on my Facebook feed. I quickly deleted them. One of her old high school friends was on the trip. Now it makes sense.

I am sorting through the emotions.

I remember when she finally moved out of our old house. I was happy that she wasn't sleeping in our bed, in our old house with some other guy. But I was sad because we entered that house with so many hopes and dreams.

I remember when I find out she was pregnant with this guy. That was really, really, really, really hard. It meant that no matter what this other dude and his family was going to be involved in my daughters' lives. That has been the biggest adjustment.

This one? It was inevitable. They've been together off and on since a couple of months after we split up. At times, it was embarrassing that she still had my name. At times, it was weirdly comforting that they hadn't married.

My daughters were worried about how I'd take it. They are really worried about me overall. I tried to explain that it isn't so much her and him, but that I'm just struggling right now.

If the Internet hadn't come along and crushed my old career - the newspaper I worked at is making more cuts - then I'd be making $80,000 by now with raises. I'd be able to travel, save, plan for retirement. That wasn't to be. And for two years now I've been casting about trying to find myself.

I've got four things going right now. I've been through the interview process at the Post Office. If I get in there, I can make $40,000 to $45,000 the first year, but I'll really be busting it. Saturdays, Sundays, no scheduled time off. Very little flexibility. It is a job. It is a safe job. If you get through the first 90 days then it's a matter of showing up and moving on up and 15 years from now I have a federal pension.

Back to financial services. Merrill Lynch, which wanted to hire me two years ago, is back in the mix. I called them and I've been through three interviews. They have a three-year training program where you make $48,000 with commissions. Way more flexibility, but it's a lot, lot, lot, lot, lot of cold calling and you have to hit targets beginning after five months are you are out. It has an 80 percent failure rate.

The aerospace company that originally hired me for an internship on June 22, 2015, is supposedly going to give me a call again. I'd written them off entirely, but the head of the Internship program said I'd be getting a call. In that case, I'd make $50,000 to $60,000 as an intern while finishing my MBA. I have eight classes left. So that would cost me $14,000 and I'd be either working or studying for two years.

The last one? There's a marketing company in town that has brought me in as a writer on five projects. I've met their expectations and the owner has talked about starting a larger small business website and he'd want me to run it. I've given him an editorial plan. I've given him a business plan. I've given him a scaled down three-month tryout. But he hasn't bitten ... and these other things are out there. This one would be the most flexible and least guaranteed.

So you see, each day I continue to wake up wondering what's going to happen to me. When someone asks me 'how are you doing' I don't really know what to say. And the uncertainty is draining. I don't have any energy. I'm constantly counting pennies. And the clock is ticking. I learned last night how desperately unhappy my daughters are with the situation with their mother and how they are counting on me to be the stable one. They hate, hate, hate all this bouncing around.

I remember the X telling me the girls will adjust and she constantly blames me with the fact that they haven't fully accepted her new reality. My 17-year-old told me how much she hated her 16th birthday party because it was so awkward and asked if that's how it's going to be when she gets married.

I told her maybe. On her 16th birthday, my ex-girlfriend didn't show up. She says there was a misscommunication. I felt abandoned as the X and this entire family invaded my daughter's 16th birthday.

This is years from now. It has to get better for me. Doesn't it? Each day, I have moments of peace where I think someday I"ll be back to being comfortable and then I can look back on these days with a smile. When are those days coming.