I'm back. So this time seems different because I don't have the strength and energy I had the first time he left. A week after my daughter and I got our own apartment we had to evacuate for Hurricane Irma and we were gone for 2.5 weeks. Soon after we returned I started having health problems that kept getting worse. It took a lot of diagnostic tests and doctors visits to figure out what was wrong. I was on the edge of having a mental breakdown because I wasn't sure if I'd need surgery or what would happen. I don't have close family to come and help and my friends here are all busy caring for their little kids. It was a crisis. Everything around me is uprooted. My daughter and I are sleeping on a mattress on the floor after having previously lived in a luxury gated community in a beautiful new home. Most of our stuff is still in boxes in the new house that my husband built for us (that's another story - he wanted to build his dream house without factoring in who would live there) where he now lives alone.
Finally last week I got a diagnosis and hope to slowly recover but the normal steps someone would take to 'get a life' haven't been realistic for me these past few weeks. It's all been a blur and I've been living day-by-day not knowing what's wrong with my health.
I've been on the phone with friends every night or meeting friends during the day, going to church events, and I signed up for a meditation class that starts tomorrow so I'm doing my best to avoid being alone. I've demanded that my husband help with our daughter extra the past few weeks but he's extremely annoyed and inconvenienced by this. Some days he loves her more than anything in the world and then other days he says she's a mistake and complains how he's too tired to take her. He doesn't know anything about how to care for her, so I hesitate to send her off with him more than a short time because it seems she just tags along while he does his shopping or works and he's not really doing anything enriching for her.
It feels complicated and overwhelming. I think I'm further behind in the 'get a life' process than most but I'm trying to slowly accept that there are a lot of things I can't control at the moment. There should be DB guidelines for complex or crisis situations because I had no problem applying those techniques the first time but this is so different. I also now have a pile of medical bills and I'm not working so I have to 1) get my husband to re-prioritize his spending to cover those bills and 2) I need to move to a city where I can get a job in my profession so I'm self sufficient again, but moving again is probably not wise right at this moment. Just eating right now is a big deal and I lost a dangerous amount of weight.
My mindset might be better in a few weeks and I may be better able to apply your suggestions (PsySara and Sotto) after getting out of crisis-mode. I really appreciate your input! PsySara I think what you're saying is I need to use a tougher approach with my husband to get him to help. I just wish I could trust him more with our daughter but another option might be asking him to cover more babysitting hours. And I wish there was a way to expedite the DB process after falling so far behind. Wish me luck!
