And still struggling

[Jim1234]

It's been a while since I've updated this, but I haven't really had anything to talk about. Just kind of gettin' on gettin' on.

Had a really good weekend with the kids. I took them to see Infinity War on Friday night. D16 and I had planned to go for weeks, and S18 wasn't sure he wanted to go with us, or was going with friends. I went to buy tickets early in the afternoon, and texted him to see whether I should buy 2 or 3 tickets. He was at Ws, but didn't get back to me, so I texted her to ask him for a response and threw in an invitation for her as well. She declined to eat dinner with us beforehand, but joined us for the movie. No pressure, we got on well, and had a nice time.

Saturday, I took the kids to meet my brother and his kids at Hershey Park for the day. Everyone had a blast. Sunday was just kind of spent recovering.

I asked W a little while ago to go over her proposal and see if we could work it out among ourselves so we could keep the lawyer's fees down. We made a lunch appointment, but she wasn't feeling well, so we talked over the phone on Friday instead. The discussion was fairly productive; it got heated for a few minutes, but we calmed down and got the conversation back on track. But it wasn't working well, because I couldn't really retype the document, or cut and paste what we liked and agreed to. There were some contentious issues, but things went pretty smoothly, so I suggested we meet with a mediator, and she agreed. We have an appointment next week.

Something that came up was paying for college and she told me, yet again, "you should have worked more." I explained why I didn't (I thought we had college well in hand, and we did, until she took the money set aside for college and bought a house.). I hadn't done that before, but on the drive to Hershey, I had some time to think, and realized validation probably would have been a better tactic. Sunday, I needed to talk about the kids, so I called, apologized for dismissing her feelings all those years, and then validated what she said, including "I should have either communicated our financial situation better or worked more so you would feel financially safe and secure," and then started talking to her about the kids so she wouldn't feel any pressure. It was a simple apology, and I validated her feelings without any further discussion. Don't know if it did our situation any good, but I feel I did well.

On another front, a woman I had been dating broke it off because I wasn't putting much effort into the relationship, and didn't make her a priority. She's right. From the start, I told her I wasn't interested in a relationship and only wanted to date. There were no hard feelings on either side. She was pleasant company, but we wanted very different things. We left the door open. so if my situation changes in a year or so, who knows?