My point is that right now you need to be detoxing from H. You are addicted and addicts have to go cold turkey in order to recover. There is no such thing as a drinking recovering alcoholic.
Maybe in the future, when meeting with SS20 and SD20, setting the boundary up front that you do not want to talk about or discuss their father would be beneficial. This does two things:
1) It lessens the likelihood that he will come up 2) It keeps your intentions pure. It shows YOU and them that it isn't an effort to intel gather on him. And it will take that accusation away from him to use later
So I do have to ask.....are your intentions with these lunches pure?
^^^ YES
I would not have breathed a word of H... but it seemed like what SS20 said he needed to get off his chest. If that's the case it would be wrong to tell him he cannot. AND, I did say quickly... well none of that really matters (about H) and moved on to other things. Again... SS20 JUST found out he is expecting, got engaged, and literally just bought a house the day before. He is overwhelmed and tired.
I'm 100% positive that SS20 does not say a word to H that he chats occasionally with me or that he met up with me.
And, there WAS NO gathering of intel for sure. I didn't ask one word about H... I just listened and validated SS20 feelings in that moment.
PS - I made his favorite pie and when loading up his car and saw I had a pie for him his eyes lit up and he said he was really hoping to get one of these while he was home and was excited and told me he wasn't sharing it with anyone!!!
^^^ That made me feel so good.
As I've said before I miss my family of 5 (now expanding!!!). I won't be a strong presence because it would make my H feel I'm not moving on in his eyes but I'm letting both stepkids know they know how to reach me and if they ever need anything.... What I hope for most is for them to have a relationship with S19. Up until 9 months ago S19 and SD10 were extremely close to one another and I know that S19 misses that too.
