LostGal asked how I was doing the other day. Thanks for asking!

Not so well, I guess. I've been kind of coasting along, especially towards the 'end of the year' (ok, I'm a teacher, I do still think in school years ), not really thinking about things around here.

I haven't been taking care of myself. I've gained back all I had started to loose this fall plus lots, thanks to the stress of this past winter. At least now I can stay home with the kids for the next almost three months and not have the stress of driving back and forth to work.

My mom and cousin were here for 10 days, D9 made her first communion last Sun. She was beautiful!! And the visit went pretty well.

I did feel a little like a straight man at times though, with Mom running around trying to manage cousin's every move (cousin is 15 yrs older than I am), and managing to ignore and insult me in the process, and H at the same time putting on the charm with mom and whisper to me how rude and uncaring I was (he was upset because I said something to him about getting priorities straight when he chose to go to a meeting of a hobby club instead of going to D9's concert)

So when LostGal asked, I was feeling more than a bit drained, and questioning lots of stuff - I found out, for example, through my cousin that my Mom has been telling all her friends what horrible, uncaring daughters she has - and I figured out why she told me I was such a b!tch while I was orgainizing my wedding (this she told me last year - 10yrs after my wedding!!)

I guess the visit helped me to see why I had self-esteem issues which would have led me to end up and stay in this R with H.

Today we were going to a grad. party in Helsinki (an hrs drive from here). We had made plans to be there at a certain time so that the girls would get to see their same-age cousins. H actually did get up and was well on his way to getting ready.

Then he saw the stuff the kids had been building with Legos. There's been some Lego 'arrest' here for several months, which I know nothing about, except that he keeps telling the kids to 'come and talk to him about it', but none of the kids seem to know what the deal is, and he won't say. So, for the most part, the kids have just ignored the Legos, and sort of brush Dad off every time he brings it up. But today, they took them out.

This set him off. He got upset, started yelling...aparently I had dropped an empty paper of pills on the floor (just about all of us are suffering from allergies) - the metal kind, and H cut his finger picking it up.

He came downstairs to find a band-aid, and as luck would have it, we're out. So he pulled the box of bandages and stuff (and with him a pharmacist, this isn't a small box) out and threw it all over the hall, yelling at the kids for using all the band-aids, how it was their fault he almost got blood on his white shirt, etc. When I asked him to stop yelling at the kids, he asked me who else he should blame - anyway it was MY fault, since I had thrown that trash on the floor in the first place.

He then told the boys that they had to pick up the mess. Being good kids, (and afraid of Daddy at this point...) they started to - so I told them they didn't have to pick up after Daddy, and ended up doing it myself.

H at this point had gone back upstairs, and called D9 up as well, to 'talk to'. I didn't quite hear what was going on, but there was some yelling and then I heard him say 'Now see - how do you feel if I do that to you?'

D9 wouldn't tell me what had happened - I found out later that he had thrown the contents of this desk (including the mouse and mousepad) on the floor - because they had made such a mess for HIM to clean, and he wanted to teach her a lesson.

Then we went to the store on the way out to get some money from the ATM and some chocolate for our friend in the hospital with her brand new twins. He asked me to go in, which I did, then he jumped out after me and yelled - Are you going to leave the kids in the car??

I answered that I was doing what he had asked. He followed me into the store, and I realized that he wanted me to get bandaids. So I picked some up on the way to the counter. He followed behind, yelling something the whole time, which I ignored. I found out when we got to the car, that I had bought the wrong kind - and he lectured for several minutes about how it would have been polite if I could have just offered to by the bandaids and asked what kind he needed (to be honest, at that point, I was just trying to keep things calm, and bandaids where about the last thing on my mind), and asked me why I couldn't just act like a civilized person instead of being so difficult.

I'm not looking for pity. The ball is in my court - I know only too well that the only thing that's going to have some effect here is for me to seperate from H, at least for a while. But damn it, I would give anything for that not to be the case. Last weekend, D9 was beautiful, we had a wonderful party here, and I realized how lucky I am to live here, with 4 wonderful kids, and good friends, and how, in spite of H's outbursts (and this WAS the first in a while), spliting up would affect the kids and their lifestyle. Like I've said before, I can't afford this place myself, most likely not any place with a yard, and I hate to think of taking them away from their friends, 'Their' woods, this house...yes I know kids are resiliant, but why do I have to 'throw' this away...

I would give anything for H to 'wake up' and realize how childish and damaging his actions are. I wish more than anything there were some magic words that I could say to make things better.

H is right in a way - I haven't been doing anything to upkeep this M lately - because I've come to the realization that there is nothing I can do. So I'm as polite as I can be, but really don't spend much time with him and keep up my boundaries - I will walk away as soon as he starts yelling, and I will defend the kids when he starts getting unnecessarily harsh with them. I hate that it has become that the kids do see now H's actions for what they are, and would rather spend time with me - I wish more than anything that they could have a mother AND a father. But I don't want them to think what he's doing is right either.

Nope - I haven't started facing my finances yet. That's my plan for this summer. I don't want to be a victim. But I would give anything to not have to end this M...