Maybe, Gabe, maybe. I was seeing signs of change etc, but he never sustains them and that's what worries me. He is more constant when I try to disappear on him, and I can't carry on doing the 'back away' dance forever. At some point, I want a mature adult R. It's like he wants me, but never quite enough. He's never 100% sure, but sure enough that he doesn't want me to move on to another R with anyone else. To me, it feels like he wants to keep me without the commitment.
Or maybe I'm just pushing him too much, I don't know. I just don't want to be in a situation like last time.
As far as the kids go, they are the most major problem in our R, in my opinion, and they cause I would say 90% of our disagreements (e.g last argument was when he said I had no authority over them).
Whenever I tried to organise regular contact sessions in the past, he never agreed to what I wanted. He offered me contact, but only on his terms, and I won't accept on his terms because I feel like it's a power-trip thing, rather than about the girls.
Also, because of all that court stuff that happened and the things Andy says to me about them, I still have so much hurt inside me that it interferes with my interactions with them. Sometimes the visits go really well and I am happy, other times it just upsets me and them being there is a reminder of what I went through.
I haven't raised my 2 eldest since they were 4 and 5 years of age. They are now 8 and 9. It doesn't feel to me like a mother-daughter connection, more like aunty and niece. I am far, far closer to DD4, and much more natural with her.
I have to DB my butt off with them every time they are here, and it's as hard as DB'ing with Andy. This is okay when I feel okay, but if Andy is stressing me or something else is going on, I am unable to do it with them and just end up crying.
I need to have the reassurance that my family is permanent, that Andy will not give me any more stress, either in the R or out of it, before I can divert my energies into repairing the mother R. I am using up so much energy trying to keep my PMA and NOT get depression (which is harder than people realise, on here, my mood still crashes frequently) that it makes it hard to extend energy elsewhere.
I really feel I need counselling about what happened with my kids because I feel I am not going to be able to move forward in my R with them until I come to terms with the fact that I lost them.
