Good News!

My youngest son announced to me last night (that would be Gabe) that he is getting married! Her name is Lauren and shes a dark haired exotic girl with a charming smile. He has good tatse, what can I say? I asked him when he was going to get marrioed, he said he didn't know, he hadn't asked her yet. I then asked when he was going to ask her. He assured me he wasn't going to. As he put it, "She'll figure it out soon enough."

I should probably point out here that two weeks ago, he was marrying Marie. They were in love he said. I have proof of this from a gentle reminder from his teacher to explain to him why we do not kiss girls at recess. Before that it was Noelle and Alex. At the same time. I told him then you are not allowed to marry more than one girl at a time in this country, but somehow he didn't seem bothered by such trivalties.

In this particular intance, I asked him where they planned to live. His answer..."With you of course!" Of course. How could I be so foolish as to think otherwise?

By the time he gets home from school tomorrow (or perhaps as soon as today), I suspect his passionate fling with the lovely Lauren will have ended. Most likely he will have moved on to someone else already. But until then, anyone want to go to a wedding?

Therapy

Out of all the pictures I have in my files this is the only one I have of him. The loser with the black shirt. That's all the kids have to go with. Thats it. What does that tell you?

So my son admitted in Therapy tonight that he was pissed off at his Dad. This sounds little but really it's not. We've been trying to get him to this point for almost a year. To hear him say he's pissed off at his dad and his feelings are hurt by the way he acts towards him was huge for me. For several reasons. I have never stopped for any length of time to accept how I feel about the man who sired my children. I hate him, simply enough. He sold me a sack full of promises that he never meant to keep and lied to me repeatedly throughout our marriage. This, surprisingly enough, I can live with, Those are his choices, not mine and I cannot control the choices made so long ago. I can only control my reaction to those choices. I chose to walk away. This was the healthiest chioce for all of us by far. And for a while, we were able to move along our with our lives. He had a moderate amount of involvement with them, every few weeks or so, and I gave him a moderate amount of respect for still being involved with his kids even though our relationship had ended. Time passed, we found a mutual understanduing of each other, os so I thought. Then he met HER. Jen, the evil shrew who made his real personality show through. Even after he met her, things porogressed normally. Hell when the kids visited him now, they actually visited a clean house. This could work, I thought. she could be good for him, I started to wonder if maybe SHE could make him into a better person, hell maybe even a better dad! Then, they decided to have a baby. Thats where the story changes. He had baby number 5, and dropped his two kids like last years newspaper. Suddenly the boys were lucky if he saw them twice a year. As it stands now, when the boys saw him at chrsitmas, it was the first time he'd seen them since April. I really really hate him for this. I hate the fact that he hurt my children. He turned his back on his kids in the blink of an eye and it really pissed me off. I hate him for making a mess that I now have to love my kids through. I cannot say this enough, this is a price I'm willing to pay because I am getting the good end of this deal. I get the kids. I get the hugs and the kisses and the bed time stories and the snuggles and the snow days and the beach days and all the fun tings that come along with kids. But I am angry. I really fucking hate that man, and I'm ok with that. I hate that he is selfish and lazy and self centered and that he was able to drop them so easily. I really believe they never meant anything to him. They were a ticket to what he thohght was a better life. I really believe he doesnt care, and never did. I hate him for not seeing what those kids really are, how sweet and smart they are, and how special they are. I hate him for not wanting to be a part of their lives. I hate him for telling them although not in actual words that HER kids and the new baby matter, and they do not. I work every day to undo damage. I can only hope I can do enough. I dont want them growing up feeling less than what they are because that asshole couldnt be bothered to be involved. I love my kids, I can only hope that whaty I have to offer is enough.

What I'm afraid of

The last two days have been good ones with the boys. But there are hints, especially with Patrick of the issues that lie just beneath. I am afraid I'm not going to be able to fix him. I have worried that I will never get the boy I used to have back to where he was. Children change as they grow, and I'm not naieve enough to believe that Patrick would be immune to this. One of my favorite memories of him is laying on our backs watching the fourth of July fireworks, and as each one was launched into the sky and exploded above us he gave each one a voice and made they say things as the exploded. I can honestly say I have never laughed like that in my life. The boy I have now doesn't always want to leave the house. He wants to lose himself in computer games and the TV. With my other child, I worry that I'm not paying enough attention to him and he will grow up feeling neglected. I worry I will not be up to this challenge. I worry I will not be able to fix him, and get him to a place where he's comfortable with himself and confident in his abilites. I worry they will not live up to the potential I see in their eyes. I worry they will grow up like I did when I was a kid, never really finding a place where I fit. I was in college before that happened. It was there I finally found people just like me. I hope they don't have to wait that long. I am afraid I cannot fix this. I worry this is bigger than me. I believe I will get through this, I have to believe that, because without hope you have nothing.

the life I should have had

I find myself, in the heavier moments of parenthood, wondering about the life I sometimes think I should have had. When I was younger, in college and even earlier, in high school, I thought about the future that awaited and never once in all that time did I think I wouls be a single mother with two kids, living at her moms house at 36. I don't dislike the life I have now, but this really is never where I thought I would be at this point in time. I find me letting my mind wander to what it would be like to have the life I thought I would have if things has turned out the way I thought it should have. What if there was a partner beside me? What if I wasn't alone on this journey? What if my boys had a dad? Who would I be? What would I be? Would that other person be there to back me up? Would he be there to fight with? I know, from looking around at the wreckage of some peoples lives that it could be so much worse. I could be shackled to someone who was abusive, cruel, unavailable, or just plain uninterested in being a dad. Things would be so different. But maybe not all for the better. Maybe I wouldn't have found my inner strong person. Maybe I would not have learned to listen to and trust my own judgement when it comes to raising kids. I have a nasy habit of letting other peoples wants and needs overhsadow my own. I lean in the direction of giving more validity to someone elses point over my own. Since I am on my own own this journey, there is no one else to get any other odeas from, so I have to find the answers my self, one way or the other. I have to figure out what questions to ask and how to find the answers I need. I have had to learn to be independant and how to maintain discipline in my home. I doubt myself every day that I have any clue what I'm doing, but I'm so much better at this than I was five years ago. If I were with someone else, maybe I would not be 11 weeks away form having my Masters degree. Maybe this is the life I was supposoed to have even if it wasn't the one I wanted. I can honestly say sometimes I look around and wonder how exactly I got where I am. I truly never thought this fate was in my cards. But as in poker you can only deal with the cards you have been dealt. Wishing for another hand will not get you where you want to be. I love my kids more than I ever thought it was possible to love another person, and I do not regret ain anyway rasing them. I think maybe I'm right where I'm supposed to be. How's that old saying go? "You wanna hear God laugh? Tell him your plans." "Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans." I think these fit here. Some days I swear I can hear giggles coming from heaven.

the destiny of children

It's an interesting thing about kids. In my darker moments, I have, in the past, questioned the motives of God in regards to giving me a child with so many problems. Not that I don't love him, cause God knows I am closer to him than any other human being on Earth. But there have been moments when I have questioned the wisdom of the higher power in choosing to send this child on this particualr journey. Everything is much harder for him than it is for most children. He was to work harder in school, to make friends, to process negative emotions and to just cut a path through his existance. Everything comes so easily to his brother. This child, my child even has trouble naviagting home sometimes, wanting more and more of my attention, testing every boundary ever placed before him. He is frequently difiant and angry, making me wonder whats going on inside of him. I have asked, at times in the past, why this child was given to me. Don't get me wrong, I know how blessed I am to have children in the first place. Too many people want them but are unable, or have their kids yanked prematurely out of their lives by the impetuous hand of fate. I do aknowledge my blessings for what they are and I know just how quickly things can change. But that being said, what is the wisdom of giving a child that requires the therapist, the psychiatrist, the special ed, the school counsellor to me? Who decided I was up to this personal challenge? Why were the odds so seriously stacked against him from the very beginning, with the life he was given, the father he was given, the family he was given. Even the love of both parents was denied him in this exisitance. That makes me very sad for him. His is an experience I cannot fully undestand as I was lucky enough to have both parents together for my entire childhood. Why was he granted a father that was able to so easily cast him aside when a new model arrived, treated his oldest child like the favorite child? I mourn sometimes, for what he should have had, but never will. And, really where I'm going with this is why was this child given to me? I've never had ADD, I can't really know how his mind works. And yet, he is SO loving, and SO considerate. Maybe these gifts were meant to balance out the shortcomings he was handed with them. If you put him in a room with people smaller thna him, he has the patience I wish I had. How can this be the same child that can be so angry is things aren't just they way he needs them to be?

I look at the last 9 years with this child, and I look at what I have learned from him. I have learned patience. I have learned to be quiet when I am angry, I have learned to be flexible. I have leanred to slow down, and how to find a way to keep trying when I want to stop. I have learned how to ask questions to those around me and how to use the system to get what he needs. I have learned to listen. I have learned how to communicate. Still yet there is more to be learned. Maybe the powers that be gave exactly the right child to exactly the right person, in that we both had a lot to take from each other. I don't know if someone else would be able to find the stores of pateince I have had to with him, or learn to think creatively when it comes to methods of helping him learn. Maybe it was done exactly right after all.

I still wonder if I'm up for this, and there are days I pray for a peaceful day where the fighting is less. But I think, maybe just maybe the people in charge might know what they're doing. I can only hope I'm doing it right. I worry about his fututre, he has so many challenges to overcome. I only hope, I only pray I know what I'm doing.  I want so much for him, I see so much in him that could be amazing. I need to remember to stop and remember he is amazing to me already.

"To love another person is to see the face of God..."

who am I?

So I look at my life, as it stands right now, and I find myself wondering who I am. I am the mother of a two children, one of which in on his own journey through a form of mental illness. I am a daughter who cares for her mothers daily needs, including cleaning the house, the yard, the kids and everything that's included there in. I buy the food, clean the house, feed the family, maintain the household, and work full time while going to grad school. I am an almost graduated Masters student who has managed to keep a B average this far. I am single mom, who is rasing two boys without any help from their dad. He chooses not to be involved since he had a new family with his current girlfriend. If it didn't bother Patrick so much, it wouldn't bother me, but Patrick wants a dad, and right now, as far as he is concerned he doesn't have one. I am single right now by choice, as I don't have time to get involved right now with anyone else. I simply have no desire to give anything to anyone else. There is nothing else to give. I have friends, and I hope I'm as good a friend to them as they have been to me. I try to be anyway. I am 36, and sometimes it feels like time is the enemy, the older it gets the faster it slips by me, every day falling away a little faster than the one before it. Somedays, I feel like I'm still 22, and not entirely sure how I ended up where I am. I look around me, and wonder How did this happen? How did I get here? I am a mom, who loves her kids more than anything else in the entire world. They are the best thing I have ever done, and I know how lucky I am to have them, healthy and whole. Patrick especially, he has his issues, but we're working on them. Therapy is working its magic, and hes in special ed in school, something I've been working for since September. So, with all of this, I still look around and wonder who is the person who lives just under the surface of all of this? That reamins to be seen.

I haven't posted in a really long time, because the whole moving in the house event actually came across as sort of anti climactic, and with all the chaos of the holidays, I just sort of misplaced myself for awhile. I'm still looking for me, I am going to update the whole blog soon because the original purpose of it has been completed, and now I have to define the new journey I might be on. I really worried that after the house was complete I woulds have nothing left to say, that perhaps people would not find me interesting anymore. A few updates to get out of the way: Pat is sleeping in his own room again ans that's great for all of us. I know the world has put this event behind them, and I think I'm getting there too. I'm in a more solid place than I was 6 months ago that's for sure. I still see changes that need to be made within myself, and perhaps that's where I'll go from here.