File this under TMI (too much information). This day also provides a perfect opportunity to collect your urine. I decided this morning to start the 24 hour urine collection that my doctor ordered for the ongoing saga of the kidney stone. What better way to celebrate a holiday than peeing into a huge jug. Guess I'll stay close to home and spare non-family members from the Ewww factor of seeing me carting around a large container of my own liquid waste.
Once I collect the urine, I will send a sample off to a lab in California for analysis. The test is to try to figure out what caused the kidney stone and how I can prevent another one from developing. I'm pretty sure I already know what the diagnosis will be - this kidney stone was due to divorce. Future preventative action - do not go through any more divorces.
My husband is still showing what a pee pee head he is. My town had significant flooding from major storms over the last few days. Did Army Boy inquire if we were overcome with water? If we had to build an ark to get out? Negative. My heart warms with the strength of his love for his own children. Someone should really write a poem or haiku about it.*
*We actually are still staying at my parents' and have only gone home for short periods but still, he doesn't know that. Unless he's actually spoken to his mother and she reported that we were fine. The likelihood of him calling her is about the same as the likelihood of me enjoying peeing in a jug.
I completely get it. During the first months of leaving the marriage, they are so self-centered that it's hard to remember a time when you thought this person was so wonderful.
ReplyDeleteA few months after he had moved out, Winter arrived and there was a lot of snow piling up on the porch area that led right to the front door. With 6 month old in the house, I didn't have time to shovel out. The dumpster was across the parking lot, and I also didn't have a way to lug a baby, a trash bag, and climb over snow banks to reach the dumpster. One night I had put a trash bag outside the front door to deal with later.
He arrived to pick up the baby for his visitation time, stepped over the snow pile and walked past the trash bag, leaving without offering any help.
It was moments like those that I wondered what the F--- had happened to my life and the person I thought I married.
What a complete ass. The utter lack of consideration kills me but I shouldn't be surprised because that's who they are. I have the echo of your last sentence in my head a thousand times each day. I don't know how you got through this with a baby. You are one strong woman.
DeleteThanks for reading.
Sweet Kay,
ReplyDeleteI used to roll these many of your same thoughts over in my head again, and again..."Why is my ex so: short-sighted/pig-headed/self-consumed/oblivious/cruel/awful as a father/rotten as a human being, etc., etc.???" Then I saw the truth of the matter which was that he was behaving according to form - according to who he TRULY was, not to the person I THOUGHT he was or SHOULD be. The insanity would have been for me to keep expecting something different from him. He was who he was regardless of the effects it had on anyone around him, and that was a truth I could rely on. In any situation we faced, I absolutely assumed he would behave poorly.
There was such beauty in that knowledge! It forced me to re-create my own life and look to him for absolutely as little as possible. I felt power in not having my brain power tied up with thoughts of him - And I especially loved the strength and clarity it gave me when I realized I was ultimately paddling my own canoe. Screw him! I didn't need him or his oars!!! (Or should I say, "[wh]oars"?!!!)
Please don't give him the power to upset you by his abysmal parenting, but look at is as an opportunity to let your kids see you SHINE. And they WILL notice. My adult kids who were 8 and 12 when their dad walked out, have thanked me profusely for my steadiness and constancy that they can look back now and see. I did not do things perfectly - and they knew it since I was committed to living a transparent life, warts and all, with the life the kids and I created together - but I was PRESENT, I was predictably steady, and I tried my best to find joy each day.
You can do it, Kay. Don't let the S.O.B. drag you down.
I snorted over [wh]oars! Lol. You sound like a great mom and I'm so glad your kids cherish and appreciate you.
DeleteYour words have made me understand that I need to stop thinking he's going to act how I would like him to. That's not going to happen. He is who he is and I need to expect nothing more from him.
Thank you for your words.
It does not matter who he is or why he does what he does, own your own actions and let him own his. You can no sooner figure him out or control his actions than you can stop the tide. Try to see him for what he is: a garden variety cheat and that is all he will ever be.
ReplyDeleteYou can't change the spots on a leopard. May as well not even try.
I used to think he was an original but you're right. He's just one of many, they are all the same.
DeleteThanks for reading and writing.