Cold or Flu? and Other Challenges

So first of all, I am suffering from a cold or the flu~ not sure which. ALl I know is I feel absolutely AWEFUL. Sniffling, Sneezing, Sore Throat, Fever, Nausea... it is not pleasant. All I want to do is sleep. Unfortunately Mr. Allen is not of the same mind and wants to play. So we have compermised. I sit, wrapped in my blankie at the computer or on the sofa and he plays.

With this adjustment he has been very understanding that Mommy does not feel good. Of course also aiding this was the delivery of some more lemons for my tea and a bag of oranges. The vitamin C hopefully will help abate the symptoms I am enduring. But Allen discovered that he REALLY likes oranges and has been nibbeling away on slices almost as fast as I peel one for him.

Ahhh yes the delivery...

Yesterday the guy I have been seeing called to see if I wanted to do anything~ I couldn't think much beyond getting out of bed to take care of the kids. There was no way I could go anywhere. So he asked me if I needed anything. I told him no, I was fine (habit there to not ask for or accept help)

So the afternoon continued and then there was the ring of the door bell...

What a sweetie! He brought me tea bags, honey and lemons. I guzzled tea for several hours last night. It felt so good on my throat and sent warmth throughout my body. Amazing stuff~ loved it.

Then this morning, the girls had left for school, Allen and I were resting on the sofa when I hear the doorbell. There was my Prince Charming with more lemons and the oranges. How awesome is that? He really treats me like a princess...

Then my best friend and I... chatting yesterday she was saying she wants to be bikini ready by summer. Bikini's? We are in our 40's what is she thinking?

So there is this actress, Nicollette Sheriden~ 46 years old and has the body of a 20 year old. No cottage cheese thighs, no baby bulge belly, sleek and slim... ok I admit I have a little envy.

So we have a challenge to see which of us can get sleek and slim and look the best by Memorial Day. Weight wise, I am ok~ could lose 5-10 pounds but not a have to. But excercise? That is an absolute HAVE TO! I am so out of shape body tone wise.

I still have the baby belly and Allen is a year old. Sit ups, crunches, whatever it takes to get that flat tummy back. And then I have to go online to research... what might get rid of these cottage cheese thighs?

The Challenge has me thinking about a lot of things in my life I need to "shape" up~ not just my body. This is going to be a fun adventure!

Caught a cold

Forgiveness and Other Random Thoughts

I had an interesting adventure in understanding a bit more about forgiveness and what it really means.





The guy I am dating knows my son's father's wife. We talked a bit about that whole situation with all of that. As I have said to most people who are familar with the situation I personally believe my son's father's wife should be held responsible for her actions or lack of action I guess is more approriate. But I also came to the conclusion it wasn't my job to make that happen or to persue it in any way. I came to believe that if it was something that needed to be dealt with it was God's job and I needed to let it go.



So I forgave her for her humanness and making a mistake when it came to decisions about her husband. After all I made more than one mistake when it came to that man. I have to say, I wasn't sure the level of forgiveness. Although I didn't wish her harm I also still was pretty peeved when I thought to much about the whole thing.



So last night my date and I were talking. He also has some inside information becuase of some friendships he has. The girl that has been renting the trailer out at the house has moved. On top of that she has lost her job. I realized as we talked that I actually was feeling compassion and worry for the woman. This has been her home for 17 years. The place she raised her babies. The only thing that she has really to show for the 20 years of marriage. Between the personal loan and the bank loan she owes a healthy amount of money each month. She isn't getting any monies from her husband as she had in the past.



Compassion... wow.

So I guess I have actually forgiven the woman, really forgiven her. I hadn't really realized it. Her husband on the other hand ~ I haven't gotten to the point of compassion for him as yet. Maybe someday~

The conversation with my date... he is a pretty amazing man. I am a wee bit worried about him. I just keep asking myself what is really wrong with him that I am not seeing or don't know about yet. I cannot imagine myself being attracted to someone that doesn't have some serious flaw. My history with men is such...

Well tonight I am not going to worry about it. I am going to go to bed with a smile, knowing, flawed or not, he thinks I am special and wants a future with me...

Curious State of Affairs

Things have been rather intrersting for me in 2010. Not in a bad way, in a curiously good way. As I have wrote before, I am dating several different guys at the moment.

One will not be dated any more because although I enjoy his company for short periods of time, he lacks the fun spirit that I really need. My daughter describes him as the old man on the street who yells at the children for walking on his lawn.

I am learning, if a guy has the "red flags" then you have to walk away BEFORE things get any deeper. So although he and I will still be friends there will be nothing more.

The other guy I have been seeing has been an ass the last few days. Or perhaps I have been a bitch? Anyway, things have been really uneasy between us. He attempted to push the dating to sexual activity. I am so not there yet. In the past, yeah I probably would have. But I realize that for me, today, that is no longer the life I want to live. Actually I have known that for a long time...

Back when my son's father started making the move on me... I knew it then. I knew it was wrong, I knew it would not turn out good. But I thought maybe, just maybe, because I loved him... OK so lesson learned. Loving someone is not reason to violate your own values. In fact someone who would ask you to violate your values for love is probably not someone you should be with.

With this guy, it is a lot easier. Although i like him, it is just that, LIKE. He has some characteristics that are fun and I enjoy his company but I don't love him so saying WHOA back off is easy. But it has caused tension...

I am not sure if I will continue to talk to him... I will have to see how his attitude is today.

Then there is the quiet guy. WoW! So he makes my heart flutter a little. Not sure why. He has been ultra conservative about boundries. Not even holding my hand yet. We have talked a lot and learned a bit about eachother. He has made some poor choices in the past and seems to understand that past choices are not a relflection of current events. He intrigues me. He doesn't need to be rescued, his life is pretty stable. I don't know... and of course because this is all new to me, I am a bit confused. I do not ever remember dating someone who didn't try to put the moves on after the 3rd or 4th date. Men in my life have been slimy. This guy... he isn't slime.

Of course as I go through all of this, my mind is thinking... so what really is wrong with him if I am attracted to him? Is he a pedophile? Is he a drug addicted hiding his addiction? Is he a seriel murderer? Really~ these are questions I ask myself just because I am interested in him. Seems like all the guys I have EVER been interested in have had something REALLY wrong with them.

So that is where I am right now in the dating department... I am curious to see how things go. It has been fun and I am looking forward to the future.

Then there is our living situation~

So last year, Mom died we had to move. We moved to the little 2 bedroom apartment. Great for me and the 2 babies. Then all the kids came home. So we moved to this place. Certainly bigger and more comfortable but not what I want for us for long term. So by summer I want to move again... The kids and I had entertained thoughts of moving out of the area. But honestly, this is home and none of us really want to leave. At least not right at the moment.

I have been looking at some of the 3 bedrooms around town. I really would like to be able to get a 4 bedroom but don't think I will be able to. Or maybe a 3 bedroom with a "bonus" room? Although Allen still sleeps with me, in the next few months that will start to deminish and he will need his own room. The girls, with their age and interest differences are totally not able to share a room. So Allen will have to be in one of their rooms or in my room in his own bed. What ever way it works out I have to keep that all in mind as I look for our new home.

I promised Katie that it would be my last move until she is 18. So it has to be a home that is comfortable and has the space we need and is at a cost we can afford. I am looking and see a few that fit our criteria... so hoping that by summer there will be the "perfect" place.

Another interesting bit has been Katie living with me. I lost custody of the child in 2003. From that point on all I had was a few hours a week visitation. "Visiting" is a whole lot different than 24/7 parenting. This chiold is strong willed, opinionated, and quite the narccissist. She has expectations that the world will revolve around her wants and desires and is shocked if things do not happen that way.

She has been a handful. Both of us have had to make adjustments to make this whole thing work. I am excited about her being here still and she and I have settled into something of a routine. She is really an amazing kid. She is bright and has so many good qualities. I am happy to be at a point where I am able to guide her through the next few years into adulthood. It isn't going to be easy and she will provide me with lots of moments of testing the boundries...

But it is with anticipation of good things that I look to the future..

Announcement!

It is OFFICIAL!~ I have custody of my daughter! It has been a long battle and one I wish didn't have to be fought. However, I am so grateful to God for bringing her home. In an ideal world her father and I would have shared her more equitably. I cannot change who he is, I can however do my best to ensure that he has better access than he allowed me.

I am in a rather odd place emotionally with all this. When my Ex and I divorced I asked for custody. At that time I did not know about 50/50 custody. Several years later, after I realized how much the kids needed BOTH of us, we had moved from the kids living with me 80% of the time to the two of us sharing a very close 50/50 situation.

There are days I regret having filed against myself in 2001 to have the custody made officially 50/50. From that time on my Ex did what he could to interfer with my relationship with our children. Most of the time though, I know I did the right thing and although I have some animosity towards my Ex for what he has done, I do know that he loves the kids and more importantly they love him.

Today, as I celebrate my daughter being in my physical custody I also have to think about my other daughter and son and their situation...

My youngest daughter does know who her father is. She has had a chance to have something of a relationship with him. It is a bit of a different relationship but seems to be comfortable for her and her father. Her father has really stepped up this last 7 months and been a positive influence in her life.

Yet, I am still a bit sad that there isn't more of a relationship between the two of them. I wish she could spend more time with him. But I have to keep myself and my feelings out of it and just let her and her Dad do their own thing.

Then there is Allen~

My little guy will never know his father. When I was talking to a friend the other day about it she asked if I had thought about letting Allen write his father as he gets older.

This is such a conundrum for me. How do I let one child have any sort of relationship with a person who caused such harm to a sibling of the child? My gut is still telling me to allow absolutely NO contact between the vile creature that is my sons father and my son. No good could ever come of it.

I am not sure what to do about how I feel about what this man did and how my son is going to look at himself because of my view of his Dad. I just don't know how to overcome my revulsion over what this man did to help my son feel good about where he came from.

Although...

For Christmas and his Birthday I bought my son a few big rig truck toys along with some cars. I shopped carefully for what I got him so that as he played I could tell him some good stuff... Like a guy the other day was teasing my little guy about being a plumber because of his britches were scooting down his bottom. I laughed and said "No, he is working on being a truck driver"

I know how much his sperm donor loved truck driving, collecting cars and trucks and maybe that is a positive thing about the man I can pass on to my baby boy. At least it is something that doesn't make my stomach turn in revulsion thinking about...

Well my babies are all in bed so I s'pose I should go get some sleep myself~ lots of stuff coming up this week that I need to get done. My friend will be by in the morning bringing me my StarBucks, I have another friend stopping by sometime tomorrow to see if he can fix my washing machine for me, I need to get some general housework done before he shows up, Bug has a dentist appointment, and then there is Friday...

My goodness lots to get done!

Monday January 11, 2010

Wow this new year is just running by SO fast!

It is already the 11th! How in the world did that happen? My baby is working on the second week of his second year. I don't know where the time is going already! My year has already been busy busy busy and is not looking like it tis going to slow down much!

Some really good stuff has been going on. I have had several dates with a couple of different guys already this year. One of the guys asked me why I was dating multiple people...

It was pretty cool to be able to look at him and say "You seem like a nice guy, but I have no commitment to you or anyone else that prevents me from dating different people." He seemed as if he was a little put off by the comment.

After that conversation I talked to a friend about the date. She made me laugh. She went on this rant about how guys (and actually a lot of females) have this expectation that if you go on one date with them that there is this commitment. She called them the "exclusion" daters... the folks who think you should exclude all others once you date them but actually should be excluded from being dated because they are morons.

So he called me up from another date~ I let him know I wasn't going to be able to go out for a couple of weeks as I have a lot of things going on. He asked what was going on, and I was rather elusive... So my daughter, in all of her infinate wisdom, rather loudly says "My Mom has a date with someone". He hears, he says "Oh so you are still seeing other guys?" "Yeah" this brings about a conversation about "exclusive" dating... Like I told him during the conversation...

Exclusive comes ONLY after there has been an AGREEMENT by two people that they will only be seeing eachother because at that point they are confident that the person they are dating is going to be the person that they marry and wish to spend the rest of their life with.

I can look back on my life and see how I so put myself into a corner with little options because of "exclusive" dating. I am excited at this new phase in my life~ where I get to date as many different men as I chose, not be tied down to an exclusive thing and be able to have fun and enjoy myself. If at some point I find myself feeling as if a more exclusive relationship might be better then I can look at things then and reevaluate... because I know I am not tied to forever dating multiple people either.

Other than my baby boy growing up and dating...

There are other big changes coming in 2010... I cannot wait to share more about them!

So the quiet one~ he asked me to go to the movies... Hmmmm~ this is going to get interesting

Lets wait and see where things go...

Contestant #1: The Intellectual

He is smart, witty, easy to talk to and rebuilding his life after a series of unfortunate events.

Contestant #2: The CharmerHe makes me laugh, calls me princess, spoils me with little gifts, has a job and my kids like him.

Contestant #3: The Quiet Guy
He doesn't Say much, yet when I have needed help, he just sort of appeared offering his services...

These 3 each come with strong points and weak points. None of the 3 have anything that gets them a black flag. All 3 have yellow flag warnings because of history~

Personally I am wanting to get to knw them all better~ each has characterstic I find intriguing...

Allen likes burritos