It's All Good

When I get down about my life and situation, I remind myself that I am alive and healthy. I have my family and good friends. And I have an amazing daughter, who is bright and silly, healthy, happy, well-adjusted, learning and growing every day. For these things, I thank God. I try not to ask him for anything other than the strength to get through each day, and the wisdom to make good decisions for myself and for A (which I haven't been doing lately!).

The recent tragedy at Gettysburg College, my alma mater, reminds me to be thankful. My thoughts and prayers are with the family of the victim, and I sincerely hope that her family believes in the promise of Easter!

Return of the Slacker

I am well aware that I have been slacking on this blog. There’s a shocker.

But I have recently come to understand why that is: pain and anger were my muses for everything I had written before, and I honestly do not feel very angry now, and I have gotten over the pain of it. One of the things that got me through was realizing that we must “play the hand we are dealt.” This is clearly not the future I had envisioned when I said “I do,” and certainly not when Matt and I decided (together) to bring a child into this crazy world. But I can’t curl myself up in a ball, mourning for what could have or should have been. Life goes on.

And my life has gone on. I am doing well. This year has actually been pretty awesome. Avery started pre-school in September, and LOVES it. The fall and winter were pretty status quo. Play-dates, girls’ nights, dates, “the Holidays” – regular stuff.

Matt and Bonnie got married in September, and I was fine with it – it was more weird than anything for me. She is now officially my daughter’s step-mother, and I see her at least once a week. It is what it is. I have mixed feelings about the relationship lasting – on the one hand, I kind of don’t think it will. She is 24 and he is 40, and I think she will realize one day that she gave up “the fun years” to be some jackass’s wife. Also, it is my firm belief that cheaters are cheaters. Because the reason that they cheat has more to do with something in themselves than with their partner or their relationship. On the other hand, if they get divorced, that will be very disruptive to my daughter’s life. She doesn’t remember a time when Bonnie was not there. In fact, Bonnie was on the scene before A made her debut. But, time will tell.

The weirdest thing is, I don’t really remember being married to Matt. When I get to the end of my life and look back, he will be a brief chapter. When I look at him now, I can’t fathom what attracted me. And it’s not because of everything we’ve been through. He’s like a stranger, to whom I am not the least bit attracted. Isn’t that weird? And I find it sad. The biggest decision I will ever make, and I got it SO wrong. And believe me, I was SO sure I was getting it right. I have known people who have gotten married, and I said – oh, that will never last. But WE are doing it right. I felt SO superior. And I admit that I have been taken down a peg or two!

One of the things I have learned through my experiences of the past 3+ years is that I try never to judge any other couples from the outside. I didn’t even know what was going on inside my own marriage, and I was living it. It is impossible to understand what goes on behind the closed doors of others, whether it’s your best friend, your sister, your parents, whoever. Others may have bigger houses than I, better cars, wonderful husbands, glamorous lives, but at what cost?! Not that I wish unhappiness on anyone! No, that’s not it. It has really just made me more empathetic to people. If a stranger cuts me off on the road, I am more likely to wonder what is going on in his or her life than to give him or her the finger. If a friend is harsh or judgmental of others, I wonder what insecurities are causing that reaction.

Life is much more peaceful this way!

Silliness

Ok, time to get funny. Yes, kids do say the darndest things! Avery has always been a very effective communicator - from the time she came home from the hospital, she was very chatty, making sounds non-stop, she knew 7 animal sounds by her first birthday (including owl!), and was saying 10-word sentences by Christmas of '06, when she was 19 months old (which is pretty amazing, if I do say so myself!). I know all kids come up with funny words and expressions, and these are some of Avery’s recent gems:

- Yesterday, she was wearing patchwork plaid pants to school, and my cousin, Meg, saw her and said “I love your pants, A! Jack has some like that, but his are shorts.” To which Avery replied “Yeah, mine are long-sleeved.” And I’ll interject here, one funny term Avery’s aforementioned cousin Jack has coined: “legpits,” which are found in the back of the knees.

- On Labor Day, I kept telling her that it was the last day of summer, and the last day of the Froggy Pool, where we had spent a lot of time over the summer. And that evening, Avery asked me “Mommy, remember the Good Old Days?” And I asked her which days she could possibly be referring to, and she replied, “You know, when we used to go to the Froggy Pool every day,” followed by a big sigh.

- We were in outside of Avery’s favorite diner recently, and there was a big pile of sand in one of the parking spots, and Avery wanted to play in it, and I said “Eww baby, that sand is dirty. Maybe someone spilled oil there or something.” And she said “No Mommy, I think someone spilled SAND there!” Uh, duh Mommy.

- Once, right after breakfast, she asked me if she could have some candy, and I said that she would have to wait until after lunch. She came back about 5 minutes later and asked “Mommy, can I have my lunch now???” She’s going to be a great negotiator – always working the angle.

- We were driving by a Harley Davidson dealership, and there was a big, blimp-shaped Harley Davidson balloon flying above, and A said “Oh look, a Pimp!”

- We recently got a new tire, and she wanted to know why Joe (the tire guy, and one of Avery’s boyfriends) had to take off the “nug luts.”

- I was going to a wedding this summer, wearing a strapless dress, and as I was leaning in to do A’s seatbelt, she got very worried. “Mommy!” she said, “everyone is going to see your booby tops!”

- You blow up an air mattress to use it, and then you must “blow it down” to put it away (makes sense!).

- She likes to say that she has blonde hair, but mommy's hair is "blonde" (she makes the quotes with her fingers).

- She’s voting for Oh Mama.

- Her favorite drink is Coca-ma-cola (which is the name we all use now).

- She asked me why daddy uses “washmouth” (which is a word we also use now).


So this is why my life is so good. This is who I hang out with all the time! She just cracks me up, most of the time! It makes my life silly, and so awesome.

p.s.

I don't mean to sound whiny, or to claim that staying home is the most difficult job on Earth. Clearly, it is not. It is far less demanding than, say, brain surgery, or rocket science. And it does include trips to the zoo, countless episodes of SpongeBob (who knew I would ever want to thank God for SpongeBob?!), days at the pool, and even the occasional nap. But it is demanding. I have the highest respect for any woman who does this with more than one child - I can't even imagine! And especially for any woman who works a full day (at a "real" job) to come home to children and laundry and house cleaning. It's work!

Life is Good.

So that brings me pretty much up to the present. I have been stuck on this installment, because I have so much I want to say, but I have decided to limit it to our day-to-day life, which is so awesome!

Life is pretty good for us. I am well aware that I am SO extremely fortunate to have been able to stay home with Avery these past two years. Most women in my position would not have been able to do that, and I know that if I had had to hold down a 40+ hour/week job these two years, I may find myself in a mental institution today! It took me three full years, but I feel like I am finally back to “normal,” certainly better than I was while I was married, and probably more self-confident, outgoing and grounded than I have ever been. I feel like I am finally the ME I was always meant to be.

Some people may think that I’m lazy (in fact, I know that some people DO think I’m lazy), that I’m putting off getting a real, paying job just because I don’t want to “work.” Those people have never spent a day alone with a two- or three-year-old! It is a lot of work. There are people who actually do what I do every day and do get paid a lot of money for it. They are called nannies. My “job” can be difficult and exhausting, as any stay-at-home parent could tell you. It begins at 8 am, and is usually finished by 9:30 pm (in my case), but some nights not until 11 pm. And of course on any given night on which I am “on-duty” I can expect my little one to climb into bed with me, which is fine. There aren’t many non-paid positions that wake you up at 4 am! (HIS certainly doesn’t – my number one critic.)

I have been staying home because I recognize that there is a chance that my child may turn out to be completely fucked up by this life that has been forced upon her (and, to some extent, upon me, although Matt would describe our break-up as a “mutual decision”). As a child of divorce, Avery gets shuffled back and forth between two houses, and I can only imagine that many nights she wakes up from a deep sleep or a bad dream not knowing in which bed she is sleeping, or who will come if she calls. I have been doing it to provide some stability in her life, which is lacking in hers, by design, but which is present in kids with one household keeping to one schedule and one set of rules.

While our life together is stable, it has not been too terribly structured to this point. This year has had a little more structure than last – Avery and I took some classes together over the past year – but many days we would wake up and say “what do we want to do today?” I have been too scattered to be able to have too many commitments on my calendar, and I have been slacking in the commitments I have had (the only one of which, really, was the Junior League, and I was not the greatest committee participant, I am well aware!).

I have been putting off finding a full-time job for several reasons: one, I know that, as a single parent, once I start working, I will probably never stop; two, I do really believe that children benefit from being home with a parent for the first three years; and three, I enjoy the time I get to spend with Avery! We have fun together! But we are both ready for me to go back to work full-time. She is so ready to be in a classroom, and she is starting preschool in September – yay! And I am looking for a job.

Our life has been GOOD. Right now, I am happy. As happy or happier than I have ever been. Each night, I thank God for another amazing day, even if the day has been particularly difficult. And I thank him for my brilliant, beautiful, happy and healthy child. I have learned to CHOOSE not to be angry, most of the time. I have learned that, while things may not always turn out as you expect, they will always work out, if you perceive them as being worked out. If you THINK everything is good, that’s good. If it all seems like shit to you, it’s inevitable that it will be anything but shit.

In Addition...

It occurs to me that I have overlooked two topics, so before I get up to the present, I must address these two things: dating since my separation, and my relationship with Matt now, as well as his with Avery.

So, dating: something I thought I had finished (successfully)! I first got back “out there” when Avery was seven months old. I signed up on Match.com, because I really didn’t have any other way to meet people! Being in my mid-30’s, I didn’t have the network of single girls to go out with that I had back in my 20’s – pretty much everyone I know is married with kids. Most of my coworkers at the school were women, and when I wasn’t working I was home with an infant. So I signed up on Match, and my first few attempts were a little crazy! My life was full of drama at the time, and I really had no business dating! I was a mess. But I needed to feel attractive to men, to feel lovable, because at that time I was feeling unworthy of love. Not the greatest motive for trying to find a new “partner”!

I have had several semi-serious relationships over the past 2 years. Each of them was “fine” in its own way, but none has been the “right” one, which is ok – I am actually still in touch with several of them. I have realized that my agenda for dating now is completely different than it was back then, which is to say, I really have no agenda. I feel like, in our culture, there is so much emphasis on marriage, that it causes many young women (including myself) to try to turn every man into a potential husband, causing us to have tunnel vision. We can only see the “prize,” the finish line. When I met Matt, I was just about to turn 30, and I don’t think it was that BIG birthday that made me want marriage so badly – it was the fact that I was almost the LAST one of all of my college and high school girlfriends to find my “prince.” They had all gotten to have a wedding, and all that that entails – showers, gifts, the perfect dress, etc. It was finally my turn! I had had a VISION for my life, and that vision was becoming a reality.

Now, I am trying not to have a “vision” for the future. I am not looking forward so much to the day that I “find someone.” I don’t think my family understands this – people are supposed to want to be married, right? But I tried it and it really didn’t turn out so well for me, so I’m trying to just be more accepting of what life brings me. I am trying to be happy with myself, and my life, and my daughter. And I have never been so content with myself and my life before.

I think I am largely free from anger. There’s a saying I love, that I learned on an Oprah episode dedicated to anger, which goes: being angry is like taking poison and expecting someone else to die. That’s not to say that I wasn’t angry – I was angry for the better part of two years! But my anger never affected HIM. It did, however affect my everyday life greatly! Is it shitty, what happened to me? Yeah, it is. Was THIS the vision I had for my life? No way! But being angry about it doesn’t change or solve anything. I do believe that people are meant to be in pairs, that the highs are that much more exciting with someone to share them with, and that we all need help with life’s hurdles. But I’m not going to make that the ultimate goal. I’m going to simply be happy with what IS.

As far as my relationship with Matt: ugh. It’s fine, but for the past two years I have seen him four to six times per week, usually for only about 5 minutes as he picks Avery up, or drops her off, but still, I see him almost every day! As I have not been working and Avery has not been in daycare, the pick-ups and drop-offs have been at one of our houses. I guess we get along. We don’t communicate too terribly much, which I don’t think is right in light of the fact that we are BOTH Avery’s parents, and we will ALWAYS be Avery’s parents. There are always going to be things we will have to work on together as we raise our daughter. But he doesn’t feel the need to discuss anything with me, and he thinks I’m being dramatic when I say that there is a HUGE potential for her life to be very screwed up, as segmented as it is now. But just like in our marriage, he wants to do things the way he wants to do them, and he really doesn’t care what I think about that. When I look at him now, I honestly can’t believe I was ever married to him! It doesn’t even seem real. After all of this, there’s very little I find attractive about him. It makes me weary knowing that our lives will be connected forever!

Matt does spend time with Avery. He has her two nights during the week, after work until before work the next morning, and one night of each weekend (unless he’s away, which he often is), which is a full 24-hour period. His nights with her, however, are always scheduled based on whatever else is going on in his life. Whereas I plan my life around my time with her, he tends to plan his time with her around the rest of his life. He cancels or switches nights on a whim, which is very frustrating to me! I don’t have too many obligations at the time, but I am trying to have a life!

Avery seems to enjoy her time with him. In fact, for the past few weeks I have often heard that she “only loves dada” and not me, and that dada’s house is “funner” (the only concrete reason I have gotten out of her is that we have a black cat, and she wants a pink cat!) I know she is three and doesn’t understand what she is saying, but of course these words very hurtful to me! I feel like I have put my life on hold for three years, staying home with her to give her the best possible foundation instead of dumping her in daycare 50 hours/week, while his life has not skipped a beat. And he gets to be the hero. Daddy is SO FUN – woohoo! And mom stinks. I hope she grows out of this, and I know someday she will understand everything that is impossible for her to understand now.

I rarely say a bad word about her father to her – on occasion, I can’t help it (like last weekend when she threw a fit all the way home from his house because she wanted to be with him on HIS day, but he had left early in the morning to play golf, and I bore the brunt of it!), but I try to bite my tongue. I think it’s important for kids to take pride in where they come from, and if they are constantly bombarded with “your dad is a jerk” it’s bound to affect how they feel about themselves (which is essentially what happened to Matt and his siblings growing up).

The Second Year

Soon after Avery’s first birthday, my marital house went on the market (and sold in 1 day!), and we moved into my parents’ house. I LOVED my little house. But, although I was only 25 minutes from my home town, I hated the location of it. I felt very removed from my family, and as I have mentioned, I didn’t make many friends there. If I could have picked my house up and moved it up to Berwyn with me, I would have in a heartbeat!

But we moved into my parents’ house, and it was fine. Not ideal – it’s not easy to live in someone else’s house – but fine, and comfortable for me to be back in my home town, in the house in which I grew up. My parents had decided to spend most of their time in their mountain house for the duration of our stay at their house, which turned out to be a lot longer than any of us predicted! Avery and I spent the summer just hanging out – enjoying the summer, going to the Poconos when we could, going to the pool and the beach. It was great and I was trying to adjust from a year that had really taken the wind out of my sails! I casually looked for a job, and we really didn’t have too much structure.

Then, in November 2006, on the day that would have been my 5th anniversary (technically, it was – we weren’t divorced yet), my sister, Katie (my only sibling and best friend), saw a doctor for headaches and blurred vision she had been having for a few months. That day she was sent for an MRI, and it was discovered that she had a tumor in her sinus cavity, behind her right eye, which was pressing on her optic nerve. She was admitted to the hospital that night, and the following day the biopsy proved that the tumor was malignant. Our family was in shock, and immediately thrown into crisis mode. Katie had gone through a long, drawn out, and very painful divorce, and only a month before had gotten engaged to a really wonderful man. She has two kids who, at the time, were 10 and 7. We all thought her life had finally turned a corner to happiness.

In December, she was to have the tumor removed. She was told that there was an 80% chance that she would lose her eye, and much of the surrounding bone. We were also told that the surgery would take eight to twelve hours. In what turned out to be a five hour surgery, the doctors were able to successfully remove the tumor, and save Katie’s eye! It was a miracle, but it was only the beginning of a long and very difficult road. On December 22nd, she started 2+ months of daily chemo and radiation.

During this time, my parents were living with her most of the time. Not only was she a single mom, who needed help with her kids and household, she had to go to Jefferson Hospital, about an hour from her house, almost daily. This was not how my parents had anticipated spending these months, but luckily for all of us, they were both retired and available to do whatever needed to be done. It was very exhausting for them, and for my sister it turned out to be horrendous. There were days when my dad had to literally carry her down the stairs to the car to start her excruciating day once again. She lost weight, she lost much (but not all) of her hair, she had very little energy. She was angry, and she was scared, as were we all!

During this time I was at my parents’ house, about an hour away from my sister’s house, home with Avery, who was a year and a half old. There was little I could do to help – I was just barely succeeding at my own life at the time! It was an extremely stressful time for me, for Katie, and for my parents, to say the least!

At the end of it all, however, Katie was found to be cured! Not in remission, but actually cured of cancer. She still has frequent appointments with her team of doctors, and will have to be monitored probably forever, but over a year later, she is still cancer free. In October, 2007, she married Jose, on her 40th birthday! It was a beautiful celebration of life and love, involving their kids, his brother, and me and Avery. The whole day was lovely!

In November of 2007, Avery and I finally moved into our own place! Although I appreciated all that my parents did for us during those 16 long months, it is so great to have our own space. We are renting a carriage house about 3 miles from my parents’ house, in the town in which I grew up. It’s not huge, but it’s ours (for now) and it has everything we could need, including a yard where Avery and I can play, a back patio where I have a grill and some patio furniture, and a little garden (which I planted in the Spring, and is now horribly overgrown!).

This brings me up to the present – I promise future posts will not be so lengthy!