Our Island Family Life

Cade was a mess Sunday night. At first he was fine. I asked him how his weekend was and he said it was good since the girl was gone and he spent the whole day Saturday away from TMW. He went to a debate with his dad. Cade has a love hate thing going on with the debates. He likes being away from TMW, the girl and baby. In theory he should be having some one on one time with his dad but the reality is that he is alone most of the day. Hours and hours. From at least 8am until 6pm. Sometimes more, sometimes less. He likes being alone to steal extra donuts, play his game boy and scrounge for lost money. He teases the older kids with stuff he knows will bug them his brothers have taught him. He says it's ok but I can tell he is stressed. Sunday evening he knocked over a cup and split some juice. No one was mad at him but he just went off and started getting angry with Will asking him why he had his cup there in the first place. He was growling and even though he wiped up the juice he starting saying how the whole weekend stunk. This was not what he had said earlier when I asked. He then started to cry and said how his dad had teased him all weekend and so did TMW and Connor said a few things on the ferry ride home. Then he was upset about having to see his dad over vacation. He has all he can do handling weekends but vacations nearly kill him. He said he couldn't take it anymore and threw himself on the bed and cried. He was like that for an hour. He got a headache and couldn't sleep until 10pm. He woke up with the headache and had nausea and was in and out of the bathroom. He couldn't eat. He obviously missed morning school. I talked with his teacher and they knew about the debate thing and knew he was being left alone so they had asked him to find out what the topic was and maybe they could discuss it. That was a mistake. I told him it was actually adding to his stress. He doesn't want to have anything to do with the topic or debate at all. He said his dad wants him to join the school team in middle school and he gets sick just thinking about it. He is well aware it was debate that was the reason his dad met TMW and he has issues with it. He hates her, resents his dad for having an affair and is not able emotionally to discuss these things with his dad. He simply isn't old enough. His dad forcing him to like things that are part of the direct cause of his anger and resentment is not good at all. Hence his love hate feeling for going. I wish the kids didn't know about him having an affair and if the separation had been done right they wouldn't. Sean never hid it and was actually angry with them for not understanding. He actually asked Connor why he should be upset that Sean was in love. Was being in love a bad thing? Should Sean not be able to love? Connor said his dad made him sick for asking him such a thing. He told his dad he was disgusting. I can't imagine why they never went back for therapy huh?

Anyway, I just spent most of Monday spending time with Cade. I watched a movie with him and asked Will to keep Sofie occupied while we did that in the afternoon. It was all about giving him some reassurance. Today he seems more himself. He is having lunch with his friend Olivia today. You really can't just trust on what the kids say alone. You have to watch and see how they act as well. Kids hide things for what ever reason. Sadly, I almost can't wait until he is old enough to not go anymore. He may still have some stress and dad issues but it won't be as bad as it is now.