Our Island Family Life

Got an email this morning from Sean today (he sent it yesterday after I had already left for town). In it he was again asking if the kids could stay until the later boat on Sunday. I had already told him from now on it was the 4pm on school nights period. I told him that again. He made excuses about he might be able to do it but it would be difficult and after this week things would be easier. I don't care. The kids need wind down time after they see him and if they get home at 7pm and go to bed at their normal 8pm time it is just a nightmare. We'll see what happens. Of course he tried to sweeten to pot by telling me he had paid the money he owed to DHHS weeks ago and that "it had just came to his attention" that he need to sign a release form to DHHS and he didn't understand what the hold up was but that everything should be fine now and that I had $5000 coming to me. I believe that like a hole in the head. First off the caseworker at DHHS already told me he had tried the signing of release form thing with them only he told them it was from his bank and now he tells me it is from DHHS. Whatever. Second, I checked my bank account again today and the money still isn't there. Then he tells me he will send the dental info to me "eventually" and that the kids last visit should be covered and he will "let me know." BS. My response was no to the staying late. I wanted the info now and a reminded him of Connor and Cade's dental appointment next week. I said NOTHING about the money or DHHS. I will not ever ask for or respond to anything concerning child support again. I got DHHS involved for this very reason and will not be drawn back into his games concerning it. He can try to bribe me, stall me, try and make me feel better by telling me money is on the way but his words are empty. Results are what matters and it isn't like I am going to put in a good word to DHHS for him. I'm not going to help him stall them. It makes me angry to think he thinks he can pull the wool over my eyes and abuse me like this then I get pissed at myself because the only reason he thinks that way is because I have let him do so in the past and it's my own damn fault in the first place. Grrrrr...me.

As for dropping the kids off yesterday that was really hard. Thursday night I was getting Sofie ready for bed and she wanted to stay up. I told her she needed her rest because she had a big day ahead with going to town and swim lessons. She started to cry. I thought it was going to be about going to bed on time but it wasn't. She cried saying she wanted to stay home. I was concerned she didn't want to go to swim lessons but that wasn't the problem. She didn't want to go to the "witch's house" and she said, "I don't want to see dad." The next day we just focused on swim. She had asked me if I would ask her teacher if she would take Sofie out into the pool. That was huge. Sofie loves the water but she was wary of her teacher. When we got there though there was a new teacher. The regular teacher was going to be gone for that class and the next one then come back. I thought ,oh fooey. Just when Sofie was making progress. However, Sofie kept improving and got off the step and onto the wall and went back and forth on it. She showed off to the new teacher she could dunk her head and blow bubbles. Maybe next week she will just go to the wall and be a part of the class. She was so proud and all the other moms were telling her how wonderful she did that day. When we got to the bay lines however all that happiness and pride went into the toilet and she was very upset about having to go. Her friend Aiden showed up with his mom and that distracted her for a bit. When Sean showed up she cried again and held back behind me and said she wanted to go home. I held her and brought her over to him. He asked what was wrong and I said she just wanted to go home. He shrugged it off and said she was just tired. Please. I handed her to him and he asked her why she was crying and she said she wanted to go home. He told her she was going home and she got mad and said, "No! Home to the island!" and cried some more. I asked her to go with dad and bring home her barbie ring for me. I gave her some reeses pieces and she sniffed but said ok. Sean asked me if there was anything he should know about the kids. I wanted to tell him to ask them himself but all I said was to be watchful of Sofie because she didn't want to be with him this weekend. He nodded and left. I stayed in town to the late boat because I need groceries badly. I picked up Will, who stayed to help out and away we went. Who did we see at the store? Sean and the kids. Will took off so his dad wouldn't see him. Sofie called me and I went over to her. She stuck her lips out for a kiss which I gave her. Sean found it funny I guess because he laughed. I asked her what she wanted me to get for her. She asked for cereal and cheese. I said good bye. Cade gave me a hug and took off to look at the cakes. I hope to God Sean was getting him a birthday cake and had a present for him. After they disappeared into the deli section Will came back from where ever he was lurking and we continued our shopping but checked every aisle to make sure we didn't run into them. Then I heard a yell. Bye mommy! Bye mommy! I knew, just knew it was Sofie. I can pick out her voice anywhere. I looked around and saw her just as Sean was pushing her out the doors. I waved and she was trying to stand up and she was smiling at me. Sean looked annoyed and frustrated. Oh well. They were quite a ways away too. I am surprised I heard her at all. She can shout with the best of them though....:) *snicker*

Ok, I am trying not to get too anxious now. I have been checking my bank account hoping I would see the money DHHS was supposed to deposit. Realistically I am sure I have to wait at least another week. Still, I have $400 to my name and the kids see the dentist next week. Two of them anyway. I talked with the teachers about the plan and there is a big copay and thinking it over I wonder if Sean isn't giving me the info because he doesn't want to pay it. I dunno. I am not having luck getting a hold of the insurance company so far. I am determined to talk with someone who can help me. I have bills coming in and over course another month of rent is here. I got another $100 for work this week but it's so little. *sigh* I have a ton of places to clean this weekend. A lot of people will be up next weekend to close up. I hope I can get them all done in time. I am feeling a little stressed. Seeing that money would be nice but like the fridge new money won't just appear just because I open to door again thinking new food has suddenly appeared. I suppose I will have to cal DHHS anyway on Monday for a progress report. What a pain. I of course did my duty and emailed Sean last night about when and where to pick up Cade and Sofie for the weekend. I didn't say anything else. No response as usual. When will I stop getting bugged about that?

Overall I have had a nice quiet week. I have been home the whole time and haven't left except to take out the trash. I really should have gotten gas for the island car. I am not even sure what days (if any) there will be someone there at the pump. I will have to ask around. I don't think the car has enough gas to get to the ferry and back tomorrow. It is swim day and sadly a visit weekend. Cade is going this time. He has been weighing things in his mind. Halloween weekend is a visit weekend and he is not planning on going. I think he feels if he doesn't rock the boat until then he will be able to tell his dad he isn't coming without feeling bad when his dad tries to make him feel guilty for not coming. Not that Sean tries hard to convince him to come anyway. Cade wants Sofie to be here too. We are having company that weekend so I am going to ask if she can stay anyway. There are moments I just want to tell him they are staying and that's it. I tell myself, what is he going to do? File contempt against me? Then all his dirty laundry will come out. I wonder if I am being petty? I just think that the kids really have so little time to be together as a family, as siblings for such a short time that they should be together for holidays and such for as long as possible. The bonds for a lifetime are made now. I think their relationships with each other is more important than with Sean or me. I know I want them all here not for my own feelings or needs. I asked myself that question many many times. Am I being selfish? Am I feeling spiteful? Am I wanting to hurt Sean? These are important questions that have to be asked and you have to look real hard at yourself and admit all the ugly you find there. I think the big thing is making sure my choices and decisions don't wind up hurting the kids in the long term. I know I will hurt them sometimes and make royal mistakes from time to time. I hope that at least in this I stop and think and not do anything because I feel hurt or bad. It isn't about me after all. I certainly had expectations of what my life was going to be like in an outline. How I thought my holidays and stuff were going to be like with my kids by my side. Still, it goes back to the first choice I made in having them in the first place that had to preclude my own wants down the line. They didn't choose to be here. That was pure selfishness on my part. So now I have to make the best of doing right by them to the best of my ability. So, in this emotionally hurtful experience here I have to look at my motives. Do I think I am trying to hurt Sean in all this? I know I would like to see him face the music for his bad actions, criminal actions, morally wrong actions, emotionally hurtful actions. I just don't know what that music should be and I do not want to be the one who plays it for him. Would I like to know if it happens? Sure. That is about as bitter as it goes for me. When it comes to the kids and their reluctance or downright refusal to be anywhere near him I feel nothing at all anymore. I felt so bad for him for a long time. I felt worse for him in a lot of ways more than I did the kids. That was how wrapped up in wanting his happiness I was. There is no satisfaction for me in thinking he is sitting at home crying or suffering over the loss of his kids. No stick it to him feelings. I honestly don't think he is doing those things anyway. I don't think that at this point in time in his life he sees the big picture or feels true loss. I think maybe someday he might. I feel more disconnected in having this empty feeling there of not caring when that might be or worrying about how he will handle it. I know this is good for me in a sense. I still don't like feeling like I have become colder or more cynical. I feel as if I have lost (am losing?) something real important about myself and that is feeling empathy for people. Maybe it's just for him? Again, more to ponder. How do I want to change from all this. I don't want to change as a person because of hurt and fear and loss. I don't think that is growing at all. So, I am trying not to dwell too much but I have been putting a lot of things off again. I have been really low on emotional energy lately and only wind up stressing myself even more.

Ok. Here is where I yet again delve into my unconscious mind and try and figure out what I am trying to tell myself. Along the way I am most likely going to go into the too much info territory. I had a dream last night. Dreams are dreams and although at times I am able to control them somewhat most of the time I don't even realize I am dreaming until it's just about over anyway. Luckily or unluckily depending on the dream I am quite good at remembering them and I usually have at least 4 or 5 a night I can recall. Not bad. So last night I only remember one. I am not sure how I feel about it. It has left me thinking about it all day though. I felt good. I felt bad. I felt ashamed. I felt powerful. I was going back and forth like a swing. When Sean first left I had dreams about him from time to time. None of them good. He laughed at me. Used me. Made me feel worse in my dreams than I did when I was awake and that's saying a LOT. After a few months I stopped dreaming about him. I felt that was a good thing. Very good. So he was in my dream last night and my first thought was why? Why now? What is going on in ME that brings him back into play? Long and short of it though is that he wasn't bad or mean to me per se. He used me yes but I was using him as well in the dream. In that sense there was more equality there even though what we were doing wasn't very nice. What were we doing? Well, you know how in dreams you know things even if you don't see what's going on? Some people I know don't remember their dreams. Anyway, we were having sex. Good or bad for me (you judge) it wasn't porno sex or even HBO sex it was more 18th century implied sex. So I KNEW it was going on but I didn't even get a chance to enjoy it even in my dreams. Oh well. It was nothing loving though. He was cheating on his wife with me. It was truly weird. Was I missing him? Missing sex? Feeling vengeful towards her? Wanting to use and abuse him as he did me? Wanting some fulfilling irony in my life? Did that make me like her? After all I was having sex with a married man. Still, it was hard for me to feel like I was a bad person in "that" sense because I was having sex with my "husband". Even though he isn't anymore. I didn't want anything from him in a loving sense. I knew that. It was just a straight up, in it's own separate box kinda thing. How did this affect our relationship? He still was an ass. He did nothing to improve himself as a father or co-parent. He still didn't pay child support. He was the same jerk he is now. It was kind of cool being with him in a way though because there was NO expectations there. I was comfortable with him and was downright mean a lot of the time. Not who I really am. I talked to him as I wanted while were in that room without fear of how he was going to react because I really didn't care. I said things I have never said to him before and demanded things, never asked for anything. I didn't care how this would complicate his life. I even thought about continuing with it if I found someone else. So against my values in every single way. I was really horrible. I played by my own rules and if he didn't like it, so what? I know the dream wasn't about sex really. Subtext maybe but it was more about letting go of stuff and not being afraid and asking questions of myself. Maybe he was in the dream because he is who I am familiar with? Maybe a lot of it is really about him and how I feel about him. I wasn't sad in any way to not feel a shred of love for him in all this. That spark that is love was totally absent and any "feelings" I had were purely physical and could have been there for anyone I found attractive. He was simply convenient and the stick it to "her" value was a bonus but not a driving factor. Doing something forbidden and wrong were pretty big turn ons too I must say. Again, nothing I would ever do in real life. I would feel so sick if I was really like that it wouldn't be worth it to do in the first place. So, much to think about and ponder.

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Getting braver at swim lessons

New pumpkiny toes

Cade's present from Connor

When all is said and done can anybody tell me what the result of Connor's maybe visit is?

oh...take a guess.

He's not going. Why? After my last post I talked with Connor and he confirmed what he had said the day before that the plan was to come home on the 5:45 but he asked if things went well if he could stay to the 9:30 boat or until Saturday morning. I said that was fine and told him I had emailed his dad and would email him back asking if that was ok with him too and to let Sean know it was ok with me. At least I would know where Connor was. I emailed Sean and told him everything and asked if it was ok if Connor chose to could he stay longer? I also said again that if I didn't hear from him by 8pm then Connor wasn't going at all. That was at 4:30. Around 7:45 there was still no email from him. A few minutes later Sean calls. I answer and he asked for Connor. He did not talk to me at all about the plans. They talked a few minutes than Connor hung up. I asked him what the plan was and he said he wasn't going. He said his dad said "something came up" and he bailed. I was thinking about the earlier email Sean had sent me and it sounded to me like Sean had plans for Connor to spend the night. Had Sean forgotten them but confirmed to "save face" then said something came up? Connor had asked if he could come over on Saturday instead but Sean said no. What? It takes too much effort to try and figure out what Sean is thinking. Maybe he had the intentions (I hate that word) of seeing Connor but when push comes to shove he chooses his new family over his kids every time. Dunno. What a pain in the behind to go through the emails and waiting and parenting issues for ....nothing. What a toad.