Smiling

This week has been amazing. Even the junk he has tried to pull hasnt lessened my joy. Three days of wonderfulness and one of them was the absolute best. I felt so calm, relaxed and most importantly cared for. Im looking forward to the rest of the week and the fact that tomorrow is thanksgiving makes it even better. I love to cook and cant wait to sit down with my children and family and enjoy.

Time to shut off this computer and go read to my kiddos. Cuddle them and tuck them into bed.

I have so much to look forward to. So much to be thankful for. So much to live for. Ive managed to put most of my pieces back together. And my future looks so bright.

Ghost

Nightmares pretty much have ruined any chance of sleep the past few days. He haunted me in real life for so many years now he is attacking me in my dreams. I woke up gasping and screaming this morning. I had dreamt he was sneaking into my house and watching me. That he had attacked me like he had done so many times in the past. Then the dream became the most horrifying thing possible. Because of him, my youngest was dead, my oldest missing and my middle child traumatized. I wasnt able to fall back to sleep after that. I was so worked up from it I ended up texting him to see how the children were. As I drove into work I cried the whole way. Kept reliving the dream and had to battle myself from turning the car around and going to see my kids. I dont want to go to sleep tonight.

To top this wonderful day off, as I walked from my mailbox he drove up and stopped to say something. Seeing him in person just shocked me. I was terrified. He even made a comment on how I looked like Id seen a ghost. Well he is my ghost. My personal demon who haunts the shit out of me. Not to mention he had texted something earlier that hinted at him eventually going for custody. I cant handle this. I just recieved a repair bill for my furnace, $500 due within 10 days of getting the bill. Lets toss in the other bills due this month too and Im left with no idea how to swing this. And with christmas around the corner, I just want to curl up into a ball and cry. Meanwhile he has it so damn easy. No bills, no worries, his mama gives him a home and food and pays for anything he wants, and whatever she may not cover, his girlfriends do. That man has never had to take care of hisself and he is older then I am.

Here I am, inside my house. I had planned on going out and doing a few things. But seeing him, just unsettled me so much. I dont know what Im going to do now. I just know things cant keep going as they are.

Pots n Pans n Real Men

I have had this pot and frying pan for 8 yrs n 1 month. Theres also a smaller pot that goes with it. It was a set that was the Only wedding gift we were given. We didnt have a wedding. We went to a justice of the peace. Requested that no friends or family show up, hell didnt tell anyone for the most part. But our pastor at the time found out and he and his wife gave us this damn set. I really liked our pastor and his wife. They were some of the nicest people. We stopped going there thanks to him. He ruined everything.

Ive used this set all thru the years with the rest of my pots n pans. I never gave it much thought but today as I began preparing for dinner it sunk in. Holy crap this was a "wedding gift". Im not with him anymore. Do I want to keep the one and only thing we were given? I went thru a myrid of emotions, from sadness to anger. Mostly disgust and anger. That itty bitty sadness lasted for just a few moments. Im sad that my marriage failed because I believe in marriage. But Im not sad that Im not with Him.

Not being with him is the greatest thing Ive experianced in nearly a decade. I am free to be myself, whoever I am that is. I am exploring and finding me. Learning I am not that beaten down wife who was granted continued existance only because of his say so. I am worthy of anything that anyone else is. I can wake up in the morning knowing that if the house isnt spic n span it wont be held over my head. That if I choose to cook pork I wont have to listen to him go on and on about how awful I am and how disgusting I am for eating pork. For frick sake its food and it tastes pretty damn good. Who doesnt like bacon? I dont have to be compared to other women on a daily. I dont have to live with the shame that he heaped on me all the time just to make hisself feel better.

So I stared at this pot n pan and decided who gives a crap. Its useful, more useful then he ever was. Im not going to allow the association of how it was attained to ruin it for me. And that transfers over to me, my life and my ability to meet new people. So many people are judgmentle. I am judged over the fact that I was married to such an awful piece of crap. Its held against me. Some people dont want to be friends with me because of the huge amount of people who hate my ex. And that also rolls over to men. There are gonna be men who wont want to date me because of my ex. And thats not my fault or my problem. Its the mens problem. If they are that judgmentle and that pathetic to use my ex against me, then they are not someone I would want in my life. If I date someone, Id want it to be a real man. NOT another boy pretending at being a grownup.

Hes so famous

Its been crazy with the holidays and birthdays lately. The kids and I had a blast for holloween and for my middle ones bday. Weve been busy with school projects and fundraisers, with home repairs and finding fun things to do. But amongst all of that still lurking in the background is the ex, constantly trying to cause problems.

Its a surprise if a day has gone by without hearing from him in one way or another. Without being reminded of how much better my life is without him in it. The other day he came up with a story of how he is messing with a mans woman and that man has threatened my ex by saying he has access to my kids. Now with my ex we have no way of knowing if this story is true or if he is just trying to get attention again. When he has his visitation he fills the kids heads with lies. Stories of this life he had lived. How he is a famouns fighter, musicion, army vetern and more. And not a single one of those are true. I worry about how my kids are gonna be treated when they are older and tell their friends that "My daddy did this......." and their friends mention it to their parents and the truth comes out. You see the vast majority of people in this county know my ex. They know of him because of how much a liar he is. They all have heard the stories, many have had dealings with him and many more have all seen the online "fan" clubs of people hating him. My kids will have to live with so much all because the ex is such a concieted, selfish, lying, horriable man.

Today a mom at the school stopped me after drop off. They talked with me. Shared experiance and told me it gets better. People know about the situation, not because Ive told them. I dont. I try to keep that shit underwraps with only select friends knowing. They know because they have seen us all these years. They saw the signs of me being a victim of violence. They saw how he had hit on anything that remotely resembled a female. They had all come across him at one point or another when he was with his many side chicks. I feel ashamed that Im a victim. I know I shouldnt. But there is a part of me that does. Knowing that others knows. Some days are just harder then others.

This morning I was awoken by him sending a msg that contained a photo. One of his newest girlfriends and him and my oldest child had went out to eat. I know he sent it just to try and start problems. He then continued to send msgs to me about how Im doing so many things wrong. I had to put the phone down and just ignore it. I dont need my day to be ruined by him still trying to treat me like his possesion. I belong to know one. I am my own person and I matter. I have three amazing children who remind me everyday how wonderful life is. Because I am their mother. I will survive.

Mommy I dont want to go

Its so heartbreaking and concerning when my kids go to their fathers. Its not just because they will be gone. Its because of how upset they are when they leave. At how they beg me to let them stay with me, how they go on and on about how they dont want to go to their dads. I gently ask why and am given a list of reasons. None are much to be worried about, a few are upseting but none really touch base on their safety, so there is nothing I can do. The fact that he doesnt do anything with them, that he ignores them while he talks and texts and FBs with his girlfriends, or that he naps or that he shoves them off on his family to watch, well despite that, what can I do? Ive repeatedly asked for my right to babysit them when he decides he doesnt want to be there during his visitation. But he wont let me.

Ive had enough and requested a meeting with the mediator. Bringing in my several months of screenshots of texts and fb msgs and call logs. Bringing in records of how he isnt present during his visitation, bringing in proof how he leaves the kids at his mothers office where our custody order says they cant be. Proof of how he has them in the presence of people that our custody order says not too. But Ive seen how the courts work, how these long drawn out cases dont amount to anything but bills. How it takes a tragic event for our local judges to finally do whats right. I have a feeling its going to be a long visit in hell while I try to fight for my kids safety.

My babies just left for his visit. My youngest staring sadly back at me with tears running down her cheeks. Her sad cry of "Mommy" and his snarky "hurry up" as she drags her feet to his car. I just want to scream. This is so unfair. This tears my heart up. Im now left in this empty house with just my fears. Waiting for these next couple days to pass swiftly so I can watch them burst out of his car and run screaming into my arms. So they can kiss and hug me and shout how much they missed me and are so happy to be home.

So crazy

Have you ever met someone who was off the wall bat shit crazy? Well I was married to that. I put up with that for years and I had seriously hoped and wished that when I managed to get away from him, that I wouldnt have to deal with that anymore. But nope. Im stuck dealing with his insanity because occasionally I have to communicate with him since we have kids.

The thing is, I try to keep our communication limited to text msgs, that way I have proof of the insane stuff he says. And I tell you what, the things he says could throw anyone for a loop. Today he exceeded his normal amount crazy. All I wanted was to drop off birthday invitations to him to put in our kids backpack to be handed out at school and a piece of paper for him to drop off in town whenever he got a chance. He went off the wall crazy, argumentative and rude. This went on for over an hour of him texting me. Half the things he said made no sense and contradicted everything else he said. Then out of no where he said he would give me the divorce (he has said this before then changed his mind- it all depends on which girlfriend he has at the time) I was happy. I started dancing at work. Now if I could only actually get him to sign the divorce papers. I thought, ok the day is going to go better now. And it did, for twenty more minutes until he dropped another bomb. He was demanding that I give him my money I get back when I file my taxes next spring. WTF?! I work, I support my kids, I pay taxes, I pay my mortgage, I pay my bills. He does nothing but mooch off of his girlfriends and lie to the courts and social services saying he is too disabled to work- but he cant get disability. Uh huh...

The day got worse and worse. He never stopped, he kept being threatening and rude all day. My phone kept beeping with new msgs from him and Id ignore them. But it doesnt matter if I ignore him or respond to him. He. Wont. Stop. Eventually he became even more irate. It was to the Point where I knew if I was near him, he would have been beating me. He would have been smashing me to the ground like he would do whenever I didnt Yes Sir him and lay down and be his door mat. I seriously do worry about my kids safety when they are with him. The kids say he has never hurt them physically. But this is a man who easily gets to the point where he has to hurt someone. He doesnt feel good about hisself unless he is physically hurting someone in someway. To make it so he can get away with hitting people he took up "mma". Made up BS stories about how he had done it for years when he had never even spoke of it for the first few years I had known him and was married to him. But then one day he decided to incorporate it into his stories of this big exciting life he "had" lived and still did... All this did was help him learn how to hurt me more. And now he likes to "spar" with idiots who believe his fantastic stories and think getting smacked by him is actually great. I can only hope that when he becomes violent he is around a real punching bag and not another woman he treats like one.

Looking Up Up Up

Ive been doing really well. Putting the pieces back together, finding who I am, not who he made me be all this time. I really thought I was overcoming some of my fears, some of my issues. But crap happens sometimes. I cant talk about it right now. I dont want to dwell on it.

Instead the other stuff, life. Its been 'normal'. Im surviving. If I gotta compare myself to something, Id say it would be that damn fish that has somehow managed to stay alive this past year. You see, at one point I had the brilliant idea to turn a massive tank into a mini jungle for some pet amphibians. And what jungle is not complete without a pool on oneside with a waterfall. And of course it had to be filled with fish. The end result was amazing. But eventually this massive hundred gallon tank ended up housing only 1 tiny green critter smaller then the size of a lime. The water in the pool leaked out/evaporated. The fish had died, or so I had thought. When all along one fish had stayed alive and managed to hide itsself in an inch deep of water. This fish survived with nothing for months in an inch of water, no companionship, no help, no fish food. This lil thing would not give up. The other day I dug out all the plants and trees, downsized this 100gal tank into a 20gal and a smaller pool and promptly tossed this fighter into the water. He is happily swimming around in fresh water. He survived crappy conditions for so long. And so have I. Ive faced death, Ive lived off very little. I fought back and lived.

Today things are looking up. I have some family and friends here helping to rip off the roof and put on the new one. Or at least part of it. This house is a layer of levels and additions so there are around 7 roofs, all in different conditions. So three of them are being replaced sorta. Throwing on metal roof. Its gonna kill me cost wise, but this is needed badly. Next step is to figure out what to do with my broken furnace, its getting really cold in here. But Im managing.

As the guys work on the roof, I find myself inside baking and cooking. Making sure there is plenty of goodies for them to have. Its the least I can do. And thats something I enjoy doing. Ive always liked doing for others. Im the type who feels good when Ive met someones need, no matter what it is. I love cooking for others. Fixing something for someone such as sewing up a rip in their clothes. Lending an ear and advice if I have some. Finding something they want/need. Having someone say or even give me a look of 'thanks/appreciation' makes me feel good. Im like the damn dog who can barely contain her self after she recieves a "Good Girl" for doing something her master said to. Its just who I am. And thats ok.