so, things have been wild.
i'm sitting here, right now, laptop overheating, eyes tired and feet wanting to fall off after a crazy-busy night at school.
several months ago, in December, i realized i had hit a really horrible place in my life.
i
had run into a brick wall that knocked me down and completely
debilitated me. i was initially knocked down probably in June last
year... maybe July. the brick wall came in the form of Muffin, money,
our apartment and work (
or the lack of it, i guess.) i wasn't working, we had a new puppy, money was tight and Muffin and i were constantly fighting.
since
the brick wall incident, there was a horrible decline for me and for my
relationship with Muffin, hence my virtual invisibility. despite all
good intentions, i had just lost the will to do pretty much anything.
i'd stopped crafting, reading, writing, tidying and caring about
anything. it seems like the instant i hit this wall i got a horrible
case of amnesia and lost all the tools i needed to do the things i was
used to doing every day. despite all good intentions i just could never,
ever bring myself to get anything done. i have countless receipts for
balls of yarn, tubes of glitter, coloured pencils and scrapbooking stuff
who's corresponding purchases have just been pushed completely to the
wayside in lieu of my fabulous descent into sadness... yes, we'll call
this my descent into sadness.
as a result of the little, silly
side roads that have been taken on this road trip i call life, i've
become slightly jaded and quite hardened and mistrusting of most things
and last year saw the culmination of my horrible attitude shifts. i'd
become volatile and rather unpleasant to live with and Muffin had had
his fill, which was the initial brick wall that began my destruction.
details aren't necessary, but just know that we nearly split up and i
completely fell apart. it was a slow rebuild where i said i'd change but
decided in my head that i didn't need to change and that Muffin would
come to his senses and realize he was wrong and everything would be
fine.
three times this happened and with each pass the arguments
became increasingly volatile and exhausting. each pass destroyed me a
little more and took longer to rebuild after... the deciding one was in
December and seemed as though it might have been our last had it not
been for me finally deciding that my backhanded decision not to actually
work on things wasn't working (
surprise, surprise).
directly
in the middle of the very special argument we were having something
clicked in my head and i made the decision to ACTUALLY change. i made
the decision to drop every single issue i had and move forward. i made
the decision to trust entirely and love with my whole heart and with no
exceptions.
i described my new decision to Muffin and sheepishly
explained why he should trust me and what a fucking asshole i had been,
expecting him to make all the changes and taking no blame. despite him
being dubious about my intentions, we resigned to work on things
again... we resigned and things really did begin to look up. school was
going relatively well, finances weren't horrible (
they could have been better, and i imagine i would have appreciated the minor struggle then had i known then what i know now) and the dog was
shaping-up to be a very well-behaved angel.
by
the middle of January our work was interrupted by a collection of
events that neither of us could have expected. events that may or may
not have strengthened our relationship (
we've not decided yet)...
events in the shape of both of our prospective schools, MORE financial
bullshit, puppies, household chores and his ex-wife. all of the events
have been relatively manageable except for the last one.
please, let me elaborate...
firstly,
let me tell you that if you are ever given the option to marry someone
who has children with another woman, take a long, LONG time to think
about where your life is going to go and how strong you are within
yourself, because i can tell you that no matter how strong you think you
are, you really aren't. the will that it takes to be a step-mother is
something otherworldly and i have never in my life felt so challenged,
demeaned, disrespected or undervalued.
i don't really want to go into a
lot of detail about it (
which,
i realize just makes me seem SUPER vague, but really, i just firstly,
don't want to take up ALL YOUR TIME and this story in particular
would... i also just don't feel it's appropriate to divulge the
intricacies of the situation in such a candid manner), but a broad
nutshell version of events since January essentially looks like a
deliberately violated court order, a series of explosive conversations,
two court dates, five emergency room visits, two sets of casts, an
outrageous cancer scare and a new court order stating Molly is now to
visit us for a month this summer... all of which is apparently my fault,
or so i've heard.
do you have any idea how terrifically stressful
it is to have EVERYTHING blamed on you? to have someone say that
everything was perfectly fine until you came along? to suddenly be cut
off of contact from your step-child because of something you've done
despite having absolutely no idea what you've done? no? then become a
step-parent, because then you will be given the rare and magical
opportunity to experience all of these things and THEN some.
imagine
living in a world where all you want to do is what you think is right
(the right thing in THIS situation, to my thinking is helping your
significant other create a better and more healthy relationship with
their child.)
now pat yourself on the back to having found this
post, because i can tell you that it doesn't work. no matter what you
THINK is the right thing, the kid is not yours and therefore everything
that you do is wrong. every word you say, every facial expression you
make, every pin you post in Pinterest... EVERYTHING is wrong. literally,
i've been trying to do the "right" thing for the last year with just
the tiniest, most stumbly, horrible baby-steps in the world. i've been
really resilient, strong and the best i can for Muffin... not forcing
his hand, but helping him to make decisions with well-rounded
information, a hand to hold and a stand of solidarity. i've tried to
take a backseat as best as i could whilst being sure that i draw his
attention to any points of interest on the way.
now, if whilst
equipped with the information Muffin decides to do something entirely of
his own volition, that is not MY fault, correct? apparently not.
instead,
i've been left to feel like a bad guy for being a supportive wife and a
step-mother who is actually thinking about the welfare, parental
relationships and upbringing of the children in her life.
you want
to know what the worst thing is? for a step-mother, Mother's Day is the
worst day in the world. there is NO recognition and nobody gives a shit
about you. National Step-Mother's Day is this coming Sunday and i am
fairly certain that not a single fuck with be given by anybody. it
hurts, you know? to be putting so much effort and love into something
and having no visible reaction or appreciation for it...
in any
event, as of right now, we are eleven days away from Molly arriving for a
month and we've been preparing with excited vigilance. we've been
tidying, picking out bedding, planning activities and trying to keep a
clear line of communication going between the households to make the
visit as safe and comfortable as possible for everyone involved. we're
really taking this as a huge step forward and hoping that this will
become a regular occurrence as, it seems Muffin is really ready to take a
positive stand in the lives of all of his children which makes me
oh-so-happy and i think is a really huge thing for him and will benefit
his children in he long run.
i personally can't WAIT for her to
get here and have been planning special activities to do with her since
the day we found out about the visit. i plan to teach her to crochet, do
some baking with her, read, scrapbook and glitter ALL THE THINGS. it's
so exciting and i really hope that she has fun.
child stuff aside,
school's been the next rung on my crazy as fuck ladder. i've been
embroiled in some bullshit
high school crap that has pretty much made me
want to die and NEARLY convinced me to leave school.
apparently i've
been "bullying" and "micro-managing" one of my classmates... i only
found out about this after being held back after class one night (
and can i say, i'm almost fucking thirty years old and in college, i shouldn't have to be kept back after class for ANYTHING. i should be able to go home at nine thirty at night and lie on the couch with a glass of wine (COLA) and a book (THE SIMS 3); not stay after class for a telling-off from the teacher)
a few weeks ago to be told that someone had gone to the fucking dean of
the department about my "micro-managing" and "bullying." further
investigation helped me to discover that in reality, the jackass that
went to the dean was actually the spineless BOYFRIEND of the girl who's
life i've been "ruining." immediately, i went to the teacher's office
and asked for a meeting with the girl who refuses to meet with me like
the bullshit, spineless coward she is.
fuck. her.
how DARE
she and her boyfriend take my name to the DEAN when i have done NOTHING
but treat her with kindness. i don't need that shit.
so i've just
buckled-down in class. i've stopped giving a fuck about anybody else in
class and decided to focus on my work and not try to forge meaningful
relationships for future networking, which is highly unacceptable when
the career path i've chosen is entirely driven by networking and
communication... how
can i justify that though when i have to live in
fear of what fucking idiot i might offend by being myself?
bullshit
aside, school's been really great. i'm awesome and really enjoying
learning every single thing there is for me to learn about hair. i
completely adore hair and can't get enough of working with it. Muffin's
hair hasn't stayed the same for longer than two weeks since my second
quarter started at school and my hair... well, that's a whole different
story. it's in a wild transitional period that we aren't even
discussing. i keep cutting and colouring it and it's still trying to
decide what it wants to do with it's life. it'll be a long process
because every single time i find a colour i like, i put it on my hair
and then immediately find ANOTHER colour i like
... it's a mess and is kind of ruining my hair's life.
in
other news, can we PLEASE take note of a discovery from the other
evening? i was looking at my statistics for my blog and i found this
little gem telling me that there was a particular search that brought
someone to my blog...
can
i initially ask why, if you were looking up THAT phrase, would you then
feel MY blog was going to have the answers to whatever issue you're
having? i have no idea and have been chewing on that question for a
while now with no fathomable answer.
right. i think it's time for
bed. i've got to try and get to a dentist in the morning because i have a
fabulous chunk of tooth fall out of my mouth during a Frito's
snack-fest the other day and whilst it didn't INITIALLY hurt, it hurts
like a mo-fo' now and i kinda want to die, so wish me luck, as i can see
a big chunk of money going to THAT in the morning.
have a fabulous day and i promise i'll pull my life together and keep this updated more often.
