TWENTY Years

We have been married for 20 years.   TWENTY YEARS.

I don’t feel old enough for that to be possible!

But yes, today is our 20th anniversary.  And I really felt like celebrating it this year!  For real.  That is the best feeling ever.

I found this quaint little cabin not too far away with a hot tub that I wanted to rent and have a little get away but hubby shot that idea down cuz it was too expensive.  I disagreed but let it go….  I should have just booked it and then surprised him.

He worked last night of course. We decided to go to breakfast this morning together since evenings are full of baseball games and all sorts of other kid events.

There is a new Bob Evans in our area so we went there and got big yummy breakfast meals.  Then we ran around to do a few errands and came home.  Not very exciting but… it was fun.  And relaxing.  Then we came home and enjoyed each others company a little bit more before he went to sleep :)

I feel secure it my marriage.  I feel happy.  I feel loved.  The other day his jerk side popped out and I was very worried but just went away from him for a while.  The next day I asked him about it and he said knew he wasn’t being OK and explained what he was feeling and we moved on.  Life isn’t prefect.  It never will be.  But I love my husband and he loves me and we have a happy marriage.  It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to say that!

Today, I am PROUD to say that I have been married to this man for 20 years.  (We all know that wasn’t always the case!!!)

When I initially told hubby about the cabin I wanted to rent, he said that he’d be happy just to stay home and cook some burgers on the grill.   I said What is that??  This is 20 years we need to do something more special!!  Ha.

Later I was thinking about that and it grew in my mind to having a party.  I thought we could do it a Friday evening – 7:00ish so it would soon get dark and we could enjoy the firepit and some fire works and glow stick on the trampoline (Kids – not me!)….  I picture us inviting both sides of the family and maybe even some friends.  And let the kids invite friends too.  Plus it seems more causal if it is dark out and we aren’t all sitting there in the sunlight wondering what to say to each other… we never get together with both sides of the family so that might be a little weird.  But I think that letting the kids invite friends too makes it all a bit more chaotic and fun and not calm and boring with people not knowing what to say.  I picture burgers on the grill, hot dogs and kraut in the crockpot, potatoe skins in the oven, my mom-in-laws pies, chips, dips, fruit trays and veggies with dip.  My sis-in-law has some lawn games we could borrow.  Hubby’s side of the family likes to drink so we can have coolers with beer and wine coolers, and another with soda.  I want to send people invitations that say “Come help us celebrate our 20th anniversary!”  See, I’m figuring it all out in my head.

A few days ago I asked him if he meant he wanted to have people over and do burgers…. he said no, I meant just our family…  So he meant just like that’s what he’d like for dinner.  Ha.  He laughed off the idea of a party.

I brought it up again today in the car.  I told him who I wanted to invite etc.  I told him I feel like we are in a good place and have a happy marriage and its been a crazy 20 years and I think we are happier now than for a long long time – maybe ever.  He agreed with the “maybe ever” statement by the way.  :)  I told him I actually feel like celebrating this cuz I’m so happy and proud of us.  He didn’t say a lot but said “let me think about it…..”   I even told him the date I want to have it.  So now, I will wait a few days before I bring it up again.  Obviously if he doesn’t want to, it will not be fun, it will be stressful and something for us to argue about instead of being a celebration so I need to get him on board.

I’m really excited about it though and that surprises me actually.

 

Hubby Has Been Awesome

Hubby is being awesomely supportive and I love him more than ever.  Yesterday he wasn’t home and I was on the phone with a client.  I was getting very dizzy but I needed to work since I missed so mush time this week being sick.  I sat down on my office floor and then was hunkered with my head on the floor, trying to stop the dizziness, all the while carrying on a (hopefully!) intelligent conversation with the client who had no idea.

I heard hubby come in but he doesn’t usually come see me right away.  Well he did yesterday and saw me on the floor and looked so concerned.  Ha.  I made like a swirling motion like I was just dizzy and he laughed.  He just sat there and rubbed my back while I talked to my client.  How sweet is that?  :)

He has been stepping up and driving kiddos more places – just volunteering and not making a big deal of it.  He knows I don’t want them to know I’ve been having panic attacks while driving.

They do know I’ve been feeling dizzy and have different medicine and that is why.  And obviously they know I’ve been sick.  A long time ago I told them my medicine (Wellbutrin at the time) was for my heat flashes.  I’ve told them how horrible this new medicine is making me feel and that it makes me dizzy and I don’t feel comfortable driving anywhere right now.  So they think this is all because of hot flashes/hormones etc.

Anyway, hubby has been awesome.  And concerned.  And sweet.  And helpful.  I have been surprised by his concern but I am thrilled of course that this has been his reaction.  I was worried I’d have to fight this alone.  Instead, he has been by my side and it has been awesome.

At Home in My Own Home

I watched the movie Dreamgirls for the first time in April 2012. I wrote about it here.

It was on TV this weekend.  I found it as I was flipping through the channels.   Funny that it was almost to the part that touched my soul last time.  The song Listen was SO powerful to me last time.  I had watched it again and again and then found it on youtube later.  This time, I was alone in my bedroom and turned it up loud.  I didn’t feel it.  I even got distracted by my phone during that scene.  Later, laying in my bed with my hubby snoring next to me, I thought about it some more.  I don’t feel that way anymore.  I DO feel at home in my own home now.  I DO feel like he hears me again.

THANK YOU LORD.

I am glad I happened upon the movie this weekend.  I am glad to be able to see the progress in my life.  I am also grateful for the reminder to stay strong and be who I am.

My Marriage is Good & Other Random Updates

Hi.  It’s been a while.  Just the usual busyness of life.  Funny how the blog posts still play in my head though.  I have all sorts of thing to say when I’m in the middle of other things and no time to type.  Then I come here and don’t remember what I wanted to say… lol

I set the time for an hour and gave myself permission to update my blog instead of working or cleaning :)

Let’s see… Marriage – Really good.  Amazing.  So awesome that I can say my marriage is good!  Yay!  I believe he has turned a corner and is truly coming out of the fog of anger and misery that he has been living in the past few years.  He laughs a lot now.  And smiles.

THANK YOU LORD!

I’m still getting used to it.  I’m still trying to let my guard down and trust him again.  I am constantly waiting for a negative reaction from him.  I still expect him to blow up over all sorts of stupid things.  He keeps proving me wrong and amazing me.  I think the kids are feeling the same , someone says or does something that used to fire him up in a ridiculous, completely unnecessary way – and we all kind of just wait and maybe look at each other with an “Oh no” type of look… and then he handles it like a normal person.  And then we all breathe a silent sigh of relief and life goes on.

I feel like I can say whatever I want to now.  Well not ANYTHING – I still try to be tactful and I am working my way up to some things…. one step at a time right!?

I point things out to him all the time though.  I’m not trying to nag him – I just want him to see things in a different way.  I want him to see how the rest of us look at the things that he gets ticked off about.  This past weekend – several times he yelled “You people!”  like he was disgusted about something we’d all done.   One was about the dishwasher, the other was about a clogged toilet.   So on Sunday morning while we were drinking coffee and gabbing, I said “Think you can get through the day without yelling “You people!” at us?”  I said it with a smile and in a relaxed way so he wouldn’t feel attacked and we wouldn’t have to get in a fight about it.  He said he just says that cuz he doesn’t know who did it and he’s talking to all of us.  I said yelling you people and storming away doesn’t do anything except make us wonder what hes ticked off  about now. He said he wasn’t ticked off. He just wanted people to know … blah blah blah.  I think the rest of the story is irrelevant.  The point is that we talk about this stuff now.  We talk TO each other now.  I call him on his crappy behavior.  And don’t worry he calls me on mine – he always has.  lol  But now he does it in a nicer way.

We have been watching American idol together as a family the way we used to.  Sounds corny I guess but there are so few things on TV that we all want to watch.   Not all of the kids are always there but whoever is home comes to the living room and we hangout and watch and laugh and talk at commercials :)  At first he made a comment about not liking Harry.  I said why?? cuz he’s a hottie??  He just looked at me and frowned.   Well he’s changed his mind and thinks he’s hilarious now.  But compare this to when the guy at the grocery store told me I have beautiful eyes and hubby sulked and was a jerk for days…. I called another guy a hottie TO HIS FACE and all he did was frown!

Don’t want this to get real long and hard to read.  I have a bunch of draft posts that I started and plan to look through here now and post or trash them.  Things are going to be all out of order.  And probably contradictory too.    Yes, my marriage is pretty good.  Better than its been in a lot of years.  That being said, he still pisses me off.  ha  Some days he still does some really jerky things.  I’m not saying its all fixed.  I’m saying it is SSSOOOOO much better.

I apologize in advance for the randomness of my updates, if I stress about doing this “right” I wont do it and then I’ll get further behind.  This blog is my place to vent, not a place that should stress me out about not doing it right, all in order etc.  Just saying. Ok.  Bye!

He Tried to Sleep with Me

Ha ha.  It’s not how it sounds…

New Years Eve
For the first time EVER we were all awake at midnight on New Years Eve!  Usually at least one of the kids is sound asleep.  And hubby is usually out but we wake him up.

Around 1am I was headed to bed and asked if he was coming soon.  I cant remember his exact answer but basically it was probably not – and he probably wasn’t going to sleep upstairs either – and he was more than a little defensive about it.  He had been asleep on and off all night.  He sleeps so weird from working 3rd shift!

I said  “Hubby.  Really?”  which of course sounded like a scolding from someone’s mother, which of course makes him want to rebel right?  I heard my tone too late, after it was already out of my mouth.  The kids were all sitting there looking at me and I’m glad they were or I probably would have started a fight with him.  So I went up to bed and tried not to be pissed off.  Lots of angry thoughts running through my head.  “Great way to start 2014 – with a great big pile of rejection from my husband.”  “So nothing has really changed at all has it???”  I really hate when he doesn’t sleep in the same bed with me.

To me, moments are important.  Occasions are worth recognizing and making into special moments. Traditions can be awesome.  You know – kiss at midnight on New Years eve.  Kiss under the mistletoe at Christmas time (still waiting for that one!)  etc etc etc.  Those are perfect scenarios for a little romance – and no big planning is required right!?!?

The way I look at it –  it’s New Years Eve – its a new start to a new year – lets start it right…  I wanna kiss my hubby at midnight and wake up in the same bed as my husband on the first day of the new year.

The way I think he sees it –  It’s 1am, it’s late but he’s wide awake.  Craig Ferguson is on.

So I laid in bed and told him off in my head for a good while.  I knew that I REALLY didn’t want this to be the way we start the new year though, especially because things have been good.  And he HAS been sleeping with me more often than he has in a long time.  So I calmed myself and changed my attitude and went to the basement where he was watching TV.  I said “I don’t want to fight with you but you aren’t gonna ditch me on New Years eve!”  I said it with a big smile :D  He just laughed a little and said he wasn’t ditching me, he was just wide awake and wanted to watch Ferguson a while.  OK then.  I kissed him and went to bed.

He came to bed  a short while later.  :)

Well apparently he was miserable and couldn’t sleep.  Finally he had enough and went downstairs.

When I came downstairs the next morning he was watching TV.  I got my coffee and joined him.  I think he was waiting for me to give him heck.  He started telling me how miserable he was all night.  He said he had eaten way too much the day before (had 2 family get-togethers that day).  He said his belly felt big like a great big beer belly and he had heart burn.  He slept sitting up in the recliner in the living room.

He told me that he said to himself “She knows I was here.  I’m going downstairs!”

I love that!  :)

He cared how I felt.  That is beyond awesome!

Christmas was Nice (2013)

Christmas was nice.

It is a big deal for me to be able to say that.  This day has become symbolic in my marriage, not for the right reasons.

Christmas Day 2010 was the day I admitted to myself that I wanted a divorce.  And it’s been a roller coaster ever since!

So yes, Christmas was nice. Nothing big to report about it actually and that is a GOOD THING!  ha.

Oh – here’s something.  Hubby is terrible at gift giving.  It stresses him out to try to pick something.  Sometimes I get nothing for birthdays, anniversaries etc.  Usually though for Christmas I get gifts he begrudgingly buys at the last minute just cuz he knows he better.  ha.  This year that was different.  It was the week before Christmas and he actually asked me what I wanted.  Personally I would love a surprise gift that he picked cuz he knew what I liked… but this is reality and that just isn’t him.   (Well occasionally it’s him – remember the cedar chest which I love!)  It is very helpful to him if I just tell him what I want instead of him trying to guess.  That stresses him out.

I like those sideways cross necklaces.  I told him I wanted one of those.  I told him I liked the ones that are curved better though than the straight ones.  One morning after the kids got on the bus, his sister said she was going shopping and talked him into going.  I’m so glad!  She should drag him along every year!  Apparently it’s quite difficult to find the sideways cross necklaces that are curved.  They found plenty that were sideways and straight.  Who knew.  I had seen them online.  He said they went to every jewelry store in the area.  They did find one at a fancy schmancy place but they wanted $500 for it.  NOT in the budget.  LOL  He said they finally found it on their final stop of the day.  I didn’t realize I was sending him on a wild goose chase when I told him what I’d like.  I think its awesome though because it required effort and he still did it! Yay.  Needless to say, I love my new necklace!

(Last Christmas I actually used a big black marker and circled something in a sales flyer that I wanted for Christmas – I think it was a necklace – and put it on his dresser.  Talk about a hint, right?  Doesn’t get much easier than that!  I didn’t get it – or any other necklace either actually.  It was never even mentioned at all.  Ha.)

He wasn’t overflowing with sweetness or mush or anything Christmas morning.  But he wasn’t jerky or rude or grumpy.  AT ALL.  He was just him.  And that is all that I can ask for.  ❤

I Hated Him for about an Hour

I haven’t felt a lot of anger towards my husband for a while.  Things are getting better with us.  I am amazed and grateful.

Yesterday he made a decision that was completely insensitive and he would not hear a word I had to say about it.  He made the decision cuz he was mad, he put up his wall and wouldn’t hear another word about it.  Oh my it made me mad!

He wouldn’t hear my opinion about it.  He wouldn’t explain his reason for the decision.  He just kept saying “It’s done.”  What that meant was that I had no say and he didn’t care AT ALL what I thought.

I yelled.  I really yelled.  I’m not proud of that.  And of course he turned it all around and it was no longer about him being a jerk, it was about me being a lunatic.  Sigh.  Yes, I acted like a lunatic with my yelling.  But he acted like an insensitive jerk first!  Can you hear the whining in my voice?! lol  We both handled it wrong and in case you needed me to confirm it for you, two wrongs still don’t make a right. :/

It turned out alright but what surprised me was how much anger I felt towards him.  All those thoughts about kicking him out of the house, and how I should have left him long ago, and…. that all came flying back at me hard and hit me in the face.

It’s like we have come SO FAR, that when things like this happen, it scares the crap out of me, my reaction is to fight like heck, fearing that we are headed back to where we were at our worst.  We have come too far to let that happen.  I WILL NOT GO BACK THERE.  NO WAY.

I think that was why it hit me so hard.  I think that is why I got SO mad at him.  I never wanted to see that jerk side of him again.  Ever.  But it’s still in there I guess.  Just like my lunatic melt down side of me still exists.  In my defense, I believe my inner lunatic was born to defend myself against the jerk.  Yep, I’m blaming him.  Ha.  But I think it’s true.  I used to be a pretty rational person.  He has infuriated me so much over the past few years though that I turned to my inner lunatic to fight back.

Well this post didn’t go where I had planned.  I planned to say that the negative, hateful feelings I had towards my hubby yesterday really surprised me.  I had not felt that in quite a while and the meltdown yesterday reminded me how far we’ve come.

“He Never Cared…Before”

“He never cared about that before.”

“Well he does now.”

“For now.”

This was a conversation between kid2 and I.  Hubby still hasn’t given her electronics back.  It’s been since Saturday morning.  It is now Thursday morning.  He is a tough cookie.  I wanted to give them back to her Tuesday night.  She got her feelings hurt pretty badly by some of her “friends” and I knew she really wanted to talk to her BFF.  They have actually been calling each other.  Using the phone to talk to each other?!?  Imagine that! lol  But it was too late to call that night and she was crying and ugh.  Hubby still said no.

I think he is right.  He is tougher than I have been with this stuff.  But notice that they will listen to him and they treat me like crap so I guess I’ve been doing it wrong :(  I need to get tougher.  I asked him to at least give them back to her for a short while that night.  Nope.  He wouldn’t budge.

The next day Kid2 and I were talking about it and she said she didn’t know why he was upset anyway. She said she didn’t do anything to HIM.  I said no, you did something to me.  And she pointed out that he never cared about that before.

And she is right.  I’ve said many times that its no wonder my kids talk back to me like they do – they see their dad treat me like crap.

“He never cared about that before.”

That sentence very easily translates to

“He never cared about you before.”

Yea.

Ouch.

Her last comment got me.  “For now.”  And she wasn’t being sassy, we were just talking.  I don’t blame her for thinking that it won’t last.

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Dear God,  Please make this last.  Amen.

I am Grateful for my Husband

I am Grateful for my Husband.

And I am so happy to be able to type that sentence and mean it with all my heart.

A few examples of his recent awesomeness:

– Kid2 has been really challenging lately.  She needs to constantly be doing something with one of her friends or her whole world falls apart.  If she had her way, she would never be home.  Or at least not be here without a friend here too.  We live in the country, so her friends who live close to each other in town get together more often, she feels left out, the drama follows.  Hubby calls it her “needy friends phase”.  Dear God I hope it’s a phase that ends quickly.  It’s exhausting.  SO, instead of answering her, I started telling her to ask her dad.  I knew he wouldn’t say yes nearly as often as I was and I figured it was his turn to deal with it.  I needed a break from it!   LOL   That was probably the best thing for the situation.  He does say no a lot.  He says yes sometimes.  He gets to see how it has been for me dealing with this by myself for so long.   He used to say “Ask your mom.”  Now he is on the other end of that and it has been a wake up call for him.

It gave him a whole new perspective – Which I think led him to deal with Kid1 in a way he has never stepped up and done before….

– Kid1 is getting quite bold lately in telling me no.  She just gets mean and defiant and says NO.  And to her that is the end of it.  I have been trying to deal with this consistently and in different ways but she has been winning unfortunately.  And she knows it.  She told me NO yesterday.  Hubby came home shortly afterwards and asked why she wasn’t doing what I asked her to do.  I told him why.  HE MADE HER DO IT. She threw her fit, she cried and moaned.  She yelled that her life was horrible, she yelled all sorts of things but he didn’t back down.  She knew she wasn’t going to win and she finally gave in and went to get ready.  (What we wanted her to do btw is to help hubby’s sister prep food for the concession stand.  Sis-in-law needed help, Kid1 gets paid to do this, she’s helped before so she knows what she is doing, and it would take about 2 hours and she needs to get off the couch! so we wanted her to go.)

I was so proud of hubby.  He was demanding without being angry.  He (mostly) kept his cool which is pretty darn hard when your teenager is hurling insults at you.

– Kid2 was very sassy and rude to me when I picked her up from track Saturday morning.  Just horrible.  We got home and she came in the house with an attitude.  Hubby asked what was going on, I told him, he took her electronics and she still didn’t get them back.

– There are more examples that I’d love to tell you all about but it is already later than I want it to be!   You’ll have to stop over for a cup of coffee and we can gab :)

He has my back now.  I don’t feel like it’s all on me.  We are sharing this responsibility.  It is so awesome.

(And he has been taking the $$ issues seriously finally too and even talked to the kids about how we’ve been spending too much and blah blah blah when the kids had a fit when I packed sandwiches for the ballgames instead of buying supper at the concession stand.  Before Hubby always wanted to just buy it there and would do that even if I had packed food.  Of course it’s yummy, but it’s not cheap!)

I feel so…. cared for.

That’s all I ever wanted.

Dear God,  Please make this last.  Amen.

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Oh... and I got to have sex last night.  HA HA That could be 
another reason I'm feeling so grateful for this man. ;)

Back from The Beach

We went to the beach and are home.  Hubby went with us.  It was nice.  He did really well with my family and I’m happy to report that we didn’t fight once.  What??!!  lol  We did have a misunderstanding once where I got my feelings hurt but we talked it out and all was well.  And since we shared a bedroom and the opportunity presented itself, I got to have sex.  woo hoo.