This girl ….

    She’s my significant other  ….. my wingman , my life organizer, my sounding board, my go to for every decision I make (sometimes even the smallest ones because indecisiveness is my weakness ) …I truly don’t know what I would do without her in my life … (especially these turbulent last two years) .. when I introduce her to other friends they are actually envious and a few have told me they need a “kelly” in their own life .. she’s one of a kind … one of those people who gets along with anyone and everyone and treats everyone like they are a forever friend … that’s just who she is .. whether it’s the cleaning lady , neighbor down the road or the waitress at the taco stand…. she treats them all the same ( could be the southern in her )  she’s also the girl we called in the middle of the night when I went into labor with Delaney ( and the entire pregnancy I wanted to ask her to be in the room for her birth ; but I didn’t … and I regret that ) .. she came over with her toddler in the middle of the night to wait for the babysitter to get there just so I didn’t give birth on the highway … and if it weren’t for her Delaney would have been born on I-95 because we weren’t in the hospital for more than 15 minutes before D came out without drugs .. or a Doctor present .. the nurse delivered her … my mom didn’t even make it .. so thank you K for not letting D be a news story ! 

       I feel like she also deserves this post because she is also the friend in the post about friends and deception that I wrote about .. swearing I would never talk to her again … ( that lasted maybe 60 days .. and that is a long ass time for two chicks who do not go a day without talking .. sometimes 20 times a day )… turns out we both saw the incident that ( temporarily ) ended our friendship two completely different ways .. I saw it as she is on my team and should never have even spoke a word to my ex at all… I’m sure she saw it as an innocent gesture ( it was only a greeting and comment made in the middle of target .. nothing scandalous but it was enough to knock the wind out of me )  .. we have both agreed to move on from it and I’d love to say it brought us closer but I don’t even think it’s possible to get closer than we already are ..
        So last week when her real significant other texted me telling me he was throwing her a surprise party ( which meant I couldn’t call her to ask what the F I was supposed to wear to attend this floating party ) on a 100 ft yacht I could not wait .. she deserved every bit of last night and it was so fun to see her 𝑻𝒉𝒂𝒏𝒌tell her man over and over again that he did such a good job … and he did .. 

Happy Birthday Girl … XO

No bad days .

Only bad moments in the day … this is currently my motto . This gets me through rough times .. I fall back on this quote and remind myself it will pass .. yesterday was prime example ( more on that at the end so keep on reading y’all )… the dating world isn’t much fun guys .. it actually sucks so much ass that I cannot wait to NOT be part of this population of singles.. it could be because I’m a rookie or it’s strictly because 98% of the available men are fuck tards .. I really can’t decide but either way I’m single and I have never been single this long in my life ….when I was 14 I was in a 2.5 year relationship  and when that ended I jumped right into another relationship a few months after ending the first .. and was with him from about 16 until I was 18 or 19 when my now ex husband re entered my life at 19… the second I met my husband I just knew I’d marry him so again it was from one long term relationship and into the next so to say  the dating world is new to me is a comple understantement ….  and clearly I’m pretty damn good at being in a long term relationship vs. this single shit .. 

       For anyone that thinks for a second marriage sucks ( and some really do but you gotta be real and pick your bad ) I beg you to believe me on this ….. you should just try to imagine yourself doing what you do ALONE whether it’s with kids or without and then try to picture adding an unknown dude into the equation .. if he has kids and you do too; it tends to flow easier because there’s a better understanding of the kid life and all that it entails but it’s still awkward at first because maybe you have a 12 year old son who knows that you are dating and he makes comments such as ” mom he can come here but if he looks at you he’s going to catch these hands ” or you might have a 7 year old little girl who asks him to pick her up constantly and wants to do gymnastics on his thighs while walking up them and onto his chest .. or maybe your 10 year old is super sensitive and starts to really like the guy you’re seeing so when you have to end it ( because that’s what happens in the dating world … relationships end faster than divorces most times )… or maybe your 8 year old boy keeps quiet and just gives you a side stare while the guy is around and you never really know what that stare means .. is it evil ? Like why the fuck is my mom not with my dad ……or does it mean absolutely nothing ? You’ll never know because you’re too afraid to ask ( and deep down you know he wishes it was daddy because he’s told you a million times that’s his go to wish ) … or even worse he has a couple of kids and those combined with your 4 feels like an actual school field trip outing every time you go anywhere ( because … 6 kids !!! )… even better yet your kids don’t  vibe well with his ( this happened once and it’s beyond annoying and I thank god it lasted a minute and the guy was “just a friend ” in their eyes because I had known him since middle school)  …. or maybe those situations are just mine and mine alone .. maybe most singles flow from a marriage directly into a relationship flawlessly and their kids all manage just fine without side smirks and human jungle gym situations and at the wedding all the kids are involved and everyone brings home a puppy and lives happily ever after … BUT for me … option A is my reality .. 
 I haven’t introduced the kids to a flock of men ( there was 2 in the past 2 years ) and when I did it was light and slow … the first guy they absolutely adored and he adored them just as much … there were moments when I swore he loved my kids more than me and he did more fun things with them than I could ever have asked for and for that I’m grateful .. he even taught them motorcross .. they actually still miss him to this day.. they text him and bring his name up frequently.. the second guy I would love to pretend never even existed because it was very short and I ignored so many red flags with him that I’m sill mad at myself for wasting 2 months of my life with Mr. green eyes .. but he did have gorgeous eyes so it kinda wasn’t my fault since that tends to be my weakness .. I’m pretty sure the guy could look like a Rambo but if he’s got green eyes and long lashes I will sign myself up … 
    Anyway back to my day yesterday …. I have got myself into an unintentional (un) relationship…. not sure how that even happens but it does ( .. you start out as friends because there’s not even an immediate attraction) .. and it eventually evolves into something more .. this “friend ” isn’t someone you’d ever see yourself with nor are they even ready for what you are after in life … but they have also made such a permanent place in your life that you can’t just let go … so one conversation leads to the next and before you know it you are stuck in this emotional purgatory waiting to figure out what your next step will be … and it has to be methodical because ……. kids … so you’re not just having fun and dating around to see what kind of love might come… you’re in the business of figuring it all out or at least that’s what you think you should be doing … then there’s the other side of your brain that tells you to let it all be … and what will be .. will be ..
So here I am .. texting my BFF ( who always has the answers and knows my entire life and every next move ) asking for advice while I wait for my cappuccino to be made even though it’s 107 degrees out and my 3rd coffeee of the day ( first one at 4 am doesn’t count in my book).. 
    And as soon as I start to get upset or think to far ahead … I remind myself .. NO. BAD. DAYS !!!! Because really what is all of this compared to a divorce ? Pretty sure I can handle anything after that big D .. and as far as these kids are concerned I only need them … this big curly dog and our evening bike ride into the sunset .. and who am I to deprive them of that happiness while I try to find my own .. so off we ride … and I try to pretend to be as carefree as they are …. 

Hello old self…..

As I was cleaning out the garage yesterday I came across an entire plethora of old handwritten poems   ( YES, HAND FUCKING WRITTEN) and some of the material was nostalgic; as I can vividly remember writing most of the poems for a writing class in middle school and the 9th grade so I spent lots of time perfecting the writing, so the poems then became etched in my memory.. It’s interesting to look back at your old self especially in your teenage years when your problems felt like they were life shattering and could possibly end your world and stop the earth from spinning on its god damn axis…meanwhile in reality it was all over a stupid boy.. a boy that you may or may not even remember existed within 4 weeks or less but NONETHELESS you suffer with a broken heart and cry into your pillow in your dark room and wait by your clear phone with an actual CORD attached to it .. ( AKA: House phone) that lights up neon instead of ringing which is actually perfect because your parents don’t even realize you are on your phone at 2 am on a school night  ….. for the BOY to call you …

This one poem in particular I can remember writing and I also remember this boy being the one and only boy who ever hurt me… He was the bad boy type back then (which clearly I never lost the attraction to that type of guy)… I liked him ALOT.. we dated off and on for over a year ( school year? ) my parents would go pick him up from his house and we would go to the movies and we would talk on the phone a lot.. I remember one night that probably inspired one of these sad poems.. this night involved one of my best friends at the time and this BOY…. I found out that while my BFF and this BOY were at the movies that they had ” hooked up” I can’t remember exactly who told me.. its quite possible it was actually him who had done the confessing but either way I was a mess…   poem attached for your reading enjoyment)

I wish I could go back and tell the girl back then that she was a bad ass girl who deserved to be treated better by her girlfriend and her boy friend back then… but I am CERTAIN the girl writing that poem already knew that and did not need any coaching. Even back then my 14 year old self had enough confidence to pick up the pieces and move on from the incident. I was quick to forgive my BFF ( I actually pitted her; knowing she lacked the confidence that I had)  and act like it had never happened and even quicker to dismiss the BOY from my life after that incident.  My 36 year old self is grateful that there were no lasting effects of this incident that would shape me into anything but the emotional BAD ASS that I am today… throughout this divorce and turmoil I have prided myself on being confident enough to know that one day it will all make sense and refrained from blaming myself for the divorce…. just as I looked back at the poems yesterday I know one day I will also look back at these years and have just as much confidence in my 36 year old self as I did in my 14 year old self.

Ps. I threw the poems away along with a FUCK TON of other things form the past and it felt AMAZING.. I also Facebook messaged the “BOY” a picture of the poems and he apologized for inspiring the sad poems… no need BOY … I had already forgiven .

 

 

 

 

 

The picture of what it was SUPPOSED to look like ……

This is what keeps me up at night and weighs down the emotional chains that drag me back into the can’t move forward darkness hole ….. The thoughts start like this…. We were supposed to be married forever… We were supposed to raise these kids together (who has 4 kids and plans to divorce?)  we were supposed to build our dream house together.. we were supposed to grow our business together.. we were supposed to watch our kids grow up together… we were supposed to grown old and die together….. After all; we were the couple that made it through all the odds since the beginning ..meeting each other under the circumstances that we did *more on that another day… and going on to marry at such a young age…. now look at us…. basically strangers who share 4 kids together and I only need him for a child support and alimony now instead of all of my other needs that I must now meet myself…. And this is  still one of the hardest parts for me.. I am naturally a very indecisive person ( Ask my BFF; it drives her crazy!) so when I was still married I would go to him for every decision that I couldn’t make on my own.. even the smallest ones … and he would help me decide …he was extremely decisive like that ( must be nice)…. now I am in the starter house on my own while he is 4 streets over with HER I have the kids the majority of the time with the exception of Wednesday evenings and every other weekend …. I watch them swim alone in our pool and play with  their friends without him there… the evenings are probably the hardest (loneliest) hours for me to fill.. these are the hours that he would have been coming home and we would have been eating dinner together and discussing our day or he’d be in the bathtub calling out my name to come into the bathroom so he could tell me some long ass story about work that I would have to stand there and listen to  ( I would give anything to have this in my life again….or at least I think thats what I want back)…. He always used the same red plastic castle that our oldest (now 12) used to play with in the bathtub… this red castle as ugly and cheap as it looked in our bathroom it somehow never got thrown away after all those years and despite me being known for throwing anything and everything away…. So when the separation came I put the castle away in a cabinet so I didn’t have to be reminded of him using it to dump the bathwater over his head ( which I can literally picture as if I watched this moment yesterday)…..  we have discussed the red castle and he knows its waiting for him if that day ever comes (it won’t )……..in these hours I know that my married friends ( pretty much all of them) are with their spouses  making dinner and being a family …. while I single mom it to 4 kids …. so that garbage disposal that broke 2 nights ago and the spaghetti that is sitting in the sink will sit in there until I come up with a way to fix it or it fixes itself … (it has happened before!)…. it used to break a lot and he would come home….take all of the stuff from under the sink out and work some magic on it and it would be as good as new….. if only everything else was that fixable and easy….. These evening hours are when the negative thoughts creep in and take over my heart…. and this is usually when the how it was supposed to be banter replays itself over and over again in my head until I lay down in my bed with my little girl curled up next to me ( she has slept with me only since the divorce… never even co slept as a baby or toddler)… but here I am with 3 kids in my bedroom ,, 2 of my boys sleep on my floor every night  ( same scenario since divorce) and together we close our eyes and sleep in this room that was SUPPOSED to be T and I alone…. and in the morning we will wake up to another day of SUPPOSED to’s ….

Friends until the end.

So this separation / divorce has brought on lots of changes… some of the first real changes came in the beginning when it all first went down and those were the “friends” they were the first to go….. The first friends who had to go were the ones on “HIS” side… these were the obvious sacrifices and although at first it hurt to see the lines drawn clearly in the sand; I was not blind to the fact that this was part of the process and almost a completely necessary sacrifice ….. I will say that although his mom and I always loved each other and had a connection and at some points before any of this we both agreed that no matter what happened with me and her son that we would forever remain friends … but we didn’t….at first…. it was too torturous for the both of us.. too hard for her to remain neutral over her first born son; and I totally got it… so we went our separate ways….

There were the other friends of his that were wives of his friends; these friends naturally stuck with him because of their husbands friendship to my ex; again 100% understood and I understood this…. there would be a time when they would have to socialize with his new girlfriend and wouldn’t it be so awkward to remain friends with both of us? No; this is not all the reason for the elimination but it did play a factor in it because if this wasn’t a reason from the start it would be once this was actually a real thing….

However; what I never saw coming and I am not entirely sure this is an uncommon thing or not….. was MY best friend and the end of our friendship…. I had asked her from almost the very beginning to stop all communication with him because it just didn’t feel right to me to have her going back and forth between the two of us.. what if she slipped and told him something that I never intended for him to hear but most apparent was the things that she would come back to tell me that he had said..it was WAY too hurtful to hear your BFF have more privy to the emotions of your husband when it is all still raw…..she did not understand this and continued on with the communications and once even told me that NO she would not stop talking to him on my behalf because there was no reason for her to… ( UMMMMM yes there was ) I let that sink in and although I didn’t like it….I sucked it up because who else did I have to vent to and go through his with and she has been there for every step of the way….

Fast forward to one year later when that SAME friend sees your ex and although she knows damn well that him and I are still friends she must have assumed that he would not tell me the things that she was saying to him….. She was wrong ….  we haven’t completely lost the connection with each other ( knowing each other since 3rd grade will do that) so he did in fact tell me what was said and as soon as the words made it through to my heart I knew it would never be the same again…… I can forgive for lots of things ( I forgave my mother in law who made a shitty Facebook post about me in the beginning …. thats water under the bridge because I am a forgiver and I understood it was anger that drove her to write this post and it wasn’t how she truly felt )… but what I cannot and will not forgive is the behavior of someone whose actions define their morals… I will forgive… I will probably eventually forget … Her words opened my eyes to what a few close family members were warning me about her and she proved them right in an instant.. her loyalty from the beginning was not with me…. I will NEVER entertain the thought of being friends with this person again… and how sad is it that people want to play both sides… what does it say about them as a person? To me it says everything….. so YES friends until the END….and it is THE END.

The power of an apology

        Apologizing is a powerful thing .. sometimes we apologize because we truly are sorry for something we said or did … sometimes we apologize for hurting someone even though we don’t see what we said or did as needing an apology but we do it anyway ….. what is harder to accept is NOT getting an apology for being betrayed and hurt and instead being fed a mixed bag of excuses … that’s when there is no forgiving because how can we forgive when there is nobody at the other end of forgiveness … that’s when the lines go silent and there is nothing left to say .. no moving forward and no speaking …  what is there to speak about when you feel so betrayed ? You surly won’t be discussing anything big or small when there is an elephant standing in the room waiting to be noticed .. 
  
  An apology goes a very long way … and so does an explanation as to why the mistake was made ..