The only thing that counts.

The most wonderful gift that I got from my divorce, is being able to live my life exactly the way that I want.  The person that I was pre-divorce isn’t the same one post-divorce.  I spent too many years conforming to someone else’s vision of what I should be to waste any more time doing that.  I live my life for me.  Utterly and completely.  I do things, are with people and go places that make me happy.  That makes me feel okay.    For people who knew me while I was still married, the “change” in me must seem shocking, even a bit crazy and erratic.  And that’s fine, I get that.  The nature of my marriage and the way I was, was never a natural state of being for me.  I tried.  I compromised too much and gave up too much and in the end I completely lost myself.  I will never do that again.  For anyone.  I am the way I am.  If you like it, good for you.  If you don’t, well tough, then you are welcome to exit the same way you came.  A lot of friendships have fallen after I got divorced.  But there are a handful who remain.  Those are the kind of people I want to be around, that ad positively to my life experience.

At the end of the day, I only have myself.  People come and go.  It doesn’t matter how much you love them or how close you are.  It’s the nature of life.  So I need to do what I need to do to make sure I’m taken care of, whatever that entails.  I decided this morning that I am done trying to explain to people how I view life, how I understand things and how I think about things.  All I can achieve by doing that is give people a very superficial view of my inner world at best.  My view and understanding of life and the world is so different from most people that they find it hard to believe anyway.  So I am not going to do it anymore.  I can only live the way I live, do the things I do and keep on keepin’ on.  I do the things I do, for me.  I live the way I live, for me.  I think the way I do, for me, because that’s what I believe to be right or whatever.  Some people get me more than others, some don’t at all.  I’m good with all of that.

I am happy with me.  I accept myself completely.  I am happy with my life.  That, at the end of the day, is the only thing that really counts.

An alternative route

I was looking at my daughter today.  She is going to like some boy someday and he’s going to say he likes her and she is going to believe him and he is going to break her heart.  And it will probably happen more than once.  I believe that kids learn from the behaviour of their parents.  Her father and I – divorced.  Already a fail.  Her father goes through girlfriends like trains through Geppe station.  And me, well I’m not the best example of how to have a healthy relationship either since I clearly suck at relationships, I’m obviously not all that and a bag of chips.  So since her frame of reference is already fucked up, I asked myself how DO I teach her to have healthy relationships.  I can’t.  Obviously.

So the only thing I can do is to teach her (both of them actually) how NOT to be in a relationship.  Not that I want that for them but maybe by teaching them how to be ok on their own that we don’t NEED to be in a relationship.  It will help in some way.  I can teach them how to be comfortable and ok with their own company.  I can teach them that the way life goes is NOT, go to school, study, get married, have kids.  I can teach them to forge their own paths.  I can teach that to be alone doesn’t make you lonely.  I can teach them that happiness starts within you, that it doesn’t take “two halves to make a whole”.  We have to be whole on our own.  I can help build their self esteem so that they don’t need someone else to tell them that they are awesome/beautiful/fantastic/whatever.  I can help them understand that love isn’t needy, and that if you love someone or if someone loves you that it doesn’t have to be some kind of prison.  When you truly love someone you allow that person to be completely who they are as they should you, that to love someone doesn’t mean to restrict them in any way from living their life or making their own decisions.  That love never holds you back, it should make you fly.  I will teach them that the point of their existence is not to find the “perfect” partner, like society would have us believe.  Getting married isn’t the be all and end all.  It’s great to have a someone yes, but it’s not the point of life.  If you don’t have someone that you can still enjoy life.  You don’t have to wait or go out looking for “someone”, while you are living your life you might just run into a person that you can spend a lot of time with.

I can attempt to teach them that.  I can do the best I can.  Hopefully they will do better than me.

But there’s another kind of love, Amanda. One that gives you the courage to be better than you are, not less than you are. One that makes you feel that anything is possible. I want you to know that you could have that. I want you to hold out for it. ~ Adrienne to her daughter Amanda in the movie Nights in Rodanthe

 

 

 

We were young and wild and free

You know how sometimes you hear a song you haven’t heard in a long time and it takes you right back to a long time ago a distant memory, long forgotten.  I had one of those moments this morning.

I grew up in a small town on the banks of the Vaal River.  We didn’t really have anything pretty except the river, our mountains were mine dumps.  The place had a certain charm I guess.  Wide open spaces, lots of veld to explore.  We spent a lot of time on the banks of the river.  But I digress.  Every year for a week ‘the show’ came to town, it’s like a fun fair or the Rand Show, just on a smaller scale.  But it was the event of the year.  Anyone who was anyone went.  And we all bought tacky things and went on the rides.  It was 1992, I was what 14/15 years old.  I was at the show with a bunch of friends and I had my eye on a boy.  We were waiting in line for one of the rides, almost like teacups but just for grown-ups, faster and wilder and higher.  They played “Enola Gay” from OMD.  And I was young, wild, free and invincible.  I didn’t get the boy that night though.  But it was ok.  We had a great time.  I still remember the lights, the smells, the dust on my shoes,  it was a bit chilly.  I felt happy, excited, not a care in the world.  Isn’t it amazing how our minds sometimes freeze frame moments…

I lived a very different kind of life than the other kids my age.  You could say I started living my life my way from about that age.  I don’t regret it.  All part of the journey.  It was an amazing time though.  We did crazy things.  We did amazing things.  Like only teenagers with too much freedom, living in a small town can.  We experimented with all sorts of things, went all sorts of places we shouldn’t be, doing things we shouldn’t be doing.  Would make a really cool movie actually lol. But eventually we all grow up, finish school, we start full time jobs, we move, we lose touch, we get caught up in making a living.  We don’t do crazy things anymore, we become responsible and do what we are told and not what we want.  We get married, have kids, work.  The monotony of life takes over.

My divorce, biggest gift I could ever have received.  EVER.  I get to rekindle some of that which has fallen by the wayside.  I get to not get caught up in monotony.  I get to LIVE.

 

 

 

This, that and the other

I really had an awesome evening at my not so secret, secret birthday party.  I just love having all my people around and laugh and talk and eat.  We had one LONG table and we had a good visit.  It was awesome.  And can I just say again how much I love living where I do it’s a many leveled kind of awesome!

So much of stuff happening in my world at the moment again.  I like that.  Possibilities.  I thrive on that.  I have grown rather fond of the unknown come to think of it.  But ja we will see what happens.  But I’m excited about the possibilities.  In other news, Cape Town will be here again in exactly 3 weeks, yay!  Awesome.  The most common response I get about me here and him there is “oh I don’t know how you do it” and yes it can be hard.  But I knew that we lived far apart when I started seeing him.  Even though he isn’t always physically with me, he is always ‘there’ for me.  Know what I mean?  That’s more than I can say for some people within close proximity.  The boy is all different kinds of awesome.  No bullshit.  I like that.  I just focus on the now.

Tomorrow my 2 week stint being kidless is over.  It’s such a mixed emotion thing.  It’s nice to have a break and awful not having them with me at the same time.  But you know such is the realities of divorce.  That’s what happens when you have children with someone and you split.  When I was growing up I didn’t get to see the parent I wasn’t living with at the time every day.  And neither do millions of other children.  We all grow up and we all survive.  And if we have issues there is always therapy.  I do think though that all children need is love.  Love and boundaries.  It’s what makes them feel safe.  And as a divorced kid (for me), the only important thing is to feel loved and safe.  So that is what I do, I make sure my kids know that we both love them, no matter what.  I make sure they have rules, boundaries, routines to help them feel safe.  I make sure they know they can come to me no matter what.  And we have conversations in an environment where they don’t feel judged and I make them understand it’s never about choosing sides, because at the end of the day both their parents love them and it doesn’t matter that we don’t all live together.  They are loved.

We can only do what we can.  And I suppose I’m lucky that I come from a divorced home.  I can draw from personal experience.  It helps because I can relate.  The two major issues that I have from coming from a divorced home is abandonment and rejection.  Biggies for sure which I have under control most of the time.  But I can try to help my kids not have those issues.  And I know what other’s to look out for.  So again.  Everything is as it should be.

Weekend Roundup – Spectrum edition

There are a couple of things on my mind, but lets face it, when isn’t there?!  But first weekend roundup.  Friday night I did not feel like cooking so we all went off to The Olive (by the way their website is up have a lookie here) and it was packed, so loads of fun as usual.  The kids played with friends, we all chatted and ate, then it was off to bed for an early night.

Saturday I went to little Taeyah’s 2nd birthday party, the cutest child on the planet.  I can’t believe that just the other day she was a teeny tiny little newborn that made her appearance earlier than planned on the day that her poor Mum was busy unpacking stacks of boxes.  We had a great time at a really cool party venue right next to the Magalies Mountain.  After the party I went off to the Solstice Beer Festival which was great.  A bunch of craft beer brewers, a truckload of people and some really good music.  Although going to a beer festival when you can’t drink is a bit meh though, I was being all responsible as one should and didn’t drink because I was driving.  Needless to say I didn’t stay too long and headed off home.  I was exhausted by the evening and watched some Spartacus and then went to sleep.  Sunday was a lazy day, I just went to town to pick up stuff for school and lounged about for the rest of the day.  And that’s that.

I did get some really nice compliments from a few people this weekend actually, that remarked how well behaved and awesome my kids are.  So that was a proud Mommy moment for me.  I have however, recently noticed a change in Christian’s behaviour.  He started wetting the bed and has really become very aggressive, which is rather out of character for him.  I had a chat to his teacher this morning and she says everything is fine at school but suggested that maybe I take him for a couple of play therapy sessions.  She says often in a divorce situation a child is fine and then as they grow older, other things than were previously addressed becomes an issue.  That made more sense than where my mind went.  I was tossing and turning last night as my mind went to all kinds of places on what could have triggered his behaviour.  I did decide however that I will have the talk with them both again and just drive the point home on where touching is allowed and where not.  I mean if you think about it, children don’t often get molested by strangers, it’s people that they know.  If I just look at my own situation, in every instance it was someone that we knew.  What is more scary in my case is that I never told anyone.  So I will just have the talk with them, it’s all I can do really.

Also it is Cape Town’s birthday soon.  I will be spending it with him and I can’t wait.  Cape Town doesn’t really like too much fussing over it, but I am fussing a little.  He promised to indulge me my fussing so it’s all good.  The boy has a good heart and I think it’s well deserved that someone fusses over him a bit for a change.  I do like him an awful lot!  Aaand that’s way more than I care to share here.

This morning I woke up with this song in my head.  I love it.  I play it really loud in the car and belt it out as loud as I can. “Say my name.  And every colour illuminates, we are shining and we will never be afraid again” it’s awesome.  Enjoy!

Expecto Patronum

I’m feeling quite anxious at present.  Just too much all at once.  I really really need a tenant for the cottage, it’s getting ridiculously urgent now.  Like someone I spoke to said, something has to change.  I actually don’t need this stress anymore.  I will make a plan.  I think I’m going to get some Biral, I’m that anxious.  Fuckit.  You know, it’s flippen hard being on your own sometimes.  Which is why I maintain, do not fucking breed people.  When you have children, your responsibilities increase by a gazillion.  It’s completely different when you just have to worry about you.

Look I don’t want to be saved, I can do this.  But sometimes it’s just hard.  But I chose this, when I made a really stupid decision against my better judgement 9 years ago, this was the path I chose.  And now I have to deal with it.  On my own, with nobody’s help.  And it doesn’t help I get angry or sad.  I must just put my big girl panties on and deal with it.  Which is exactly what I’ll do after I throw my litttle tantrum.  Everyone is entitled a tantrum every now and then.  As much as I believe in positive thinking and all that, I also believe that we have to work through any emotion that comes up for us.  It doesn’t help to suppress anything, the only way out is through.  Right now I am a little pissed off and sad and lonely and a little desperate, among other things.  I am going to allow myself to be pissed at myself for being so fucking stupid to marry someone I KNEW I shouldn’t have married, and then to make things worse to have children with that person.  Really now, how fucking idiotic.  And then furthermore to stay in that marriage for 8 freaking years.  What the fuck was I thinking?!

(Disclaimer:  I love my children more than anything and I don’t regret having them.  What I’m venting about has nothing to do with them.)

Then at the same time I’m trying to have a life, keep my eye on goals, get to where I want to be.  Convince myself that I don’t need anyone, even though my heart longs to be part of someone.  Have healthy relationships.  And try to be a good person and do good things.  This year has been good for me in terms of setting boundaries, determining what I want, where I want to be, but Jesus I still have a long way to go.  And yes, I know I shouldn’t look at where I am going I should look at where I am at.  But sometimes I just can’t help feeling that shit just doesn’t seem to work out for me ever.  What am I doing wrong.  Maybe it’s just the slight hint of hysteria speaking.  I also can’t help to feel sometimes that maybe I am just completely unlovable.  I feel sometimes like just locking up my heart and throwing it in a deep dark dungeon and just go through life half dead.    As if that would be easier.  As if that is any way to live.

What I do find interesting though is when I feel like this, when I’m this sad and feel like sitting in a heap and just cry, I choose anger as my weapon of choice instead of breaking down and crying.  I’ve done this for as long as I can remember. My anger has always masked a deep sadness.  It comes out as irritation and harsh words, while inside I am just very sad and all I need is a hug and love.  Which of course is totally counter productive.  You aint going to get no love and hugs when you are being a bitch now are you.  Call the Mothership and ask my kind to come and fetch me.

Expecto Patronus.  I wish that worked.  For those of you that don’t know, it’s a spell from the Harry Potter books, and yes I read the books and I watched the movies and I loved it, so there.  That spell conjures an incarnation of the caster’s innermost positive feelings, such as joy or hope, known as a Patronus. A Patronus is conjured as a protector.  It doesn’t work because we all know that in real life no-one is going to save to us.  We come alone, and alone we die.

The box is a size too small

So my blog post from yesterday caused quite a stir.  Needless to say also from the children’s father who reckons I’m batshit crazy, but I am a good mother and that he deserves some credit.  Well you know, there are no noddy badges for being a parent and doing what a parent should be doing.  We did however agree on some points and everybody is moving along swiftly.  I realized yesterday that so many people are divorced but nobody really talks about it.  No-one voices their frustrations and the emotional issues attached to that really.  Everybody thinks it, but no-one says it.  Even me, yesterday was the first time I actually voiced some aspects of what is going on in my head regarding the divorce here on my blog, I’ve always just spoken in general terms and what I have learned from it.  So I have decided that the next time something comes up I will, instead of just typing it out to get out my head and saving it in drafts, actually publish it.  But for now I’ve given it far more airtime than it deserves.  So onwards and upwards.

My Ireland trip is looming on the horizon, but instead of the earlier excitement I felt, I now feel a bit blah about it, I am still excited of course but my Mom won’t be be able to join me anymore.  I did ask someone else to come along but it’s also very short notice for them so they are seeing if they would be able to and will let me know.  If that person can’t come along I have decided to go by myself.  I must admit it does seem a bit daunting for my first trip out of Africa to travel all by myself but I think it will be a good experience if it happens.

Right at this point in time, I have my attention firmly focused on the good things that’s going on my life.  I am taking a bit of financial strain with being tenant’less but it will work out as it always does.  And that’s the thing hey, everything always works out in the end.  So why worry.  Everything works out in the end.  I felt myself starting to fall into the usual “boo hoo nothing ever works out for me” trap yesterday but I quickly snapped out of that when I looked at all the things that are working out.  You know, I am a resourceful, strong and resilient human being.  I can and do take a lot of shit and I’m really flexible, I generally go with the flow.  I don’t need anyone, I think I have more than proven that I can take care of shit really well by myself.  I think however, that it is exactly that mindset that makes me feel alone sometimes, like I have no-one in my corner.  Because I do have people in my life that are awesomely supportive.  They aren’t necessarily going to sort shit out for me, but they are there.  And they are awesome.

Being in an argument with the kids father yesterday brought up a whole lot of stuff for me, and I thank my lucky stars that I am not in that situation daily anymore.  He really did make me feel like there is something wrong with me.  But now, not being caught up in that situation anymore it’s easy to step back and see it for what it is.  And you know if people think I am batshit crazy for living and believing the way I do, then well, that’s their opinion.  I don’t fit in a box, and I don’t want to either.

The realities of divorce

You know.  When you get married you never think about the fact that you might get divorced.  You are temporarily blinded and swept up in a haze of chemically induced madness called being in love.  You don’t think that the person you are looking at with stars in your eyes and who you love the most could quite possibly turn out to be the very person who irritates you the most.  That person who you thought you would spend the rest of your life with could very well turn out to be a verbally/emotionally and/or physically abusive asshole that likes to wear your underwear.  You have no idea of knowing shit like that before you get married.  So you get divorced.

When you don’t have children it’s quite easy in most cases to get rid of that person.  You never have to deal with them or see them again.  But when you have children it becomes a whole other ballgame.  You are never rid of that person.  And in most cases they will forevermore irritate the shit out of you and push your buttons.  And there is no way around that.  Because some people will still try and control you and use every opportunity they can get to tell you how shit you are and that yes, they do think they are holier than you.  This is the reality of divorce with children.  If your kids live with you, you try to keep their lives as stable as possible.  You juggle life, finances, playing mom’s taxi and try to keep on top of everything to the best of your ability.  Because for me at least, it’s important to also have a freaking life.  And it’s not always easy.  More often than not you sacrifice things you want to do or have for the sake of the family unit.  You don’t get to go where you want to go whenever you want to, it takes planning.  Most of the time spontaneity goes right out the door.  Friendships suffer and some fall away, the dynamics of friendships change when friends get divorced.  Because for all intents and purposes we are not a ‘family’ anymore.  And I know on the weekends I don’t have kids I avoid “families” like the plague.

I am lucky that I, as a single mother, have a really solid support structure.  So I do have some measure of flexibility.  But for the most part, it’s me.  The responsibility of raising my kids and providing for them lies with me.  The fathers pay maintenance, and I’m sure some of them do what they can to give input and when their kids are with them to spend quality time with them.  But you can’t put the two together and look at them equally.  In reality some fathers have their kids every second weekend, that is only 7 days in a month.  So they overcompensate, they take them places, buy them shit and let them do and eat whatever they want.  While back at home (for me at least) I maintain routines, make sure they eat healthy and spend time with them and try and make sure their level of dysfunction won’t fall over to the extreme.  Because you can look at it which ever way you want, if your family is divorced, it’s dysfunctional and there are always emotional issues attached to that.  So the most you can do is damage control.

The last thing I need is for some sanctimonious holier than thou asshole sitting on their perch, living the life they want preaching to me about how I can do it better.  Fuck you asshole, go fuck yourself.  I do not need some asshole putting my kids under cross-questioning about what I’m doing, what’s going on in my house, who comes there etc.  That is fucked up.  That upsets the crap out of me.  I know what that was like as a kid.  If you want to know anything ask me, don’t go through my kids.  They are too little to tell you to go fuck yourself, all that happens is that they feel torn and guilty.  Think about that next time Dad’s.  Have the fucking balls to do your own recon asking the other grown up, and if they have any backbone, they will tell you to go fuck yourself.  Because you know what.  When you get divorced, you have absolutely no control over your ex spouse anymore, fancy that.  You do not get to tell them where they can go, what they can do and with who.  And you do not get to use your children as pawns.  It’s not their fault that you as a couple fucked up and decided to breed.  So you do not get to make them pay for your sins.  You leave them out of it.  You keep your judgments about the other parent, which is just your opinion and doesn’t make it true, to yourself.  You don’t discuss the other parent in front of the kids with your friends/parents/girlfriend.  Do you have any idea what that does to a child?  I know exactly what that does.  So next time Dad’s when you find yourself feeling holier than thou.  Shut the fuck up until the kids are gone.  When they are gone, you can discuss your ex spouse to your hearts content to whomever wants to listen and judge as much as you want to.  Because you know what, your ex spouse does not give a shit about your opinion and they can choose to let it affect them or not.  But to a child, hearing one parent talk shit about another affects them and again, they did not choose the situation.  So think about them instead of just yourself.

And the moral of the story kids – for fuck sakes if you really really want to get married, give it time.  Don’t just jump into a marriage, there are repercussions that you can not imagine in the event that you do get divorced.  If you are really set on getting married and you do, do not breed, for the love of God, the world does not need any more humans.