Last weekend, I was introduced to X's current boyfriend. It's been six years since she moved out of the house, but this is the only one of them I have met. I've never asked for much information in this area, and she's never volunteered much about them, other than to ask if the kids could stay with me on nights when she had plans. I know of only one other former boyfriend by name, and that was only because he was the sibling of a prominent radio personality here.
The introduction was cordial. He seems like a good guy. He has a daughter about the same age as our older daughter. He was there so that X could introduce him to the kids and go out for ice cream together.
Emotionally, it was much more difficult than I had imagined it being. Although I have no feelings for X, my feelings of rejection in that relationship haunt me still, even more so given the downshift in together time I've had in my own romantic relationship. Putting a face and a name to what she wanted, at least superficially, gave me the impression that she wanted something very different out of a man than me.
That demon of undesirability is lurking in the dark reaches of my mind. The weekends that my girlfriend and I normally would spend together are now just maybe a few hours together. Dinner at a restaurant or sitting together at church. I struggle with the feeling that while she says she is unhappy with it, she is really OK with it, or at least doesn't feel the same pain that I feel when I realize that we won't be spending that time together.
I've been trying to channel energy into things that I've needed to do for a while -- yard work and decluttering to name a couple things. I don't have a lot of disposable income, so getting out of the house to do things that cost money seems infeasible, and going places where there are a lot of people by myself feels weird, like I'm being unfaithful to the relationship.
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Sunday, August 10, 2014
My Moribund 2am RSS Feeds
Started to take a look at the blogs that I used to follow via Google Reader many a year ago. I migrated them to Feedly when Google did its Spring Cleaning shutdown of Reader. Most of the feeds have gone dormant. Only Anais (Dancing with Myself), Dawn (I am Doing the Best I Can and other blogs), Tom Allen (The Edge of Vanilla), and Drunken Housewife are posting with any degree of regularity. Here is a listing of each blog in my feed and the number of days since the last post was published.
What blogs do you miss?
- ...For a Different Kind of Girl (Eponymous) - 506
- A Very Merry Un-Birthday (Mandy Lou) - 1151
- Dancing with Myself (Anais) - 4
- Deepest Darkest Thoughts (Trueself)- 178
- Drunken Housewife (Eponymous) - 32
- I Am Doing the Best I Can (Dawn) - 6
- I Should've Been Famous by Now (Tajalude) - 1004
- Mind Blowing Insanity (Jinsane) - 165
- Never Judge a Book by its Cover/Blogger (Cat) - 1175
- Never Judge a Book by its Cover /Wordpress (Cat) - 772
- Phyllis Renee (Eponymous) - 1562
- Reality & Redemption/Wordpress (Digger Jones) - 173
- Reality & Redemption/Blogger (Digger Jones) - 1871
- The Edge of Vanilla (Tom Allen) - 29
- The Eyes Have It (Fiona) - 138
- Unsolicited Advice/Blogger (Digger Jones) - 2052
- Unsolicited Advice/Wordpress (Digger Jones) - 455
What blogs do you miss?
Playing the Hand You're Dealt
Last weekend, we had the closest thing to one of "our weekends" that we've had in a long time.
My girlfriend's ex-husband got paid late last week, which meant he had money, so he promised his son that he'd come get him for the weekend. He cancelled the Friday evening pickup, claiming he had to work and promising to pick him up the next day. Actual pickup time was Saturday afternoon at 3 pm. No explanation given. He was driving another new used car, the third or fourth that he's had so far this year.
It was almost an overnight for us, but her daughter's plans for the weekend fell through when the friend she was going to stay with got sick, complications from hypoglycemia. With no other plans, she was going to stay home, so that put the overnight plans into the "nope" column. The three of us met for dinner, and then she took her daughter home so she could come over to see me. We had about four hours of together time, which was reinvigorating.
I shared with her my feelings that the lack of together time this year had been a drain on me. I also made it clear that I didn't blame her. I knew she didn't have control of her ex-husband. But it was also true that I was experiencing severe loneliness due to the unpredictability and infrequency of our time together. She said she didn't like the way things were for her. She said she knew we needed time away from the kids so we could talk freely in a way you can't when you're on the phone or texting. She said was able to "compartmentalize" that and go on, realizing that this was just how things were going to be for a while because she didn't see him getting any better about being there for his kids.
We talked about how we could be more creative about finding time to be alone. She floated the idea of changing up our weekly dinner night so that instead of me coming to her house, she would come to mine without her kids. She would make them something for dinner and let them eat by themselves. Her kids are 15 and 12, so they can handle a few hours on their own.
We tried it out this past Wednesday. I had dinner ready for us and we snuggled after that, spending about three hours together. I asked her how her kids were dealing with this arrangement, and she said her daughter (the 15 year-old) was OK with it, but the son wasn't happy, complaining that she was probably going to eat something better than what they were having. Although it hurt to see her go, we were both happy with it, so we will probably make this the new weekly routine.
Got a phone call from X this evening letting me know that when I bring the kids home on Sunday evening, her boyfriend was going to be there and she was going to introduce him to the kids. She said that the kids know about him, so this wouldn't blindside them. I guess I will get to meet him as well. Should be interesting.
Work is still grinding on me. The project that I was conscripted as tech lead for about a month ago is hitting issues with resource allocation, with a consultant whom they hoped to have lined up not ready to go. Realizing this, the powers that be have agreed to extend the completion date, which was already way too aggressive. I'm getting some interest from recruiters, so I've been telling them that I won't be available until the project winds down, which will be most likely October now.
My girlfriend's ex-husband got paid late last week, which meant he had money, so he promised his son that he'd come get him for the weekend. He cancelled the Friday evening pickup, claiming he had to work and promising to pick him up the next day. Actual pickup time was Saturday afternoon at 3 pm. No explanation given. He was driving another new used car, the third or fourth that he's had so far this year.
It was almost an overnight for us, but her daughter's plans for the weekend fell through when the friend she was going to stay with got sick, complications from hypoglycemia. With no other plans, she was going to stay home, so that put the overnight plans into the "nope" column. The three of us met for dinner, and then she took her daughter home so she could come over to see me. We had about four hours of together time, which was reinvigorating.
I shared with her my feelings that the lack of together time this year had been a drain on me. I also made it clear that I didn't blame her. I knew she didn't have control of her ex-husband. But it was also true that I was experiencing severe loneliness due to the unpredictability and infrequency of our time together. She said she didn't like the way things were for her. She said she knew we needed time away from the kids so we could talk freely in a way you can't when you're on the phone or texting. She said was able to "compartmentalize" that and go on, realizing that this was just how things were going to be for a while because she didn't see him getting any better about being there for his kids.
We talked about how we could be more creative about finding time to be alone. She floated the idea of changing up our weekly dinner night so that instead of me coming to her house, she would come to mine without her kids. She would make them something for dinner and let them eat by themselves. Her kids are 15 and 12, so they can handle a few hours on their own.
We tried it out this past Wednesday. I had dinner ready for us and we snuggled after that, spending about three hours together. I asked her how her kids were dealing with this arrangement, and she said her daughter (the 15 year-old) was OK with it, but the son wasn't happy, complaining that she was probably going to eat something better than what they were having. Although it hurt to see her go, we were both happy with it, so we will probably make this the new weekly routine.
Got a phone call from X this evening letting me know that when I bring the kids home on Sunday evening, her boyfriend was going to be there and she was going to introduce him to the kids. She said that the kids know about him, so this wouldn't blindside them. I guess I will get to meet him as well. Should be interesting.
Work is still grinding on me. The project that I was conscripted as tech lead for about a month ago is hitting issues with resource allocation, with a consultant whom they hoped to have lined up not ready to go. Realizing this, the powers that be have agreed to extend the completion date, which was already way too aggressive. I'm getting some interest from recruiters, so I've been telling them that I won't be available until the project winds down, which will be most likely October now.
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