catching up

Has it been three weeks? Really? Since I last posted? Good grief. So a quick wrap up.

I started my new job this week. Here’s what I know – after a year of not working regularly out of the house, my feet are not used to work shoes. I am limping.

We are spending all of our spare time thinking about school choices for our daughter, who can go to pre-k next year. She has a late September birthday, and our city has a September 30 cut off date for going to school. So she will be the youngest in her class, and I am freaking out. Should we send her? Hold her back? How do you know what to do?

Then there’s school choice. We are in the public school realm. We live in a large urban city, with terrible and ok schools. How do we get into an OK school? By going to endless rounds of open houses and putting in applications for schools outside our neighborhood. And praying we get accepted. This is a part-time job, figuring this out. And you know, it’s only her entire life we’re talking about here. So no stress involved at all, right?

The little man is doing well. Right after I accepted the job, his sleeping regressed and I was back up two times a night with him. But this week he’s been cooperating beautifully, and I’ve only shed a few tears at handing him over to the nanny. Part-time work is nice, I have still had a lot of time with him during the week.

I just found out a friend’s father just passed away. He was 4 years older than my father and was diagnosed with cancer 8 months ago. I want to drive to my hometown and attend the services next week, but it’s not practical (3.5 hours away, infant, etc). But my heart is heavy for my friend.

Marriage has had its ups and downs, but we’re still coasting along.

Nothing from in-laws.

And that sums up my past few weeks. Nothing too terribly exciting. Just life. I’ve barely had time to click around the blogosphere. What’s been going on with you?

new start (professionally, anyway)

This is it! The night before I start my new position.

No one wants to be dooced. I, in particular, am very paranoid about it. I work in a relatively small field and given the personal nature of this blog, while I might not be fired (I've been too distracted with life to talk about some of the unbearable people with whom I have worked) yeah, I don't want to lose my anonymity. So there might only be vauge-ish work postings, though I think work will quickly become very consuming.

On the home front things are ok. I've gotten a thought in my head I'm having trouble shaking. I want a post nup - a POST-nuptial agreement that spells out I'll get full custody and all our money if my husband leaves me. Not quite sure I should bring this up. We live in a community property state, and in our jurisdiction, the lawyer I consulted made it clear joint custody was the norm.

So in an unsure world, I want assurances.

My husband and I are talking about moving, actually, to get out of the city itself. He thinks it's driven by public schools (and not great private options), whereas for me it's driven by a desire to get to a locality that is more mother-favorable in case of divorce. Maybe my natural optimism is not returning?

Despite my misgivings, things have actually been going well. At our last session, when I was talking about regrets, my husband said he understood that we had reached a point where actions speak louder than words. He can say he's in this, and wants to have a better relationship, but until his actions match it's all talk.

When I got home Friday night he had arranged with our nanny to have her come Saturday and babysit, and we went out and saw Sweeney Todd. Awesome. I'm not a blood and gore person as in slasher flicks, but I love it when it's part of the rich story. The music was really great - soaring, operatic, very singable. I have got to get that soundtrack.

And we spent the rest of the weekend working on the house - prepping our attic project. I feel my last few posts might have given the impression of slovenly living. Well, 9 rubbermaid containers on one floor is a bit much (again, the house was built in 1914 - there are NO closets! well, minimal closets). It's a great house, and fairly often it looks great. When you're in a bad place, as I have been, my bad habits are definitely magnified. I'm excited to have the floors put in, it'll look amazing. I'll have to post pics.

Now we just have to get the tree out.......my family has always kept the Christmas tree up until Epiphany (the 3 wise men's visit). I took all the ornaments off when my daughter was napping, so now we have a very dry, dead tree (though still pretty! very green!) with lights and an angel. Tomorrow's project, throw it to the curb. It always makes me a little sad. I told my daughter today we were taking the tree down and she looked at me very seriously, shook her head, and said, "no." So I hope this is not a major drama. In our city people put the trees on the front curb for what appears to be quite random pickup. No notice of when. Often there are trees lining the whole street for a week or so. Quite nice for the dogs, I suppose, though I try not to think about the action they all get. Man, I hope pick up is not tomorrow morning.

Still no word from my inlaws. I've told many friends the story and no one can believe it. Though then they always say, hmm, well, this explains a lot.....

And, finally, the weight. Sigh. I was doing great. I weighed myself before Christmas and I was exactly the same - 173.5. Wow, I thought, good stuff. Somehow that let me slack off even more (plus all the holiday chocolate!) and I know I am up. I'll post a weight on Friday- maybe 5 days of semi virtuous living will get me to my starting weight.

Somehow this turned into a full update post. Not sure how that happened.

OK, wish me luck as I start my new job. I'm feeling really positive about it. We'll see how I feel tomorrow.....

getting mad

Ok, everyone is saying I need to get mad. So now I'm mad. Last week, husband worked late every night except Friday, and he "deserved Friday off" and went out with friends. Not a single night with our daughter, or helping around the house in any way.

Last night I ask him how the apartment hunt is going, and he says he's narrowed it down to 2 places. WTF. "Working" my ass. Jerk.

Last night he comes upstairs at 3 am, which wakes me. And then a dear friend calls from New Zealand at 5:30 am. And then my daughter wakes up at 6:45. I get her, bring her into my bed. At 8 we go wake my husband up. Oh, he says, I didn't realize she was up. He says I should go back to bed. I'm exhausted, and I start sobbing. Cry myself into near sleep. And then he oh so helpfully brings my daughter upstairs and she proceeds to have a tantrum/crying fit.

Why the hell can't he manage? Why is this all on me? I get up, calm her down, read her books, and just lose it with him. Scream at him for being worthless, no help at all, just wanting to be the fun dad but not a real adult. Scream at him to leave.

So, he left. Looking at apartments, I presume. Says he'll be out tomorrow.

Weekly update (I'm too frenzied to do links to all the relevant places, so here's the link to last week's update).
- My daughter and I are off to my parents for Thanksgiving. We leave tomorrow, driving 6 hours to my sister's, then on Tuesday driving to my folks, 10+ hours. Returning Sat/Sun. I should have bitten the bullet and flown, but am hoping it'll be fun. Sort of. My dad seems ok, sounds strong. I'll tell my sister when we're driving, and I'll tell my parents once I get there.

- I semi-accepted the job. They offered me a lot of money, and "comparable benefits." Every question I've asked was answered one of two ways - oh, you'll decide that as the program head, or that'll be covered in the offer letter. So, I decided since they weren't offering me any negotiating points, to proceed to offer letter - I wrote and said I'd like to accept the job, and if it all works out, I will, and if I can't get the offer the way I like it, I'll walk. I'll speak to the lawyer on Monday, and we'll have this week to hammer it out. They want me to resign my current job the 26th, and start with them on the 10th of December. Maybe one of these days I'll wrote more about this. Every single professional or professional/friend contact who knows says to take it. Only people who know me solely personally (and who are currently helping me through this emotional upheaval), or through this blog, have expressed any reservations at all. It is one of the only things that temporarily quells the anxiety.

- Weight. This is another long to come post. I've lost more than ten pounds through this ordeal. Which means another 10 to look ok, and 15 to look really good, and 10 more to be truly in the right BMI. I'm eating fairly healthfully, though not drinking enough water. Need to exercise. Aerobic.

- marriage. See above. Not sure where to go now. Take the week off and see what things are like when I get back, I guess? We have a joint counseling session the 28th. Not even sure why anymore, though I think we should keep it. At least it's a place to air things.

- anxiety. Sky high, though tempered by anger and excitement at leaving. The one thing about daily posting (NaBloPoMo) is that it buries posts. Particularly since I write so much, and particularly weekend posts. So check out yesterday's anxiety post.

The question still remains - any good ideas for managing anxiety?

weekly update

OK, so as usual too much going on. This daily posting thing is good, in the sense of discipline and forcing me to get it all out, but also a bit exhausting. I'm exhausted, and don't know where to go with a post today.

So, I thought Sundays I could do a weekly update, just to take stock. Things are happening so fast in my life, that maybe having a weekly record will help sort things out.

Let's build up to the big thing. Heck, these are all big things. I have TOO much going on in my life right now. Too much. Too much to bear, too much for any one person to shoulder. I was looking over the blog today, though, and noticed in my tags all I'm writing about is marriage. That's the crisis, I suppose.

My Dad - had triple bypass surgery a while ago. My god, I don't even remember when. I had to look it up. Two and a half weeks ago. He's doing ok, able to get up the stairs and take a shower daily now, so has made a lot of progress. I'm still trying to figure out if/how I can get there for Thanksgiving.

My job. Still hate my current job, and haven't even written about that. Hate with a passion, and doing a crappy job of it, too. I have an assistant (not a personal assistant, a junior staffer) and he's really stepped up and is covering a lot. I'm applying for FLMA, and just taking tons of time off for various counselor and doctor appointments.

Job offer. Still sitting on the job offer. Supposed to let them know Tuesday. Vacillating between two poles. A fool to take it, a fool not to. Slightly leaning toward taking it, but really not sure. Maybe tomorrow I'll write more about this, try to process it a bit more. None of my other interviews panned out in productive, immediate ways. The low-energy people are indecisive. The guy I sort of forced myself on wants to hire, but needs to go through a whole process. So this offer is good. And a big job. Interesting, probably very fulfilling. Maybe too demanding, given everything else going on in my life, and my desire (even before all the shot hit the fan) to spend more time to with my daughter.

Marriage. Ugh. We talked again today. He confirmed, as I knew, that I was putting too much pressure on him. He needs space, and I cannot give it to him. I want to talk, and work on things, and spend time together, and so on and so on and so on and it's making him crazy. Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming myself. Just acknowledging that if I want to try to improve things, I'm not. I'm going to try to let go, and wait until our joint counseling session Tuesday morning to put things on the table. First, I'm cheap, and it frustrates me to think of him wasting money on renting a place. (of course, to him it's not a waste). I need to talk about Thanksgiving, establishing boundaries, laying out a process. I should write it all out, to be prepared for Tuesday. After we talked today I left the house and ran errands, leaving him with our daughter. It was a good move. I came home to a more civil, pleasant guy. I suggested he do some painting tonight (I've not even typed about our work on our house, let's just say SIGNIFICANT) and he thought that was a good idea.

In general, for completely unknown reasons, I've been in a fairly good mood today. Even typing now, I don't feel the sadness and crushing grief and panic I've been feeling. I don't know why that is. Parts of our conversation were hurtful. Am I in denial? Right now I just feel matter of fact.

I am strong. I will survive. I will get through this all. I know that. I wish, I hope, I pray, it all works out for the best.