i am not broken.

Am I angry because I am jealous that he’s getting laid and I’m not?

Or is it because I think it’s damaging to my son that he’s having sleepovers when he’s there?

Or is it because he can have a fucking party every other fucking weekend when my son is not there?

And let’s just assume it’s jealousy.  Because I think that’s likely it.  What the hell am I jealous of?  He’s dating a girl who was totally married when they met.  The relationship can’t be all that awesome/healthy/good.  And if it is?  I should just be happy that he’s happy.  I’ll work on that.

I’m not one of those new agey people.  I don’t visit psychics.  I’ve never had my tarot cards read.  I don’t even read my horoscope.  At the beginning of the year I talked about intentions and how I might believe in them, at least enough to sit down and write an entry about what I wanted to put out there this year, but that was about as new age as I get.

“Put out there”?  I’ve always really thought it was hokey.  Putting stuff out to the universe, as if some sort of force were taking into account all of these wishes and spitting them back out into tangible results.  Does the force assess the outcome before spitting stuff out?  Does it consider how my wish will affect someone else?  I dunno.  But I do know that everytime I say the words “put it out to the universe” out loud, I chuckle inside, because really?  I don’t actually believe the universe is listening.

Except today I remembered something:  When I was in therapy with my husband we had to talk about relationships and our expectations.  We had to come up with what we thought the ideal relationship looked like.  What we wanted out of our relationship.  I wish I wrote it down so I’d be able to get back to exactly what it was I was thinking.  However I know a few specifics that I noted:  I desire a man who trusts me.  Who does not expect me to share every. little. detail.  I do not want to feel like I’ve got to tell him what I did with every minute of the day, lest he suspect that I was cheating on him in that unaccounted for bit of time.  I want a man who I am seriously attracted to.  Whose ass I want to grab.  Who I am still attracted to a few years into the relationship.

I want a man who understands me.  Who knows when to back off.  Who doesn’t feel the need to attend every social function with me.  Who doesn’t expect to sleep in my bed every night.  In fact, I’d like it if he went home every night.

And then we get to the part that is most familiar:  I do not want to hold hands.  I do not want to cuddle.  I do not want to hug all the time.

We did a lot of talking about what I find attractive in a man, and why my husband isn’t attractive to me.  So obviously, i picked out traits that are opposite to him:  I do not like feelings.  No feelings.  No crying.  No sensitive innards.  I want a little bit of indifference.  I like it when I feel like I have to work for his attention.  And yes, this part is a little messed up.  And yeah, it has plenty to do with my relationship with my father.

So what do you know?  It turns out I got exactly what I asked for.  A man I am insanely attracted to, who isn’t holding my hand, kissing or cuddling me.  Who gets me so worked up when he’s moved to become passionate about anything.  (when he gets pissed off I want to jump him.)  Who hides his feelings behind walls.  Who speaks my language.

Exactly what I ordered.

I am going to read the menu a little closer this time.

A year ago tomorrow he kicked me out.

We had been in therapy since late the year before.  When I said I was serious this time, I wasn’t happy, I was ready to leave, we went to therapy.  He made me promise to go to ten sessions.  I promised.

I went to those sessions.  I was honest.  It was hard and I came clean about the crush and the feelings and about my past.  I hate therapy.  Does anyone like it?  It looks so easy on tv.  In Ally McBeal I thought it would be nice to have someone guide me and tell me that I needed a theme song.  But this therapist wanted me to tell her why I liked a boy.  What he made me feel like.  Why I liked talking to him more than I liked talking to my husband.  She made me tell my husband that I needed space.  She tried to help us communicate to each other what we needed, the motivation behind that, and when we chose to ignore the needs of the other person, she tried AGAIN to help us to tell each other why exactly we need the things we do.

We had some fights in that room.  That room with the walls that were so close to the door and the couch, where I could never drink enough water.  Where I had to pee after every single session.  That room where I left any emotions I was willing to let out.  That room where I realized that being a single mom might not be The Worst Thing in The World.

Some weeks were good, some were bad.  Mostly though they were good.  I dreaded going in and almost always felt better coming out.

I kept a list of the dates.  So when week ten rolled around, I knew damn well that it had arrived.  And I didn’t know what was going to happen.  I spent the day unsure about it.  Going back and forth on what I’d say.  Do I just go in, pretend not to know that it’s session number ten?  Do I go in and pretend that everything is good, that I think we can work things out, that I’d like to continue with the sessions because they really are making a positive impact on our relationship?  Or do I go in and admit that I have been keeping track of the dates, that I know that this is the session, the last one that I had committed to, and that I had made up my mind and was done.

Ultimately I told the truth.  Near the start of the session I admitted that I had kept track of the sessions and that I knew that this was number ten.  I let on that I was done.  That not only was I still unconvinced that this was going to go anywhere, but that I was ready to move on to the next phase, where we figure out what living apart was going to look like.

And then the therapist kicked me out of the room.

I never did get to talk to her about it after that.  I never got to hear her say that she was glad that I made the decision and that she was proud of me for finding the strength and the voice to articulate it.  When she brought me back into the room it was only to give him the chance to tell me to go home, pack my bags, and find someplace else to stay.

He kicked me out.  I had to say goodbye to my two year old child and find someplace to sleep.  And the next day I had to go to work.  I don’t remember what those days were like.  I remember where I stayed, the smells, the drive to that house.  I remember the music that I listened to, and everytime I hear Regina Spektor I’m right there again, those feelings come back.  I remember being a mess.  Talking online to the crush.  Telling him about how much I missed my son.  I remember him being supportive.  But he was careful back then.  He didn’t call me.  It was all too soon and he knew I was vulnerable and sad and easily taken advantage of.

The first year is behind us.  I am relieved.  I am sad.  I am hopeful.

Expectations are tricky.  I had to see the ex today to drop off my son’s stuff.  On trade off days we either meet at daycare or one of us drives to the other at lunchtime.  Since the crush had a lunch event today with not me, I decided to drop my son’s stuff off with his father.  I’ve let go of stuff like the expectation that he will remember my birthday, or the expectation that he will say something nice.  Because he doesn’t.  And now that he’s seeing someone else, he’s even more careful.  I remember he used to tell me that I was sexy.  That he would always think that.  Now I wonder if he still thinks it.  If I have any sort of power over him.  I doubt it.  And that feeds into my self talk where I don’t believe the nice things people say to me, because look, as it turns out, what he told me?  No longer true.

So we stood there, in the rain and snow, and swapped out the carseat and two days of clothing.  And we talked about all those things parents talk about at trade off time.  Just about the kid.  Stuff he did, stuff he didn’t do, only about the kid.  I’ve let go of the expectation that he wants to know how I’m doing.  Because he never does.  I got cold and wet and it was lunchtime so I was hungry.

As I drove away I realized what it is that hurts me about this all:  I’m afraid that I’m the only one going through this pain this week.  He accused me so many times of being unsentimental.  Of not caring about honoring the past.  And this week, this thing that I’m going through is all about the past.  It’s about letting go and cherishing what was.  It’s about remembering that he was a good husband, that he wasn’t awful, that it was just *us* that was awful.  It hurts me that I don’t think he even knows.  And if he does, it’s certainly not affecting him the way it is me.

Did I mention the snowstorm going on out there?

We went snowboarding a few times this winter.  The last time we went out I got ballsy.  Turned off the path into some trees.  Except it wasn’t one of those paths.  It was a huge amount of light light powder and trees that grew so dense there was no way I was boarding through that.  I got stuck.

I called him on my phone and asked him how on earth do I get out of this mess.

He calmly tried to talk me through it.  I spent some time kind of digging/climbing out of this hole that just seemed to keep getting deeper.  When I finally did get out he reappeared.  The boy found his way above me and came to help.

I read through old posts tonight because I wanted to write a new one…

He did research and told me where I could find the plug for my block heater.

Tonight we went to a concert.  Together.

He did not kiss me.

The ex, he said he’d call Wed night, Friday night and tonight (Sunday) so I told him no, that’s too much.  Just call Wed and Sunday.  And then I emailed him to be super sure.  To make sure that what I heard and what he said were the same.  And he says he has email access in the hotels.

He could be dead.

More likely he’s just an asshole and forgot to call his son when he promised.

And I’m angry.  I want to make sure I’m not angry because he’s on a road trip with his gf.  A road trip that I will likely never get to make, because I dont have the kind of money that he does, and because I’m not sleeping with anyone in that oh-so-healthy way that he’s doing.  But who am I kidding?  Yes, I’m angry because he has let my kid down, and whether the kid realizes it or not, this is going to be the first of many disappointments from his dad.  And I’m angry because I would have loved to go on this trip.  But not with him.  But still I am human and jealous and even though his relationship has the worst chance of working out, ever, I am still envious of it.

I kind of hate him tonight.

So I realize how this looks:  First I write about how much fun we had that night we went to the bar and hung out and got high and went to eat chinese, getting me home at around 4 in the morning.  Then I go on and on about how jealous I am because some little asian twat from the coast comes over to visit him and blah blah blah.  When I wrote that I was *sure* they were having mad sex all over his apartment.

(FYI he did let me know that they did not sleep together.  He worked it in all nonchalant.  Because normally we do not discuss the sex that may or may not go on over weekends.  I mean really, we never say “hey how was your weekend?  I didn’t have sex.”  But because (and of course I may be reading into this) he knew that I didn’t want to know if he did have sex, I’m guessing he figured out that if he didn’t have sex YES I would love to know that for a fact, he told me.)  So yes, no sex.  Also and really this is totally as awkward as it sounds:  I asked him if he is in love with her.  (to illustrate the crazy, his response to that was “in love with who?”)  So no, not in love.

And then last weekend happens.  And true to the pattern, it was fantastic.

Friday night I had dinner with him and his friends.  Then I went out with my girlfriends and had the Best Time Ever at karaoke.  The next morning he picked me up early at my place (with coffee!) and we went snowboarding.  On the way back I exclaimed that I was hungry.  Ten minutes later he said he was too.  Did he realize I was trying to have dinner with him?  I’m starting to believe the theory that he really *is* as dumb as we suspect he is.

WAIT WAIT hold on because we have newsbreaking stories rolling in here as. I. type.  Every night I talk to crushboy online.  Every night.  We have an unwritten online date every night at 10.  Except for weekends when every0ne is allowed to do whatever and no one really had to explain themselves.  Except normally we do anyways, because there isn’t much explaining to do.  So it’s sunday night and I’m on my standard 10PM date.  Which, now that I check the log, STARTED AT TWELVE MINUTES AFTER TEN.  I am not imagining this time.  We have a date.  It starts at 10.  End of story.  Whatever you wanted to do tonight, get it done now because ten is when we start our chitchat.  No earlier because that just keeps both of us from being productive all night.

For real, yo.  We both are kind of in the habit of not turning the thing on until ten.  Yet we’ve never actually discussed the rules that surround our “agreement.”

Anyhow, we are talking tonight and I’m talking and he’s not answering for oh, I dunno, a minute?  When my phone goes off.  Text.  From him.  Dude.  He TEXTED ME TO TELL ME THAT HIS INTERNET CONNECTION CRAPPED OUT.  Are you kidding me?  He’s polite and shit?  Most of my other friends would just drop it and let me assume that you lost your connection.  I know better than to think he just hung up on me.

Back to Saturday I guess.  We had dinner.  Well no, we didn’t just have dinner.  First you have to understand that my apartment is kind of at the edge of town.  When one returns from the skihill that we went to, my apartment is the first stop.  That’s pretty much why I can always scam a ride to the skihill.  That’s also specifically why I was OK with living all the way out here.  So instead of dropping me at home and making me drive all over the place to meet him for dinner, he asked me if it was ok if we ate way up north, (OK, sure, more time in the car with you, cute cute boy…)

As it turns out, this particular restaurant no longer existed at the location he was looking for.  So we had to drive downtown to visit their other location.  Downtown.  That’s like twenty minutes away, maybe thirty.

He took me home.  He had a party to go to that night.  I was asleep by 9.

The next morning he invited me to breakfast.  Now, keep in mind that his friends were all hungover from the party.  So really he had no one else available to him.  Plus I was online.  I doubt that he would have picked up the phone and directly invited me out for breakfast.  Normally this is something reserved for his male counterparts, so it was kind of a big deal to me that he invited me to breakfast.

After that we went back to his place…

And did not have sex.  We hung out.  I spent the day with him.  We had to pick up a friend of his.  We had a good time.

He also told me that he considered calling me Saturday night to see if I needed a driver.  How sweet is that?  Except you’re right.  He didn’t.  Minus whatever sweet points I considered giving him just then.

I went home in the late afternoon.

The week was good except for the fact that he’s likely taking a new job (elsewhere) soon and said job will take him to That Other County which will not be named, because really too many facts and this all becomes highly googlable.

I had a point back there when I started this entry.  It was to say basically that you should not take my weekend drama all that seriously because I am aware of the fact that I tend to have a shit weekend one week and an OMGICANTBELIEVETHATJUSTHAPPENED weekend the next.

It takes very little to convince me that I am unattractive.  Fuck hormones and self-confidence and the voices inside.

It’s not the living together thing that bothers me, I knew that was going to happen eventually.  It was the fact that I was blindsided by my three year old.  a heads up from the father would have been considerate.  he can do what he wants w his private life, but once it has the potential to fuck up my son’s life, it becomes something that I have to deal with as well.  I never want my son to come face to face with the realization that he has information about one parent that the other doesn’t have, and have to question whether or not he should or shouldn’t tell the other.

Also for the record:  we discussed relationships not progressing at a healthy pace in therapy.

I’m not supposed to judge his relationships or his business, but I do not believe this is healthy and for fuck’s sake, my son will have to deal with the fallout when it falls to shit and his father is a mess again.