Some bonuses to being single…

So yesterday was a good day for me financially, despite it being a bit bleak for pensioners and richer than me people!

Firstly I got an email from the office head of finance. My heart sank as I read that they had miscalculated my salary since coming back from maternity leave. It then gave a little skip as I read that the had under paid me! It’s ate a substantial amount that they owe me and they’re giving it to me in a lump sum next pay day!! Woohoo. I could do with the extra cash as I hit a car yesterday and will have to pay for the paintwork to be touched up… Doh!!

The second thing that happened was the budget. I can’t claim to understand everything that was announced yesterday, but a handy little calculator on the BBC website told me I’d be £287 better off a year.

All in all, I’m better off financially now than when I was with The Ex. I always felt the need to ‘pay my way’ with him despite earning considerably less and having a bigger addiction to shoes and underwear! Since he left though I’ve insisted that he pay all bills and maintenance for our daughter. Plus I get working tax credits and child benefit. I can understand why people try to defraud the system! It feels like I’m doing something wrong, but what I’m doing is remarkably all above board and legit! No wonder the country is in trouble!!

Mother’s Day

One of the bonuses of being a newly single mum on Mother’s Day is that everyone feels sorry for you.  I got a total of 4 cards from my daughter!  She’s ever such a clever girl you know!

It’s The Ex’s weekend with her this weekend and it didn’t twig about Mother’s Day until Thursday when I realised I might not get to see her today… When I text The Ex to ask if he could bring her back a little early he replied that he’d been thinking about it and wondered if we could do something together. It confused me. I asked him what his motivation was behind the suggestion.  Was it because he felt sorry for me being alone on Mother’s Day or was it because he wanted to spend time with me and our daughter. He replied that he thought it would be nice to spend some time with us and that today seemed like a good excuse.  Still confused I agreed.

Perfect Stranger stayed over last night.  He took me out to a comedy thing in Barking, which was actually really good fun! The Ex was playing heavily on my mind though and I felt myself withdrawing from Perfect Stranger as we neared my place.  I didn’t sleep well and I felt uncomfortable with Perfect Stranger there.  This morning he got up before me and was crashing around a bit, which I didn’t understand.  When I got up I saw a card and some small chocolates on my kitchen counter.  It was so sweet of him.  I really appreciated it.  But still I couldn’t help feeling disconnected from him.

I was almost relieved to leave him to go and meet The Ex and my daughter.  We had agreed to go to a soft play place with a cafe so we could have a bit of lunch too.  It felt… normal.  It felt easy and it felt natural.  I wish I could hate him.  It would make things easier for me.  But I don’t.  And today was a taste of what it should be.  Saying goodbye and going our separate ways afterwards was tortuous…

Final straw

Last week was a bad week.  It started with something that really wasn’t the end of the world.  I had an ASDA delivery scheduled for Wednesday evening. Long story short is that they didn’t deliver and I had run out of milk.  I can’t leave the house once my daughter is asleep unless I want to wake her up and by the time I knew they weren’t coming it was 11.30pm so couldn’t ask a friend to watch her whilst I nipped to the shop.  As I say, it really wasn’t the end of the world and a friend who lives nearby came to my rescue, but the panic and anxiety I felt was disproportionate.  I felt so out of control and totally overwhelmed by the whole event.

The next day a woman almost pushed me off the platform at the train station.  Again, my internal reaction was completely disproportionate to the event. Later in the day I got an email from The Ex telling me that he was going away on work for a week at the end of the month… with her.

Thankfully I had a counselling session booked for that evening so I thought that as long as I could hold it together until the session I would be able to work through the complete despair and loss of control that I was feeling.  The final straw came when the GP’s surgery phoned and cancelled the counselling session….

I decided at that point that it was time to start the anti depressants that the doctor prescribed back in September when she diagnosed me with Post Natal Depression.  I had resisted so far as I thought I could work through it on my own and with a counsellor.  There is also a stigma that goes with them and I was worried what people might think.  It is time to try something else though.  Time to gain some control again.

The Big Boss vs mum & daughter day dilemma

Fridays are my day off.  I cherish the time I spend with my daughter on those days and really look forward to them.  We start the day by going swimming then will invariably meet a mummy friend and her daughter for lunch and soft play.

I work for a small UK branch of a large European company.  Our Head office is in Europe and the big boss owner of the company is based there.  This coming Friday the big boss is coming over to the UK for a visit.  The usual unnecessary panic has engulfed the office with people running around tidying up and getting ready for the big visit.  I personally think a workspace that is too tidy just looks unnatural and as if we don’t do any work. That aside, I have a dilemma.  Do I come in to see the big boss on Friday?

There are only 20 people in our office, but even so I doubt I’ll be missed. He is the kind of man, though, who will remember you if you are there… My managing director has rather unhelpfully said that it’s up to me whether I come in or not.

I feel like I should come in, but ultimately I’ll be here for a 5 minute meet and greet from which he will go in to a closed door meeting with the more important people in the company.

Part of me wants to show everyone my dedication to my job, especially the big boss man, but what I really want to do is have my day with my daughter as usual.

Burning Bridges

I am a very amenable person. I will always give the benefit of the doubt to all friends. I never ask much from them, even in this incredibly tough time.

Last night, however, something snapped with regard to Flirty Friend.  Not taking in to consideration the random conversation I had with him last week, we’ve always chatted on Facebook or via text about trivial and more meaningful things. I know that he works a lot and works hard, so I never chased if he didn’t respond to a text.  Last night, though, he ignored me on FB chat for the second time this week… So I sent him a message “It’s rude to ignore a friend you know?! A girl can take a hint though.  Consider me backed off”.

I felt so mad. I’m not normally one to impulsively burn a bridge like that, but I’m not going to beg attention from anyone not least someone I haven’t actually physically seen for years!

I feel bad that I also may have burnt a few bridges with Perfect Stranger too… He stayed on Friday night and hung around in the morning on Saturday.  With the counselling session with The Ex playing on my mind I couldn’t focus and I must have come across as distant and uninterested. On Saturday he had to vie with my daughter as well as my pre occupation for attention.  He was good natured and as he left I apologised and he was understanding. I haven’t heard from him since though… Maybe The Ex was right… maybe I am needy and dependent….?!

Confusion of the inner conflict

Last week The Ex and I had a counselling session. We’ve been having them weekly-ish since he left.  Originally he had said no to counselling, but I argued that we had nothing to lose and he agreed to go to the sessions on the proviso that we weren’t going to end nor save the marriage.  In hindsight I realise that nothing can be solved without a goal in sight.

I mentioned in last weeks session that I couldn’t see a point in going any more as all we do weekly is analyze the relationship and the past.  But why go through all of that.  Why sit and listen to him say he doesn’t want to be with me anymore over and over again. Why go through the past if it’s not going to ultimately make a difference to the future?

The Ex didn’t reply really.  We rarely look at each other in the eye during those sessions and both of us normally talk to the counsellor rather than each other. He said to her that he had been thinking about working things out. But just thinking about thinking really.  When pushed to say it to me he said he couldn’t as it wasn’t a definitive wish.

My problem with it all is that there seems to be an assumption that if he said he wanted to work things out I would welcome him back with open arms.  My inner conflict is that part of me wants to just welcome him back with open arms. Another part of me can’t ever forgive him for what he’s done to me, to us, to my daughter. Part of me wants to move on with my life and find someone new. I am on a constant roller coaster of emotions not knowing one hour to the next how I’m going to feel about the people in my life.  It’s making interacting with anyone difficult.  I can’t focus. I can’t commit to a conversation as I lose the thread too quickly.

The counselling is supposed to make things clearer, but for me it’s creating more confusion and less clarity.

Poorly sick…

It was inevitable, but I finally succumbed to the bug that everyone has had, including my daughter. I’ve been on the sofa most of the day catching up on some much needed sleep and generally feeling rough.  Perfect Stranger stayed over last night.  I was feeling ropey when he arrived, but went down hill whilst he was here.  My daughter was up half the night for some reason… the only thing that would soothe her was lying on the sofa singing to her… Thankfully Perfect Stranger is a heavy sleeper so didn’t notice the numerous visits to the loo and my daughters room.

I never got much sympathy from The Ex when I was ill, so didn’t miss anything him not being here.  Perfect Stranger left with a kiss and told me to stay in bed at least til lunchtime and that was an order.  It felt nice to have someone care just a little bit.

When I’m with Perfect Stranger he is attentive and affectionate.  He’s interested in what I have to say and compliments me all the time.  He gives me everything that I need right now… And yet when I’m with him I can’t help but want it to be The Ex. I don’t want to not be in love with The Ex.  Despite what he has done to me and my little girl my overwhelming desire is to have my husband back.  To be a family again.

Tonight The Ex came over to see my daughter.  He’s been away for a while and wanted to see her.  He arrived just after dinner and in time to give her a bath.  It broke my heart every minute he was here.  I watched him with her and wanted so much for that to be the norm… She loves having him around. I love having him around.

Perhaps this is part of the grief process… I’ve been through denial and anger. Maybe this is the isolation and reflection part of it… Being ill on your own probably doesn’t help with the feeling of loneliness… I just want to be normal again, in all ways.

Flirty Friend

For those of you waiting for an update on Flirty Friend… Nothing!  Didn’t hear from him after Saturday until Thursday when I initiated contact.  No mention of Weds and not turning up.  No mention of Saturday’s conversation. He’d been manic busy apparently… No biggy, but not best pleased.

Crying over split milk…

My daughter didn’t breast feed.  She was so small and jaundice when she was born and she was sleepy that it took an hour to get even an ounce of milk in to her using a bottle.  She’d fall asleep on the bottle and we’d have to strip her down and wipe her face with cold cotton wool to try and keep her awake long enough to drink the milk.  I was determined that she would have breast milk for as long as possible though, so I expressed 5 or 6 times a day and kept the milk in the fridge or put it in the freezer.

She has always been tiny and at first the health visitors were obsessed with her putting on more weight.  After one weigh in they said I should give her formula once a day.  The first time I gave her formula in a bottle I cried.  It felt so un natural to me.  Please don’t get me wrong there is nothing wrong with giving your baby formula or choosing not to breast feed.  Every woman is different.  To me, though, it just felt wrong.  Part of it was a sense of failure.  Somehow I was failing my daughter for not giving her the milk I wanted to and somehow she was failing me by not breastfeeding.  It was a very significant moment.

For 10 months I expressed religiously. Even when I went back to work I expressed in the boardroom at lunchtimes.  I even had a speical halter neck top with holes in it to hold the breast cup so that I could pump hands free… Similar to something you might find in Ann Summers. It wasn’t the most attractive sight, but it helped me express whilst also feeding my daughter a bottle… strange I know! The only reason I stopped was because I had to go on to medication that wasn’t safe for my daughter.

The trouble is, she never really liked breast milk after trying formula and going on to solids… She especially didn’t like the defrosted milk.  And yet I continued to fill my freezer full of breast milk!

So now she is weaned and drinks cows milk.  She doesn’t need nor probably want the breast milk in the freezer and yet I just can’t bring myself to throw it away.  It symbolises something so important, something so worked for.  I know it’s just milk, that the most important thing is that I have a happy and healthy (at times!) baby.  I will do it, but I may very well cry whilst I do.

Every high has a come down

I’ve crashed.  I have no doubt that it has something to do with the new moon tonight, but I am in a funk.

Old School Fling hasn’t contacted me since Thursday.  Flirty Friend hasn’t been in touch since our “conversation” on Saturday, and I doubt he’ll be coming over tomorrow. It shouldn’t bother me.  I’m not that in to them.  I guess I just wish they were more in to me.  It’s all about making me feel better about myself at the moment.  After the high of the end of last week, I was bound come crashing down.  I just didn’t expect it to be quite such a come down.

At the end of the day I just want to be wanted.  And quite ridiculously I usually want to be wanted by the people who don’t want me back.

Last night I texedt Perfect Stranger to say I was grumpy.  Half an hour later he was at my door.  He looked after me for the night, making me sit down and fetching anything I wanted.  He just cuddled me on the sofa and tried to make me laugh.  I don’t what’s wrong with me, but I just couldn’t focus on the fact that I was getting exactly what I wanted from him… I was too preoccupied with what I wasn’t getting from the others… It’s completely contrary and unnecessary.  I should be grateful for what I have.  Believe me, it bugs me as much as it’s probably bugging you!

Perhaps this is what The Ex was talking about when he said He wanted to want to be with me, just didn’t.  Perhaps we never really appreciate what we have… even when we lose it.