Little Man Part 2

I know I said I would continue introducing my kids, so tonight I thought I would finish with little man.

In my last post on him I explain how at birth he was born with a pool of blood on his brain that was causing him to have seizures. He also suffered from GERD and has kidney issues.

Thankfully we were able to find a medication that stopped the seizures! We were also able to find medication to help with the GERD. And now we could move on to the kidney issue.

So while we focused on the seizures we still needed to have the kidneys checked. When we did, we were informed that we would be going to see the urologist at Sick Kids. That was it. So at the end of August we made the trip to Sick Kids. They did an ultrasound on his kidney and the doctor informed us that there was a blockage in his right kidney (that’s what was causing it to swell) and that he has a narrowing in the utters (the tub that goes from the kidney into the bladder). He needs to stay on his antibiotics daily till we go back in 3 mths. If we suspect that he’s getting a UTI we are to increase the dose to 3 times a day and get his tested for one ASAP.

Thankfully to this day he’s never had a break thru UTI!!!

At the end of November we went back for our 3 month check up. Another ultrasound and worst results. Now they tell us there is a blockage in both kidneys and they want to send him for a Lasik Renal Scan (they will inject him with a low dose of radiation and take multiple pictures of his kidney to see how well they are functioning). We were booked for this test in January.

Januarys appointment comes, I venture to the hospital by myself. We made it threw another ultrasound and the scan. WHAT A DAY THAT WAS :(

It took 3 nurses more than 45 mins to get the IV in his arm to give him the radiation. But little man is a trooper and as long as no one was holding him down he was fine. The minute we all tried to keep him still he cried to the point he was sick. Thankfully he didn’t mind the fact he had a brace strapping him down to the table for the 45min scan. It went from his armpits to his knees. Thankfully he was so tired that he fell asleep for the entire exam!

We go back 5 days later to get the results.

The scan showed that both kidneys were functioning!!! Not at 100% but they were producing urine. We come back in June for another ultrasound. They informed us that at some point he will need surgery on them. Right know they would rather wait till hes older so that its easier to work with. At this point they really aren’t causing an issue so until they do we will see if the blockage works its way out on their own!

So in June I make the long trip again, yet another ultrasound and the news that the blockages are still there and now there is back flow as well (meaning that the urine is traveling back up the tub into the kidneys). We are to continue with the meds and come back in 6 months again.

So this brings us closer to present time. We went 2 wks before Christmas for another ultrasound. Both blockages still there and backflow still present. While doing his physical exam, the doctor gets a strange look on her faces and says she’s going to find another doctor to get him to check something....nope didn’t say what it was...just walked out of the room. 5 minutes later both doctors come back. The second one checks his groin area...they talk and then inform he that he has a weaking in his groin and she thought she felt a hernia (GREAT). Plus they cant find his testicles (double great). Actually I already knew that they hadn’t "dropped" yet cause our GP made a comment about it at his 15 month needles. Sick Kids wanted us to come back 4 weeks later to have them checked again and I convinced them that my GP was seeing him in 4 weeks for needles and already had it on the radar. They agree this is fine as long as I keep the appointment.

So this brings us to the beginning of this month. At little mans 18th appointment the doctor is able to find 1 testicle!!!! He says he can’t feel the other one no matter how much he digs (and he did). He wants to see him at age 2 to check again and we will decide then what to do.

So right now as I type this, little man has 2 kidneys that are functioning but not at 100%, he has a missing testicle, He has multiple food allergies (Was wheat, egg, milk, soy and peanut. Now just peanut and egg). He has out grown his GERDs and if you were to meet him without knowing anything about him, he is a happy, energetic, curious little man who keeps me on my toes more often than not!

I wish he didn’t have to deal with all these medical issues but over all I wouldn’t change him for the world!!!

Little Man you will never understand how much I love you!!!

Awaking

So today was the day! I have been holding a lot in and biting my tongue when it came to actually talking to my ex. I have been able to vent but never to him. TODAY THAT CHANGED!
Today I got to yell, to scream, to demand answers (as hard as it was to hear), to demand an explanation for what I'm going threw and why.

I learned that that even though in my world, I have been blindsided and haven't even had a chance to take in all the new changes in my life. But he has know or thought he knew for over a year that he didn't want to be here. That he has been "playing house" just to make life easier. Hes been lying to me for over a year on how he really feels. So in some ways that explains why it was so easy for him to just up and walk away from our family. 

What hurts the most is that hes been living this lie while all the while I was thinking our life was changing for the good, that we were reconnecting as a couple who for main years were just living as parents.
I know we are not the only couple who have fallen into "parent" mood, who has let our relationship slide because our kids are the most important things in our lives. But in the last year, we have been taking time for US, we had been going on date nights, we had been make sure that even if we couldn't get a sitter and actually leave the house that we would still take couple time and work on our relationship.

So from this day forward I'm not going to dwell on what could have been or what should have been. I'm going to focus my attention and energy on making my life with my boys the best life we can have (no matter what). We aren't going to loss out on opportunity's just because we don't have him in our lives on a full time basis. Sure it may take longer to get to those special vacations that we have been talking about taking, but when we do, we will have all realize just how special our time and trip will be!!!

As a family we will make the scarifies to go to Disney land, to take those special day trips that my boys love to take. So what if we cant buy a souvenir and we have to pack a lunch, its nothing that we didn't do before.

I would like to take back the name of my first post and rename this one my new life. Cause as much as I want to admit that 2 weeks ago when he left i was ready to start my new life, i wasn't. but after our talk today, I AM!

I'm ready to focus on me, my health, my well being, my kids, and my new family.

WHY?

This is a question I have been asking myself alot lately.

Why did he leave? Why cant he see how much he has hurt everyone involved? Why do I have to clean up his dirty work? Why do I have to be the only one to deal with the after math?

I mentioned this weekend that I thought the older boys may need to so see a counseler and he says "oh they're fine, alot of kids go threw this. Its only been a week. How could they need help?
We arse face, I know this cause again I'm the one left dealing with everything. Of course you dont see it cause the breif 3ish hours you spend with them now a week, they try there hardest to be good.

WHY? Cause they think that if they are you will come back, they think that if they show you how strong they are you will relize you didnt have to leave. if they act the way "perfect" children act, you wont be stressed. Little do they know that no matter what they do, you left for other reasons. You took the cowardly way out. Instead of dealing with "your" issues, you put yourself in a situation where I would make the choice for you. Again...WHY? So you could hold it over my head that I told you to leave, so you didnt have to admit to me that it wasnt anything I did, so you dont have to admit that your in a depresstion and need help more then me and the kids could ever need.

You got to pack your bag, walk out the door and pretend that everything is just fine. When your so called friends ask what happen I can just imagine the story you have come up with. Seeing as none of them liked me to begin with, I'm sure you all sat back last night with your beers and had a good laught at my expense. Funny how they dont even the truth, funny how your not ashamed of what you have done but you still hide it from them....again WHY? Cause its none of their business (or so you tell me).

NO, its cause your not man enough to say "yes, I walked out on my wife of 14years and our 3 boys. Yes, I have left her in a position that she is going to have to deal with issues that as a couple where stressfull enough, but thats ok she can handle it" Funny how that converastion will never come up to them

I realy wish you could see what I have to deal with everytime you stop by for a visit. You dont see that fact that middle man starts taking everything out on big man. You dont see him get so mad that he punchs the wall, counter, the door or even his brother. You dont see the pain in his eyes when I ask him what the issue is, or the tears that flow when he does admit that he is pissed off at you. Your not here to reasure them that you will love them till the day you die, because they are your kids and nothing they can do will ever change that.

You also dont see how hard big man tries to be perfect. How he completely issolates himself to his room to avoid middle and little man. How he no longer enjoys the things he use to. If he doesnt have him nose in a book or writing matchs hes pretending to eat. You dont see how hard he tries to help around the house, so Im not so stressed. How he takes it upon himself to be a dad to little man. He tells him everynight that he loves him and will never leave him.

You dont see how little man is acting. I know hes more then likely to young to really understand whats going on, but trust me he knows. He screams, he yells, he hits his head. He hit the walls and door just like middle man everytime he is told no or doesnt get his own way.

These are just a few of the why's I get to ask myself when it come to you. I know I will never get answers, I know that until your forced to deal with them, you will never understand just how hard this is on them and me....but thats right, you dont really care now do ya???

PS. I couldnt get spell check to work tonight so please forgive the 100"s of spelling mistakes Im sure I made. The more you get to know me the more you will understand why spell check was invented :)

Little Man

Because of the day I've had instead of dwelling on it I thought I would start to introduce my kids.
As you may remember I have 3 sons (9, 6 & 18mths).

My little man (18mths) has had one heck of a journey so far.
He was born at "term" threw a scheduled c-section. Prior to his birth my ob\gyn had made a comment that his right kidney seemed to be enlarged and he would schedule an ultrasound on it with in 2 hours of birth. Yes we were concern but all in all nothing that we thought would be a life long battle, doc said its common to see it and once baby is born it turns out to be nothing at all (our fingers were crossed)

So on Sunday July 11, I get up as normal and go pee, but something is different. It just keeps coming, coming....could I just have broken my water???? I hae no idea. Yes this is my third child BUT I have never had a labour, never had my water break, never had a contraction (i know...lucky me)
So I give my niece a call and ask her what she thinks (at this point she is also pregnant with her 3rd all of which she ends up delivering drug free...crazy woman).

So we have decided that yes chance are my water has broke 24 hours before my scheduled section. So off to the hospital my mom and I go. Because I was scheduled for the next morning they never even checked me they just went ahead and called the doc on call and prepped the OR....I was shocked. I had talked myself into thinking I would just spend the night in the hospital and go ahead as planned.

The one good thing about this delivery is I was able to stay awake ( I think that's good???) My husband made it with minutes to spare (not that he was going in with me but it was nice to know that he was there)

So little man was born Sunday afternoon, a healthy (???) 10lbs 14ozs. Nurses all said he was doing great and they were going to take him over the special care nursery (scn) till I was in recovery. Not a problem. They did the normal test on him as well as a blood sugar test because he was so big. His levels were low, so they asked if it was ok if they gave him a bottle. Sure do what you have to. That night they kept him in the scn, they woke me up a couple times to go down and see him but over all it was a quite night.

Monday was much the same, Little man had spiked a fever and they were running a wide range of test to figure out why. Everything came back fine, his blood cells were low but that was because of the fever.  I had happen to notice that while I was feeding him he seemed really really jumpy, and twitching. I mentioned it to the nurse and she says it normal. My mom did the afternoon feeding that day and also made a comment about it.

Tuesday morning, I wake up in my room....feeling well rested but wondered why no one had come down to get me for feedings all night....think this was strange but breakfast was here and I would go down right after. THEN the pedi's doc walks in. He sits down beside me and give me the information that I will NEVER forget for the rest of my life. He said he received a call from the nurses in the middle of the night that little man had stopped breathing a couple time in what they were calling "duskies". He informs me that he believe that the twitching we had noticed yesterday and the duckies made him believe that he thought little man was having seizures. I of course am floored? What was he saying? How could this be happening to us? What was causing them? The questions just kept coming to me. He informed me that they were going to take him down for a ultra sound of his head and as soon as the results came back he would let me know.

He leaves and I of course call my husband to try and give him the news. I can barely speak....he has to get the kids off to camp before he can make the 30min drive up to the hospital. I ask him to call my parents to let them know what is going on as well cause I wanted to go down and see the baby.
Tuesday Afternoon @ 1:37pm we are down in the scn and the phone ring, the nurse comes over and said the doc is on the phone for me, the results are in. They offer me a chair but I refuse. I can handle what every was going to be said.

The doc explains that little man has a pool of blood on the front of his brain the size of a loonie. The pressure of the blood is causing the seizures and they were going to get him started on anti seizure med asap. This of course could take a couple days to iron out but until it did he would be staying at the hospital, there were also going to keep him on antibiotics for the "unknown" fever he was still fighting. I bring up the fact that they still have not done the ultrasound on his kidney. At this point he was urinating and it was the furthest thing from their minds. We need to get the seizures under control and figure out what the infection was.

Wednesday, I'm discharged from the hospital. I was suppose to leave on Tuesday but with everything that happen the ob wanted to keep in for one more day. All day I was talking myself into realizing that he was in the best place, I had 2 other kids at home that also need me. I will say the hardest thing I have ever done is leave that hospital with out little man. I broke down all the way out of the hospital and even worst once I got in the van and started home. I tried to pull it together for the older kids but it was short lived.

We had made the plan that once I came home from the hospital I would be staying at my parents house for a week or so. I need to recover and my husband needed to get back to work. My parents were going to drive the kids to and from camp and would also be there to help with the baby.
We get back to our home, I go down to the bedroom to lay down while my husband went to pick the kids up. As soon as I do, I look over to where the crib is suppose to be. My husband and parents thought it would be best to take it to their house cause we didn't know how long my stay would be at this point because of the seizures. With everything going on, not knowing if we would loss the baby, not knowing really anything or having any answers, it hit me like a ton of bricks. My husband comes home to find me crying hysterically in bed and of course he thinks that the hospital has called. He looks at me with a painfully look and asks "what happen?" when I explained you could see the relief on his face to the point that he almost started laughing (just out of fear). He apologises for what they did and said they were just trying to help and didn't realize it would make me feel that way (I to this day still don't think any of them realize just how scared I was.)

So after a long week of trying to go about normal life with the older boys and doing the hour long drive everyday to the hospital. They called and said that he was well enough to leave the scn but they still wanted to keep him for a couple days. We had figured out that he also had GERD. So they were working on getting him to eat, keep it down and not stop breathing. He had to be hooked up to monitors for 24hrs with out setting it off before they would even consider sending him home. But because he was going into a regular room I was more then welcome to come up and stay with him. I was torn....do I stay home with the older kids or do I go and be with the baby. After talking with my parents and husband it was decided that place I needed to be was with little man. So back to the hospital I went....for god knows how long???

After 2 days and the monitor wasn't going off anymore when he was eating or after, but they did notice that O2 levels still dropped. It was decided that we could go home with an apnea monitor (for those that don't know an apnea monitor has 2 sensor pad that go on the baby's chest, they monitor his O2 level as well as heart rate) so now we were waiting for one to be delivered. It had to be shipped from another city which was over 3hrs away. We should be able to leave in the morning!!!

This is just a very small glimpse into little mans problems issues, but its getting late and I don't want this post to be 10 pages long. I will carry on with his story tomorrow....Our journey home!!!

Some back ground info on how this went down

What you need to understand is, I never seen this coming AT ALL.

Its not like we had been fighting or anything like that where both party's start to get the feeling like this isn't going to work (and trust me when I say I have had those feeling before but I have always worked on our relationship when they did arise and we always got back to a good place).
To be completely honest with you, I simply asked him one night what his issue was that day (he had been grumpy for about 2 wks but with xmas coming up and being on one income for the first time in years, he was working extra hours so that we could pay cash for xmas!!!)
The answer I got, "I'm tired and stressed". Yes he had been working long hard hours and yes it was coming up on a slow time of year that we always get concerned about wither or not he would get laid off (thankfully he didn't).

The next day he went into town to pick something up so I sent him a bbm asking if we were all right. He had been really quite all day and its not like him at all.
He sends me a message back and says we will talk when he gets home...???
My heart sunk, I didn't know what it was we need to talk about, I couldn't imagine what was going threw his head or what was about to come out of his mouth.

He starts by saying he doesn't care about anything other then the kids...I ask what he means?
He doesn'y care about himself, his job, me, or anything.
I'm completely shocked, I'm looking at the man who has been there for me threw thick and thin for 14 years and he has no emotions? He is completely calm, cool and collective. I on the other hand am now crying. How could the man I love be having theses feeling and I not realize? How could he be in a place where he can admit this to me and I never seen it coming?

From the out side looking in, we were in a great place. Over the years we have been threw alot and have struggled to stay strong. But as a couple we have always worked there everything and always came out stronger then ever.

I asked him if he thought maybe he was depressed? He said he didn't thinks so. I asked if he wanted to go see our doctor and talk to him and maybe get some help, wither it be medication, therapy or whatever he may need to help him.
He say he doesn't know.

So now I'm staring at a man who I love with my whole heart and he seems a million miles away. Hes out in left field and staring at the sun.
I ask more question. Like, whats does he want to do, where does he want this to go, how can I help, can I help, is there anything I can do to take some of the stress away? Everything is answered with "I don't know"
After about 3 hours of trying to get him to open up, he hits me with "I think I need to move out" I'm stunned, shocked, heartbroken, and at a lost for words. He could not have told me anything that would have shocked me more.

With that new information, I get up and walk into our bedroom. I'm a basket case, I cant stop crying, I feel the walls closing in, my heart is pounding out of my chest, my head is spinning....yep I'm having another attack.

By dinner time, he decided hes going to call in sick to work. With that I think great, we can talk more after the kids are in bed and get to the bottom of this. Kids go to bed, I get ready for bed and he....falls asleep on the couch. I go out and try and wake him but of course nothing. The next morning after the older 2 have gone to school. I sit on the couch determined to get answers. Of course the more question I have the less answer he has. Its always..."I don't know"

He says he still loves me but he doesn't know what he wants, he want to like himself again.
This of course breaks my heart, how could he not love himself? He was a wonderful man, a great husband and father, he was successful at his job, he had made great strides in life, we were the parent of 3 wonderful boys, we owned our own home, had just bought a new van (with out help for family), we were on the right track to be debit free in less then 2 years (except for mortgage) and we were even talking about selling our little house and getting a bigger one. But some how he doesn't know if this is what he wants in life.

He leaves for work that night, leaving me to stew on what is to come? With Christmas less then 3 wks away my first thought is the kids. How can this be happening to us, to my family?

He gets home the next weekend, tired and grumpy and all I want is answers. I'm afraid to push to much cause he is closing up the more I ask or try and figure things out. All that was decided this weekend was that we would keep think quite till after the holiday. This would give us both time to figure things out.

For him: where he was going to go, what he was going to do, how he was going to start a new life to make himself happy again.

For me: how was I going to raise my kids without him, how was I going to be able to keep our home when I'm not working. How was I going to be able to get over my issues with my little man to be able to go to work and support us? How was I going to explain to everyone what the hell was happening.

Between the second weekend and the new year, things seemed to be going good. We were almost like a normal family. We went our shopping with my parents, had dinner out, had family movie nights, played games with the kids as well as dealt with normal everyday issues. I was almost to the point that I thought if I just stop pushing for answers and ride this out that he would realize he needed help and would take the steps to keep our family together.

Then New Years even hit. We never really do anything special for new years, we just hang out with the kids and if we lucky we may seen midnight. So we decide that we would have a family night, we watch a movie and put the kids to bed. I'm sitting on the couch wondering whats going to happen. The holidays were over and that is what we agreed we would stay together for.

This is were things start to change. We talked again new years eve and his story stayed the same, he loved me but thought we were better off as friends.....REALLY FRIENDS??? After 14 yrs you want to just be my friend? When I asked what he wanted at the end of the day his story was still "he didn't know". He didn't know if he wanted to be with me, he didn't know if he wanted to be a family, he didn't know if he want it to all end.
Again me thinking that if I just ride this out he would realize that he needed to talk to someone and get some help. And for the sake of the kids he would continue to stay he till he could find a place of his own. WE thought this was for the best, WE decided as parents that until he could answer where he wanted to be at the end of all this the best place to be was here. Why put our kids threw all this if when everything was said and done we would be together....or so I thought WE decided.

The weekend after new years, he had made his decision. He was moving out. He was going to walk away from me, the kids, my family, everything. He was going to make this move with no clear answers.

So on the Sunday when he left for work he wasn't coming back to live here. His sister was going to let him stay there for now. We switched vans (mine was older then his and he had been using it to travel back and forth to work), he takes all the keys to his and me to mine, plus his house key. He left with the items he normaly did for a weeks worth of work. Nothing more, nothing less.

So in a matter of 5 weeks, I went from being in love with my husband and father to my kids, to being completely heartbroken and a single mom of 3 kids who wasn't working.

RESENTMENT

This is not a word I use lightly or can say I really have ever felt before, however its the first word that pops into my head today when someone asked "how I was holding up".

What do I resent?

For starter, lately my ex! He has left me in a situation that I never thought I would be put in. He left so quickly that I never really had a chance to deal with my own feeling about the end of a relationship let alone how I was going to manage to raise 3 very energetic boys (1 that has anxiety issues and 1 that could be labeled special needs).
I resent the fact that he gets to make all the decisions right know. He get to walk out the door and move on with his life as if we didn't even exist. Sure he says he will still see the kids and right now its hard cause he away at work 5 nights a week and is staying at his sister which is almost 30 minutes away. I'm thinking the same thing, no made how hard it is I would be making every attempt to see my kids as often as I could.
Don't get me wrong, I give him as much time as he would like. Here lies one of the problems.
With everything chance I give him there is always something else he would rather do or cant afford to do.
It really pisses me off that not only does he get to move on that easily but that I'm now left to deal with all the backlash.
He hasn't been close with his side of the family for many many years (other then our niece and her family...a.k.a my rock). So my family has been his man family for 14 years. But of course because its "my" family I'm the one left to tell everyone that we have split up and answer all the question (even if I don't have the answers). I'm left to handle the kids as best as I can as they deal with their "new" family. I'm left listening to the screaming, the fighting, the tears, the fears, the question, the idea that its some how something they have done, or something that one of their brothers have done.
No matter how much I tell them I love them and will always be here for them, the only thing it seems like they care about right now is the fact their dad walked out.
I'm left dealing with my own issues over the break up and the fact that with no notice or warning my entire life is changed now. I have more then my fair share of issues to deal with on a daily bases let alone all the new stuff that is being thrown at me.

I know the older kids are pushing their limits just to see how much they can get away with and I knew to expect it, BUT they are kids and they know how to push the buttons and drive me crazy. This also is nothing I'm generally not use to, but before I could rely on him to back me up. I knew I just had to get threw the week and he would be home (even if I took it one day, one hour or one minute at a time...he would be back). I always feel bad when I do loose my patients with them, right know its even worst.
Sure he says he will come on the weekend to watch them so that I can work a shift on not have to pay a sitter, but really....I think I would rather be paying someone! All his visits seem to do is make the kids act worse, till I can convince them that I will not put up with the behaviour.
I can honestly say I never in a million zillion years thought that IF someday we did split that this is the guy father he would be. I know its still all really new for all of us, but if this is already happening then whats to come? Normally things start out good. fathers what to see their kids, do stuff with them, spoil them so to speak. But it feels like I'm forcing him to see them.  Last week (which was when he "officially" moved out), he never called once, he never even sent me a bbm about them. I was crushed. I kept thinking that my kids whole lifes were about to change and they have no idea.  Again its not like he called "them" on a regular bases but he did call home every night to talk with me, and of course I would ask if they wanted to talk to him. The scary part about last week is not once did any of them ask to talk to him or even when he was coming home? Yes I did find this odd, my middle man is always asking what day it is and then counts how many more sleeps till he comes back.

My mom had been planning on going away this weekend and had asked weeks ago if she could take one of the boys with her, which of course as a sahm i jumped on! So I asked my big man (a.k.a old's age 9) if he want to go with her or stay and visit with his dad (of course I check with the ex first to see if he was ok with it cause it was his visitation with the kids) he said that was fine. I wasn't sure what my big man would say, but after asking where he was going and who was going to be there he decided to go away. I said are you sure you don't want to see your dad and he looked at me with a stone cold face and said no. It broke my heart :(
Tonight I get a bbm message asking me to have my big man call his dad. Now I will admit, at first I said they were already in bed. Why? Cause we were having a good night, they hadn't been fighting or anything and I was afraid what talking to him would do...especially this close to bed time.
BUT after about 2 minutes I said to big and middle man "do you want to call and talk to your dad" both answered "no". As much as my heart broke with their answer I also felt happy that they were making the decision not to talk to them. That once again I wouldn't be left to deal with the behaviour that would follow the call.

week 1 of new life!

This week has been full of ups and downs, smiles and tears, heartbreak and joy (as hard as that is to believe). But more important, this week is the start of my new life with my 3 sons.

Over the last couple weeks I learned that the man (a.k.a husband) that I love, have been with for 14yrs and the father of my 3 children has decided it would be best for HIM to move out. Yep you read that right, I was completely blind sided and heartbroken (more about that later, don't want to dwell on all the negatives).

So last Sunday when he left for work, he officially moved out. He knew when he was done work at the end of this week he would need to find someplace else to live. It wasn't fair to me or the kids to have him still coming home,"pretending" we were a happy family.

So this week I rearrange my entire house.
Before hand, we shared our room (which is almost like 2) with our 18mth old son (more about him later as well. He will need a few post to understand), and the other bedroom was share by our 6 and 9 yr old sons. We had always talked about give the kids the bigger bed room and us either moving to the "dinning/playroom" or into the small bedroom (which he was never to really liked the idea of). SO as the first step in my new life, I went ahead and did it!!!
My older 2 boys now have the large bedroom, my toddler now has his own bedroom and I'm in the toy room! The kids love the idea of having all their stuff in one area!
Now as liberating as it was to make the change, I will omit that for a couple minutes during the process I was completely scared of how he would reach to it (keep in mind that the man I thought I was living with has changed so much in the last 5 wks its like dealing with a complete stranger)

For the first time in what seems like forever, my children have been going to bed with out an issue (even the toddler). Its soooo nice to have a "normal" feeling in my life!

We decided last week when he left that we would sit down and tell the kids this weekend when he stopped by for a visit (here comes the tears). I have suspected for a while that my 9yr old knew something was up but I don't think he knew just how serious it was (my husband is normally gone from Sunday night till Friday morning so they would have wondered where he was all week). My 6yr old is a typically 6yr old and even if he thought something was up as soon as another thought came in he would have forgot the first one.
So after what seemed like the longest week of my life, I finally told my parents what was going on (they were super supportive,SHOCKED, but supportive) I knew I couldn't face them in person or even on the phone to give them the news so I chickened out and sent my mom a facebook message ( I know it sound really bad, but I'm super emotional on the best of days let alone the last couple)
I told her that first off me and the kids were safe and OK, that my husband and I had decided it was best for all of us, especially the kids that he move out. We didn't know if it was a final decision but for now it was the best one for the children. I asked her not to call me or ask question cause for 1 - I wasn't ready to deal with details and more then likely wouldn't have all the answers. and 2- my kids didn't know so to have them hear me talk about it wasn't how they were going to find out.

So I have spent the whole week trying to figure out how on heavens green earth I was going to tell my children that their father was walking out the door...why you ask because he didn't/doesn't know how he feels about me, himself, life or anything else. He does know that his main concern is his children. He says he loves me but thinks we would be better off as friends. Honestly, I don't know how he expects me to be his "friend" after everything we have been threw as a couple (again more details to follow) or everything he is about to put me threw.

So as Saturday morning nears I get more and more stressed about this, to the point that I'm having panic attacks. I have had to put my toddler in his crib so I could sit in the bathroom and talk myself "down" ( I have been dealing with major anxiety for almost 18ths now and have finally in the last 3 months decided that I needed to do something about it). I received a bbm @ 11:25am Saturday morning saying he was on his way (your right, yet another panic attack) I start thinking about the fact I am about to break my kids hearts, I have to see him for the first time since he left, and I have to trust him not to tell the kids while I'm at work for 2 hours. Personally I think he was more afraid of the conversation then I was but I wanted to make sure I would be there for my kids when they find out, to make sure they understand its nothing they have done, nothing they could have did and that we both still love them as much as the day they were born. This is what is best for everyone involved (or so I keep telling myself) and that they could still talk to daddy when ever they wanted to and would still see him every week.

The conversation went about as well as I had except. My 9yr old said he already knew then instead of dealing with the news he started playing with my toddler who thankfully had no idea what the heck is happening. My 6yr old broken in to tears the minute the words left his dad's mouth, which of course started mine all over again. I hugged him and told his everything I wanted to say to try and help him deal with things. After some intense minutes he settled down and said he didn't have any questions and wanted to leave the room. I at that point thought that was what was best for him. I have never seen him respond like this before and as much as I think he needed his time, so did I.

All week the boys and I had been planning a movie night for Saturday (something that we often did as a family anyways). So I had stopped after work and grabbed a movie.
After my husband went and packed the rest of his clothed (which I had asked for him to wait till after the talk to do) he was standing at the front door and called all the kids to say goodbye. My middle man was dumbfounded at the fact of what was really going on, he breaks into tears again and says " why are you leaving? We are suppose to be watching a movie together?" Again my heart breaks for him (and me) and I explain that no daddy is leaving and it will just be mommy and them watching the movie tonight. NOW I will omit, that I did think "hubby" was going to ask if it was OK if he stayed and watch the movie with us BUT noooo, he gave the kids a kiss and hug and left. I was so pissed, heartbroken and frustrated all at the same time that had my kids not been in the room with me I would have lost my mind. This is not the man I feel in love with 14 yrs ago, nor is he the man i thought i was raising my family with. It was if he was a complete stranger living in his body.

All in all the night went OK, we watched our movie as a "new" family, did our new bedtime routine, and after a bit of a fight between the 2 oldest everyone settled down for the night. I on the other hand was in for a long night yet again.  After a quick call from my mom, I was ready to talk to my rock (my niece and best friend). She completely understands what I'm going threw (by no choice of her own and I pray her end result is different).

I'm sorry the first post is so long but as I get into more details about myself and my life it will make more sense. I'm really hoping that by sharing my story and feels not only will it help me understand what happened but may help other people to know they are not alone!

As hard as your life may seem at any given moment, you need to stop and remember all the things that are positives in your life, all the blessings (even when in may not seem like it) you have in your life!