It's been one heck of a year and I'm glad to see it go!

Less than 30 minutes to the New Year and looking back, I'm glad it's finally ending even though it seems to have gone faster than ever. It was a really difficult year though, pretty much from the beginning when my adopted dad started getting worse on Natalie's birthday. He died 9 months ago, on March 31st, of lung cancer. I miss him very much and think of him often. Of course, that loss for me just made the loss of my parents (not to death but to prison due to their own extremely selfish actions) even more difficult to bear. The weather added to things with spring being delayed and then when it did come, it came with severe weather. We had a close call when the tornado sirens went off in early April but nothing came of it thankfully other than severe hail damage on the southside of town. I was very grateful that John was sent home early and he came home just before it all hit. That wasn't the case six weeks later. I had been aware that we were to get severe storms so had stayed home and had been watching the weather all day. I had this sense of dread during the afternoon, felt very anxious. Kept watching the radar and saw a storm off to the SE that looked bad. It was and this storm was heading right for my town. Warnings started popping up in the SE so I started to get things together in preparation for going down to the basement with the two girls John was still at work. When the sirens went off (late, I found out later), we all went down. This time the warning was for real. The southside of my town took a direct hit from a rain wrapped tornado. This happened just an hour or so before Joplin Missouri was hit. Thankfully, it was a fairly week tornado. If it had been the size of the one that hit Joplin, we would have taken damage and loss of life similar to theirs, I'm sure. The tornado touched down not very far from the hospital and there were numerous stories of close calls. It hit near the neighborhood I had lived in when my brother-in-law was killed so I have had a hard time dealing with that. Tornadoes have been a huge fear of mine since losing my house to a fire when I was a kid and that combined with what happened in that area back when I was living there just made it worse (ironically, while houses on either side of my old apartment took damage, the house I lived in was untouched). It was just really weird to see all the damage down there and to realize that I was less than four miles away. It could have just as easily hit where I lived. Still kind of freaks me out, in all honesty.

So those two events and some other struggles have made this a particularly difficult year and so I'm not sad to see it go. I'm really hoping that this next year is a much better year because I kind of need a break here!

As usual I've been neglecting my blog.

And since this is supposed to be the blog where I'm posting about the girls, that's kind of sad so one of my big resolutions this year is to focus more on this blog and make this the main blog I post on. It will mean a name change since it won't just be about the girls but about family life in general and other things. It will be a work in progress but I'm hoping that I'll get better at updates and pictures and all that good stuff. A lot has been going on which is to be expected with two girls and I know if I don't post and take pictures and things, things will happen that I will forget about later on. So that is my plan.

I will also be taking The Mom Pledge. You can find out what that is all about here. I want to be more positive about parenting and do what I can to be a better parent. It's not easy though and a good part of it will be figuring out what I need to do to better myself and feel better about myself because I think that is for me the biggest challenge, feeling good about myself and feeling confident and finding value in myself as well.

I was really hoping things were turning around.

But nope, they weren't. It's just me being stupid again. I had decided that I was, no matter what, going to celebrate the holidays. I was going to take the girls trick-or-treating and I did (and their dad STILL does not know I took them) and I was going to celebrate Christmas. He had actually been pretty laid back about the whole Christmas thing, keeping fairly mum on it all and I was thinking that while he wasn't going to join in, he was AT LEAST going to respect MY beliefs for once. UGH! How stupid can I be?! I should have realized something was up when he wasn't sleeping in our room at night. For the longest time we had been sleeping in separate rooms and we finally got them switched around so that the larger bed was just for us to sleep in and the girls shared their own room. Before, I was sleeping in our daughter's room on her bed and she slept in the larger room with her dad and sister. And I figured this way they would have the larger room for their toys and stuff and my husband and I would have a place to sleep together. But lately, he had been falling asleep in the room with the girls and not coming to bed. Intimacy was declining again. And now, he's back to telling me how defiant and rebellious I am. For crying out loud, it's CHRISTMAS. I'm not sleeping around on him. I'm not going out and drinking with strange men or being gone all hours of the night. He's calling me this because I went out with my sister last night to WALMART and bought CHRISTMAS presents for my oldest daughter who had a birthday two days after Christmas anyway! Seriously! I got THREE gifts that cost me less than $25. I got my younger daughter TWO gifts for about the same amount. I bought some gift wrapping stuff and things like that and because it's against HIS beliefs, because HE believes that HE will be thrown into the Lake of Fire for believing it, I am the one who is rebelling and being defiant. All I want to do is buy some presents for my kids, wrap them, and give the presents to them on Christmas Day. That's it. I have a small tree in my office. I did not buy any lights. I ended up not doing the Secret Santa thing I was part of because I ended up leaving the group I was in. The only decoration outside of my office are snowflake decals on the window that my older daughter put up. THAT IS IT. Oh and I mailed Christmas cards out. But to hear you, you'd think I was like the people down the street with the HUGE holiday display outside of their house or the people whose house I pass on the bus with all of the lights! I haven't even taken the kids to see Santa Claus (though after this, I think I just might, may as well be as rebellious as possible!).

I want to bang my head on a wall. I have tried and tried and tried and tried to make this work. I REALLY tried to give up Christmas. It was HARD. It was PAINFUL. It was DEPRESSING. I HATED IT. I HATED people who celebrated Christmas. I was becoming a Grinch about it all, seriously. I did not like myself. I did not like having to be isolated from everyone for a good four months because I didn't celebrate any of the holidays from Halloween on except for Thanksgiving. I have done SO MUCH for him and tried SO HARD to respect his beliefs only to have him ignore me and take me for granted anyway. It didn't seem to matter that I was making HUGE sacrifices for him. It was just expected because I was married to him never mind he lied to me about his beliefs to begin with.

I don't believe what he believes. It would make life (and for sure our marriage!) easier if I did but I don't. I just wish he would realize that and realize that all the crap he does just makes our marriage more unbearable for me.

So I managed to win a giveaway.

And it was to an online adult store, of all things. I have to wonder if the universe was trying to make up for the fact that all my husband got me for my birthday was a massager from Goodwill and not just any massager, a massager that probably belonged to an old lady (it kind of had an old lady smell to it), looked older than me, and was only $2.99. I mean seriously, who gives a USED, second hand massager to his wife for her birthday and wedding anniversary?! EPIC fail. That and the lack of um intimacy during the last two months I think led to karma being nice to me for once because I almost never win giveaways and definitely not giveaways for a $55 gift card. So I'm excited. I made my purchases today (took me quite a few days to figure out just what I wanted to get because I haven't gotten anything like this since my husband and I started dating and I wasn't quite so shy--yeah, funny, considering I've given birth in front of total strangers since then) and they'll be here soon. Maybe this is just what I need to get a little more action. At the very least, it will spice things up whether I'm with him or going solo.

My favorite age.

Isabelle is now reaching the point of her development where everything she does is just positively cute (even when she's getting into trouble!). She's been walking for awhile and now she's starting to talk (a little earlier than Natalie but she wasn't walking quite as early as Natalie either). She's kind of an odd one with the talking though as she's not saying words but phrases though they're not very clear. We've had a game for awhile where I would hide under the blankets and say, "Where's Mama?" She would peek under the blanket and I would respond, "Here I am!" Or I would hide her and say, "Where's Isabelle?" and when I found her, would then say, "There she is!" So now, when I do it, Isabelle says, every single time she finds me, something that sounds a lot like, "There it is!". She also says "upsy daisy", "hi" (while waving), what sounds like "bye-bye", and what John thinks sounds like "thank you". She also has this game where she'll bring you a doll to hug. I hug the doll and say, "aww" and now Isabelle does the same thing. It's absolutely cute. She'll also respond to my saying, "No, you can't!" with "Yes, I can!". I don't know where she got that one and I have a feeling that this may really come to a head when she's older! She says something (can't quite understand it) when I have something she wants and she can kind of say "banana". Yes, this little girl has quite a vocabulary at not quite 15 months old (though she still won't really say mama!)! I can only see that getting bigger as time goes on. Natalie just started talking at 15 months with her first word, "Hi" but her vocabulary just exploded after that so I'm definitely anticipating that with Isabelle as well.

She's getting more into playing with her toys (and with her sister's toys). She loves her legos though still hasn't quite figured out how to put them together. She plays with them instead, putting them into the cupboards and things in the play kitchen we have. She likes to play in the cupboards in the regular kitchen but we have to watch that because she's prone to getting into trouble. She dumped the rest of an open box of Minute Rice the other day.

She's cute though and I love this age. I really loved it when Natalie was this age and missed it when Natalie grew out of it at three. I'll need to take video this time so I can remember these days even when I'm old and erm grayer.

Feeling more lost and confused than ever.

I called over to the hospital the other day and talked to someone in the women's health department, specifically someone who is supposed to be part of the domestic violence part of this department. To be honest, I don't feel like I got a lot of good answers and if anything, I couldn't help but feel she was telling me that I'm pretty much stuck until I get a job and make enough money to move out (unless I have someone I can move in with) because my husband isn't beating me.

At the same time, I have nearly everyone else I've talked to telling me I need to get the f out NOW. Well, that would be great if I had somewhere to go! I can't go by myself, one because I don't want to abandon my children and two because I would be a failure of a mother if I abandoned my children. My one older sister tells me I can come live with her. Yeah, thing is is she's in another state and from what I'm hearing, I can't even go more than 150 miles with my kids (you know, I really have to wonder if there are economics because this stupid law and just who the f came up with such a STUPID law in the first place?!) for more than 90 days. I was told by a therapist that I could be ordered back to this state with the kids so first of all, that's going to mess them up, being in a place only to have to return here and second of all, that doesn't help me with my where the heck I'm going to go because I'll be right back where I started! And I'm sure my husband would get a HUGE kick out of that. Plus, if I have to be ordered back here, that could possibly jeopardize my getting custody. I have another older sister who suggest I just do whatever I want and not listen to what he says anymore and not do the things he wants me to do. This has everyone else concerned that he'll either try to kidnap at least our older daughter or retaliate violently.

Would someone please tell me what I can actually do?!

He called last night, starts mentioning that he probably has been in the wrong with how he's been treating me and how he probably did not plan his trip out very well (okay, who are you and what did you do with my husband?). Then it goes from there to he might be home early, doesn't really give me a full reason why just mentions something to the effects that there's been a difference of opinion and from what I got from the little he says, I think it's that he doesn't really approve of the church's teachings. This doesn't entirely surprise me, after all, the whole no shaving thing is not something the church he attends to follow. In fact, even his best friend who has left not only the church my husband has been going to but several other of the offshoots, STILL shaves so it seems to me like John may be leaving the whole Armstrong offshoots behind period. Hard to say but it's still a step in the wrong direction because he's keeping himself a prisoner of the law following these laws, he doesn't get at all that the laws no longer need to be followed but that's a discussion for another day, to be honest. So I really don't know when he will be home, could be any day now, just hoping that this whole thing doesn't totally screw up our finances because if it does, there's going to be some massive problems. Unfortunately, I think I'm just going to have to make some more phone calls, maybe even go and see someone in person because I really do not know what else to do. And I guess I'm just going to have to print off some of the stuff with the bank accounts and find out just what my options are and ask a lot of questions including what exactly can happen if I did decide to leave and go to my sister's.

At this point, I still really have no desire to stay with him. The religion is a huge problem and not one that's going to be fixed overnight, especially when he is SO disrespectful towards anyone who follows beliefs outside of his. Not to mention that our relationship has deteriorated so much, it's going to take a lot of work to get it back on track and it's not work I'm willing to do unless he makes some HUGE changes and they're changes he's not very likely willing to make (especially when he keeps saying that my asking for certain changes in order for me to stay is being manipulative). We continue to be at an impasse. And I don't see that changing ever.

I can't do it anymore.

I never went into a marriage planning to leave it. When I married my husband, it felt right. It added security to our relationship. We were friends and lovers and now partners for life. We married eight years ago today. The pictures of us at our wedding show a couple in love. I looked happy, my husband looked at me with love. We were the picture of a couple very much in love.

Eight years and two children later, I'm done. I'm miserable. I'm lonely. My husband hasn't look at me the way he looked at me in those pictures in years. I don't feel needed by him. He gets his emotional needs met through his church and through our five year old daughter. We have slept in the same bed maybe a few times in the last year. Otherwise, we sleep in separate beds, in separate rooms. Sex has gotten less and less and when it happens, it's because I not only initiate it but practically beg and harass him for it.

This, along with other issues, has finally led me to decide I can't do this anymore. As much as being alone would suck, I would at least have the ability to make choices for my life. I would be able to celebrate Christmas. I would be able to pursue my own religious beliefs. I can own Harry Potter and watch the movies. It's sad but I find more positives in being on my own (even if I didn't get custody of the girls) than I do in continuing to be married.

I'm sad though. I'm broken hearted and once again, I wonder what's wrong with me. It just seems like many of the people in my life either don't seem to really love me at all or stop loving me.

Just realized that OCTOBER is the blog writing month.

Dang it. I'm never good with these things. I should be writing more. I would love to do NaNoWriMo next month. I need SOMETHING to focus on when everything else is going crazy around me. My husband is still planning to attend the Feast of Tabernacles in the Dells even though he STILL has yet to ask anyone to drive him and our five year old down. Currently, it's the Day of Atonement. He's to fast today, all day from sundown Friday until sundown Saturday. I have a hard time understanding these kinds of things but then, I have a hard time understand Christianity in general. Just seems like a lot of work for nothing, if you ask me.

Tuesday is my birthday. I turn 31. It's also my eighth wedding anniversary (don't ask me why I got married on my birthday; it seemed like a good idea at the time). My husband has Wednesday off in order to have time to get down to the Dells before sundown. He did not take Tuesday off and he's working three hours late on Monday. And in the meantime, he's somehow going to have to get everything ready to go before he leaves and he's not the most organized person in the world. He's also expecting to take our five year old with. I can't help but feel that I'm not even a priority for him. His religion is more important and I'm an afterthought, if even that. Just getting so tired of it all.

Need to make some very hard decisions.

When John and Natalie returned from South Korea last October, we had a bit of a crisis from the beginning. He had returned with a full beard and told me that because the Bible says one is not to shave, he is no longer going to shave. I about booted him out then and there. He did end up spending the night next door because we had such a loud argument over it, the police were called. I was furious. It was just one more stupid, inane, asinine rule I had to tolerate because of his religious beliefs. And worse, it wasn't even one of the things the church he had been going to practiced! He did shave it off for awhile, at least long enough to find a job, but grew it back (again, without even talking to me about it or taking my feelings into consideration at all). It has greatly affected our marriage since then and yeah, okay, it's just a beard, I know but it's the lack of consideration that's a problem. He does not take my feelings into consideration. He goes on and on about how he has "no choice" in the matter because it's what the Bible says. That is such garbage! There is ALWAYS a choice! You don't HAVE to choose to follow some stupid rule! That's the whole thing behind free will. It's not like God is play a game of The Sims and clicking on you and forcing you to do certain things. You have the ability to make your own choices. Yes, there are consequences for the choices you make but you still have a choice. And this is one of those things I don't get. He's so AFRAID of not doing what he's supposed to do. I mean seriously? He's going to go to hell/the lake of fire for SHAVING?! Are you freaking kidding me?!

Like I said, that was almost a year ago and I was furious then. Now, I'm just tired. I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired of trying to get him to do the things he needs to be doing (like filling out the paperwork that keeps the student loan people from garnishing his wages). I'm tired of asking him for his time, asking him for sex, asking him for anything really. We don't really talk and we don't plan. He's getting moodier and moodier all the time. He hates his job which usually means he will at some point lose it because once he starts hating his job, he doesn't put the effort into it and with the (what I think are) ADD issues he may have, it becomes very easy for him to end up losing his job. It's happened before, many many many times before. He wants to go to the Feast of Tabernacles. This requires him to miss a week of work. The last two times we've done this, he's lost his job within a few months. The first year we went was before I had our oldest daughter. He was working two jobs. He lost both of them less than three months later and that year was the WORST year we had financially and supposedly there is this idea that if you tithe and go to this stupid Feast, you'll be blessed financially. Yeah, hasn't happened yet. The next year that we went, he lost his job less than a month after we returned. Fortunately, we were able to get by on him subbing at the local school district so it wasn't quite as bad as it was in the past. BUT, we started having car issues and one of his sisters AND her son died shortly after we returned and because he missed so much work, we couldn't go to the funeral. Again, definitely NOT blessed going to this thing.

But he still wants to go. Only thing is is that we don't have a car. He doesn't have a way to get down to the site that's 90 miles away. He doesn't have a place to stay. He doesn't have a way of getting around the town that the site is in (no public transportation there really). Services are everyday during the week; some days there are two services. It's an eight day deal and he plans to take our five year old. I think she's going to be bored as can be and eventually get sick of the whole entire thing. I know I did the last time I went down and I was an adult! It's BORING! I have no intention of going. His way of punishing me for that is to not include me in any of the Feast gift giving (this IS supposed to be the replacement for Christmas). He is also supposed to be leaving the day after my birthday (which is also the same day as our wedding anniversary).

I can't do it anymore. I can't keep going like this where I'm expected to follow his beliefs, put up with whatever he comes up with that he's read out of the Bible, and yet not be able to follow any beliefs of my own. I'm supposed to put up with a lack of intimacy and friendship within my own relationship and be perfectly happy with it. I'm not happy with it and I refuse to bend over backwards and give up everything of myself just to get that from him. At some point, either in the near future (especially if he does go to the Feast) or somewhere down the road, I'm going to have to leave. He will never change and I will never be happy staying with him. It's just an absolutely terrifying thought for me. I think I would be better about it if I didn't have the kids but I do and I worry I can't do it all on my own, I really do. But I can't keep living this way either. *sigh*

Weight and health and all that stuff...

Last Monday was kind of an interesting day for me. I woke up with what I thought were gas pains and about 12 hours later, I'm getting wheeled in to the OR to have my gall bladder removed. It definitely was not on my list of things to do and having my husband home for a week in order to recover (laproscopic surgery is definitely easier to recover from than traditional surgery!) while nice is not going to do our paychecks any good. Still, I had sort of expected that day to come. About 10 years or so ago, I had a kidney stone and when an ultrasound was done to find it, they found a stone in my gall bladder. My parents both had had theirs removed by the time they were in their early 40's and one of my older sisters had had hers removed at the age of 22 so I figured it was just a matter of time. Then, a month or so ago, I started getting pains in my right side here and there. It wasn't excruciating but it was noticeable. I figured that time was getting closer to having surgery. I made an appointment for a physical but couldn't get in until the end of next month. The gall bladder decided not to wait.

Naturally, when a part of your body fails and you find yourself in medical need, the first question that comes to mind is "what else is going to decide to go?" I did mention to my husband before going down to surgery if this was going to be the start of medical issues for me. Unfortunately, he decided to share that with a friend of his, a friend who is very judgmental about a lot of the things I do and on my weight. He made some comments to my husband I found very offensive including one comment where he basically says he doesn't understand how I can eat myself to illness and possibly even death. Thing is, other than on Skype, he hasn't seen me in over 5 years. He hasn't watched me eat. He doesn't know me. He doesn't know my history and he doesn't know my family medical history. He is making assumptions based on my weight and the very very few times he saw me, one of those times being when I was pregnant. He doesn't know the times when I was on diets trying to lose the weight and going to the gym to exercise. He doesn't know of all the weight loss books and exercise videos I have purchased over the years. He doesn't know how much I have fantasized about being thin and being accepted by people. He doesn't know how I have avoided people just because of the shame I have felt about my weight and how avoiding on person in particular because I feared her being disappointed me meant I never saw her again because she DIED from a brain tumor even though she was healthy, ate well, and was a runner. He doesn't know how often I have avoided being in pictures and having pictures taken of me because of my own feelings towards myself because of my weight and how I struggle with those feelings every day. And those feelings of inadequacy leads more to depression than to feeling motivated towards taking care of myself. Those feelings of inadequacy tends to more likely lead me to food than to exercise.

It hurt and angered me and it angered me even more that not only did he make a comment like that (among others) but then he goes on to say that he's glad my daughter is active and so far not picking up my inactive tendencies. She's FIVE! I was active too at that age! I had a 10 acre farm to run around on and was outside nearly every single day! I didn't really start to become inactive until my teens when my options for sports dried up because I wasn't good enough to get on any of the teams. And that was just the start. I'm glad she at least has a dad who is very active because she'll have someone to motivate her and be active with. I didn't have that. I didn't have parents who really were watching what they ate and us in turn. I spent a couple of years primarily under the care of my older brother who ate mostly hamburger helper while my mom attended school 50 miles away and those were the nights he was at home. Other nights I had to make my own dinner, a microwavable meal. I'm sure there were better options but my mom certainly didn't seek them out, not when our food budget was likely very limited (and ours is too but I try hard to buy food that is better than what I was fed as a child).

I won't deny that there were things I did after I moved out that didn't help with the weight and definitely encouraged the weight to go up at an alarming level. College food was not a good thing for me. I wish I could go back and make better choices knowing what I know now. It's definitely much easier to put the weight on than it is to take it off, that's for sure. And I've tried and I've failed and in failing, put even more weight on.

I won't deny though that there are things I can do now to improve my health and those are the things I need to work on, as hard as that is. Having had surgery has been a little bit of a push in the right direction. I have to be at least a little more mindful of what I eat as eating too much of the wrong thing can wreak havoc on my body. Exercise though is always a challenge. It's a challenge to find something I enjoy enough to do continuously. It's a challenge to find something I can do all year around (sorry, it gets below 0 around here, as low as -20 and more during the DAY and that's without windchill being factored in). It's very easy for me to get out of shape which is something that GREATLY frustrates me because it takes FOREVER for me to get into better shape. And so yes, exercise has been a source of frustration for me even though I know that it would greatly improve how I feel on many levels. Just doesn't help that I also struggle with depression and days I don't even want to get out of bed and function much less go and exercise.

Some people are able to just go out there and do it and do it no matter what the temperature, how they feel, etc. Some people are able to eat certain foods and ONLY those foods without being tempted to eat anything else. People call that will power and some do have a very strong will power. Others need a little more motivation and I definitely fall under the latter. I find I need a lot of support, encouragement, and (shall I say?) a sense that someone actually gives a damn. I find I need to be rewarded in some way or I lose that motivation. Getting into the habit is hard and finding the reason to get into the habit, I think, harder still, at least for me and especially when I have issues with depression.

Some people would say I'm just making excuses but unless you have been in my shoes, I don't think you have the right to judge. If weight isn't an issue for you, doubly so. It's one of those areas I've struggled with for a long time and I will probably continue to struggle in this area awhile longer. I don't think it's ever going to come easily for me though I have made some positive changes in the last ten years I think are important, especially since having children. In another ten years, I hope to make more positive changes. Nothing happens overnight though and I will probably always have a vice or two that threatens to trip me up, just like everyone else does. Till then, I guess I'll just keep working at it as best as I can.

My issues with religion.

The "kingdom of Heaven" is a condition of the heart - not something that comes "upon the earth" or "after death."
Friedrich Nietzsche

Religion is kind of a difficult subject for me. To be honest, it has been for a long time. It started before I met my husband and marrying him and being exposed to his religion hasn't helped. This video sort of echoes how I feel about religion in general:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RviMdf7gng4&NR=1

The biggest issue I have with religion is the use of fear to get people to follow a bunch of inane rules that go above and beyond the basics, nit picky rules that set them apart from everyone else. It's one thing to follow rules that help you avoid hurting others. It's another to follow rules that are so outside the mainstream, it literally disrupts your life and your relationship with others. And this brings me to my second biggest issue, when following rules that set you drastically apart from others gives you a sense of superiority over those who do not follow the same rules you do. My issue is in seeing people almost sneer at those who do things differently because they have different beliefs. It can be seen in general in a Christian vs atheist situation but it can manifest itself among Christian religions too. I've seen it and I hate it and it turns me off of many Christians. The judging of and disrespect towards those with other beliefs drives me crazy and it is as far away from being a Christian as you can possibly get.

On the other hand, I have seen the opposite. I have seen Christians who try very hard and very humbly to act as much like Christ as possible. They don't judge. They're very open minded even when beliefs totally outside their own are brought up. They do all they can for their neighbors. They WANT to help others and feel that being a Christian is all about helping others and showing love towards others. They are supportive and help those who are struggling with spiritual matters. They are positive. They're not perfect and they're willing to admit it.

I know two couples. One couple shares the same beliefs my husband does. I'll admit, I don't know them all that well and I've only been at their house a few times but the times I have been there, it's been very tense. I have felt that my behavior was being scrutinized and I would be judged on the things I did (and I was and later on also judged even for the books I owned when the husband helped my husband move our things one time). I was made to feel that I was a long way from being where they were at. They would make comments about people and their beliefs and even their weight often acting as if they were superior because they held beliefs that they felt were THE beliefs and those who didn't hold those beliefs were inferior. It was very hard to be around them. They were very stingy with help, acting resentful and using that as another means of feeling superior. THEY didn't need help so others should get their act together too and if they were doing what they were supposed to do, they wouldn't need help anyway. Their children are limited as far as who they can be with and spend time with due to concerns of influence.

Another couple I have been very blessed to know. I met the wife online in a group and we met a few times in person over the next 4 years. When I returned from South Korea, I spent the first two weeks in a hotel while I figured out my living situation until I had the baby and my husband and daughter returned to the US. When this friend found out, she talked to her husband and they both offered me a place to stay for the summer. She helped me find a midwife and drove me to the appointments even though she was over an hour away. When I struggled with making decisions, she would talk to me. She and her husband were very devout in their beliefs but it was never pushed on me though offered if I was interested in joining. She helped me out as much as she could even giving me things for my apartment when I moved out and things for the baby. She was my doula for the birth and was absolutely wonderful with her support. I am in awe of her and her husband's generosity. Members of their church were very helpful to me as well (unlike my husband's church that barely even acknowledged I was home much less offered a helping hand in anyway). Even if they hadn't given me as much as they did, the fact that they opened their home up to me, someone they barely knew, is a testament of how loving and giving they are. They're both in school now, preparing for a life in the church, preparing to give even more of themselves to others and I'm just absolutely amazed by them. They are examples to uphold. They are good and moral and kind and decent and for sure deserve to be a part of the kingdom of Heaven (if there is one). If the world were full of people like them, it would be a peaceful world. And no, they're not perfect because no one is but my time with them was probably the most peaceful time I experienced in my life and I will always be grateful for that.

But, to those like my husband and his friend, that's not enough. They are not following the "rules". They need to be following the Old Testament part of the Bible. They should not celebrate Christmas or Halloween. Those things are evil and pagan. And it makes me sad because my husband could really do well to have a friend like my friend's husband instead of the friend he currently has. It makes me sad that there is so much of a sense of fear behind what they do. They really struggle, I think, to enjoy THIS world because they are so afraid of losing out in the next world. They are afraid of the Lake of Fire and it is because of that fear that they totally forget the important thing, love. They may preach it and talk about it but they don't practice it. They don't practice love. It's all about control and making sure that the rules are being followed and making sure the kids are following the rules and are not being influenced to stray or rebel. It's all about fear and fear is what can make religion dangerous. When fear is the basis of a religion, when control is used, religion becomes dangerous.

I will not believe something because of fear. I will not follow some arbitrary rules because I'm afraid of hell or the Lake of Fire. If I do something, I want it to be because it is the right thing to do. I don't want to hurt others. I may not have many beliefs but there are things that are important to me. Unfortunately, much of what is important to me has been deemed unacceptable by my husband because of his beliefs. And he will not respect my beliefs though he demands respect of his. And that I have many issues with as well.

So religion continues to be a struggle for me. I do not believe what my husband believes. I tried and it just didn't feel right. I didn't feel right. It always felt like I was forcing myself to believe these things and to do these things and I couldn't stand behind those beliefs 100%. Anything outside of those beliefs though are not accepted here in my house. So I'm left adrift, not sure what I believe, not respected for any beliefs I do have, and feeling lost and alone because I don't really have anywhere I really belong because I don't belong here really with someone who so thoroughly rejects any beliefs I may have that are outside of his. And I'm not free to find a place I do belong. So it's been a hard road and a lonely road and a very lonely marriage and that is why I struggle so much with religion. It has always been at least somewhat of a struggle for me but it has gotten much worse over the years and sadly, I will probably never be able to really find myself spiritually until I leave my marriage. Sad that it will have to come to that but really, that seems to be the only option I have.

It's been awhile and I still don't really have much to write about.

Not that there hasn't been much going on because there has. I mean, it has been over three months now but it's hard to think about writing much of anything these days. To be honest, it's a struggle just getting from one day to the next. For a long time now, things have been stagnate for me. I wish I could say that I enjoy parenting but when you have a spouse who has very rigid ideas about things, it's hard to. And lately, it's hard for me to enjoy much of anything about life. There's nothing to look forward to. Fall, while it's my favorite time of year, just reminds me that there are holidays coming up that I can't participate in. The sense of loneliness and isolation is nearly unbearable. We identify with people who share in the same traditions and rituals as we do and when we don't have those, we feel lost and adrift. At least, I do. Due to my husband's religious beliefs, Halloween and Christmas are forbidden. I am not allowed to celebrate those holidays and I am not allowed to participate in anything relating to those holidays with my children. They are not even to watch a TV show that has either of those holidays in the episode but are to turn off the TV immediately. It's easy to take for granted how interwoven those holidays are in the fabric of our lives from October on until you find yourself not able to celebrate those holidays and forced to avoid them at all costs. It's nearly impossible to do so, especially in the US. It's not quite as hard in South Korea.

The Feast of Tabernacles is supposed to soften the blow but it has not due to the fact that the last time we went was back in 2007 and less than a month after we returned (it's a week long deal where you are required to travel somewhere else in order to partake in it and you save up and use 10% of the last year's income in order to partake in it), my husband lost his job. When we went in 2005, my husband lost both of his jobs within three months so it's not something I eagerly anticipate especially when saving up the 10% at this time is quite a hardship for us. But supposedly, it's supposed to all work out to being enough money for a nice vacation for a week never mind that the week also entails 2 hour church services every day (and some days, TWO two hour long services). These services are tedious enough for an adult, for a child, they must be absolutely mind numbing and not surprisingly enough, many children struggle to sit still leaving many a weary mother to wander the hallways (because, at least at the site we've gone to the last two times, they have yet to set up any kind of child friendly deal like Sunday school; the best they have to offer is a nursing area for mothers to hide).

My husband wants to go even though doing so would be extremely difficult. We don't have a car which is an absolute necessity for something like this. He wants to go even though he has yet to make any kinds of plan to do so. People reserve their lodging in June, months ahead of time. The Feast is in October this year and he doesn't even really know what he plans to do. I will not be going. There is little point in me doing so when I will have to spend the entire time starting at a TV set, trying to find something to do while my husband and older daughter are gone all day. I did that the first time I went down with him, back when I was pregnant with our firstborn. It wasn't fun. And though it's supposed to be a time for members of the different congregations to get together and see each other again, no one really noticed we were there, at least not enough to want to get together with. I have come to find that members of my husband's church really tend to not have much to do with each other. Some churches, you find members getting together for various things in the church and for fellowship and for things outside of the Sunday service. With his church, members get together ONLY on the Sabbath. They just make a really long day of it. My husband and daughter are gone on Saturdays not just for the two hour services but for a good hour or so after that. I guess that's fine but to me, it just doesn't seem like anyone has a relationship outside of the church and that's the part that frustrates me and it especially frustrated me when I returned from South Korea alone and almost 30 weeks pregnant. It's terribly lonely and when you add to that the isolation that tends to come from having to avoid everyone from October on because you can't celebrate certain holidays, it gets really isolating and when you add to that the cold and the days getting dark earlier and earlier, it's a recipe for severe depression.

This last year, I've lost a number of friends. One friend ended our relationship for the umteenth time because her relationship ended with my nephew (too long of a story to go into now). Supposedly, she was going to get back to me when the pain of her break up wasn't so hard to bear that it interfered with our relationship. Yeah, that was back in December and she's back to dating my nephew so I don't know what her deal is there other than the usual ill treatment of me. I don't even know why I consider her a friend other than the fact that I've known her close to 20 years now but I suppose when you take away the years we were not talking, it's probably considerably less than that. Another friend passed away and that has been very difficult for me because he was a replacement for my dad who never was the most stellar parent in the world and now that he's where he's at, I find it easier to just not talk to him at all. A third friend moved away. We still meet up here and there though when she is in town so her moving away is nowhere near as dramatic as the lost of the other two friends. Still, it's been a difficult change. My older sister also moved away to another state leaving our family feeling more fragmented than ever. Not that it was holding up all that well with my mom being gone but since she's the oldest, her moving so far away has had a great impact. There really isn't an older sibling now for me to rely on. My brother is nearby, yes, but not really available. It just leads even more to that sense of isolation and loneliness.

I suppose it wouldn't be so difficult if my marriage also wasn't struggling. Having kids put a huge strain on our marriage. It forced me to stay home and my husband to be the primary provider. Money is always tight. Both of us are always tired. We don't get much time together and unfortunately, my husband would rather prioritize time with the girls than with me. I know he can balance both out but he chooses not to and it's frustrating. He won't get a babysitter so we can go on a date. Dates are rare, very very rare. We had one about 11 months ago. Before that, it was more than a year. And before that, even longer. He would rather spend time as a family. We spend most of our time as a family. We ARE a family so it's not like we're not getting any family time. When he's home, it's pretty much family time. I want time with my husband. I want time with him to talk to him and plan our lives and figure out just where we're going down the road. No, instead, I may find out what his plans are when he just spontaneously mentions them or I find out that he's been making plans and preparing without even discussing it with me (he had started doing some of the preparation for going to Korea months before I even suggested we go back when he knew I had no desire at all to go). I don't know what he wants to do five years down the road or more. I know he wants to live in CA or AZ because he hates the Midwest and he hates winter. That's about it. I don't know how he plans to accomplish this and sadly, I can see him being in the same place five to ten years from now, the only difference is that he'll have worked and been fired from just about every single job that's available in this area. I know I have little confidence in him. It doesn't help that he really has been fired from just about every single job he has ever had. He starts to get bored and frustrated with where he's at and then he starts to screw up and make mistakes. Sometimes, because he doesn't take care of himself, he'll start to fall asleep on the job and gets fired because of that. He's lost numerous jobs due to falling asleep.

But I'm not supposed to be working. I'm supposed to be staying at home and taking care of the girls. I'm supposed to be the house wife. I'm supposed to be homeschooling. I'm supposed to be breastfeeding and doing the shopping and the laundry. I'm supposed to be following his beliefs as far as what the girls are to learn and believe. I'm not supposed to celebrate the holidays I have grown up with and loved as a child. I'm not supposed to go to school. I'm not supposed to do anything that alters my body such as have a tubal so I don't have to worry about becoming pregnant with any more children. I'm supposed to feed my children healthy food with as few ingredients as possible and I'm supposed to avoid high fructose corn syrup and MSG even though we get food assistance from the government that is limited. I'm supposed to be okay with him taking up to 20% out of each and every check: 10% for tithe and 10% for the Feast of Tabernacles. I'm supposed to be okay with not being on his checking account because he couldn't be bothered to wait until I could go with him before he set up the account. I'm supposed to be okay with having almost no say at all in MY life but to follow him where he wants to go even if that means going to South Korea YET AGAIN because he's not happy with the money he's making here.

I'm not okay. I'm miserable. I hate my life. I have days where I want to die. I have many nights where I go to sleep thinking that I will be just fine with not waking up the next day because the thought of living another 40 years depresses the crap out of me. I have nothing to look forward to. Yes, I have my children and yes, I must be a horribly selfish person for not thinking of my children but are they really mine? I mean yeah, I gave birth to them and I went through quite a bit giving birth to them but he makes all the rules and the rules do not take into account anything I would like to do with them. I can't take my older daughter to some activity that is going on on a Saturday because she's going to church with her dad and it's the Sabbath anyway so she can't do anything that day never mind that just about every single freaking thing that goes on for kids in this freaking town is on a freaking Saturday. I can't take her trick or treating or take her Christmas shopping for her dad and baby sister. I'm constantly faced with a list of "don't"s. Don't take her to Mc Donald's; don't have her around these people; don't have her involved with that; don't get her these books; don't let her watch this on TV. It's never ending. I'm tired of it. This was never how I envisioned a marriage. It's not a marriage. I don't have a partner. I have a father. I have a marriage that is similar to how things was when I was 18 and still living at home. I'm told I'm rebellious because I watch shows and read books he doesn't approve of. I'm told I'm rebellious when I bring home HAM for myself.

I had a controlling father, a VERY controlling father who was also very chauvinistic. The man literally (and I'm using the word correctly when I say this) would not make a sandwich for himself if there was a woman in the house. He felt that he should be waited on and worshiped because he was a man. I feared him so I didn't do much to fight back even though he was also verbally abusive. Towards the end, I did though. Towards the end I started to lose that fear. I don't fear my husband and it shows. I know I don't respect him. I run my mouth and say whatever I feel like saying whether the kids are around or not because I know it ticks him off. I have become that sick of him and it's getting to where I'm so sick of him that I would rather be alone than live with him and the children. I would rather have no one in my life and be completely and totally alone.

I should leave. I know I should leave and I think about leaving all the time. I'm afraid of leaving the girls. I know he would never hurt them. That's not the problem. He has trouble enough taking care of himself though and I fear that would carry over to the girls. I don't think he could handle all of the details he would have to handle like doctors and things like that. I worry that he would be even more likely to lose his job and the girls would suffer due to that. I'm also still nursing and feel that obligation heavily. Even though my youngest is over a year, I nursed her older sister considerably longer and I don't wish to shortchange her--at least not too much. I haven't even looked into medications even though I have probably been fighting post partum depression for well over a year because I'm afraid of taking anything that would force me to wean. I feel that sense of obligations all mothers feel, sometimes to the detriment of their own mental and physical health. And I could never take them with because my husband would fight me and it would be a vicious nasty fight and I'm afraid he would win and to be honest, I don't think I'm a good enough mother to not lose.

So I constantly feel a sense of failure in my life because I can't do much more than survive each day (and boy does that make me feel like I'm living with my parents again). But instead of having school to help me feel good about myself (because I had always been a good student except when things at home were REALLY hard which made high school kind of a struggle to get through), I have nothing. The mommy wars especially have me feeling like a colossal failure to the point where I avoid most parenting groups. If I could do it all over again, I would not have gotten married. I for sure would not have had any children. And it's not because I don't love them but because I'm not doing much better than my parents did with me. And the sad thing is, I'm starting to understand more and more why they were the way they were.

To be 30 and feel like life isn't going to get any better than this is positively depressing. And the idea that there's at least another 35-40 or more years of this is enough to make me want to drink to a stupor. All I want to do is run away and find myself and find an actual purpose for my life. And no, religion is not going to help. Religion is crap. The Bible is crap. Too many people out there use religion to enslave others. I want nothing to do with it. I want nothing to do with busting my butt for a POSSIBLE everlasting life. Not to mention, I hate this life enough to want to check out at times, WHY would I want to live forever? Even in the spirit? I just don't have faith that there is all that much outside of this life. And I don't fear hell or the lake of fire or wherever it is that bad/evil people are supposed to go when they die. To be honest, I fear life more. Physical pain is nothing compared to the deep emotional pain I feel day to day. Even if there is NOTHING out there after I die, it can't be much worse than this.

All I want (and I have EVER wanted) is to be loved and accepted for ME. Not loved and accepted because of what can be gotten from me. Not love and accepted based on my religious beliefs. Loved and accepted for ME as I am NOW, faults and all.

Getting closer to having a toddler!

In the last month, Isabelle has made some great strides in movement. Back in February, she started scooting. It was sort of a combination of a military crawl and the way an inchworm moves. She would pull herself along with her arms but would also push herself forward using her feet. She could move around pretty quick this way once she got going. It wasn't too long after that that she figured out that doors didn't have invisible force fields (no idea where she got this idea but she just would not leave a room for the longest time) and she could leave the room and go anywhere she wanted to. This then evolved to climbing/pulling herself up on the bed (which is on the floor so not all to far to climb). From there, she would be able to sit down on her own. Not too long after that, she learned to pull herself up and finally, she mastered a regular crawl and has completely abandoned the military crawl she used for over two months. She's cruising now and learning to climb up on and over anything that stands in her way (her favorite is the foot locker I currently have in the bedroom). She's also getting into more trouble. Anything left in her reach is subject to being pulled down or dumped. If it's within her reach, she's into it. Nursing is getting interesting too as she's just not as interested in lying still for her meals. Instead, she would prefer to take them "to go". Unfortunately, that's one of the downfalls of nursing. You just can't get a breast "to go". She's also very well aware of where my breasts are which has me thinking of those who think a mom shouldn't nurse once the kid starts pulling up mom's shirt. Well, my ten month old knows exactly where to find her food and is already starting to lift up my shirt so...but no, have no intention of weaning this soon. Just a matter of time now before she starts walking which has me wondering just where the last ten months plus have gone. Admittedly, Natalie was walking by this time but I'm okay with Isabelle taking a little longer. My apartment isn't quite ready for a walker just yet!

Hmm, beginning to think I prefer the cold...

At least with cold weather, you don't get tornadoes. On Sunday, my hometown was hit by a tornado. There has not been a tornado here in almost 45 years. Last month, we had a really warm day that turned into severe weather when a cold front went through. The tornado siren sounded and we went down to the basement only to find that the storm didn't produce anything. This time, it did. An EF-2 tornado struck the south side part of my town touching down just a mere block or so away from one of our hospitals. It then took a NE path through town crossing 4 highways before dissipating near the bluffs. What's absolutely shocking is that despite NUMEROUS close calls, there were NO serious injuries or fatalities. Considering that our tornado struck a mere hour plus before Joplin, MO was hit, I consider us all extremely lucky. To add to that incredible luck is the fact that the siren nearest the area that was hit did not sound. It's been dead for a number of years. The warning that would have sounded through the weather radio also did not occur due to a malfunction. By the time the warning came over the weather radio, it was too late. If you were not watching TV, surfing the internet, or set up with a warning system over your cell phone, you did not get a warning. My brother was one of those people who did not even know a tornado hit until my sister called him to find out if he was okay. At the time, we didn't know where it hit. Fortunately, he was 8 blocks away from the path.

I had a chance to take a look down in the area the next morning and it was just amazing. Large trees were down at the room or snapped in half. Some homes were hit really hard and others barely touched. My old apartment that I had 8-9 years ago had no damage while houses on either side were hit. What's absolutely amazing is while trees were brought down, lilac bushes were left unscathed, blossoms intact. It looked like a war zone down there and I imagine that the neighborhoods down there will change bit by bit as trees are removed and houses town down and rebuilt.

Some of the stories that have been told are simply amazing. One couple rode the storm out in their car and survived. They come out of the car to find the apartment had been damaged severely. Another rode out the tornado in his bathroom and emerged to find no roof over the rest of his apartment. A bus driver basically drove into the storm head on and got through it without a scratch. It was a rain wrapped tornado so no one could see it and because of that there weren't even any pictures of it and officials for awhile were not even sure a tornado had hit. But the damage was clear that it was a tornado that struck.

We lucked out. Looking at what happened to Joplin, things could have been SO much worse. An EF-5 would have damaged the hospital and left a devastating path of destruction through my town. A storm hitting 24 hours later would have severely impacted rush hour traffic. We lucked out, massively.

Still, the whole thing has left me feeling unsettled. I live a mere 3 1/2 to 4 miles away from where the tornado hit. The last tornado hit the airport which is not all that far from me. I have been having nightmares since then and hearing anything about a tornado/storm makes me nervous. We're due for another really warm day on Monday and a cold front coming through. The Weather Channel is already talking about the possibility of severe weather in my area. I'm not looking forward to this. My husband will be at work and I'll be home alone with the girls. As much as I was done with winter, I do have to say that cold weather does keep the severe weather down.

Posting some current pictures.

And of course, realizing as I do so that I really need to take MORE pictures! Doesn't help that my five year old keeps stealing the camera to take over 100 pictures of random things around the apartment. I'm glad she likes taking pictures so much (really need to get her a camera) but all of her pictures take up space on my card. lol And of course, one of these days I really need to get some professional pictures done of Isabelle too.

It's been kind of a long (and COLD) month.

March ended on a rather somber note. Just after 2am on the 31st, a dear friend of our family passed away. He's actually the father of my younger sister's first husband who was killed back in 2003 by my father (long story there that I won't get into today). My father even before then was not the warmest father in the world. In fact, in many ways he was quite abusive both verbally and later on, physically. So, I never really had the greatest relationship with him even though we were similar in many ways and had a lot in common. My mother was also arrested and charged with being a party to the crime, first degree intentional homicide (my father was charged with first degree intentional homicide). Both were tried in two separate trials and both were found guilty and sentenced to live in prison without any chance of parole. So basically I have no parents in the sense that they are not in my life. I am not allowed to see them. I can write to them and my mother does call me collect but that's about it. They were not at my wedding. They have never met my children and very possibly never will (there is concern that they could still victimize my younger sister and I since the murder occurred in my apartment and I saw it happen so that's part of the reason why at this point I'm not allowed to see them). The last time I saw my mother was when she was here for my dad's trial in August of 2004. I saw my father a year later when he was in court for some motion he was trying to put through.

Jesse, the father of my sister's first husband, sort of unofficially adopted all of us four kids after everything went down. And for almost eight years, he was like a dad to me and the only grandparent my children really knew (other than my older daughter talking to my mom once in a great while). He was there at my wedding even though I barely knew him back then (even went and got fitted for the tux so that he could be dressed for the occasion). He was there to hold my oldest shortly after she was born. I would call him and talk to him and he would stop by and see my girls. During my youngest daughter's colic period, he was the only one who could hold her and calm her down and it was because of this that we started calling him The Baby Whisperer. He was a good friend and a wonderful and generous man who would give the shirt off his back and the shoes on his feet and do anything he could to help his kids out.

Last March, I found out he had lung cancer. He was told that without treatment, he would have only two months. With treatment, he might have two years. He started undergoing treatment for it, getting both chemotherapy and radiation. He was getting radiation at the time Isabelle was born so he didn't get to meet her until she was one month old. Even with the treatment though, the cancer spread. Around Christmas time, he was told he had about six months. Then he got worse. In February, he was told he had a month/month and a half. I got a call March 27th that he was in the hospital. He never regained consciousness.

The funeral was April 5th and he was laid to rest in a grave next to his son. It still feels odd sometimes not being able to call him and talk to him. I used to call him all the time, even when I was in Korea and phone calls were very expensive. The world has seemed much emptier since he died. He had so much energy and life within him that it just doesn't seem real that he's not here.

So that's been difficult to deal with at times. Shortly before that, my older sister moved away to another state and that's been hard too. It's hard not to feel an overwhelming sense of loneliness when people close to you leave so April has been particularly difficult this year. Doesn't help that outside of a couple of warm days (including one especially warm day that brought with it a severe storm and almost hit us with a tornado too) it's been quite chilly. We at the end of April and we're still getting nights that are below freezing and even snow! Makes me wonder when it's really going to start getting warm outside.

Isabelle's nine month update.

Took Isabelle to her nine month doctor's appointment last Friday. Current stats: 26 3/4 inches long (23rd percentile) and 14 lbs, 2 oz (.5th percentile). She's gaining weight but still pretty small. However, her ped is not worried as she looks happy, healthy, and has at least a little bit of fat on her.

She also now has her first tooth. It came in around the beginning of the month.

How do I tell my oldest daughter...

...that her grandpa is gone? He's not her biological grandfather but he's been the only grandparent she knows for the last five years. He lost his battle to lung cancer about two hours ago. I went to the hospital to see him one last time and came home around 2am and by then, she was asleep. I don't have the heart to wake her and tell her but I truly do not know how I'm going to tell her that he's gone. We've been preparing her for this for over a year now, since we first found out and we've been talking about it. She's seen him a couple of times this week when he went to the hospital after he suddenly declined on Sunday but it's hard for ME to believe he's gone and I saw him less than an hour before he died! It just doesn't seem real.

Poor thing. First her Aunt Mia moved far away to Tennessee and now her grandpa has died.

Getting just a tad tired of winter here...

I seem to remember a groundhog saying that spring was going to be early. So much for that! We did get our first spring thunderstorm early Tuesday morning and later Tuesday evening. This was followed the very next morning with--believe it or not--SNOW!!! Yes, we got about two inches of snow here following the almost two inches of rain we got the day before. And with the snow came the cold, lows around 15 degrees expected tonight with temperatures going lower each night through Sunday which is expected to be around 9 degrees. Really? I mean, it IS almost April for crying out loud! I'm getting sick of this! I swear, the older I get, the more I hate winter and the more I want to get out of Wisconsin for good.

The computer works again!

Though to be honest, it's been working for more than a week now. I'm SO glad too and it didn't take much to fix it at all. I didn't even have to take it in. I hadn't been allowing Windows to update my computer in awhile due to the fact that one time when I had, my wi fi was disabled. Somehow, the updates got turned back on and I guess enough of them were loaded to take care of the virus problem. When I turned on the computer while talking to the tech person on the phone, a whole bunch of things started scrolling down the screen and the computer was looking for errors. When that was all done, my desktop loaded and I was no longer getting error messages about the virus. Only problem was my computer wasn't able to go online. The tech person was able to walk me through to fix that and it wasn't long before the computer was up and running again just as it was before. Whew! That was a huge relief for me. I did download and install an antivirus and I passcoded the computer so that not just anyone can get on it. I hate to have to do that but John's been going on it while I'm gone and not even bothering to ask me if he could and it was starting to really get to me. Sadly that's one of the many issues we have right now.

So the computer's working and spring is on the way so I thought I would change the template again. At least this one didn't take quite as much work as the last one. lol

Posting from the library.

My computer which is my lifeline as that is the main source of social interaction for me (yes, I know, it's pathetic) is dead. While I was at the store on Friday, John went online on Internet Explorer (I usually use Fire Fox), clicked on a page, and my poor computer was hit. While it still turns on and goes to my desktop fine, I get hit with error message upon error message saying I have a virus and I'm unable to go online or even open a word document. So I'm at the library, catching up on things but only get an hour to use it. SO frustrating. I hate this and I was FURIOUS with John for going online without even asking me. He doesn't feel needs to and it's one more issue we have, his complete lack of respect towards my things. So, I will be taking the computer in tomorrow where I bought it over a year ago and hopefully it can be fixed. If not, I'll be in the market for a new computer. *sigh*

Updates on Isabelle.

It's been a pretty busy month for Isabelle. Along with rolling, she's been scooting around now and getting into all kinds of things. She may not be crawling but it's amazing just how quickly she gets herself around pulling herself with her arms. She was having some trouble rolling back to her tummy from her back but has recently mastered that which means that she is no longer safe to set down just anywhere. You turn your back on her and she WILL be gone!

This is the fun age though and I enjoy it very much. She's happy, she's active, and she's just fun to be around. She's making all kinds of noises and gives very sweet and sloppy kisses. Hard to believe she was such an unhappy baby only a few months ago. Her personality has really bloomed since her colic stage ended and she's an absolute delight to be with.

She's not sleeping the greatest at night all the time but doesn't wake up more than once a night. If I could get Natalie to bed earlier, it probably wouldn't be a big deal but oftentimes, she's not asleep until after midnight which makes it harder for me to deal with any 4 am feeding times that may crop up.

I'm just tired of it all.

I'm tired of all the sadness, all the greed, all the bad things in life. So much has been on my mind lately and it's really wearing me down. I'm getting SO tired of life being like this, that sense of things never really getting any better, just struggling and struggling and never getting anywhere. I'm getting tired of feeling detached from people, of feeling like I'm on the outside looking in, having nothing to really look forward to, of old wounds reopening again. I'm tired and my mind is sad and I feel such a loss of control of everything, a sense that nothing has been right in the last 8 years and I wonder if it ever will be.

I know I have two beautiful, healthy daughters and I know I should be very grateful for them. It's not that I'm not it's just that everything else is so overwhelming. And I don't know who to reach out to or who I can talk to. I feel SO alone and that feeling almost never changes and hasn't really.

I've had my share of death I've dealt with. I was with my husband at his mother's funeral after she died following complications from gallbladder surgery. I witnessed the murder of my one brother-in-law. I was there when my younger sister gave birth to a stillborn baby. So far, these deaths have all been rather sudden and unexpected. I had never really dealt with a long term illness. I have very vague memories of my grandfather and his series of illnesses following a stroke. I was three though and very out of touch with what was going on. My grandmother's illness and death from liver cancer happened when I was even younger so watching and waiting for someone to die has not been an experience I had ever gone through...until now. And I will say this, I prefer the sudden death over this.

The father of the brother-in-law of mine who was murdered took us all on as his "adopted" kids very shortly after the murder happened and my parents were incarcerated. He has become more of a father to me than my father (who was very emotionally distant and prone to being at the very least, emotionally abusive) ever was. He was there for my wedding and has helped me out a number of times. He came to the hospital after my first daughter was born and would visit and spend time with us whenever he could.

About a year ago, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. He had been a smoker so the diagnosis was not a total surprise. He was told that without treatment, he would have only a couple of months and with treatment, up to two years. So he went with treatment. We had been preparing ourselves for his death since then but even with that, I was totally unprepared for how quickly he would get worse. Even with the cancer spreading, he still kept his spirit and did as much as he possibly could. There were setbacks here and there but again, he still had some spirit left in him. A couple of weeks ago, he got worse and went to the hospital. The cancer had spread even more and he had reached a point where he couldn't eat without getting sick. He was told to start getting his affairs in order because at this point, there was nothing more than could be done and he had maybe a month to a month and a half left. I saw him on Thursday and I don't think he has that long. He came home Friday and now we're just waiting. I try to call him but he can barely talk that long. His spirit seems to already be gone; this is not the person I had come to know these last eight years.

This no car thing is getting REALLY old.

Back in September, I made the mistake of getting a place with my younger sister. I knew it was a bad idea. We've had problems in the past living together and I knew at anytime, my husband and daughter would come home and then there would be even more problems. My sister and husband do not get along. But, the friend I was living with was getting ready to sell her house and needed to get the room I was staying in ready for that. Isabelle was starting to have issues with colic and I really didn't know when John and Natalie would be returning to the US. My sister had two weeks to find a new place to live because where she was living, the landlord would not let her stay so she had to go. She has three kids and had such a bad rental history that it was next to impossible for her to find place. We found a 3 bedroom apartment that was right next door to members of my sister's first husband's family. The landlord was not overly concerned with rental references, and it was a three bedroom apartment which we were going to need for the six people who were going to be living there. We got the place and moved in. She needed some help with babysitting because she was both working and going to school full time. One of the things I had expected was some help with transportation (I mean, I was footing most of the bill for the apartment as I paid about 90% of the rent and security deposit and I was babysitting for free). Things did not exactly work out that way. And when John and Natalie returned, there were some huge problems and my sister moved out less than two months into the lease (she was able to get taken off the lease though).

This left us with no car. And while we live right on the bus line, the bus system itself is horribly inconvenient. It runs every half an hour until about 6 pm and then once an hour until 10:40. That's during the week. During the weekends, it's once an hour. Some areas have even less coverage, once an hour until almost 6 Monday through Friday. One area in particular even lost coverage, from 10:25 am to 1:25 pm, there are no bus runs. Problem with this route is that the two big grocery stores on that side of town (and also one of the cheapest grocery stores in town) is along it. These are the two stores we go to the most. The rest of the stores are more expensive with items up to $1 or more than what you would pay at the cheaper store.

John works until 3:30 during the week. He's off on Fridays. Other than Fridays, he can't go to the cheaper store. Then there's the fact that we try to shop only once a week. When we lived in Korea, we didn't have a car. We were shopping almost every single day in order to replenish supplies because when you don't have a car, you're limited in how much you can buy because you have to carry it home. So there's the time thing there too. It's incredibly time consuming to take the bus to the store several times a week because you can't carry home a week's worth of groceries.

I'm just beyond frustrated right now. We've gotten by using the neighbor's car because my sister's first husband's dad sort of adopted us kids so he has always helped us out and has said we can use the car whenever it is available. It used to be available quite often and so we didn't have any problems getting out to shop but now they've had some car problems and the car isn't available as often and now we're finding ourselves without a way to get groceries. I HATE asking people to take me to the store. I don't know a lot of people who are willing to do this. My sister couldn't even be bothered to take me to the store when she lived here and I was babysitting for her. Forget asking her now. My one friend probably would but she has done SO much for me, I hate asking her for anymore help. My brother probably would but then I'm having to kick in about $20 or more in groceries for him and I can't afford it. So I don't know what we're going to do. I don't know if we're going to get anything back on our taxes because John only worked a month and a half before the end of the year. Cars are not cheap. Getting a car licensed and insured and gassed up is not cheap. Keeping a car running is definitely not cheap. But we really do not have any other options.

I hate how politicians go on and on about all the things we need to be doing to reduce global warming and stuff like that but when it comes down to it, they really don't do anything to SUPPORT making earth friendly life style choices other than to sign into law things that take away our FREEDOM to make choices about what we buy. A ton of money went into building this bus station downtown and the bus routes were all changed to include it making the whole thing a huge deal and yet the bus routes and times are SO inconvenient that only people who absolutely do not have a car are going to use the bus. Anyone else isn't going to waste their time. Why take the bus (even if it does cost a lot less to use than a car each month) if it takes about two hours to get from one end of town to the other when it takes only 30 minutes at the most to do it by car! They could make riding the bus FREE and it still wouldn't get many people riding it (and they do make it free too, once a month). John has the choice of catching the bus right outside of our apartment and taking it downtown and catching another bus in order to get to work or walking seven blocks to catch the bus that will take him to work. He usually makes the walk which isn't a problem most days of the week but it's winter in Wisconsin and he's done this on mornings where the temps have been as low as -12 or more degrees (and that's before the windchill). It's just really frustrating and I'm especially frustrated by the fact that instead of my sister giving me her car when she got her new one (since the car was given to her), she sold it instead. And instead of paying me back the money she owed me for rent when she moved out, she took her entire tax return (that she had to call and brag to me about when we've been struggling for the last three months to pay our rent in time) and spent it on a car. Sometimes, it's really hard not to hate her.

I'm just getting to where I'm going to post an ad on Craig's list offering $30/month to someone who can drive me to the store once a week to get groceries because this is getting absolutely absurd.

Isabelle's six month update.

Took Isabelle in for her 6 month check up ten days ago. Other than whatever caused her rash the day before, she's healthy and gaining weight. She currently weighs 12 lbs, 11 oz and is 25 1/4 inches tall. To compare, Natalie at FOUR months weighed 14 lbs and was 25 1/4 inches tall.

A few days before she turned 6 months, Isabelle decided she was tired of watching everyone else eat and stole a slice of apple from her sister. She gnawed on it for while and seemed to enjoy it greatly.

A few days later, she got a really bad rash everywhere. I had no idea what it was and since she also seemed puffy and swollen, I decided to take her in to the emergency room to make sure nothing was wrong with her. No idea what caused the rash but the doctor gave me a prescription for an antihistamine and the rash was gone almost as quickly as it came. Pretty scary though!

Struggling...cont.

I HATE that there is such a taboo out there about hating being a parent. I wasn't even sure I wanted to have kids when I met John. At first, we both decided we didn't want kids. Both of us struggled with less than ideal childhoods (John's in some ways was even more messed up than mine; he wasn't even raised by his bio parents but by his half sister from his dad's first marriage). Eventually that changed after we married and I started trying to figure out my life purpose. Looking back, sometimes I think I should have just not have had kids. It's not that I don't like my kids because I do and I love them and they're the best part about being a parent, it's not the kids thing at all. It's the isolation, the constant mommy wars that divide mothers and makes it next to impossible to have ANY friends. It's the LONELINESS. It's the feeling like a failure when you can't do everything possible for your kids because there's only one income but feeling guilty too for even thinking of going back to work and not being with your kids all day. It's the damned if you do, damned if you don't feeling that constantly follows you around and that feeling that no matter what you do, you're going to completely and totally screw up your kids. It's the feeling that what you do is NEVER enough. I hate it. I hate feeling that way. I hate feeling like a complete and total failure. I hate spending most of my time alone even with two kids and a husband at home. I'm a dishrag, a sponge, or a mop. I'm used when needed and used all the time but not always asked how I'm doing or how I'm feeling or how my day was.

No doubt, people will read this and say I need to stop playing the victim, get up and get out there and do something. It's amazing how people who know little to nothing about me at all will take something I say in a post and just think they can give me simplistic advice to follow and that following their advice will solve all of my problems. And if I don't follow their advice, well then again, I'm just playing the victim.

There are times I honestly do not know what to do. I don't have a mother I can call and talk to for advice. I don't have a family that is supportive that I can go to when I'm having a hard time. I'm basically faking it, trying to do it all with little support and a TON of conflicting advice. And seriously, there are days when drinking myself to oblivion starts to look real darn good.

I had my older daughter which was a clusterpuck and a half (cesarean birth that totally traumatized me and triggered the post traumatic stress issues I already had). My marriage dang near disintegrated when my husband decided to go all cult-follower on me. I moved in with my sister. We patched things up. We found our own place in another city. Two years after that, my husband goes to Korea, we follow him four months later, and less than a year after we get there, I'm pregnant again. I return to the US, have the baby (which thank goodness was the empowering VBAC I needed), my husband and daughter return three months later, and again, I'm dealing with power struggles between us as my husband goes all zealous on me. This time, I don't know if I can take it anymore. I don't know how much more I can give. Add to that family issues that just keep getting worse and worse, and I just want to run away and go hide in a cave.

It's not just I feel I'm failing at being a parent. I feel I'm failing at life. I'm not getting anything out of it and I really wonder if this is it, if this is as good as it's going to get which really isn't all that good. I'm still trying to figure out the purpose of even being alive. And that's been a struggle in and of itself for the last eight years having severe survivor's guilt from my brother-in-law's murder. I still sometimes feel I never should have survived that day and because of that, I feel stuck, I feel that no matter what I do I'm stuck because really, I never should have been here. And that feeling gets worse all the time and nothing helps. I see everything falling into place for other people and I wonder if it will ever be that way for me or if there will always be this sense of failing that I constantly carry. I don't know. I just don't know anymore. I don't know what to do. I don't know who to trust or what to believe or what higher power to look up to. I feel stuck and not able to grow up, yet growing older every day. And I have no control over anything, just dragged along for the ride, completely and totally helpless.

Struggling...

It's hard to feel that parenting is a good enough purpose when I feel like such a failure at it. I'm not the "fun" parent. I'm definitely not the "calm" parent. To be honest, that I survived my childhood is nothing short of a miracle. A therapist who had worked with my mom and dad for over a decade even asked me how I got through it all. I lived in a very dysfunctional household where I was, at best, merely emotionally neglected and at worse, verbally and physically abused. I did not even feel safe enough to go to my own mother if I had been hurt and would try to hide even when I had gotten BURNED. So how can I even begin to teach my children anything about love and treating others with kindness when I wasn't raised that way myself?

Since my husband has his idea as to how our children should be parented, I feel like there is little I can even do. I'm out of touch with my five year old, having been away from her as long as I was and I'm still trying to figure this new baby out, a baby that until very recently, had colic and, since that ended, has struggled to keep weight on and gain weight.

So actually, to be honest, right now, parenting seems to only point out to me my many failures. And so, more and more, I seek to find SOMETHING I'm good at again. It's not so much I'm looking for a career or anything that would take me away from them but something I can accomplish and succeed at. I'm 30 years old and I can't even DRIVE! So there's this feeling not so much that I'm missing out on life but that something is missing in my life. And maybe the solution is nothing more than to seek out a new craft or find a church. I don't know but I have to find SOMETHING because this can't be it. I don't know very many mothers who do ONLY the parenting thing. There is SOMETHING else they are doing whether they are involved with their church or have a hobby or sell something online or write articles, SOMETHING. They are not just mothers.

Changes!

New year, new decade (because, really it is when you think about it as the first year was 1, not 0 so the end of the decade would be 10, not 09), time to make the blog look a little new too. First is the name, changed that (especially since our shoebox has increased substantially since returning to the US and to NORMAL housing prices ha ha ha) and plan to change colors, template, who knows what else! So...stay tuned!

Happy New Year!

Since last year, I had been trying to decide what to do about my daughter's blog. We were expecting our second child but had no idea if we would have a boy or a girl. I had thought of keeping the same blog for both but I had also thought of setting up a second blog either for both kids together or a separate one for the new little one. We found out we were having a girl so that made coming up with the blog title fairly easy and I knew I wanted to have one blog for both girls but just wasn't sure when to start it up. I therefore haven't done too much as far as blogging about Isabelle, my second daughter. I still blogged about Natalie on her blog though. She turned five last week and with the end of the year, the answer was clear, I would start a new blog for both of them on January first. New year, new blog, it made perfect sense to me.

So, this is a blog about my five year old daughter Natalie and her little sister, Isabelle who was born back in July. Hopefully I'll do a better job of keeping up with the various milestones and such than I did on Natalie's blog (though I didn't do too bad considering). I also hope to post various pictures as well as video of the two as time goes on. So, stay tuned and welcome!