have me time (and a place to vent)

It’s so negative, and I’m trying not to be negative. But I thought I might need it…and I do.

I’ve had a shitty Christmas. My favorite holiday. And it even snowed! Should have been a great time, but it wasn’t. To the people who made it so, I say this.
1. She’s not spoiled. She’s a baby. You sulked all day because you didn’t get what you wanted. Yet because you’ve put off looking for a job, you didn’t give us anything. Who’s spoiled?
2. Just because I don’t parent like you do doesn’t make me a bad parent. What do you think it says to her when you bash Mommy?
3. I am not thin by choice. It’s not to piss you off. I am stressed, have no time, and have an active 16-month-old. But thanks for making me feel repulsive. It’s no less hurtful than it was in my teens.
4. Thanks for ruining the one vacation I’ve had all year.

and not in a good way.

I didn’t mean to. And I’ve probably cried four times the tears he did. But I still feel like shit.

Which pisses me off. Because (without getting into too much detail), I don’t think I’m in the wrong here. They offered help, I took it (though I knew better), and now it’s been thrown in my face in the cruelest way possible.

Then I come home and learn that R is not coming home tonight; he’s staying at his dad’s. I’m sure they’re drinking and having a good time, and I don’t begrudge him that. (In fact, I’d rather he do it there.) But who’s supposed to watch Anya tomorrow while I work?

I really, really need to vent, but I feel shitty doing it on Facebook…my parents are on there. Yeah, I know.

And I don’t really have anyone else I can talk to about stuff like this, so…hi. If you made it this far, thanks for reading.

And not just because the lack of alone time is getting to me. After all of the discussions we’ve had, he’s doing things I expressly asked him not to do: calling her names (I can’t tell you how many times I heard the word “turd” yesterday), smacking her fingers when she does something she’s not supposed to, and now feeding her meat.

I know parenting is a compromise, but dammit, these are not small issues to me. It wasn’t so bad when he was just around in the evenings, but now she’s dealing with things like this all day. And I can’t intervene because I’m scrambling to make enough money to keep us afloat.

Grr. Just…grr.

And I have no internet yet. So no long rant for me except inside my head.

That’s probably for the best.

Bebe is sleeping, Mom and Dad have gone into town, and R is next door eating. Commence ranting. (Warning: Long, rambly post. Sorry about this.)

Bebe aside, they’re starting to drive me crazy. While I’m grateful for all my parents have done for us (financially and emotionally), it’s really hard to move back in with your parents – even temporarily – at 37.

Seems like I do everything wrong. Granted, they both have more than a touch of OCD (Dad more than Mom), but I’m getting criticized at every turn. I still haven’t figured out what I’m supposed to be doing with the toilet paper. Dad has his and I have mine (for reasons I can’t fathom, we can’t share a roll), and every time I go into the bathroom, there’s a different roll on the dispenser. I’m not sure what the switching is all about, but I’m sure I’m somehow provoking it. (Bathroom breaks are few and far between, and rushed when I get them…when I’m in there, I grab whatever is on the dispenser. So you’d think mine would stay on the dispenser. Not so.)

I don’t eat/drink the food in the fridge fast enough…or else I eat/drink something he was saving for Mom. Generally, though, I don’t eat as much as fast as I should. Yet when I do start eating something, he throws it away. Even if it’s still good.

I forget to write down feedings, so he assumes the baby hasn’t eaten in hours. I (gasp) doze off sometimes when the baby’s asleep; someone must always be awake and watching over her. (He’s been sitting up with her every night since the first week, because a couple of times I didn’t wake up when she cried.)

Basically any time the baby cries, unless they’ve tried to soothe her and have failed, there’s this unspoken assumption that I’m letting her cry because I don’t love her enough to stop what I’m doing and soothe her. Even if what I’m doing is stealing a much-needed bathroom break.

Add to this the interpersonal tensions between my parents, between my parents and R, and between R and myself, and you have a powder keg looking for a match.

There’s more, but you get the idea. My shoulders are probably permanently anchored about my ears now, and my jaw is cramping in the clenched position. R says it’s a wonder I’m not more crazy, considering.

I need to move out. NEED. For my own sanity if nothing else. But every time we go next door, Anya gets really jumpy and fussy…this is the only home she’s known. So I keep putting it off. Hopefully this week will be the week. But going back to my last rant, if R doesn’t get a job soon, I won’t be able to afford that house. Which means Anya and I will have to move back in here…semi-permanently.

Let’s not go there.

And I’m still hurting from the c-section. Any sort of activity sets off a couple of days of pain. Minor activity, like cooking dinner, causes me to hurt so bad it wakes me up at night. The doctor says I’m healing beautifully. So I don’t know what the deal is. My best guess is that my body’s just struggling in general. My skin is horribly dry, my fingernails are growing oddly, my hair’s barely growing at all. I barely make any milk, so I’m only nursing to comfort Anya, not to feed her. Yet I haven’t started having periods again. (Granted, I bled so much after childbirth that they had to give me medication to stop me…it’s possible that I just haven’t built up any blood yet.) When I saw the doctor, he did some bloodwork on me and everything came back normal; I’m not anemic, my white cell count isn’t high, and everything else is as it should be. I don’t know what the deal is. But I am worried about the toll the impending commute will take on me in light of all this.

Did I mention that most of the time I complain about incision pain, I’m treated as if I’m milking it for sympathy and to get out of doing things? Yeah.

Mostly, though, I think my biggest problem right now is I have no time for myself. I went from living alone to living with someone who worked nights (so basically living alone) to living with a houseful of people who are up in shifts 24 hours a day. I have no time to think…no time to relax, process, bitch, and get over things. And no one really to talk to about it all, because everyone in my daily life is the cause of some of my tension. If I had even 20 minutes a day alone with the laptop, I could let it out. But most days I don’t even get 5.

I know it’ll all work out eventually. It’s just hard to muddle through it at the moment. If you made it this far, thank you for listening. :)

while everyone else is otherwise occupied. Such moments are few and far between.

Last night, life seemed pretty hopeless. Everything’s been getting me down lately…money, relationship tensions, an excess of television and a dearth of alone time. I nearly broke down in Toys R Us…a new low.

Then I came home, and Anya was so very happy to see me. She and I lay on the bed and she just looked at me, smiling and laughing and cooing while playing with my hair and touching my face. And I remembered why I’m doing all of this.

It’s true: Having a baby changes your life forever. While some of the individual moments may be bad – very bad – the overall change is better than I ever imagined.

It finally came on early enough for me to watch it, and I caught it as it was starting. Do you think I got to watch it? Hell no. Because R insisted I read an online job application to him and enter his answers so he could walk with the (sleeping) baby.

WTH?

I’m a bit annoyed with him, honestly. He’s making the minimum effort to find a job…mostly he plays video games all day at our house, while I’m at my parents’ watching the baby. (Long story…another entry in itself.) He also spends every Saturday at his parents’ drinking with his dad, and every Sunday shopping for stuff we don’t need. All while I’m wondering how we’ll pay bills.

And don’t get me started on his hair. Which he refuses to cut even if it would mean getting a better job. He’s basically making his daughter do without so he can have long hair.

I’m going to try to keep this short, because (a) Anya will probably awaken soon and (b) if I start babbling, this will turn into an entry so long no one will want to read it…including me. My goal is instead to post more frequent, shorter entries so I stop stewing about things.

Whew. Do I sound like a shut-in yet?

Anyway, stress.

1. I’m broke. Brokebroke. I am $200 short for rent, with nothing left over for bills. My STD insurance only covered 8 weeks of leave – something I only discovered after I’d taken 7 of them. And I’ve racked up more expenses than I’d counted on with the c-section, the move, and my [expletive deleted] former landlords. My parents (and R’s) have offered to help, and I will have to take them up on that or cut my leave short. Which no one wants me to do…least of all Dad.

2. R is still unemployed. I think I’ve finally impressed upon him the urgency of our situation, now that it’s too late to pull ourselves out of it unscathed.

3. The new place is still a work in progress, because I’ve not exactly had much help in getting everything set up. Which is incredible, considering the extra hands I have.

4. I’m still living with my parents as a result. I’m 37 years old and living at home. That’s an entry unto itself.

The little one is stirring, so I’ll have to save the rest for later.

Just as soon as I can get time on a real computer (when I’m not paying bills).