Emotional Baggage Sundays (+1): Fighting the Urge to Fight

I have a confession to make..... as much as I subscribe to the school of thought that you just have to let stuff go, I still harbor a lot of anger, hostility and pissedoffedness toward The Ex. Like, I get really, REALLY angry to the point where I'd like to commit trespass to his chattels (something along the lines of this) or some other act resulting in grievous bodily harm (but only in my mind, loved ones..... only in my mind). I'm usually a pretty laid back person who doesn't get worked up over much, especially when there's nothing I can do about it. But dealing with The Ex frustrates me to NO END, and I'm just tired of it.

Take this weekend, for example. The arrangement is that whoever has the kids for the weekend picks up said child (as we already each have one of them) at 6pm on Friday and returns them at 6pm on Sunday. Pretty standard arrangement. In the spirit of cooperation, we've been somewhat flexible on this schedule so that nobody is up in arms if we can't get there til 7pm or want the kids to stay over a little later on Sunday for dinner. However, this also leaves great room for abuse. Daughter and I had graduation for our martial arts class on Saturday morning, which The Ex claimed he could not get Daughter to so she would have to stay with me Friday and he'd come get her afterward on Saturday. Wasn't really too happy about this, because in my opinion if it's his weekend, it's HIS responsibility to get her where she needs to go and figuring out the logistics is his problem, not mine. But as usual, I said okay because I had Daughter's interests at heart and knew this was important to her.*

(*Daughter fell off a scooter and broke her wrist a week ago, 3 days before she was supposed to test to become a green belt. The day after she had surgery to reset the bone and have a pin inserted, she went ahead and took, and passed, her green belt test WITH her cast and scratched up face and knuckles.... she was uber determined. So yea, to miss the graduation would have been no bueno.)

Then The Ex changes things on me AGAIN and insists that I bring her to him. Uh no, that's not the deal... it's pick ups, not drop offs. That doesn't matter to him though. So all Friday evening and Saturday morning through afternoon we are battling via text because basically he was refusing to honor the arrangement, AND the secondary arrangement that HE came up with, and come pick her up. It even devolved to the point of him calling me a "stupid hoe".... wholly unnecessary. So FINALLY he says he's on his way to come pick her up around 1pm. I shower, get dressed, and wait.... and wait.... and wait..... because I had to be at a bar association event that afternoon. About an hour and a half later I get a text saying "I'll be there in an hour." It took all I had not to scream obscenities about him in front of his child. Although my calm outer facade said "Fine, I'll just take her with me to my function" my insides were screaming with rage. It took Daughter calling him for him to finally agree to at least meet me en route to my function, to which I reluctantly agreed because the event, while not kid un-friendly, wasn't all that kid-friendly either. I show up to the designated spot.... my travel distance being much further than his.... and he isn't there. More waiting. More rage, which I'm trying desperately to conceal in front of Daughter, but knowing me I didn't do a very good job..... even when I'm quiet, I tend to seethe. He finally shows up and Daughter is on her merry way (to the most hoodtastic and craptastic park festival that The Ex was supposedly too busy "organizing" to come pick her up, but from the looks of it, it didn't look like much "organizing" happened to put that mess together).

I just get so angry at the complete and utter lack of consideration and his constant need to try and punk me..... just a bully mentality. Never mind the blatant disrespect and insults, which really piss me off too, but which unfortunately I am somewhat used to from our days of being in wedded bliss (if you can't detect the custard thick sarcasm there, please stop reading my blogs). I'm a pretty cooperative person, but the more he tries to push me and punk me, the less inclined I am to show kindness. It's kind of a Golden Rule thing, a lesson which was apparently wasted on him. Had he 1) explained why he needed my assistance and cooperation instead of just saying "I can't/won't do it" and 2) Stuck to his word after I agreed to help him out, it would have been an entirely different scenario. And I told him that..... you receive what you give out, and so I wasn't giving out much in the way of compassion and consideration.

This troubles me, however. I don't want to be a bitter, vengeful person. I don't go as far as to be the nightmare baby momma from hell and just do things to fuck with him for the sake of fucking with him, but I'm just not inclined to be very nice. And I'll admit..... my brand of mean is quite surgical and designed to jab right where it hurts. He boxes, I fence. Regardless, though, it wastes A LOT of emotional energy, and, like a real physical fight, even when you've "won" you still come out a little beat up and sore. I'm troubled because it seems like instead of relations between us improving over time, it seems to be getting worse and worse.

Right now I'm at the point where I'm no longer sure how to be the "better person" without being a doormat that gets shat upon constantly. When you are dealing with a person who has no sense of why it's important to honor his word and thinks of nobody but himself, yet insists on what a "good person" he is, it's very, VERY hard to be the bigger person and ignore his antics, insults, and lack of consideration. Does the Golden Rule mean that if someone gives you bad treatment that you are then justified in giving it back? Or is the Golden Rule an absolute mandate that must be followed no matter how you are treated? I know that constant tit for tat gets you nowhere, but there has to be some point at which you should be able to stand up and fight back.

All I know is that I'm tired of the anger, the insults, the conflict, the drama...... I just want to move on with my life peacefully. And not have the constant urge to fight.

How Love Works: Divorce from a Kid's Perspective

I'm not 110% certain that this was actually written by a child (you never know with things you receive in e-mail chains), but the message is the same nonetheless. Kids see, feel and experience much more than you think they do, and this is especially important to remember when it comes to divorce. The following is hilarious..... but not. Enjoy.

Fin.

"Did you see my Tweet about.......?"

So yes, loved ones, I know I've been seriously slacking on the blogging front. But it's really been for legitimate reason, I swear...... ok, maybe not swear, but that's my present argument. But for real, part of the reason is that this blog originally was to be about my "adventures" going through and post-divorce, and one very fruitful source of inspiration is the world of dating.

Well, I'm not dating.

Yes, loved ones, I've been officially boo'd up for quite some time now, so there is much less tom- and kimfoolery to write about.

Except.... there really is.

However, since I would like to remain outside of the world of dating, I can't write about all the issues I think about and deal with in the day to day world of relationships. Ok, so there are many benign topics I could write about if I would quit being lazy and actually sit down to a keyboard to type something other than a Tweet but anyone with a relationship-themed blog who is actually IN a relationship knows that this is a veritable minefield of potential drama (which means that the most open and honest relationship blogs come from those people who AREN'T in relationships..... hmmm, think about that for a minute, loved ones). And as a person who tends to not trip about many things that normal human beings trip about, thus leading me directly to these mines, my inclination has just been to avoid the field altogether as not to inadvertently cause an explosion by being asked to explain and justify what I meant or get grilled about the ulterior motives of my post. And I'm not falling into the trap of "Say whatever is on your mind..... I won't get mad."

*long Napoleon Dynamite-esq sigh*

Anyway, one thing I have noticed is not only how blogging has an impact on relationships (or rather, relationships have an impact on blogging) but also another relatively recent social networking phenomenon: Twitter. As the saying goes, you're nobody til somebody Tweets you..... ok, maybe not, but my point is that it seems EVERYONE is on Twitter these days, and most likely if you're on Twitter, your boo-thang is on Twitter, too. And of course you follow each other. The result of this is that you are privy to your love muffin's thoughts and experiences all day.

Cute and special, right? It's great that you know that your hunny got a speeding ticket the very MOMENT it happens (because true Twitter heads would be Tweeting the news while they are waiting for the cop to finish writing out the ticket), verdad?

Sure..... and no.

Of course you can e-interact with your boo with an @ reply, or even a direct message, which is almost, but not quite, the same thing as talking to them about it (I'm a believer that text messaging and e-mails and the like are valid forms of communication.... I'm a modern girl). The conundrum arises when you get home. Because your boo already knows that you got a speeding ticket, ate maque choux at Yats for lunch, found out your BFF is pregnant, and think your co-worker is a moron.... what is there left to talk about? I frequently find myself starting off conversations with "Did you see my Tweet about......?" Of course, I usually didn't go into the entire situation in 140 characters or less so I do have SOMETHING to talk about, but I've just noticed that Twitter has had a definite influence in my verbal communications, whether that's an assumption that he already knows what I'm talking about and has some frame of reference, or that the matter was so inconsequential that 140 characters was sufficient to address it and it doesn't need to be discussed again.

Two ways to look at this: (1) Twitter hinders conversation because you've already talked about what you were going to talk about so there's no need to talk about it again for fear of being redundant, or (2) Twitter filters out the BS chatter so you're not subject to it after a long day of work (more of a bonus for men who complain that their girls talk too damn much, but I'm not one of those type of women anyway). I guess this really depends on what type of Tweeter you are, whether you are like me and Tweet about the mundane minutia of the day, or whether you only Tweet about major life occurrences. It also depends on what kind of verbal communicator you are.... whether you feel the need to share, or want to hear, every single little detail of your or your boo-thang's day.

For me personally, I don't think it's a problem. Sometime Tweets are actually a conversation starter: "So what did you mean when you Tweeted........?" and you can further elaborate on those 137 characters you wrote at 1:22pm. On the flipside, though, on a particularly boring day there's really not much more than what was written in the day's Tweets, so there's really not much more to say.

So....... has anyone else noticed Twitter's impact on relationships and communication? Good, bad, indifferent?

Oh, and follow me on.