Thursday Updates

[freezorburn]

Pardon the novella. I need to get this out. This weekend is my last weekend with my dog for a while.

I think there are a couple of people here from the old CD board that might remember my story, but I had a love/hate relationship with this dog for the longest time. XH and I adopted him from a rescue organization about 8 years ago. He had some issues -- guarding food, and occasionally reactive to another dog or another person, but we never could figure out what the common thread was. And he can't stand it when someone comes to the door. Just the front door. He doesn't care if people come in through the back door or the garage, just don't come near the front door. I spent a ton of time working with him on basic obedience, and really getting him to walk on leash without pulling. I learned how to give him massages to try to settle down his anxiety. He did mellow out after a while, but was still energetic and needed lots of exercise.

One of the toughest things about this dog was finding help walking him. If we wanted to hire a walker or a sitter, he wouldn't accept just anyone.

When I was married, I always felt like the dog took me for granted. He would wait by the door for XH to come home. And after DS was born, I was on my own a lot. XH was on the road 10-13 days (weekdays) a month, so I guess I was already single-parenting a lot during that time. I was beyond exhausted. The dog demanded 4 walks a day, I didn't have much in the way of help, and I thought there were times that I was going to collapse in the middle of a walk. Maybe right on top of the Prime Meridian, which we crossed multiple times on our daily routes. It kinda sucked to be putting so much energy into caring for a dog that seemed indifferent to me.

When XH broke up with me, he told me the dog was the only thing he wanted from our marriage. I could have everything else.

Being the reasonable person that I am, I didn't hold him to his word, and we settled for something more equitable. But he still got the dog, since I was making DS my first priority and I didn't know how I could also take care of the dog and rebuild my life.

Funny thing, though. Divorce is hard on dogs, too. They're sensitive to our emotions, for one thing. And the disruption to their routines and home life is hard on them, too. At one point the dog and I didn't see each other for 6 months. The first time he saw me after those 6 months, I think he was in shock and disbelief. And then he didn't want to leave my house and go home with XH. So we worked it out for me to have the dog a few days a month, here and there. And now his body language towards me is so different from before. I feel like he's happy to see me. And he wants to stay close to me and isn't looking for XH to come home, or to come pick him up. And he hates leaving my house, which is the first house he lived in when we adopted him. He has known four other homes since we adopted him, but I think my house is always where he has felt most at home.

And now I think he knows something is up again, because XH has been moving his stuff in to a studio apartment these past couple of weeks. The place he has been living for the past 18 months is empty, and he is with me for the weekend. On Monday XH is packing up his car with the dog and they are going to drive back east to XH's hometown. XH will be back every other weekend to spend time with DS, and the dog will stay with XILs. I'll get to see him for a few days over the holidays.

Tonight the dog curled up with me at the foot of DS's bed, while we read stories and waited for DS to fall asleep. And then the dog fell asleep. A little bittersweet, for all that we had to go through to get to this point, for the dog to show me affection, trust, and appreciation. I have him until Monday. DS will be with his dad, so it will be good one-on-one time. I'm planning on taking him on some adventures this weekend for a last hurrah.

[akafred]

freezorburn, cue the tears! Have a great weekend together!

[judyblume14]

saraml13, good luck wrapping up your to-do list, and I hope you get to enjoy your weekend before diving back in on Monday. In my opinion, it is never a bad idea to send a personal note of thanks to anyone, for anything! Personally, I don't post "statuses" on LinkedIn, I would just update my role in my profile and call it a day.

[xctsclrx]

DS has been accident free at school since Tuesday. Now that all the teachers are on board with helping him he doesn't just sit at the bathroom waiting and wet his pants. YAY!. at home however. . . We were accident free Wednesday but yesterday four accidents in four hours. ugh.

[judyblume14]

Oh freezorburn! Enjoy your puppy this weekend!

[Covergirl82]

freezorburn, that is an awesome story. One of my coworkers adopted a dog who had had a bad life prior to adoption. She has worked with this dog for years on similar things, and it really is the little things that are huge milestones for adopted dogs that had bad lives previously. Enjoy your dog-and-you weekend.

[librarychica]

I just walked into a child's consignment store to sell my baby stuff. I sold nothing. Bought 4 Halloween costumes for $30 (dress up restocked!) and am trying not to cry in my car. Yet another chapter in "why can't Library decide whether she's done with babies, seriously, what's wrong with her?"

In other news, the first Girl Scouts meeting was complete chaos. This was supposed to be a group welcome/signup meeting. There are 3 troops, 6 leaders. Two had prepared. Some sort of miscommunication along the way. I was one of the two. My coleader was the other. We had prepared for 5/6 year olds and were wrangling ten of those and half a dozen older girls.Luckily I had made extra copies of my coloring book but the older girls were unimpressed with my animal sounds icebreaker.

[librarychica]

Hugs, freezorburn. Enjoy that puppy!

[greenmonkey1]

librarychica I can relate. Currently I have several baskets of clothes that need to either be sold or donated. They are taking up a fairly large corner in my basement and apparently a fairly large corner in my mind. This should be easy - put the clothes in bags marked "donate" and put them at the curb for the truck. I had little problem doing this for the first batch of clothes and now that I'm on batch two (little man basically skipped a size) I am waffling.

Logically, we are done with kids. We are financially and mentally at capacity. The last pregnancy/l&d had multiple serious complications (for me) and I am firmly in the medical category of "old" for pregnancy. While I did not raise the question of more kids with my OB, I am pretty sure he would want to discuss adoption rather than conception.

I want to get my house cleaned up and decluttered. Why am I having a hard time letting go?!

[akafred]

This week has gone MUCH better for DD at school. Fingers crossed it lasts.

[waverly]

DS had to write an application (1 sentence- I tried to get him to make it 2 sentences). And he got accepted for the leadership club! Only 2 kids were picked per class!

I don't think it's favoritism but his speech teacher runs the club so she knows him which might have helped.

[mommyatty]

librarychica and greenmonkey1, I don't think holding on to baby stuff is always about wanting another baby. I had a tubal and ablation. There's no doubt I'm officially done. But getting rid of the baby stuff feels like admitting the babies are big kids, and that's hard!

In other news, DH keeps getting intermittent baby rabies. One of the kids in DS's class has a brand new baby brother and it made DH nostalgic. Sheesh. Crazy man. He was absolutely, 2000% on board with being done. But give him a baby in the vicinity and he's all hormonal about it. So it's not just you guys.

[erinshelley21]

mommyatty my H doesn't this too. Even though this last pregnancy was so tough for both of us he still can't commit to being done. Which I'm sure is not shocking to anyone here based on the house saga lol

[librarychica]

Sept 23, 2017 11:59:54 GMT -5 erinshelley21 said:

mommyatty my H doesn't this too. Even though this last pregnancy was so tough for both of us he still can't commit to being done. Which I'm sure is not shocking to anyone here based on the house saga lol

My H doesn't have a strong opinion either way. It's all on me to decide. It's odd, because it's not like I'm one of those do everything moms. He parents a lot too. You would think he'd have an opinion. I am okay being done with babies, though, but my heart hurts at being done with toddlers.

I told this to my mother today and she told me that I have lost my mind. So there's that, lol.

[waverly]

librarychica- toddlers drive me crazy. I can't imagine my heart hurting being done with them. I love having school age kids now. Although I do kind of wish they could stay this age.

DS used to schedule cuddling sessions and that kind of went by the wayside. 😭

[traveltheworld]

librarychica, you are definitely not alone in wavering. I know we should be done with two. It's all we can handle energy wise, but DD is such an amazing toddler and brings so much joy into my life that my heart hurts when I think of being done with this age too. DH loves to remind me that we could just as easily end up with a child that's more like DS (super difficult baby and toddler), and realistically, that's probably why I won't have a third.

[supertrooper1]

I'm 99% done at one, but I decided a couple of years ago that getting rid of baby stuff doesn't mean we have to be done. We can always buy new.

[akafred]

I had a very challenging toddler. I look at my boss's toddler, my next door neighbors' toddler, and the school director's toddler and it hurts my heart to be OAD because they are so sweet and chill. Mine was into everything. Theirs stand around and watch stuff around them. Mine actively created chaos around her lol.

[erinshelley21]

When I was pregnant we said we wouldn't decide until DD was 1. That's when DS went from being super chill and easy to challenging. So far DD is a little more high maintenance but not terrible.

The thing I can't get past is I've had 2 super easy deliveries with only minor complications during pregnancy and after. The after complications were much easier this time with the exception of ppd.