Overwhelmed in every way possible, I was coming off a seventy-two-hour work week between my two jobs. My marriage nothing more than a filing status. An out of control five-year-old, a depressed teen, and a self-described invisible child about to enter his teens. Last year our lives were forever changed by a mistake most parents have made. My husband, in a store, put a helmet on our son Aidan then knocked on the helmet to see if it would protect him. Aidan said he could feel it. My husband put the helmet back and left with my son. Half an hour later the police were at the house to arrest him for injury to a child. It would take almost a year to get the D.A.’s office to turn over the surveillance video. All that time my husband was insistent that he didn’t hurt Aidan he barely hit the helmet.
The police department told me he PUNCHED my son three times in the head. An exaggeration, something highly misleading. They lied to me! Then arrested my husband in front of our kids. We were threatened by CPS that if I let him near the kids they would take them from me. Yet, my husband’s story never changed. Once the judge saw the tape he immediately granted my husband’s lawyers request to drop the charges. We could now pick up the pieces of our lives.
But, I have realized I am still stuck in survival mode and have forgotten how to live. I went from doing everything with a partner, to alone. Working to not need financial support, not an easy transition for me. The only thing I knew for sure I don’t want back in the partnership.
Overworking for monthes I now did the unthinkable, I had said no. I put myself first. I had been workin for a friend at his store and already put in 45 hours that week for him. He asked me to come in on Sunday, a day I never work the store and was a day promised to my second job. He wanted me to come work for him after I finished for the day, and I said no. He gave me sad eyes and it made me feel guilty but I went home.
I put on my pajamas, watched old Saturday Night Live skits with my kids, while working on a puzzle with Aidan. We laughed, a lot. I had forgotten how funny my boys can be. I had missed this, I missed hanging out with them. I had been working so much we had not been connecting as a family anymore. My children were growing, while I was trying to survive and keep us together, I was missing so much. I need to stop working so much, picking up extra hours at the store.
I have a bucket list like so many others, but now the boys and I are adding things to do as a family, and as individual and one on one time. To reconnect. To grow. I don’t want to miss out on my boy’s life and interests. I plan to fill this blog with things we do, our experiences, our interests. I would love for you to join us on this journey.
Best wishes,
K
A Frazzled Mom's Diary 