Tracking tip of the week: 

Follow your nose. Enough said.

 

Ok, where were we? To sum up from the last blog telling how I started down the dark path. No, not the dark side but the road to unhappiness. So subtle I didn’t even notice. Ok, summing up. Husband decides I am useless unless making money, best friend losing fight with cancer, dealing with usual stresses of motherhood and extensive family.

Guess I didn’t mention an alcholic brother, a grandfather recently passed, mother stressed to the limit helping them, and just everyday life. We’ll just accept those as added stress and move on.

How did I deal with this latest hubbie issue? Well, here was my first mistake. I started looking for work. I should have said how stressed, insulted and unhappy he was making me but I didn’t want to make waves. Didn’t want to fight in front of the kids. Didn’t want him to get angry at me and leave me. Didn’t want him to think I was lazy or couldn’t get a job. SHOULD have asked him what changed his mind (we’d always planned for me to raise kids and go back to work when they were in college). SHOULD have continued with trying to publish (argued to myself that I could continue after kids were older).

I tried very hard trying to find a job that would still allow me to be home with the kids, take them to sports and activities, keep up with the housework, etc. Needless to say these are few and far between. I tried home sales, more piano lessons, and other small-paying jobs but nothing was enough. I applied for part-time as a pharmacy tech but they wouldn’t hire me because I hadn’t worked for several years. I found a balance with the home sales and lessons. I applied to be a substitute teacher, figuring that would be the best way to work during the day and still be able to take kids to stuff.

To get through this time, I still wrote but focused my efforts on my best friend. I knew she was going through a rough time so once a week I sent her a funny story I wrote to try to give her a little laughter. Our weekly calls went to every other week, then once a month, then only a few emails. I kept sending the stories, hoping to hear but she did not want to talk to anyone but her husband and children. Very hard on me but I tried to distract myself with the pitiful attempts to make money and be a full-time mom.

I started gaining weight even though I was not eating very much. I lost my workout time because I worked during the day and then as soon as kids were home, bam, out the door driving them to many different things. I often got home just in time to cook dinner, finish laundry and get the kids to bed. My only consolation was I had some time at the end of the day to write for about half an hour.

After a year of this, I was coping, getting by, making a bit of money and keeping things off my mind. This was when it all got worse.

My husband who swore he would help out at home, driving kids to their activities etc, suddenly got promoted and was traveling every other week or more.

My best friend died.

More next week on the continuing downward trend.