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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 9:49:47 GMT -5
Mine wasn't okay because I had to deal with him locking the kids out when I went to work,he forgot daughter at daycare,he refused to pay bills out of his two pensions yet I was working three jobs. He felt that it was okay to go shoot pool and take classes leaving son with baby but when son had to go to school he wouldn't drive him to class making him late so he had to drop his college courses. We have poor transportation so two hour trip by bus was 15 minute drive.He had mental illness so best for kids that I leave.
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Post by desireelafleur on Oct 14, 2014 12:50:02 GMT -5
Heh. I bet we are closer in age than you think. This November I will have been married for 14 years, although the mess for only about 6 of those. So for eight years you lived together without a mess? What precipitated the mess? Unless you don't want to say ... I'm just curious. My DH was messy right from the get-go. I was just barely okay. I picked up after myself, and cleaned every so often, but didn't really have routines. Usually had dishes in the sink and a pile of laundry to be done. I was totally unprepared to cope with his messiness. lara,My husband has always been a messy. He mainly confined it to his car and since I had my own I didn't have to deal with it. In the beginning we were young with nothing to our name. Easy peasy to keep clean. (I actually laughed secretly at my parents who said I was a poor house keeper.) My mom died when my son was a year old and I fell into a depression exacerbated by hormones. Things became slightly cluttered as want with a new baby and depression but again we still owned very little. Then my husband got a higher paying job and we started accumulating stuff faster than I could deal. I found by then that I actually didn't have a need for very much. I had a few things I loved and the library was a godsend since I was/am a big reader. But with more money comes the option to buy and so it was. My husband couldn't/can't hold a job but somehow managed to make more money than the last job. We moved a alot which allowed me to throw things away because he din't want to move it all again. Then I insisted we get a house about half way through our marriage and that's where the problems really began. 1 person is simply not enough to take care of the lawn, the house, the cars, snowblowing, raking, cleaning...etc etc. My depression increased dramatically, my marriage was tanking, my weight was increasing. So in an effort to save the unsalvagable I thought, "If we have another baby," we'll bond again and he'll be more motivated to help. You can guess what happened then. My thin resources flew out the window. Then my car broke down repeatedly, and I had a baby/toddler to occupy my me during my limited times when I wasn't so depressed and well here I am...my eldest takes direction fairly well and is a godsend...but it's not really his responsibility...
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Post by desireelafleur on Oct 14, 2014 12:53:16 GMT -5
Mine wasn't okay because I had to deal with him locking the kids out when I went to work,he forgot daughter at daycare,he refused to pay bills out of his two pensions yet I was working three jobs. He felt that it was okay to go shoot pool and take classes leaving son with baby but when son had to go to school he wouldn't drive him to class making him late so he had to drop his college courses. We have poor transportation so two hour trip by bus was 15 minute drive.He had mental illness so best for kids that I leave. I am so sorry that this happened to you. I hope that things have improved although I do know that you can't remove your children's father from their lives completely even if you wanted to.
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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 13:08:14 GMT -5
So much has happened...after we got divorced he got help and became a better person!!! Thank goodness. But we're still divorced. I wish he'd changed while we were married!!!
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Post by desireelafleur on Oct 14, 2014 13:10:56 GMT -5
So much has happened...after we got divorced he got help and became a better person!!! Thank goodness. But we're still divorced. I wish he'd changed while we were married!!! Good for him. And good for you for admitting it. Sometimes things weren't meant to be, *hug*
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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 13:11:35 GMT -5
Thank you I needed hug today.
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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 14:06:38 GMT -5
Thank you I needed hug today.
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Post by larataylor on Oct 14, 2014 15:26:47 GMT -5
So much has happened...after we got divorced he got help and became a better person!!! Thank goodness. But we're still divorced. I wish he'd changed while we were married!!! So the guy's a freakin' loser until you divorce him, and then he decides to finally work on his stuff and becomes a decent partner for someone else, who thinks you were just a jerk to this nice guy. (Not saying this is your exact story, Lostchild) But I'm sure this scenario happens a lot. I could easily see it happening in my own marriage, in fact … but DH has recently been addressing some issues and things have been much better. Still, I can't really say whether sticking it out was "worth it" or not, and I think some people need a divorce to wake them up.
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Post by larataylor on Oct 14, 2014 15:33:14 GMT -5
desireelafleur - thanks for explaining that … it just puzzled me a bit. Maybe you said all that in your intro, and I should have gone back and looked for it. But yes, of course circumstances change, and can change from something you can handle to something that goes out of control. Until three years ago, we were in one house for our entire marriage. We did have a baby, and ups and downs with money, and there were times that the house was in good shape. Sometimes I forget that some people move around a lot more … I wish we had!
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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 15:54:34 GMT -5
larataylor he is still no prize but after CPS made him take classes,his doctor straightened his medication he is a lot nicer. We try to work together for the sake of our nine year old because we don't want her to be that stereotypical rotten no good kid of divorced parents you here about.
We want her to have a pleasant childhood not marred by Mommy and Daddy fighting all the time. So even when we don't agree we come to a resolution of some sorts.
She has s a great kid and pretty balanced although a little clingy at times but I think its the age not the kid.
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Post by quietbird on Oct 14, 2014 17:01:42 GMT -5
Dear lostchild, I am so inspired by and glad you had the courage to do what was best for your children. Another hug. And although it was too late for your marriage, in a cosmic scheme, how wonderful that your ex took that opportunity to become a better person. I know it doesn't always come 'in time' on an individual level, but I like to think overall the world is moving towards greater compassion and love... one drop at a time, however it comes. Here is one careless decision I've wanted to post here for some time, but it is awful: In my worst stages of mental illness around squalor, I locked my room from the inside so no one could get in, and went out the window - I was desperate for a sense of privacy and control. My family's whole house was hoarded and squalorous, but I was the only one who was labeled as having a problem, and blamed as being the source when 90% of it wasn't my stuff to have any control over. I've accumulated a lot of shame and trauma around that. (Now I am the one cleaning the house! Heh.) When I was coming back in the window one day I knocked a small candle onto a beautiful piece of stained glass that was sitting on top of a box below the window. It shattered immediately. It was my mother's, and one of my favorite possessions. Just one more wake-up call that my behavior and life situation was diseased. It used to cause me great pain to think of that stained glass - I would want to self-harm. I have to let it go now... I almost have. I've never written about it anywhere, and it is good to. There are few places anyone would understand at all; I feel immensely grateful to have this forum, where everyone has different situations, but we all can empathize with the specific little 'weirdnesses' that happen with squalor/hoarding.
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Post by lostchild on Oct 14, 2014 17:16:12 GMT -5
Darling you have internalized all the blame for your family. They need to see themselves as they really are but since they don't you can only work on you. That said you should never feel like you did the harm. They raised you like this. Again you are reevaluating and learning how to be a competent clean adult.
Try not to blame yourself for them. They have targeted you as who to blame because you accept it. Don't accept itbecause they are really to blame.
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Post by quietbird on Oct 15, 2014 4:02:51 GMT -5
Thank you for the welcome re-programming, lostchild.
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Post by desireelafleur on Oct 15, 2014 5:57:37 GMT -5
Dear lostchild, I am so inspired by and glad you had the courage to do what was best for your children. Another hug. And although it was too late for your marriage, in a cosmic scheme, how wonderful that your ex took that opportunity to become a better person. I know it doesn't always come 'in time' on an individual level, but I like to think overall the world is moving towards greater compassion and love... one drop at a time, however it comes. Here is one careless decision I've wanted to post here for some time, but it is awful: In my worst stages of mental illness around squalor, I locked my room from the inside so no one could get in, and went out the window - I was desperate for a sense of privacy and control. My family's whole house was hoarded and squalorous, but I was the only one who was labeled as having a problem, and blamed as being the source when 90% of it wasn't my stuff to have any control over. I've accumulated a lot of shame and trauma around that. (Now I am the one cleaning the house! Heh.) When I was coming back in the window one day I knocked a small candle onto a beautiful piece of stained glass that was sitting on top of a box below the window. It shattered immediately. It was my mother's, and one of my favorite possessions. Just one more wake-up call that my behavior and life situation was diseased. It used to cause me great pain to think of that stained glass - I would want to self-harm. I have to let it go now... I almost have. I've never written about it anywhere, and it is good to. There are few places anyone would understand at all; I feel immensely grateful to have this forum, where everyone has different situations, but we all can empathize with the specific little 'weirdnesses' that happen with squalor/hoarding. quietbird, why was that a "careless" decision? Your emotional state had you climbing in and out of a window. Was it careless for you to leave the stained glass there? Or maybe it was careless to leave the candle where you knew that you could knock it over? I want to make it very clear. It was an accident that happened to take place in the midst of your mess during an emotional time of your life. You are right that it was a wake up call but it was a wake up call that your condition at the time allowed you to turn an accident into some sort of condemnation of yourself. You are working on you. As for the blame game...it's a hard game not to play. What I do know from your posts is that you accept that there is problem. You accept that you can exert influence over this problem. But correlation does not imply causation. Just because you have the ability to address a problem doesn't mean that you caused the problem in the first place. *hug hug hug*
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