Tag Archive | "DIVORCE"
IS IT POSSIBLE TO HAVE A LOVE AFFAIR THAT LASTS FOREVER??
My newly single friend has a question. I asked her to send me an email of her dilemma:- "I wonder if it's possible to have a love affair that lasts forever?" Andy Warhol "I have just come back from the most amazing trip to France. Having recently separated from my husband and it being ‘his weekend’ with my children, I decided to go and see an old friend from University. Whilst sitting by her gorgeous pool, chilled rose in hand and a much needed awful trashy novel that I couldn’t put down, her husband’s brother popped by to borrow her laptop. I'd met him before, years ago. Had always fancied him. In fact we had a bit of a fling way back then. Rather like a scene from "Desperate Housewives", (although sadly I look nothing like any of them except perhaps the old lady) my book was put down, body covered up and I had eyes or thoughts for no one else. We chatted, we laughed, we drank wine, it got dark, he wrapped his jumper around me, he cooked, we danced, we sang and we went to bed. I can honestly say that I have never had an experience like it. I felt so free. Such passion, so right, so amazing. Even the way he held my hand made me want to kiss him even more. The feel of his skin on mine, the loss of inhibitions, feeling like you fitted in someone’s arms and that the roof could cave in and as long as your hands didn’t separate then you could deal with anything. Sadly, I am now home. Every time he texts me, my stomach falls to the floor. I can’t eat, I can't sleep, I can barely even breathe and when I try and close my eyes I run through each delicious moment with him. I feel more alive than I have ever felt, I can’t stop smiling (is this why the crinkliest, prettiest old ladies are so happy? Did they find a passion that lasted their lifetime and the lines on their faces are from pure blissful happiness?) In my heart, I know it was a holiday thing and that I'm behaving like a lovesick teenager and yes, I know I’ve only just separated, but tell me someone please, can this passion, the way someone makes you feel last forever? Or do I have to settle for companionship the next time around?" I wasn't sure how to reply. I'm not sure myself. How many people in life manage to maintain the passion? Surely it doesn't take long before you move on to a different level. A calmer level. A level that can be maintained through the years. If you have extreme passion, won't you blow up? Be unable to function in the wider world. If you find your soulmate, somebody who makes you laugh, understands you, thinks you are beautiful then maybe, just maybe, you can maintain the passion. But I'm not sure I can think of many long term couples who still kiss passionately. It's what we all want but life very often gets in the way. Children are the biggest passion killers in my experience. So maybe, if you meet after you've had your children it can be possible, because you go back to being yourself again, to a degree. OH I DON'T BLOODY KNOW. HELP!
Continue reading...OLD FRIENDS AND FAMILY
Thursday, April 8, 2010
I'm still loving being back in Melbourne. Finding it marginally scary how little I remember - I'm putting it down to hormones and pregnancy and new babies. That is what made up the bulk of my existence when I was here last. Friends and babies. It's been great coming to the other side of the world and catching up with some old friends and family. My uncle and aunt came for lunch over the Easter weekend, with their daughter, my cousin. We used to spend a lot of time together when I lived here last. Last night we had dinner with an old friend at her new house. I hadn't even met all her children, let alone seen her new house or caught up properly on the last 10 years of news. It was just great. Again, I thought it might be hard because when I lived here, in what seemed like another life, with my husband, she and I spent a lot of time together. In fact, there was a group of us. About 5 couples and for a time we all did stuff together. We were very close during that time and being away from family meant that everybody put themselves out much more for each other and we relied heavily on each other. Instead, last night, she made me laugh. She admitted to finding it strange to see me back on my own, that she couldn't quite believe that it had all happened. That she found it extraordinary that our marriage had broken down, "I mean after that HUGE favour you did him, I can't believe that he had an affair", she said. "What favour?" I asked her. "MARRYING HIM of course" she exclaimed. "you were SO much cooler than he was, working for a record company and all that stuff, I mean the Pet Shop Boys even bought you a wedding present".... It made me feel a little better for a minute, even if it wasn't true. She talked about the dementia her mother in law had. Apparently the frontal lobe of her brain has been affected and it makes her behave a bit like a teenager.....quite worryingly, by the end of her list of symptoms, which included strange sleep patterns and odd behaviour, I decided that I may have the same form of dementia.
Continue reading...“FORGIVE AND FORGET”
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
John Prescott’s wife of 48 years was reported yesterday in the paper saying that she has still not forgiven him for having an affair with his secretary, “because to forgive is to condone”. Well that’s an interesting thought. Forgiving isn’t condoning in my book – she says she can now “get away with [...]
Continue reading...SCHOOL FRIENDS
Thursday, January 28, 2010
My youngest and most sensitive child is feeling a bit low. He spends his life fluctuating between thinking life is brilliant one minute and thinking life is shit the next. I can go from being the best mum in the world where he buys me a Terry's Chocolate Orange and hides it in my bed to somebody who has somehow managed to ruin his life in a millisecond. He is feeling a little sad at school. Sometimes he decides that nobody likes him or wants to come back to his house for a play after school and then suddenly the whole world seems to be against him and he drags himself up the road to school and other times he positively bounces. This was not helped yesterday by being asked by his teacher to talk to another little girl in the class about how it feels to have separated parents. I think it's a good thing that the teacher has asked him to talk about it, I hope he did manage to make her feel a little less isolated, but I'm not sure. "Mum, she's really sad. The teacher asked me to talk to her because her parents are just splitting up and he said that because my parents have already split up maybe I could help her. I didn't know what to say to her. I told her that she had to just try not to think about it too much. To just get on with other things. She said did she just have to stick her chin out and I'm not sure what she meant, but I told her that it's not easy and that sometimes I'm still sad about it". "That was really lovely of you to talk to her" I told him "and did you tell her that sometimes it's not all bad? That you get to have two houses and more holidays and sometimes even new families to play with?" "Well, no mum, I didn't, because that is just not true. It's not better to have any of those things. It's worse. It wouldn't have made her feel better". ...and then my heart just breaks a little bit more for him.
Continue reading...“EVERY OTHER WEEKEND” RULE
Sunday, January 17, 2010
I have just realised that there is a finite amount of time when you're divorced or separated with children that the "every other weekend" rule applies. To be honest, it is one of the most painful aspects of a separation to have to manage the sharing out of the children like they are little commodities with overnight bags. Especially for the one who doesn't get to live with them anymore. When they're very young, it is a total nightmare and we have spent a huge amount of time arguing over the logistics. Now my children are older, we have to consider their own plans and so it is all starting to get a little more blurred around the edges. This, I guess is a good thing. One less thing to stress about. At some time in the future, there will be no more "his" and "my" weekends. Just weekends. However, things will change again when my ex moves next month into his six bedroom house about 45 minutes away by car - initially I guess it's going to go back to a more rigid routine as they will have to be driven to his new house and can't then get themselves back. Once he's married, I'm not sure how it will work. I wonder how my children will feel going to their "other" house and sharing their space with three more children and a new "stepmother". At what age are they allowed to put their foot down and say they don't want to go? At what point do I relent and find myself with absolutely no time off from my kids because they'd rather stay closer to where their friends are (I am under no illusions that it will have anything to do with wanting to stay with me). My ex has told my teenage son that when he has passed his driving test he will pay for the insurance of the car so that he can drive my other two children up and down the motorway to his new house. Over my dead body. I can't think of anything worse than letting my 17 year old newly qualified with no experience risk an accident with my two other children in the car. What a nightmare. I need to quickly arrange some new government legislation - like they have in the US that a new driver can't drive any passengers until they've been driving for a year. Much better. I have the kids for the next three weekends, but this weekend they've all been busy doing stuff. My ex took the boys to the Sunderland Vs Chelsea football match yesterday. I wasn't expecting, when he picked them up to see Builder Bloke's ex sitting in the car with her children outside my house - studiously looking in the other direction. Obviously I know the children well - it's a shame - they clearly weren't allowed to get out to come and say hello and I certainly wasn't going to go out and greet them. I had a pang of ...what? Not jealousy, but something....perhaps it's just because it's all still so raw and new. I had to turn it round and look at it from another perspective. Did I want to be going to a football match in the rain with six children? No bloody way. Did I want to be sitting in the Sunderland stand with my ex watching the team get slaughtered 7-2? No bloody way. Anyway, my teenage son said it was the worst experience of his entire life. I went to a lovely 40th birthday party last night. I sort of got invited as my friend's plus 1, but knew lots of people and was very pleased to have been there...I like knowing people who are only just 40 - even if the gorgeous, very young looking party girl kept complaining about all the new wrinkles she has acquired.
Continue reading...HOW DID YOU FIND OUT YOUR PARTNER WAS HAVING AN AFFAIR?
Sunday, November 15, 2009
OK. A big reason for adding different tabs to my blog was so that I could do a bit more with the divorced aspect of my life without boring the pants off my happily married/single/living together friends. It is not easy being divorced. Far from it. But. Perhaps for those of us who are separated [...]
Continue reading...PARENT TEACHER CONSULTATIONS
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Tis the season of “Parent/Teacher Consultations”. Do teachers hate these sessions as much as I think they do? It must be really awful having to listen to parents bore you stupid about their little protegees. Or maybe it’s not like that and that is why I am not a [...]
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Thursday, May 20, 2010
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