Balmy Days

The weather has turned and the days are lovely. All I want to do every weekend is have a picnic somewhere next to water and trailing willow trees.

Recently, I cannot help but make comparisons between my life now to what I experienced this time last year.

In 2005: E just started school in August, and I started working for TEBA, doing their SLP's. We had to move during August as Kia (our dog) misbehaved and got us thrown out of the previous place, which was a lovely big farm house. I was a single mom mostly as P spend all his time 'working late', whilst fucking his business partner. I now refer to the debt he occured during this time as his 'fucking debt', scuze the pun. (I cleary still have anger issues here as I can just feel my heart rate increasing, pushing up my blood pressure and setting my mouth in a grim line). In another entry I wrote the beginning of August I was clearly playing with the idea of leaving p, but wanted to wait a month or two to sort myself out financially and just get into a better frame of mind. Little did I know then that he bubble would burst the first weekend in November - mainly because I started to put more and more pressure on p.

In 2006: Still busy with SLP's but for another company with totally other mining houses. I also have another client which is not related to mining at all and might be my entry into growing my little business a bit. E is doing well in his school and I do not feel guilty dropping him there at all. In contrast - I feel like an ogre for fetching him in the afternoons as we have a tantrum nine times out of ten because he wants to continue playing with his friends! My personal finances have made a total turn for the better and I can with confidence say I am independant financially, nothing as liberating as knowing that you are not in 'jail' anymore. This has restored balance in my relationship with p. I have to admit, the road to a secure and happy family has been emotionally really rocky for me and I am hesitant to announce that we have arrived. But I do believe we are making progress. As a very good friend of mine used to say - as long as your lows are higher than your previous lows, you are making progress.

We have started to talk about buying a house together, now for me, that is a huge commitment and one that would indicate a serious emotional 'deposit' from me. So on some days I look at the property market and others I just nose around to see what a rented cottage will cost me. I am finding it extremely difficult to throw myself 100% into this relationship, if all I really want to do is hold back in fear of getting hurt. Even though I realise that by holding back I am increasing the likelyhood of having this whole thing steer on the rocks.