I just read this article and think it is so true! As a teacher, I see students who struggle to make friends, are left behind… and no matter how great their grades are, things just aren’t right if they don’t make friends!

I recently snooped in my boyfriend’s email. I know how awful it sounds. It is a breach of trust. It means that the trust in my relationship was non-existent… but I’m not ashamed I did it. I know D. would like me to be, but I’m not. My gut feeling told me that something was just not right… and I was right. So, in a relationship, is it ok to snoop? Should there be secrets in a relationship? One person I talked to said there is no such thing as snooping in a marriage…. there should be nothing there for him or her to be ashamed of, so nothing to hide.

With teenagers, we get them to give us their password and MSN access so we can check what they are up to. Most teenagers will tell you that they would prefer to be trusted. Does that apply to relationship as well? I have no issue with giving my password to D. but I would PREFER that he trusts me.  So… is there such a thing as snooping in a relationship? Is it a symptom of something deeper going on?

And if you find something… don’t you already get your punishment for snooping? The hurt you will feel is punishment enough… and the shame you will feel if you find nothing… will also be punishment enough.

Jennifer Love Hewitt found out a boyfriend had been cheating on her with a few girls by snooping and does not regret it. Is it better to find out that way than the way Sandra Bullock found out.. I sure think so!

I am seriously guilty of this. I too often argue for the sake of being right but never actually gain anything from the argument. Me and D. often leave arguments both frustrated. I will work at being happy and not being right. I will try to let go of arguments and try to listen more… in all my life’s situations! This article found on http://charlottekamman.com/ really made me think and I will try to apply this as much as I can!

Me and D. had a bit of a fight yesterday. It’s a bit difficult to see where our relationship is going. We do love each other but I don’t know what he has to offer… He can’t be WITH me. All I get is time here and there, as much as he can because he does make the effort, but only time here or there anyhow…

And he asked me a question yesterday. He asked me what I wanted. I just heard this song on the radio and that’s what I would like… A home, a family, happy children and parents in love. Enjoying the little things from daily life. Seeing my children grow up and enjoying every moment of it… and a home I can’t wait to get home to!

Oh yeah
Yeah oh yeah

The only ground I ever owned was sticking to my shoes
Now I look at my front porch and this panoramic view
I can sit and watch the fields fill up
With rays of glowing sun
Or watch the moon lay on the fences
Like that’s where it was hung
My blessings are in front of me
It’s not about the land
I’ll never beat the view
From my front porch looking in

There’s a carrot top who can barely walk
With a sippy cup of milk
A little blue eyed blonde with shoes on wrong
‘Cause she likes to dress herself
And the most beautiful girl holding both of them
And the view I love the most
Is my front porch looking in, yeah

I’ve traveled here and everywhere
Following my job
I’ve seen the paintings from the air
Brushed by the hand of God
The mountains and the canyons reach from sea to shining sea
But I can’t wait to get back home
To the one he made for me
It’s anywhere I’ll ever go and everywhere I’ve been
Nothing takes my breath away
Like my front porch looking in

There’s a carrot top who can barely walk
With a sippy cup of milk
A little blue eyed blonde with shoes on wrong
‘Cause she likes to dress herself
And the most beautiful girl holding both of them
Yeah the view I love the most
Is my front porch looking in

I see what beautiful is about
When I’m looking in
Not when I’m looking out

There’s a carrot top who can barely walk
With a sippy cup of milk
A little blue eyed blonde with shoes on wrong
‘Cause she likes to dress herself
And the most beautiful girl holding both of them
Yeah the view I love the most

Oh, the view I love the most
Is my front porch looking in
Yeah
Oh, there’s a carrot top who can barely walk
(From my front porch looking in)
A little blue eyed blonde with shoes on wrong, yeah
And the most beautiful girl
(Beautiful girl
From my front porch looking in)
Holding both of them
Oh, yeah

See the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-HtiZcHUmE

My life is pretty weird right now. I spend one week with D. and the other one alone, like a single mom. It’s very bizarre.

I grew up switching from one house to another. I always hated it. As much as I don’t enjoy routine, I really hated having a double life. What’s really ironic is I’m living the same situation as an adult!

When we lived together, each week would be different. When my stepson would show up, life would be completely different… D. would be completely different. Now it’s different because we don’t live together, but I still lead this double life. Kind of like a superhero, but no heroic gestures and no superpowers…

D. seems happy with this new situation. He has been able to throw himself into work and become what he considers a success in his field. He can also throw himself in his role as a father, being 100% present at all times and devote himself entirely to his son that week. We have very different views of what it means to be a success and what it means to be a parent.

For me, being a success does not just mean being successful at your job. It’s being able to balance your life so that you have a job you enjoy, having a family, being in a relationship and having great friends. And all of that needs to be balanced. I don’t think D. can do that. He seems to see a family, friends and a relationship as something he cannot fit in his life and still be the type of father he believes he needs to be and be successful at work…

I don’t know where this relationship is going. I don’t know what this means for my life. I’m happy when I’m with D…. but what kind of life is this? How can I be two people. I don’t believe in this. I’m not at easy like D. is with this double life. I’m one person, whole and full of love and life… both weeks. Right now I feel as if someone is telling me that one week I get to eat great meals but the second week I get soup and maybe some bread and I need to wait for the following week to eat properly!

I don’t understand why there can’t be balance in our lives. I have found balance with him. I don’t feel like I’m neglecting anything or anyone. Yet, when he was with me , that’s how he felt.

So, this is my single mom week. I don’t mind being alone. I have a pretty good life, lots of things to do. I write, I study, I see friends and I like my life… but I don’t like this double life…So how do I fix this? Only D. could fix this but I don’t know how he could… I can’t offer any suggestions. So we will stay this way for now and I’ll try to adapt to this double life and see how it goes… but I don’t really have high hopes and dreams for this relationship…

I jsut finished reading this interview with a woman who decided that in order to save her marriage, she had to do… well, nothing! She decided to think of herself first and let her husband deal with his own issues. Talk about a choice! When I said that everything we do in life is a choice, this is a great example. She chose not to get involved in his issues, to let him work it out. She chose not let it affect her.

Now, I don’t know that I would be able to be as serene as this woman. Knowing my husband spent months somewhere out there, maybe with other women would be too much for me to bear… and that would be my choice, that would be respecting myself. But I like this woman’s guts for not letting it get to her, choosing to not become part of the problem!

Here is an excerpt and the link to read about this woman’s choice:

Out of the blue, Montana writer Laura Munson’s husband told her he wanted to leave, that he didn’t love her. She calmly replied that she didn’t buy it, sat back and let him figure it out. Four months later, following all the signs of a mid-life crisis, he changed his mind and returned home. After Munson wrote about her story in the New York Times, she was inundated with requests for her secrets, which she reveals in her new book, This Is Not the Story You Think It Is. Munson spoke to TIME about how she saved her marriage — and her sanity — by refusing to be her husband’s problem.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1978903,00.html#ixzz0kbzpUN5d

Since I moved out, I find that I have more energy. I don’t sleep as much or at all during the day and I am actually making plans, keeping myself busy and taking care of myself. Could distancing myself from my relationship have caused that? The article also mentions the importance of communication though, and in that sense, we are absolutely horrible, me and D. with this. We don’t really talk. We never solve problems. Everything I say is always seen as a critique and it only helps to keep us apart more and more. We actually seem happier when we DON’T spend time together… could that mean something? Here the article that caused this reflection.

Healthy Relationships Create Healthy Life!

Is your relationship with your significant other, mother, father, or friend making you sick? Believe it or not, there’s scientific evidence to suggest that our relationships can actually contribute to illness. Therefore, in order to achieve a healthy life, it is important to make our relationships healthy.

There have been studies to suggest that people who are married often tend to live longer. Experts reason that marriage provides a nurturing environment for individuals, enabling them to better fight off disease. The support of a loving spouse can make all the difference in the world, especially when one is facing a serious illness.

Maintaining healthy relationships can help to lower our stress. Stress is considered to be an important contributing factor for illness. By improving our relationships with other peopleparticularly with family memberswe can cut down on the stress which can sap our strength, making it difficult for us to ward off infections.

But it is not enough to know that healthy relationships can make us healthier. It is also critically important to know exactly how we can ensure that our relationships are healthy. Psychologists contend that the key ingredient of a healthy relationship is communication. Unless we feel safe to communicate our feelings, we will be unable to thrive in our relationships. If you don’t like to confront people, you might find it more difficult to communicate. Therefore, you must learn effective communication skills.

Before you can communicate in your relationships, you must know your goals and desires. In other words, you have to know what you want before you can articulate it to another person. You should try to keep an open mind, listening carefully to what the other person has to say. If you are bothered by a person’s behavior, try to avoid saying something like, “You are always late.” Instead, say something to the effect that, “When you are out and I don’t hear back from you, I worry.” That way, you are telling the other person how his or her behavior makes you feel. It is also vitally important that you admit your mistakes and apologize for them. Such a simple action shows that you are really concerned about the other person’s feelings.

Healthy relationships also depend upon setting limits for yourself, and respecting the limits of other people. You should never tolerate abuse in a relationship, whether it is emotional abuse or physical abuse. At the first warning signs, you should seek distance from the abuser. Such distance is critical for your emotional well-being and long-term health.

Ray Kelly is an Exercise Scientist with 15 years experience in the health and fitness industry. Check out his Biggest Loser Australia Review or http://www.free-online-health.com

I’ve been feeling very guilty this weekend after a conversation with D. I felt like an awful person after what he shared with me. Basically, he told me that being with me had changed his life negatively. He let go of projects, friends and so on. Many of his sentences make me feel guilty. Things he does with his son are always accompanied by: it was nice, it had been a long time. As if my being around meant he could not be himself.

I felt awful. Felt like an awful person and tried to figure out where I went wrong. I understood what he said.  A long time ago, with my daughter’s father, I did the same thing. I stopped seing my friends, stopped doing the things I like and concentrated on that relationship. It was just simpler than the fighting. For a long time I blamed him. He was a jerk. He ruined my life. He only brought negative things in my life. After some time, I stopped being so angry and decided to take a look at my choices and my responsiblilty in all of it. It makes no sense to keep on blaming someone else. I could not help him, I could not change his behavior. I could only take a look at myself.

I CHOSE to let go of friends. I thought it was what was needed for him to be happy. I CHOSE the easy way instead of discussing with him and seeing what it was he really wanted and finding some sort of compromise. I CHOSE to let go of my projects because I thought I needed to follow in his projects for him to be happy. I CHOSE to put myself aside, to forget who I was for that relationship. Most of all I CHOSE to stay with him even though this was a bad and violent relationship.

Now, don’t get me wrong. What he did and how he treated me is unnaceptable and nobody should treat another human being this way. He CHOSE to solve his problems with violence. He can only blame himself on that one. I CHOSE to stay and I have myself to blame for this.

I hope D. starts looking inside himself and figure out why HE CHOSE the things he chose to do. What made him do it? Why would he think this is what I wanted? Why was he in this relationship if it made him unhappy? He CHOSE to stay. He CHOSE to make those changes in his life. And I am done feeling guilty about this.

Instead, I’m reflecting on my own choices… Reflecting on the choices I have made in this relationship and continue to make…

Choices… Everything is a choice!

Getting upset and fighting is so easy. I feel frustrated right now and a fight would just break out between me and D. Many little things… as my mother said, thinsg won’t all change just because we don’t live together.

The thing that does change is the fact that I can take a time out a lot more easily. I have decided to take a time out and breathe before I express myself. I have 3-4 things that bother me and I just don’t know how to express them so that it will make a difference and not just sound like I am complaining on and on like D. has said I do all the time. So I have decided to take the next few days off and think of how to handle this… more on this later!

I’m very “reflective” today. Thinking about what might have caused my depression and the break-up of my stepfamily. I have decieded to finish reading Stepmonsters, a book about stepmothers, even though I am no longer a stepmom. I’m almost at the end of the book and I have to say that it does help me reflect on what happened. There is a section where she talks about rumination and that really got to me.

What the author, Wednesday Martin explains, we stepmothers tend to ruminate about stuff that happens. One event makes us remember another painful event until it goes around and around in circle and it engulfs us completely. That is one of the things that kept happening to me. The other issue she talks about is feeling completely alone. That’s how I felt. I did not feel support from my man and I did not think he understood. People around me were supportive but did not really understand.

I am slowly accepting that this adventure is over for the right reasons. That I did not fail. That I did everything I could but it just didn’t work out and that getting out of this life was the best decision for everyone. I have see proof of this every single day since I have left. My daughter is happier. She does not seem as stressed. I am sleeping and eating right. My anxiety is almost completely gone and I feel like taking steps towards making my life better. I have been able to deal with conflicts much easier. I have been able to step up for myself and express myself to my man and he actually seems to understand! He also seems a lot more relaxed around me and things are much easier.

We have decided to go away for the weekend, just the two of us. We used to enjoy those weekends but as time went by, they got worse and worse. We just could not get away from our life. I wonder how it will be this time. I am hopeful that we will simply appreciate each other’s company and have a good time… it has been a long time since we had a good time together. We love each other, that I am sure of. Our lives are just not compatible right now. But I do hope that one day, we will be able to live together again. But for now, this is great and seems to be working!