Farm Doin's - 2020

[sKePTiKal]

My tough, gritty & gruff, plainspoken all-man marine posted this last night when he couldn't sleep. This kind of thing keeps bubbing up from him - totally unexpected; not to "type" - and shows the levels of complexity that are impossible for a puzzle-solver like me to not love....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT5u2xVEO5M&feature=emb_logo

[Hopalong]

Men need beauty, sweetness and stuff that goes to the heart as much as women do. If not more, given how they're programmed in this culture.

SO nice that B knows this and shares it too.

hugs
Hops

[lighter]

That was so touching, Amber.   

It felt like SEEING B come into focus.... rich colors, and depth of emotion...... thank you for sharing that. 

Does he often have trouble sleeping?  Is it pain, or worry?

Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

Some of both Lighter. He slept great when he was here.

There were many many nights I'd be up most of the night or several times a night those first months alone. It makes such a difference knowing that someone who cares is there. As Hol & S spend nights here & there at the hut - I'm re-experiencing a little of that kind of insomnia. But it's really minor. I have my routines pretty well down these days - even if I make exceptions to it here & there.

Right now, the time B & I can chat freely is after 9 or so; and it usually wraps up no later than midnight. Usually. LOLOL. Depends on what else is going on that we're chatting about. I have a feeling today's events will lead to an actual phone call... LOL.

Seems his D and her girlfriends got the wrong idea about his secret "trips"; the haircut for the Navy gig... and scheduled an "intervention" with him.... because they've only seen him hug two women in 18 years... and the way they connected the dots... they came up with him exploring latent homosexual tendencies. (I'm still laughing my butt off here over this...) After the girlfriends left, B came clean and explained to the D about me. And swore her to secrecy so his Ex doesn't get wind of it and cause trouble. Altho, at this point - it's a) none of her business and b) nothing she can do about it either. He's just a tad paranoid about dealing with drama.

I did warn him, that he'd have to tell her sooner or later - and sooner was preferable, since at 18 she should already know how to keep some things quiet, so as not to create drama. She was already stressed out enough, worrying about him when she went away to college.

This is still fabulously hilarious for me. I'm betting he sees the wisdom in my advice now. LOLOLOL.

[lighter]

Hee.  Sometimes it pays to be honest.  Not that B exploring his sexuality would be a bad thing. 

Just what, exactly, is B afraid ex will DO when she finds out about you?

And....
How likely is it his DD will keep that secret?

Depending on the answer, maybe he should have let his dd's imagination continue running away with itself.

Hurry up, B! 
Quick!
Go.
Run!
NOW!
Time to go to WV before your ex discovers Amber!
::whispering::.
I hope his DD doesn't give away his position.

Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

She'll just create a whole drama - and possibly beg for money he doesn't have. And make herself out to be a martyr in the process; she's not well either - COPD and recurrent pneumonia. One of B's allergies is to drama. LOL.

He owes her half the proceeds of the house, when he sells it. And to keep the peace, he's kept her on his health insurance but because she is perenially broke also paid all her co-pays.

As far as I'm concerned, he's done right by her and doesn't have to give another inch. Not when she's constantly berating him, criticizing him, and running him down to Boo. Mostly due to his medical issues, btw. It's not serious "trouble" - it's just stuff that irritates him immensely. And that type wouldn't hesitate trying to reach out me with her sob story either. For financial help.

So - he's adamant about keeping HER in the dark and I can't say I blame him.

[lighter]

I don't envy B's predicament.  He has unfinished business with the ex...  it will affect his dd..... ex will put the dd in the middle..... B will suffer, bc his dd will be made to suffer.  Such is life when we make children with PDs.

Do you think B has any co dependency issues?  It seems such an odd thing for a soldier to have such an aversion to conflict, but there it is. 

Dear, gentle B.



Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

DD is adopted; Ex left shortly thereafter because B was injured and she just didn't feel "that way" about him anymore. DD is what kept him alive till we met.

I can relate.

[Hopalong]

So B's ex took the child with her as an infant, and B lost regular contact?
Or had less frequent contact than he was expecting as a father?

That's tragic if so.

hugs
Hops

[lighter]

I think B was very involved Dad, sounds like.

It made my stomach flip to read what happened.....the wife left B cause of his injuries. 

That she bullies him over them....she sounds like a sociopath.  Not that she is, just saying.  It doesn't speak well of her to run him down to their child, in any case.

Lord. 
And he kept her on his insurance AND paid her copays for HER medical problems.....all while NOT making fun of her or her health issues to their dd.

Putting MANY miles between them will be a good thing, B and ex. 

I wonder if he'll be able to break all contact.

Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

B raised the D; Mom wanted to be gone. Until 18; now Mom feels like her opinion matters more than his. LOLOL.
He handles this way better than I would... hasn't seen Ex since HS graduation a couple months ago. He is pretty much as no contact with her as he can be. Distance is even better; and why there was such secrecy about what he was planning. He really didn't want to be found, after he sells his house, gives her 50% and he takes off. Lots of self-preservation in there with the secrecy.

One of the ways I got involved talking to him all those years ago was him asking the women on the forum for some help to buy D a good sports bra. He didn't know where to start. But he is now a veteran of Victoria's Secret... LOLOL. And the guy's "bench"... waiting. I got involved again with the prom dress - the prom that didn't happen due to Covid.

His oldest D - biological - is the same age as Hol. The one who lives in London. But she ended up living with mom until her teenaged years, when mom couldn't handle her anymore. B was still enlisted & active initially; so I'm guessing it was shortly after his injury that he got BL back on track. She's an engineer; thinking software engineer. But she likes tinkering with tools as much as B does. And there's at least one grand-daughter too. She's old enough to be his realtor.

Then, there's all the kids he's fostered over the years. So, he seems to come by "strong fatherhood" pretty naturally. There are some differences between he & I over philosophy that way, the way there usually are - but except for the "adult daughter follies" we don't have to actively parent. I raised Hol very very differently than most people did in the 80's-90s. And it has made her extremely self-sufficient and independent; but it also has it's drawbacks too. We've talked about it in those terms; and she's at the "no parents get it completely right even when they don't do something wrong" stage about it.

Brianna, B's D, wants to be a tattoo artist - which Hol did for about 10 years. So, she'd welcome Brianna to come stay and talk about that and maybe get our brand of Amazon female mentoring too. Hol has two step-brothers (Ex #2's boys) and she's been in contact with them; saw the oldest one out in Portland when she was on her road trip. So she's no stranger to blended families.

[lighter]

B sounds like the kind who's calm at the surface, but paddling like hell under the water.  To keep all those children on track, be enlisted, get injured, go through his own recovery... he had to paddle like mad.

It's difficult to imagine a woman abandoning a child, any child, bc that's how my mind works.  I know it happens.  I know worse happens. B's ex wanted that child badly enough to go through the adoption process.  It certainly appears like selfish and harmful behaviors in all directions....and....
 it just keeps coming up for me, not as a judgment...
but as a behavior style....
psychopathic.

YET, she appears to have fostered children?

In any case, I'm hoping B can make a clean break, and getaway. 

It sounds like he's deserving.

What, if anything, is the adopted daughter saying about her mother's sudden bossy boots reappearance into her life?

Lighter

[sKePTiKal]

She's not saying too much Lighter. She does speak up when Ex's ideas and hers conflict - or when Ex is being unfair to B in some way. I can only imagine what kinds of abandonment issues MIGHT be experienced in a case like this. But if I know B, he's done everything he can to make sure the D isn't in anyway blaming herself for someone else's choice in the matter. Still, those kinds of feelings really HURT.

Got my bedroom curtains ironed & rehung; after all the work in there they were pretty dusty. Still waiting on my rug; pad is supposed to be delivered today. Hol is attending to some homeowner tasks that she wasn't waiting around for contractor to take care of. She is hoping to get to inspection & occupancy late this week so she can move all the rest of her stuff there.

It's quiet around here. And I'm remembering how I go about doing things again. Instead of getting pulled in this direction or that - or navigating around people eating at all times of the day whenever they're hungry. Thinking about when is a good time for overhauls of hvac/hot water systems. I'd LIKE to get the furnace replaced this fall and a/c upgraded... both heat/cooling with two zones for upstairs & down... leaving the ground floor as is.

[Hopalong]

I can't feel comfortable demonizing a woman I don't know enough about, or labeling her "psychopath" or "sociopath" or "PD." (Could be true, could be partly true in some ways, could be hyperbole or pot-stirring.) I don't know what her issues really are, and don't know anything whatsoever about their actual marriage.

B sounds like a wonderful father and as though he's threaded the needle with his ex as well as he could. In addition to really being there for children. Bless 'im.

I found that although I loved M, when I listened to him denigrate the "crazy" mother of his children I was disturbed by his glee. She had her own desperation.

Sisterhood is sticky, for me. Even for strangers, until I learn otherwise directly. Or at least, it just feels like a moral imperative for me, not to pile on for my own entertainment or satisfaction. So far, I feel I don't know enough about her life to have a view.

hugs
Hops

[sKePTiKal]

I'm kinda the same way Hops. I only know what Buck has said about her; but I do know it takes two to tango in ALL cases. And while I feel his hurt at the suddenness of her pronoucement is genuine and it was a long relationship... I don't know all the details either. I have read enough of the military wives' support pages & stories to know that it puts incredible stress on a relationship. There is an awful lot of lonliness in those marriages. And depending on length of deployment - people change too.

But I'm not about to go into detail with B about my marriages and don't expect him to about his. At our age, it would be rarer than hen's teeth to find someone who'd never been in a close committed relationship and had their share of lessons learned; pain; and regrets, sometimes. In fact, I'd be real gun-shy of someone who made it to 60 WITHOUT having had that kind of relationship!

Sometimes, there's such a thing as "over sharing" that doesn't really contribute anything to learning about a person, as they are now. Society seems to have expectations that this is a good thing for people to do. I question that premise. I think sometimes, that's how patterns get repeated within relationships. It's more complicated than that, sure... but I think that level of "confession" contributes to it. I'm much more interested in a clean slate approach, discovery, exploration, and actual first hand experience than trying to work out what went wrong in the past, in a present relationship. It kind of contaminates things, I think.