a year gone by

A year ago today my life changed forever.   Some say a year later and nothing has changed, and many many days I feel the same way. But other times I think how so many things have changed. I see so many more faults in myself than I ever saw before. I see more all the time the role I played in my life crumbling around me.  I see some strengths in myself that I didn't know I had as well.   

 You know life isn't always perfect and I know people like happy blogs where life is always wonderful but life isn't always birthday and barbeque's. Some times life is simply just a shit storm. If none of us ever talk about the rough waters, how can anyone know who to turn to when their shit storm starts? Some times it is hard to hear the down parts of life or to hear when some one we love is not the person we want them to be or the person we have made them out to be.

  The hard part about life when its storming is the rest of the world might be experiencing sunny skies.  I have learned that all to well.  In the last year my life has fallen apart and I see it in my children I see them struggle.  I see it in friends and family.  You know life is falling apart and you don't know what to tell people or how to let people help you so you, or I push people away, another one of those things I have realized about myself. One of those things I am not so proud of.  Everyone else's life hasn't stopped just because mine did.  Things are still happening and I have to deal with those things, and I have had to learn to deal with them differently then I would have before. Which is where some of the strengths come in.   I have had an overwhelming amount of things fall on my plate in the last year.  I often wonder when the clouds will clear and the sun will start shining again. 

  My grandma use to say there is always some one worse off than you and always some one better off then you so be happy with where you are.  That can be a lot easier said then done at times.   Then you have a moment like I had the other night. Owen and Xavier were sitting up to the counter and Xavier said to me : mom you and dad made me like this and he pointed to himself, then he said and you and dad made Owen like this and pointed to his brother.  I turned and looked at their cute little faces and I said your right buddy we did and we did a really good job.   And we did.   We did a really good job.

  Over the last year I know the thought has come up that maybe things were a mistake, or that things will be so much better of with a divorce, I don't know how anyone in their right mind could listen to my little boy, or look at the faces of any of my children and ever think any part of our lives was ever wrong, or a mistake, or not the right thing. Its hard to lose things in life that mean so much to you and realize how easily you could be replaced in other peoples worlds. To learn just how easily you are displaced, then replaced is almost as heartbreaking as the rest of it.
  This year has gone by so fast and so slow.  And while so much has changed so much has stayed the same.   I still love my husband as much if not more than I did a year ago, some would ask how that could be and I don't have the answers.   Some people think I should have moved on cut my losses long ago. Some people don't understand my forgiveness, this baffles me.  Isn't that what we are suppose to do forgive people love them for their faults and forgive?  I question myself on this all the time am I being stupid, why am I holding out.   You know a lot of people say when your done having kids you just know you just have that feeling and to be honest I had that feeling I love babies but I don't want any more kids. In this last year I have never had that feeling that I was done with my marriage, it has never felt right to me to shut that door so I haven't.  Every day I wonder if I am crazy or if I am right.   I guess only time will tell. 
  We have been through ups and downs and then even more downs, right now I feel like I have a partner for the first time in years.  Some one to help with homework and other things and that is a good thing. 

   A year later and one thing that hasn't changed a year ago we were the Howard 6, Mike, Amber, Winter, Zarley, Owen, and Xavier.  Today we are still the Howard 6, Mike, Amber, Winter Zarley, Owen, and Xavier.