Doing the mom thing right!

Following my friends on FaceBook, I often do the quizzes that my friends do, just to see how I fair, because the answers are sometimes hysterical or I just want to prove how epically Canadian I am.  Today a friend of mine did a word cloud.  I find these fascinating because it shows the words you often use and the more you use a word, the bigger it is in the cloud. 

Here is mine.

For a minute I was awash with guilt.  While both boys’ names are there, they’re TINY.  I thought “I can’t share that!” what will people think?  That I don’t talk about my kids enough?  Then it hit me.

• I’m not just a mom.
• I’m not just an employee.
• I’m not just a wife.
• I’m not just a family member.
• I’m not just a best friend.
• I’m not just a baseball fan.

I’m many things, all of the above and more.  I don’t live solely for my children and I’m not just “their mom”.  I’m a dynamic person with a lot of passions and apparently a lot of happiness.  BHE and I do a LOT of things together.  We go on adventures, we explore new things, and we get out and about so it’s obvious that he’d be the biggest name.  It’s obvious I’m living my best life full of love and happiness.

There’s no shame in my game.  I love my kids, they’re a very important part of my life and an important part of me, but I don’t live only for them, I live with them and they get to see what a happy and fulfilled parent looks like.  I know they’re happy and well loved and I’m thrilled with the balance and joy in my life.

The grey rut with the explosive neon moments

I’ve come to not only learn, but accept that this is what life is.  I was driving to work this morning after dropping the little gifts off at daycare, filling the tank with gas, then joining the rest of the rats on the daily race down to work.  It was a brilliant and sunny morning, but it’s just such a mundane and repetitive task … monotonyyyyyyyyyyyyy.  Then I thought about what a great weekend LML and I just had.  We try to take advantage of every opportunity to be together and enjoy ourselves.  I had to do a short work trip to Minneapolis, so he took a day off, we had a coupon for a free short haul flight and he came with me.  It was fun to adventure the Mall of America with him.  Not to mention I got to meet one of my working mom friends (my evil twin) that I’ve known for 8.5 years.  I have bright, vivid neon memories of hanging at that cool mall with them.

When we landed on Saturday, we took off downtown to meet another old friend of mine.  Richard and LML love to talk craft beer, and they’ve even begun trading them.  What was supposed to be an hour drink at BarVolo, turned into a 4 hour visit there prior to heading out on transit for some EPIC BBQ in Greek Town.  I love it when stars align and LML’s friend Derek who happened to be downtown joined us.  Again a brilliant flash of GREAT TIMES OF LIFE. 

My learning from this weekend is that yes, a lot of life is the mundane boring stuff we have to do (commute, grocery shop, laundry, etc.) but if you take every opportunity possible for those neon firework moments, you’ll smile a lot more often during that traffic jam!

Why wait so long to be happy?

It’s only one reason, fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of failure, fear of hurting someone. I know … oh boy do I know. I spent YEARS in a marriage where I felt like nothing more than a pay-cheque and a piece of furniture. When I told him I was lonely, he’d tell me that was bullsh!t.; nothing like having your feelings nullified, and completely disregarded. I thought our downfall was communication, but it wasn’t, it was trust. The trust was not only broken, but ruined early on. I believe (to this day) that trust can be broken, then earned back. When one heart is open to fixing things, and the other heart is committed to doing whatever it takes to gain the trust back, I truly believe it can happen. I’ve SEEN it happen, but that was not the case for me. After having my trust broken, when I was at my most vulnerable, I was asked to offer a chance, to trust that he’d do the right thing and be honest with me. I did … then found out, years later, he’d continued to lie about things.


It didn’t matter what happened after that, what we tried, what we wanted to work, the foundation was destroyed and it was impossible to rebuild. It’s not that we didn’t try, and in the end he tried as well, I believe that, but I think at that time we were just afraid to fail, even though we were NEVER going to succeed. He’s not a bad man, I’m not a bad woman, we just weren’t right for each other. It took me a LONG time to accept that. I’d say too long, but it wasn’t, I learned at lot of lessons, what I want, more importantly what I don’t want. What I need and what I need to give to my partner, to be happy. I have the two most amazing sons, and finally a best friend, who blossomed into the love of my life.

The most amazing thing about my love now is that it’s SOLID. Even the baggage from my past, and the baggage from his, is something he and I can discuss openly and comfortably. We’re not perfect (granted we’re so close it’s scary ;) but we’re happy, we communicate, we enjoy one another and our life together. We want the same things, we want to be together, and we want the other to be as happy as we are. It’s ALL positive, it’s all good, and it’s what love should be.

When I started telling people about the divorce, and how different and incredible my life is now, many people are open with their woes. So many people are unhappy, something is holding them back, whether it’s the tools to fix what’s wrong in their relationship, or leave to be happy alone, or find someone else. I know that fear, I lived it, and fortunately with the support and love of my friends and family, I was able to choose to be happy. I hope those that I come across have the opportunity to be happy as well.