as a favor.

What I need today more than anything in this world is for my house to sell.

It consumes me night and day.

It is one of those things that I go to bed thinking about and I wake up thinking about.

There are so many reasons why I want it to sell, but mostly it is to cut ties with my old life and move home to be closer to my support system.

It no longer feels like something I want.... It is something I need.

Each day without a showing or an offer is painful.

I sometimes think that it has taken so long because I needed to see and feel more to be 100% certain of my decision.

Probably the day I listed the house I was at about 80%, and now.... I am at 110%.

So if you can... as a favor before you go to bed tonight....or as you are reading this,

Think some really positive thoughts for me.

We need this, more than you will ever know.

Chapter 4.

When i first started seeing my therapist she told me that through this process I would have to sit down and write four letters.

One to my former husband, one to the other woman, one to a person I felt that saved me and one to my daughter.

I have written the first two listed above and you have read them here, the third was recently written but the fourth I have struggled with for months.

Below is my best effort at telling her how it is today... and how it's been since she came into my life.

My best girl;

It took me four hours to fall in love with you.

That is by far the fastest I have ever fallen in love with anyone in my life, so don't feel bad.

Minutes after you were born and they layed you on my chest... I felt nothing.. but pain and confusion.

It was not until we were alone in our room four hours later that I looked past the cries and the fear inside me... and saw you.

Really saw you....

That moment was the most defining moment of my life.

I had this feeling then that I still carry with me today...

That you and I would be forever.

I had no clue about what was to come, or that this is where we would be today... but I would do it all over again and more if it meant having you in my life.

In the first months of this mess it was you that pulled me out of bed and gave me the focus and drive to live and for that I owe you .

I promise that I will spend the rest of my life giving you the life that I wanted for you and nothing less.

Please know that we will always be ok.

No matter what life throws at us, there will never be a problem too big or too small that the two of us can't fix head on...

you and I will make it through it together, always my girl, I am never going anywhere.

Nothing in this world means as much to me as you do... and everyday I am grateful to have you by my side.

I know that one day when you read all these words that I have written, you will have so many questions.

I will always do my best to answer them, but all you need to ever know is this;

You are loved.

So loved by so many, and that my girl will never change.

I love you through and through,

Mummy

xoxo

briefly

When you least expect it.. life kicks you in the ass.

I wrote last week about the broken furnace and broken gas fireplace. I rounded out the week with a broken dryer and the dog getting sprayed by a skunk.

As calm as I try to be, I am not a calm person by nature....I lose my marbles on a regular basis.

Each thing that happened made me think, well at least it can't get worse then this..... but it did again and again.

After the dog got sprayed by the skunk I sat down on my laundry room floor and cried. A lot.

But, I picked myself up and went into the garage and washed him with this magic stuff....

and tried to take a look at things from a different perspective.

The facts are as follows

My furnace broke: but i was gullible enough to buy the crazy insurance from my gas company so if it breaks they come and fix it for free. (so $1100 of work done for free)

The gas fireplace broke: but was fixed for free with in 24hrs by my trusty neighbor dan.

My dryer broke: it is actually dead and beyond the world of fixing, but my other trusty neighbor jessie just happened to have a spare dryer that he is letting me use.

The dog got sprayed buy a skunk: my house and my dog wreaked like bloody hell, but both were fixable with in 24 hours. (thanks to lindsbabes fancy skunk smell recipe)

Each of these things which seemed like the end of the world at the time---- are small things that with help from those around me were fixable.

All I had to do was ask.

My Best Girl

I leave a lot out when I write. I know, I say that a lot.

Mostly because it sometimes seems like to much to say, but other times I think I am the only one in the world who must be feeling this way....or maybe I am just to ashamed to admit what really goes on.

But lately I started to understand that we are all sort of interconnected with our emotions and feelings.

An easy example is my beautiful little girl.

That same little girl that I tell you says and does all those sweet and amazing things also does the following;

Screams bloody murder when I tell her no.

Screams bloody murder when I take something away from her.

Screams bloody murder basically at the drop of a dime.

She slaps me.

She hits me.

She throws down any where at any time... meaning, she will lay on the floor at home, shoppers, my family's houses and lose her mind for no good reason.

Throws food on the floor, at the dog and at me.

Rips apart books.

You name it she has done it.

For example, I went to fill up the dog's food container the other day in the garage, it is a two minute task.

This is what happened with in that two minutes.

After this, she decided it would be a good idea to rip down the entire wood part of the toy bin.

The funny thing about all this is that for the longest time I only told the people closest to me what a struggle she had become. It is sometimes so painfully hard to even get through an hour with her.

There are more days then I would like to admit that I want to run screaming from the house.

It wasn't until I started to open up to everyone around me that I realized, everyone with kids is dealing with the same things I am.

It has nothing to do with being a single parent, and everything to do with just being a parent.

So these days instead of saying she is "great" when people ask, I tell them how she tried to rip the cats tail off, or how she threw a massive tantrum on the floor at Walmart.

The honesty about what I am dealing with or what goes on here on a daily basis is so important, to not only those closest to me.... but to everyone.

This is what life is like, it's the things we don't say that tend to be the most important.

from a we to a me to an us.

It's thanksgiving this weekend.... and it is freezing, and my furnace is broken and I can't get the gas fireplace going.... so we are cold.

In fact one of us is still in her sleeper from last night, because it is the warmest thing that I can find for her to wear.

It's a good thing I have a little girl who constantly runs about 2 degrees higher then the average person.

This weekend has been hard, because as the seasons change I am reminded more and more of where we were last year at this time.

He was still here, and I was still believing in us.

He was gone this weekend last year to Vegas, opting out of Thanksgiving to go on a trip with some of his work friends.

Or that's what I thought...... actually that's what I forced myself to believe, because thinking it was anything else seemed so impossible at the time.

It becomes clear after all this time that I was just so unwilling to see the obvious. That I was so blind to what was happening right in front of me.

The clear part me to is this: we were not a priority then.... something like Thanksgiving, although seemingly unimportant to some... is still a time to be shared with family, together.

Setting those expectations for my daughter now has become so important for me.

It's days like today that create her memories.

Like what Nana's house smells like when she walks in.... or how Grandpa makes her feel like the most special little girl in the world.

I want her to feel love on a day like today sitting around a crowded table and laughing about how many drinks my brother has on the go at any given time, or how my other brother at 35 still refuses to eat any form of vegetable.

Yesterday as we walked down by the path close to where we live, we ran into a couple and a child.

They were both holding the little boys hands on either side and doing the 1, 2, 3 weeeeee game. (you know the one, where you swing them up in the middle of you)

We play this when she is walking with Nana and I in the mall.

She looked up at me and said 123 weeee, and my eyes filled with tears.

Knowing that it was just me and 123 weee, is not a game I can play with her on my own.

But my best girl solved our problem.

She stood in front of me and lifted her little hands into mine.... and we 123 weee'd all on our own.

It reminds me that we can do this, that against all odds.... we are going to make this life,

our life..... just that... ours.

Waiting in the Cold.

Have you ever had one of those phone calls that last so long not only have you had to change ears, but you actually change to speaker for a portion of the call because both ears are now sore?

I have had plenty in my life... but only few have ever made me really re evaluate things as much as one I had the other day.

A friend of mine, who suffered a loss far greater then my own called to check in.

The call was filled with tears and laughter.... but mostly it was filled with a profound connection that I never would have expected.

To raise a child alone is an experience like no other.

The only people that ever really understand are the ones that actually do it on a daily basis.

It's those people that I can laugh with about the strange yet amazing parts of single parenthood....

There is something to be said for restraining your child in a headlock in her highchair after she has shoved a french fry up her nose.. and pulling the part that is logged so far up her nose you can barely see it...... out with a pair of tweezers.

Those are the times when i miss someone walking in the door at 5 to ask me how the day was....

because that is not the kind of story anyone wants to hear, but a parent.

We discussed those moments when random strangers ask if our daughters look like there mothers/fathers.... or what it's like when your child is calling other people mama or dada.

Believe me, you can't make shit like this up.

I have cried in the checkout line at walmart, after someone asked my little girl where her daddy was.

The other thing we talked a lot about was love.

The way my friend talked about losing the love of a lifetime was heartbreaking.

The pain I could feel coming from the other end of the phone was so familiar.

The pain I felt knowing that I have never been loved like that was a deep blow that I never would have expected.

It hurts to know that I haven't had that in my life yet, and it may never happen for me.

Ever.

The pain I feel is like a cut that's healing....

some days I barely feel it...

and other days I feel like someone just poured salt over it.

I don't know when this goes away completely or if it ever will.

fear.

The new me doesn't work so well sometimes.

Although there are good things about it, there is also bad.

I take things to heart more, I take things to seriously, I regret more, I am hurt more.

The things that used to roll off my back don't.

I feel somethings so deeply, almost too deeply.

The smallest things that really shouldn't hurt so much, shake me to my core.

It scares me.

It scares me that there is more out there that can be lost, and that I will end up with that same pain I had in my life on day one of this for the rest of my life.

It forces me to push away the good things out of fear.

Like I said, the new me doesn't work so well sometimes.