In other news - Amazing littles and ENGAGED !!

In other news. Lailah is almost done with Kindergarten ! She's done so extremely well and I am so proud of her! She is also losing her first tooth, although, it's not wiggly enough to come out yet.












Noel has learned to sit up all on his own already! At 5 months old! He also has his very first tooth coming in! Lol, out with one tooth, in with the other! So funny!



Justin and I are doing great. Really solid relationship I believe. We communicate well and he's just perfect for me. He proposed !! We are engaged and I couldn't be any happier ! I can't imagine spending the rest of my life with anybody else. He's my light in the tunnel that gives me hope and courage to keep moving forward. He's my rock who keeps me grounded and safe. He's so much to me and I love him so much.

I've survived.

I've survived.
These past two months have felt like I've been living in Hell on Earth. Seriously. It has been emotional and mental hell.
Hit over and over again.
My sister being an asshole. Wham.
Bennett's birthday. Wham.
My family going on the cruise and everything that happened with that. Wham, wham, wham.
Mothers day. Wham!
My mother being a cunt. Double wham!
Leaving my mothers house, bouncing around others homes, and finally landing back at my dads house. WHAM, WHAM, WHAM, WHAMWHAMWHAM.

Jeeze,  you'd think I'd be able to catch a break but nope.
So, in my last post I ended off with talking about the cruise and the daycare. Mothers day was approaching the following day. So here goes:

The sad thing about Mothers day - besides not having Bennett with me, was that I went to get my mom a card and unfortunately I couldn't find anything that wouldn't have made me a liar to buy. She was never there for me, never listened to me, never hugged me, never cared for me, nor has she ever been supportive or kind to me. She's everything I aim not to be as a mother. So, that really sucked because I felt obligated to get her a card or something or else I'd have had to hear it nonstop from her. I'd have been attacked by her, my sister, and my brother. I didn't want to deal with it.
Fast forward to the Monday after Mother's day - almost 2 weeks ago. I had an appointment to go to and my mom was supposed to watch Noel for me as I attended my appointment that was only a half hour long. But she wasn't home. Moe was home but I didn't feel comfortable leaving Noel with her so I didn't go. When my mom got home I attempted to talk to her about it but she claimed that she told me she had a doctors appt which she did not tell me it was at the same time as mine - and that she felt Moe could just watch him anyhow. I told her I did not feel comfortable with Moe watching him since I didn't like the way she was with children at all. She overheard me from the other room - which I didn't even know she was in. She texted my mom threatening her that if I didn't go downstairs then she was leaving and no longer helping her with the daycare because I wasn't supposed to be there during daycare hours. So my mom started freaking out - mostly on me. I was hungry and I had gone upstairs to eat which is when I caught my mom for the conversation.
So, I ended up calling 211 and got us put on the family shelter list.
So - fast forward to the next Thursday I got a call from a shelter that is 25 minutes away. I told her I would have to talk to my family and call her back (Justin and Lailah).
Fast forward to Saturday - My mom came downstairs "asking" (demanding) that I go and watch a daycare kid because she "emotionally don't feel well". I asked her why, she told me that she got caught by the state withholding abuse information about her husbands ex which placed his kids in a dangerous situation. So they stripped her of her daycare license since she is required by law to report any and all abusive situations immediately. Which she failed to do until it was convenient for her (she wanted to take custody of her husbands other 2 kids to spite the mother).
Anyways...

So, I said, "Welcome to my world." 

and she said, "I wish I had your life, it's so EASY!" 

And I said,  "You have no idea what my life is like or how I feel because you don't care to. You don't care to know me or talk to me or understand me. I struggle a lot emotionally and mentally and you don't even care." 

So she went off like a firecracker! Screaming, "Nevermind! I don't want your help! You only ever care about yourself! Everything is always about you! Who cares about anyone else because you're selfish! You only care about you! You won't even help or care about your own mother!" 

As she ran upstairs and locked all of the doors. -.-
So noon passed and 1pm, 2pm, 3pm - Lailah went upstairs multiple times knocking on the door telling my mom she's hungry and thirsty and to let her in but my mom would not let her in, even though she was sitting right inside the kitchen on the other side of the door.
So I decided that was the final straw and I packed up our things and we left. I had no idea where we were going but we left. My dad came over and he helped us pack our things into the car and then he took us for lunch/dinner because we were starving!
I ended up driving an hour away to go stay at my aunt Cindy and uncle Mikes house. They are the nicest people I know. I love my aunt Cindy more than she knows, I think. She really listens to me, gets me, understands me - you know? I feel like she really is the only person (besides Justin) who truly tries to understand me and cares for me. It means the world to me. I really hope she knows that. I keep telling her but I don't know how much she really believes me. I appreciate it and I appreciate her.
So we stayed with them for one night and then we moved on into Justin's Adads house.
We stayed there the past week.
We called back the shelter on Monday in attempt to go there but they told us we had to get Background checks done. So we went and got them but Justin's pat court shit was on his record even though he was found Not Guilty. So we were told we had to get it expunged. We went to the courthouse to do that and he got a court date to go to and it's $100 to get it cleared. WTF.
Now we are at my dads house, moved back in.

The next steps are for me to get a job and work towards getting the necessary scholarships for school in fall. I HAVE to do this.
I really want to attempt to get the job back that I had 3 years ago as a home based therapist working with children who have behavioral and mental health struggles. It pays well. The only problem with that is that they only have 15 hour a week cases, which would mean that I would need to take on 2 cases and I don't know if they do that. Because daycare assistance requires 20 hours of work a week. And we wouldn't be able to afford to pay someone for daycare when it would be more than half the money that I'm making. It would be pointless.
So, I guess we'll see..... I'll report back when I know more.

I need a boat

I've built up this wall. This wall that surrounds everything internal and precious to me - my sanity, my humanity, my existence, my life. I built up this wall in the center of my little island in which I live on, knowing about the harsh storms and rising tides on the outer edges of my floating rock of land. Over the past decade the storms have been very harsh, threatening - and the tide has closed in. I just built my walls higher and thicker. Things seemed to have settled down and worry faded away. Happiness and joy was all that flooded in until I recently checked out of my watchtower and noticed that my island is smaller than ever and only my wall and the water outside it exist. My walls are being threatened in the worst way. The water could continue rising and the inevitable will be the result - I will drown. I don't have any boats - I never prepared for this, I never knew how bad this was going to get. I thought I took all necessary precautions within reason. I call out -- I just need someone to help me build a boat. I need hope and guidance. Where do I go from here?

I crumbled.

Tomorrow is mothers day. I should feel happy and blessed and all that wonderful stuff. But all I can think of is about how I don't have all my children with me. Bennett is with his aparents and I just wish I could see him and hug him again. But I can't.
I've really been struggling recently. Last Friday was awful. I was in complete breakdown mode. I had these thoughts that just wouldn't let up on attacking me and emotions that overwhelmed me more than I could handle in one day. I was texting Justin and just completely broke down. I wasn't feeling very safe at all. I was even about to go sign myself into Butler (mental) hospital for some assistance with coping. Justin left work and came home to get me through the day.
I ended up smoking a couple times over the past couple days. I needed something to help me through all these emotions and struggles. I even had a couple drinks on Friday night while I went out to play cards.
I still am struggling. I feel so down.
When I first smoked I felt a bit paranoid. I went and sat in my moms bed (because for some reason I relate safety to my mom) with Justin and Noel, then Lailah came up and she cuddled me and I stroked her hair and Noel was laying on his belly looking up at me babbling away and I just broke down crying. I felt so entirely blessed to have them in my life. I felt like having them was complete and pure happiness and in that moment I got to just live and breathe them with everything else feeling non-existent. It didn't matter where we were or who else was around. It was as if they were all I could see, breathe, and know. And in that moment I felt like I was in heaven as complete happiness overwhelmed me. I just smiled and cried and cried while holding my little ones. If that makes me a bad mother, so be it.
Tonight Liz sent me a mothers day video with pictures of Bennett. It was sweet. It literally made me cry. I tried to have an open conversation with her but I guess I overwhelmed her because she stopped responding. I really wish I could ask to meet him. To fly down there and be able to spend a day with him, laughing and hugging him. I wish I could be around him again. But I know he doesn't know me and it would problem be weird and frightening for him. Blah. Why is this so difficult and stupid?
I have so much more to say but the baby is getting fussy so I have to cut this short to tend to him. But next time, hopefully I'll be able to get more out.

Here's the video. And here's our convo: