Photos.

I finally uploaded all of my photos from June 2009 and after. Here are some of my faves:

Gleneden Beach, June:

Backyard on one of those 105 degree days, July:

Down at the Willamette, damnit (Sellwood)! July:

Sauvie Island, another 105 degree day, August:

I ordered a bunch of pies for clients, but kept this one for myself. Apricot. Don’t know why I need to show you:

Joey, his dad, his sister Devon, & Lu sitting on Devon. Sellwood park, September:

She got her face painted at the Weiner Dog Races at Grant park. September:

One of the last warm days of the year. Sauvie Island, September:

Getting ready to go to the rose garden. September:

Devon + Lu:

Joey + Tania:

Pretty Tania:

Me + Lu:

Lu, the model:

Halloween Tania:

Halloween Lu:

Rock band with Jeaninne & Taylor. Ashland, October:

Thanksgiving. The computer is there to show Joey how to carve the turkey. Video tutorial is the way to go:

The kids and me on Thanksgiving:

The kids on Christmas in their Christmas jammies:

Me in my Christmas jammies:

Christmas, Part Deux (when Grammy Glo came to Portland):

Bath time. Yes, that’s Suave. No, I’m not ashamed:

And last, this photo just cracks me the eff up and makes me want to cry at the same time. The first time she rode this, she was all by herself. Then, she wanted to ride it again, so we just left her on it. She was the only kid on the ride. Then, she wanted to ride again, and the mom of the kids you see in the photo totally hijacked the car (even though there were other cars available). Lu was actually sitting on the other side of that row, and the mom came over, unbuckled Lu’s seatbelt, pushed her over, and shoved her kids in. It all happened so quickly that after I recovered from my shock, all I could do was pull out my camera to take a photo of how Lu looks like she wants to cutabitch. The little one in the back is crying because her mom just spanked the shit out of her for taking too long to get in the car. I know, it’s not funny, but if this happened to you, you might only be able to laugh awkwardly and hope the mom doesn’t hit you too. Oaks Amusement Park, June:

And with that, I’m out.

With love,

New place.

I’m in a new place.

Both literally and figuratively.

I moved to a small two-bedroom apartment. It’s so tiny and clean. I spent the last two weeks moving and cleaning up the old place with Joey. At one point, I said to him, “Wouldn’t it be great if people had deadlines for cleaning up their lives?” I had this deadline to have the old place finished. The plan was to go through everything and get rid of stuff, so as not to bring everything over to the next place. I wanted to start fresh, taking only the good things with me. We sorted for a few days, but as things got closer to the deadline, we realized that it would be more efficient to start packing and moving, and doing the sorting later. We talked about how people do that in relationships a lot. You pack up and move on to the next relationship, bringing all of your baggage with you. People need to declutter their lives before starting something new.

So anyway, here I am at the new place, putting stuff away, making Goodwill piles and trash piles. Oh well, at least I’m doing it. The whole process was strangely cathartic and healing. And Joey was really good company.

I should also add that this move was largely a result of all of my thoughts about life being shaken up because of the divorce. I had this picture of what my life should look like – married, two kids, living in a beautiful house, etc. Once the “married” part was shattered, I was able to look at everything in my life and ask myself if this was what I really wanted. One of the things that I realized pretty quickly was that I hated living in a big house! I hated cleaning it. I hated how alone I always felt in it. I hated that people would stop and look at how beautiful the house was and not realize how miserable the person living inside of it really was. I hated how easy it was to accumulate stuff. I hated having to yell up the stairs for my family to hear me. I hated having a yard that I didn’t have time to garden in. The only reason I lived in the house was because I thought I should. I am really grateful for my time living in that house, because it showed me that when I wanted a house like this, I wasn’t really very adept at defining what I truly want in life. And I’m not saying that everyone who lives in a beautiful house is doing what I was doing. But it’s what I was doing. So, it was a pretty quick decision to move to a small apartment. And the kids and I love it here. I love that we’re not all in different rooms all the time. I love that it’s so easy to keep clean. I love that there are no stairs. I love that I have to be really discriminating with what I want to keep. I just really love it here. Not that I won’t ever live in a house again. I don’t know. Maybe when I can pay a live-in housekeeper.

With love,

P.S. I found my cardreader! So hopefully I’ll be uploading some photos soon! (Of course, as soon as I found it I packed it, so it’s in a box somewhere.)

New Year.

Happy New Year!

I love the New Year. It’s such a great time to start fresh, get organized, and reevaluate what is important. Maybe it’s the Capricorn energy in the air around this time of year. I dunno. But I’m excited to start fresh!

I am starting the New Year off by moving to a new place. It’s a small apartment, so I will have half the space to keep clean. Cleaning is increasingly difficult now that I’m the only adult in my house. I only have childcare on the days that I see clients, so on the days that I am doing other work, I am trying to keep my 3yo happy as well. Cleaning is not a priority. But I hate the mess. It makes me feel yucky. I want to live in a place that is easy to keep clean. So, I am getting rid of a lot of our stuff and totally downsizing. I think I’ll also benefit from the fresh energy of a new place. We have no memories there, and will be able to build new memories that are filled with fun and love, and free of pain and betrayal.

This year, I am also going to get serious about tackling my debt. I have law school student loans and a pretty hefty business loan, as well as all the credit card debt from my marriage. I had to incur the debt to get to where I am today, but it’s time for me to tackle it and move forward. I am going to be doing the Dave Ramsey debt snowball. I have it all planned out and am really excited to get started!

This year is also about taking care of ME. I have taken care of others for so long, and I need to put some focus on myself, because when I don’t take care of myself, I am operating at about 50% effectiveness in taking care of others. I have to pour most of what I have into my law firm, so that means my kids lose. They’re growing up so fast and they deserve the best of me! Mostly, taking care of me means guarding myself from toxic people. But it also means eating better, exercising more, and doing things that I love.

It should be an exciting year! I am determined not to dwell on the past or waste my energy on people and things that don’t pay off for me emotionally, physically, or spiritually.

So, Happy New Year! I hope 2010 brings you lots of love & happiness.

With love,

Christmas.

Maybe I’ll update with a bunch of photos, once I get them uploaded.

We have had a wonderful Christmas so far, and it’s actually not over yet! We have Part II happening tomorrow, as my Mother-in-Law is coming into town. She loves to go all out and spoil the crap out of her kids and grandkids. She’s a truly lovely woman and the kids just adore her.

We had a really wonderfully different Christmas this year! I got really sad thinking about doing the same thing as last year, but minus one, so I decided to scrap the traditions that we had and come up with some new ones. I asked the kids to each tell me something that they wanted to eat for Christmas Eve dinner. Tania said, “Sushi!”  Talula said, “Cupcakes!”  So, sushi and cupcakes it was. We had SIL and BIL over and we made sushi & cupcakes, and played Apples to Apples. It doesn’t get much more fun than that, folks. The girls got to open a few gifts early. We all got new pajamas, and they each got a new stuffed animal. SIL brought over gifts for us too.

It was a great night. BIL said, “I think this was the best Christmas Eve I’ve ever had!”

Tania managed to let us sleep until 8:30 on Christmas morning. Then we did stockings. Then we ran downstairs to open presents. Tania, the fashion girl, got a bunch of new clothes, shoes, and jewelry, and Talula, the artist girl, got an easel and a bunch of art supplies. We spent the morning trying on clothes, painting pictures, and eating cupcakes.

It was so much fun! The magic of the kids filled the house and I was able to enjoy it instead of worrying about whether a certain someone was happy, whether I did enough, whether the house was too messy for someone’s tastes, whether I had been perfect enough. My kids were so happy! They thought everything was perfect! And they didn’t give a shit about the messy house! They threw wrapping paper around and spilled cupcake crumbs everywhere and then stepped on the cupcake crumbs, smashing them into the floor. I LOVE THEM.

Tania said, “This is the best Christmas ever!”

We spent the rest of the day watching movies at SIL’s house. The X came over to see the kids for a few hours and was pleasant.

All-in-all, a great Christmas! And there’s still more! And then a New Year, filled with promise!

How was your Christmas?

With love,

Struggle.

You know, I really wish that I could post something like, “From now on, I’m not going to struggle. I’m not going to be sad. I’m not going to bore people with my sad story. I’m going to be strong and happy and move on and never look back again.” And then I wish I could do exactly that.

But my life is not working like that. It goes in cycles. And when I’m feeling sad, I really need to write.

On Thanksgiving, STBX broke down crying and told me how sorry he was. He told me how much he loved me. How he was afraid that he’d messed things up beyond repair. How I didn’t deserve any of this. What a wonderful wife I was. How sorry he was for rewriting history and demonizing me to justify what he had done. I told him that he was still carrying on an affair and that I couldn’t accept his apology while he was continuing to hurt our family. We talked about him ending it and us trying again. I told him it wasn’t something that would be easy. He tried to talk me into it, and then we agreed to think about it.

The next day, he said he couldn’t do it. I felt like I’d just been set back 2 months. It had been 2 months that I had kept my distance from him and I really started to move forward. That night really set me back.

A few days later, he left to go on a road trip with the filthy skank with tattooed-on eyebrows and a Jay Leno chin and and a vapid, utterly boring personality person who used to be my friend until she decided to start effing my husband he continues to have an affair with. She and her Hello Kitty collection has now moved back here and is living with him.

My 10yo is devastated and refuses to go to his house if she’s there. Of course, this is all my fault somehow. There’s just so much wrong right now that I had to get it all out. Ever since he came back, he’s just so angry and cold. I don’t understand how he could go from “I love you more than anything in the world” a few weeks ago, to this mean, sarcastic, mocking person he is now. It’s making me really sad. More than anything, I miss the man that was my best friend. I feel like I’m going through the stages of mourning all over again. Except, probably before, I was mourning the loss of the life that I knew, and now I am mourning the loss of a good man who has turned into a shallow, selfish, shell of a human being.

It’s really hard to feel so erased from the life of someone you care about so much. It’s really hard to hear my daughter talk about how happy we were a year ago, how it was the best Christmas we’ve ever had, and then to have all those memories dismissed so callously.

My daughter was crying the other day, and I started apologizing to her. I really had bought into the idea that I could have done something to prevent this or stop it. I really beat myself up over reasons STBX gave for having the affair and leaving. My daughter said, “It’s not your fault Mom. You did everything. You always did everything.” And what she said really made me realize that it was OK that the house was a mess sometimes, because over the course of the marriage, I finished law school, gave birth, took care of a newborn and homeschooled my oldest, worked on a farm with a baby on my back, did freelance legal work while breastfeeding a toddler (and still homeschooling), studied for the bar exam, took the bar exam, passed the bar exam, set up a brand new law firm, ran the law firm, made more money than I’ve ever made in my life, and single-handedly financially supported our family. And it’s OK that I blew up and yelled a few times, because over the course of my marriage, my husband was always looking for someone else, drinking to excess, and basically being completely emotionally unavailable to me. And it’s OK that I slept in the basement because well, I don’t want to get into it. But I had good reasons and I am laughing about them sleeping together on that bed.

Anyway, I am struggling. But I am still moving forward. I know now that this wasn’t my fault. I was a good wife. I did what I could to salvage things even after he basically ripped my heart into a million pieces and stomped all over them and pissed all over the stomped, ripped pieces. If he had put as much effort into repairing our family as he did into destroying it, we’d be in a really great place right now. But the guy couldn’t even try marriage counseling. It blows the mind.

Anyway, thanks for listening. It feels so good to get that all out. I think in-real-life friends may be sick and tired of hearing about my problems.

With love,

Getting a head start.

Last year, I read the book “Your Best Year Yet” by Jinny S. Ditzler and planned my year using the 10 questions from the book. So, I decided to pick up the book again this year and was pretty surprised about what I learned.

The first thing you’re supposed to do is look back on the past year and see what you’ve accomplished. Truth be told, anyone looking at my life can see that it’s been a really shitty year. My husband had an affair with my friend/employee and left our family. I had financial problems. I have to move out of my beautiful house. Good Lord, so much more. But you have to look back and see what you’ve accomplished and what a valuable exercise that was for me. Here is my list of accomplishments.

1.  Built my business/law firm to be nearly profitable.

2.  Did a great job for my clients.

3.  Built a name for myself in my field.

4.  Developed closer relationships with friends.

5.  Developed closer relationships with my girls.

6.  Lost 30 pounds.

7.  Ended a soul-sucking relationship.

8.  Gained more clarity about my purpose.

9.  Dealt with painful childhood issues that have held me back.

10.  Learned to trust God.

11.  Learned to trust myself.

12.  Developed my value system.

13.  Developed my sense of self-worth.

14.  Paid down some debts.

15.  Learned to be more frugal and purposeful with money.

16.  Learned to ask for help, and to say what I need.

So, it’s a pretty great list. I’ve basically had a life-changing year. And looking back on it made me feel like, wow! I can make 2010 even better than 2009! My planning last year was all business-related. I had no plans about my marriage or kids. I had focused on being a stay-at-home mom for 3 years, and I was ready to get my career started. Making my business successful was my most pressing need at the time. And it has been a success, but I learned so much more than I ever imagined possible. If you told me a year ago that I’d be separated and divorcing my husband a year from then, I’d have laughed. We were extremely happy a year ago. It’s really crazy what you can’t possibly plan for. We were snowed in and cozy with our little fire a year ago. Tania says it was the best Christmas ever. I don’t know, the demise of my marriage is not something I could have seen coming, but I’m glad that my focus was on my business, because I’d be screwed right now without it. I guess my point about that, is that having a plan is smart, even though you can’t plan for everything.

The next steps to YBYY deal with your past year’s disappointments, what you learned, and how you limit yourself. Then you define values and roles in your life and then set your goals. My primary focus this year is going to be on the role of “Candice’s Coach.” So this has a lot to do with physical health, emotional well-being, and just taking care of myself. I did a pretty horrible job of that this past year and I think it affected so many areas of my life. I can be a better mom, lawyer, business owner, friend, if I am a healthier me.

So…the number one goal on my list for 2010 is to quit smoking. I started again because of the divorce, and now I want to quit. I was so eager to get started on the next year that I decided to quit today. I am tired and totally jonesing for a cigarette right now, but I should be past the cravings in a couple of days. Maybe I should have waited until January.

Anyway, wish me luck! It’s hard! And maybe I’ll post more about the rest of my 2010 goals. What are yours?

With love,

Reflection.

Have you ever been able to look back over a period of time and see how much you’ve grown? I look back over the past few months and I am amazed at how much has changed in me. I believe that I’ve been through a painful purging process and am finally seeing the positive results of it.

I am more in touch with my feelings, emotions, and intuition than I have ever been. Honestly, I think that side of me was severely stunted as I tried to get through the day-to-day of my situation. I had too much responsibility, and never enough time to stop and ask myself what I was feeling. I pushed down feelings, I ignored my intuition, I was hard on myself when I felt emotional. Now, when something feels bad or not right, I am able to stop and dig deeper to see what is going on.

I am closer with my children than I’ve ever been. I feel more able to anticipate their needs, instead of only realizing their needs haven’t been met after they act out. I feel more able to give them my time and my love. We have spent so much time together, just doing mundane things like watching their TV shows, seeing movies they like, and just talking about what interests them. I feel like for a long time I went through the motions of knowing they are my biggest blessings, but not truly feeling it, and not truly doing my best to be their biggest blessing too.

I am able to see that when other people hurt me, it’s not a reflection on me, my worth, or what I deserve at all. If someone is living a life of inflicting pain on others, it’s not about me. It’s about them. And I have the choice to not accept that.

I am able to take an honest look at my own faults, and admit where I am wrong, even when dealing with someone who can’t do the same. I do it for myself, to become a better person, and not because I expect the same in return.

I am able to see blessings and express gratitude on a daily (sometimes hourly) basis. In the past, as I’ve been living through problem after problem, I failed to see all that I have. Now it’s kind of a habit to turn to gratitude when I’m feeling down or stressed. Probably the biggest area of growth is being able to feel gratitude for the hard times, because I know they make me a better person. Sure, I feel sorry for myself sometimes, but it doesn’t last long these days. I know that I am blessed. I know that all of the bad things happen for a reason. I know that I am living and loving as I should be, and that as long as I am doing my part, that life/God/the Universe will take care of the rest.

These are just a few of the things that I’ve reflected on. So much has happened since I wrote my last post that it was hard to come in and post something that didn’t recap on all of the events that have happened. I really don’t want to go through it all, but I just notice that I’m not so swayed by every declaration of love, every infliction of pain, every betrayal, every apology. I am steadier now, I know myself better, I have better insight into others and their motives, and I know that I am loved and I love, I am strong and compassionate, I forgive but am not a doormat. I am going to be OK.

With love,

I have so much.

My life has been so crazy lately, but when I stop and look around me, I see so much.

I have two beautiful, wonderful children who fill my life with so much love and joy. I have friends who care and support me in ways I could never have imagined possible. I have a family who rallies behind me and fills in the holes that I keep missing as I struggle to get through life’s current difficulties. I have amazing clients who show me what family is all about. I have a business with so much potential for growth and success. I have a soul and spirit that strive for truth and knowledge and love. I can’t tell you how blessed I feel right now.

My divorce has literally brought me to my knees and forced me to face the deeper issues that hold me back from being the person I am meant to be. My deepest fears of rejection, abandonment, and being unloveable, have all been realized and I have the opportunity to overcome them for good. It is so surreal to look back on the last couple of years of my life and see that so many areas in my life have led up to this breakthrough. So many of my issues center around my mother’s death and my father abandoning me. My work has forced me to face these issues, my marriage has forced me to face these issues, and my parenting has forced me to face these issues.

A few years ago, I started to have nightmares that I would die and leave my kids in the same situation I was in when my mother died. I was in the process of putting together my own estate plan, when a friend asked me if I could help her with hers. All of this led me to open my own practice, which centers on estate planning for families. Seeing these families come to my office and leave with peace of mind has been incredibly healing for me. Telling them my story has really forced me to face the pain that I experienced.

When my husband had an affair with one of my friends, and ultimately left me, the deeper pain that I experienced really resurfaced in my life. Here was this person, who I had given myself completely to, and he had rejected me and abandoned me. This has forced me to face the idea that I may be unworthy and unloveable. But when the Universe brings pain, the Universe also brings understanding and healing. Certain people, certain books, certain moments, have all been brought into my life to show me that this is it. I have been rejected and abandoned by someone I love. And that’s OK. It’s not that bad. I think I might just love myself anyway. I actually enjoy being with myself. I can’t believe that this is what I was afraid of. I have so much.

My children are going through their own pain, pain that I tried to stop, pain that I never in a million years ever wanted them to experience, but pain that will largely shape the people they are to become. My prayer for them is that they know deep in their souls that they are beautiful people and that they know that someone else’s choices are no reflection on their worth. My prayer for myself is that I can show them that I love them unconditionally. I know that all parents love their children unconditionally – but what is important is how they perceive our love, and I hope that I can always be a parent who knows that. I have so much.

With love,

Music.

I have been having a lot of fun with music lately. The past few years have been wrought with musical laziness on my part. H has great taste in music, and I let him take the reins on whatever we listened to. Every road trip we went on, we were accompanied by his Zune, and so we never had to deal with the radio.

Well, last weekend, we drove 4 1/2 hours to Southern Oregon in my antenna-less casette-having car. I don’t have any casette tapes. (I had an awesome collection of casette tapes in Hawaii. I went to the thrift stores and bought any random mixed tapes I could find. Such gems.) It was a very musically interesting car ride. Radio is inherently bad anyway, but there are parts of the drive where all I can pick up is a really bad country station. I actually heard a song about fried chicken and cold beer on a Friday night. It was bad. But for some of the drive, I got to hear old favorites – early 80s Madonna, early MJ, the Human League, Smashing Pumpkins. Stuff I had all but forgotten about over the past few years.

I had a moment of giggles as I tried to relate different genres of music to the different phases of my life. Country music definitely describes the past few years: Horrible, lots of cheating and alcoholism, and I’d rather just turn the radio off (leave) than listen to it (ever deal with that bullshit ever again). I guess you could easily replace “country” with “rap” or “R&B.” (Hope I’m not offending anyone too much.)

Anyway, as much as I enjoyed the randomness that the radio dished out, I did feel inspired to start building up my own music playlists to listen to throughout the day. I have been left with no music, but it’s good, because I can find music that I want to listen to, that isn’t heavy with memories and sadness. It’s nice. I’m having a lot of fun.

So, anyone have any suggestions for music? I’d love to hear them!   Aside from not liking country or rap, I’m also not so into oonce-oonce club music (although I do like Yelle) or Beyonce-ish stuff. I guess my broad category would be “indie with a splash of punk and 80s.” Thanks!

With love,

Eulogy.

Somewhere recently, I heard someone talking about how when she got divorced, she and her friends got together for a celebration and she eulogized her ex-husband and their marriage. During a time when it’s so hard to believe what my husband has become, and when I’ve decided to cut off all contact with him aside from handing off kids, I feel that it’s a good idea to eulogize him. It is almost as if the person I knew is dead, and if that were the case, I wouldn’t be dwelling on what an awful person he was. At funerals, people only say the good things. Or maybe they’d say, “He was an asshole, bless his heart,” or, “What a piece of crap, may he rest in peace.” I really want to get rid of the bitterness that I feel every time I think about him and all that he’s done to destroy our family. I finally feel like I’ve fallen out of love with him, and I want to be free and live joyfully and without baggage.

So, without further ado, here is my eulogy:

When Joey and I met, it was a warm July Sunday evening in Hawaii. It was love at first sight, like something out of a movie. We spent hours talking and laughing and having fun. Every time we’d see one another, Joey would bring me sunflowers and daisies. Everywhere we went, whether it was the grocery store, a restaurant, or anywhere, The Cars were playing on the radio. We took it as a sign that what was going on between us was nothing short of magical. We spent nearly every day at the beach and every night sitting on the dock in my backyard, talking and dreaming about our future together. We were only together for a month when he said he wanted to marry me, and I knew it was crazy, but felt that I’d met the love of my life and that everything would work out. We got married under the plumeria tree in my parents’ backyard on New Year’s Eve. It was one of the happiest days of my life. There have been so many good times that we have had together over the years. I will never forget all those times swimming together in the clear blue Lanikai ocean or the drives to the North Shore for sushi and a beer. I’ll never forget singing karaoke together. I’ll never forget the times we had breakfast at Dennis’s and did the crossword together. I’ll never forget seeing him hold our baby for the first time. I’ll never forget moving our family to Portland, and all the hope we had for a wonderful life here. I remember walking through the door of our new place for the first time and seeing an enormous painting of Bowie and a pretty blue typewriter. We’d go garage saling every weekend and listen to “Time Is Tight” while we drove around. We were so poor, but we were so happy to be together. Even on Christmas, when we didn’t have any presents, we were able to laugh and have a wonderful day in our pajamas, watching Christmas movies. I’ll never forget meeting his family for the first time, and all the wonderful moments we spent getting to know one another. I’ll never forget the time that one of his oldest and dearest friends gave me a huge hug and told me that he had never seen Joey so happy before. When we went to visit the vineyard to see my parents, Joey loved it so much that he wanted to move down there and so we did. It was a nice life, being able to be together all day. Sometimes we could work together, with Lu on my back. We spent lots of time down at the river. I will never forget the time that he bought me two bouquets of flowers on Mother’s Day, one for me, and one to throw into the river to pay homage to my deceased mother, whose birthday was that day. He held me as I cried and I never felt so loved or understood in all my life. Those are the memories I have of the man that I loved. He was a charming, energetic man who made me feel loved and secure while he was here. May he rest in peace. 

With love,