i'm home from work today with a bad cold. i'm in my pajamas, no-one else is home, and its snowing pretty hard. i have a fire going and its pretty cozy, despite me being sick. doing a lot of thinking lately about step parenting. a lot.

dh and i have been in a downward spiral the past couple of months. august/september was full of threats of divorce and the realization that neither of us are the same person anymore, and not in a good way. we talked about therapy, i found a few therapists, but scheduling/arguing/life kept getting in the way. i was trying to make a last ditch effort.....and realized its *always* me trying to make the changes. frustrating. i decided that one more time, i would try, and that was it. otherwise, i would have to focus on myself and make plans for my own future.

dh and i were both off this morning, and ran around together doing errands, having breakfast, and just talking. it felt pretty good and i almost felt a sense a relaxation from all of the tension recently. we came home, got our coffee and sat down to talk. he mentioned that he had to talk with me about something important, and its gone on too long without addressing it. this is how it went (for the most part)

until we can get into therapy, dh and i decided to try something new, as the tension is becoming unbearable in our house. discuss the skid situation, but with absolutely no arguing, just listening. then walk away, think things through, and come back with hopefully, a fresh perspective.

here is dh's perspective on our situation:

1) if we just had more family bonding time, i would see what a wonderful child ss17 is and none of these arguments would be happening