Avoiding Baby Mama/Daddy Drama

Today I made the mistake of getting into a brief disagreement over the phone with my son’s father, something I told myself I would never do.  But you know when you’re compelled to make your point and you just can’t help yourself?  That was me today.  I had to let him know that I knew what he was doing.  If you tell him you’re coming, then come.  If you have no intentions on coming, then don’t say, “I’ll let you know” or “I’ll see.” What does that mean anyway?  I’m sorry, but I had to let him know that there is no reason to lie to the poor kid.

Lord knows I wanted to say more, but held back because, one, we were in a store and we weren’t the only ones there.  Two, I took a quick look at my son’s face and felt bad that he even had to hear this.  Had I not given a hoot, I would have yelled into the phone, “DON’T MANIPULATE OR LIE TO HIM THE WAY YOU LIED TO ME.  IT ISN’T FAIR TO HIM, etc.”  So I waited until I got home and calmed down and wrote it a text message instead, along with the “etc” verbiage that I will not bore you with.  Basically, in the text message, I told him that my son isn’t as gullible and naive as I was when we were in a relationship. I told him that I have kept the door wide open for him to spend time with my son. I told him and that it isn’t my son’s job to call him to tell him that he’s sick.  Yes, he actually said that to him.  Had he been more involved or even called him more often he would have known that my son had a terrible cold.  I was very thankful that technology had evolved and someone had invented text messaging as a way to communicate, because I honestly cannot speak to this guy without getting upset.

Have I forgiven him for manipulating me over a nearly 10 year relationship?  I thought I did, but obviously, there’s some left over resentment that I guess I haven’t quite dealt with.  As much as I try to avoid the “baby mama/baby daddy” syndrome, on occasion, such as the one I mentioned in this post, I find myself furious to the point where I feel I need to engage in a conversation that quickly turns into a disagreement where tension is felt, voices are raised, and feelings are fuming.  And guess what?  It doesn’t necessarily change the situation.  What I really hate most of all is that my son is in the middle and has to listen to mommy and daddy argue.  Like I said, this is a rare occasion for me as I promised myself long ago not to “get into it” with him.  As I wrote the text message, I thought about the parents that “get into it” daily, sometimes over valid reasons, and many times over nonsense.  Or the parents who constantly bad mouth the other parent.  As much as we want these little people to agree with us in that daddy or mommy are absent or deadbeats, it’s important to let the child formulate their own opinion.  The last thing you want to do is to cause friction between the other parent and the child over negative things you have said.  The kid will blame you in the future for a damaged relationship between them and the estranged parent; I’ve seen it happen.

The best thing to do is to keep quiet if you are unable to have a civilized discussion or if speaking to the other parent literally and figuratively makes you sick (which is the case with me).  If you feel so compelled to get your two cents in, then send an email or a text message, but don’t get into a text messaging war either.  Stay cool, keep the door open, invite the other parent to participate in your child’s life even if you know he won’t show up.  Later on, you want to be able to tell your child that you did invite daddy or mommy to the baseball games or to graduation, to the spelling bee, etc.  Your conscience will feel better knowing that you reached out.  Don’t give up.  And don’t let your kids feel that any of this is their fault because it’s not.

-Thriving Lilly

Is It Really Love?

I admit.  I am no love expert.  In fact, I know very little about love, if at all.  Other than the love I have for my loved ones, I don’t know much about romantic love.  I mean I see it when I’m around couples who appear to be deeply in love, or in some cases, hurt by love. At my age, I would have thought that by now, love would have been something that I’d be able to relate to or be able to easily identify.  But to tell the truth, it’s one of the most difficult feelings to describe.  Ask me about fear or dislike or even anxiety and I can probably write a dissertation on each one of them.  But love, that’s a bit more complicated.  It means so many different things to so many people.  And even when one is able to identify it, there are different points that run along the love spectrum making it even more difficult to fully understand: is true love?, is it real love? is it unconditional love? is it lust? is it a crush?, etc.  So the very thought of love is, well, confusing.

Here’s the key, when you’ve really found love, when you can say you are truly in love, all of the uncertainties are suddenly vanished.  From what I understand, it’s something you just know, something you feel, like magic, I guess.  I’ve had deep feelings for people before.  I’d think about them all of the time for like a month or so, then I’d really get to know them and wonder what the heck was I thinking?

But this time around, something is different.  I think about him all of the time and it’s been about a year.  He’s the first person I think about in the morning and the last person I think about before I go to bed.  I dream about him occasionally.  Even when I’m mad at him, my feelings towards him don’t change.  I accept his flaws, his mishaps, his bad decisions, and his imperfect self.  When he’s happy, I’m happy that he’s happy.  I want to spoil him, I want to be held by him.  When I listen to certain songs, I immediately think of him.  I look forward to his phone calls and his text messages.  And although I have these really deep feelings for him, I don’t want to tell him, not just yet.  I’m not ready for the possible rejection or the possible non-mutual factor.  To gain the confidence to utter the words “I love you—I think” only to have him respond by saying “I like you alot, but only as a friend” would be devastating.  I’m not ready for that.  But what I do know is harvesting these feelings takes a good amount of energy.  If this is love, it feels darn good.  And I can only imagine the feeling when it’s mutual.  And in the words of New Edition, “if it isn’t love, why do I feel this way, why does she [he] stay on my mind?”  Only time can tell.

-Thriving Lilly

Confessions of a Side-Chick (short version)

I could write a book, a very lengthy book about this topic.  But I’ll keep this simple and revisit the topic in the future.  It wasn’t something I chose, IT chose me.  I never wished it, I never yearned it.  But here I was.  Unknowingly, I was someone’s side-chick.  How was this possible?  That wasn’t what I signed up for.  No, I mean, literally, I did not sign up for it when I naively signed up to be a member on an online dating website.  I went on the site seeking what most people were seeking: companionship, and if I was lucky, a legitimate relationship that would someday lead to a lifelong commitment.  Anyway, I met this great guy on this site.  Little did I know that he was in a “situation”.  Little did I know that he was taking a “break” from his current 3 year situation. How would I have known?  His profile made no mention of it and why would it?  We began talking frequently on the phone, going out to lunch and dinner.  I must admit, I was impressed when I first met him.  He was quite handsome and was able to hold a decent conversation.  After our first date, we decided for a second, then a third, and so on and so forth.  Eventually, the relationship became intimate.  One thing lead to another and I found out that I was pregnant.  I was a bit shocked, especially since he was adamant that he was unable to have children– a line that many guys use apparently, so beware. Anyhow, I stupidly fell for it and I found myself in the midst of a major life changing scenario.  The pregnancy wasn’t the biggest shocker, though.  Finding out that he had someone else that he had to explain his mess to was quite the shocker.  All of a sudden, the dinners and luncheons stopped.  The intimacy ceased.  The phone calls and text messages decreased.  He had played me and, I guess, the other woman as well. Suddenly, he wanted to be “honest” with me.  Really?  Now?  He had been with this woman for three years “off and on” and apparently this was their “off” season, at least in his mind anyway.  He was faced with having to make some major decisions in his life, but in the back of my mind, I knew that he would never choose to commit to me instead of her.  Just as well because I became so disgusted with him, that the thought of being with him was appalling.  His choice had already been made as far as I was concerned.  The mere fact that he even told me at this point that there was someone else was a clear way of telling me, “hey I have someone that I’m committed to and therefore don’t plan on being committed to you.”  Because, honestly, if he really wanted to be with me, he would have just broken it off with the other woman, and committed to me without any mention of the other woman.  Other than the disgust I felt for him, I was disappointed in myself because I was so gullible to fall for such lies.  Furthermore, I was pregnant with someone’s child who clearly did not want to be with me in the first place.  Here I was, Ms. Side-Chick and I hadn’t even chosen the title.  I wondered why so many women accept the title and are okay with being that woman that he will probably never commit to.  I wondered why many women seek this type of relationship while so many women cry at the very thought of sharing their many with another woman.  Well since that episode in my life, I’ve grown up quite a bit and have come up with some tips that might help in figuring out whether you are a man’s side-chick.  Feel free to add more in the comments.

1.  He wants to move the relationship at a very quick pace.  While this might be a plus to many women, others may view this rush as a way to not only get you in the sheets, but may also be used as a tactic to show his significant other that other women are interested in him as a way to regain her attention that she once used to give him
2.  He communicates with you only during certain times of the day.  This is a classic.  A man who has no other attachment will make himself available to you whenever, not just 9-5 while he’s work, or only when he’s out running errands, you get the point.
3. He only communicates with you via texting.  Can I get an Amen for this one?!  If his fingers are doing the talking more than his mouth is, you may want to question this. And if you call him right after he has sent you a text and he doesn’t pick up, unless he’s at work or in a legitimate setting where he can chit chat, you may want to raise an eyebrow to this.
4. He never invites you over to his place.  This may come across to some as a good thing in that he’s not eager to get you in his bed and wants to get to know you for you.  The flip side of this is that someone else is already in his bed.  So when he wants to get romantic, he suggests coming to your place or maybe going to a hotel. This is definitely a red flag.

-ThrivingLilly