First of many

So... we've had the first of what is to be many talks, I suspect.

He asked if I wanted to talk. I didn't and yet, I did. It made me shake, I didn't want to do it, but said I would. I was determined not to melt down and get emotional. I couldn't look at him so I sat on my sofa facing the (turned off) television and he sat on his. I spoke first, telling him I wasn't sure where I should start so I would just say what I was thinking about. I mentioned how 2 years ago, he'd asked for 3 more years. I talked about the education for the children, what I wanted for them, how much better I thought it was, how I wasn't the only one who thought this way, how school is not the same now as it was when he went. I mentioned the redundant homework, the lack of teaching 'soft skills', the pressure of it all. I mentioned how our daughter would benefit from having a year of teaching in full English to get her used to the environment and she'd be able to make friends before going off to secondary colleges. I told him I knew the kids wanted to study in Australia, that they've mentioned their wish. I forgot to mention how stressful it is for the kids to learn here, but surely he must see that. I will mention it next time. I also told him that this was hard for me too and that I actually like my life here and that going back wouldn't be easy.

He spoke next and countered every single thing I said with his own argument. Both sides are valid, I acknowledged that. Then he said we must keep all our options open. He knows what I want for them, but that's not the only way to go here. He said we must be careful because what I want for them is often based on a desperate need of mine! He said that often when I made a decision that I found it hard to veer away from what I was expecting and what I so desperately wanted. He wants me to consider all the options and we'll decide what's best for the children. He remembers saying three years but also mentioning at the time time about our daughter finishing standard 5 or 6. He said we've done a good job, creating an amicable environment for the kids, that a lot of kids don't even have what our kids have and their parents are supposedly 'happily married'. He spoke of several options that he thought were worth considering, including - we can wait until our daughter finishes standard 6. One kid can go to Australia and one kid stays here for a while. We can wait another 6 months and leave in the middle of the year or I can go at the end of this year with both kids. His main point being that there are a few ways to go about this. I didn't agree with him right away. I knew the words he wanted me to say, but I didn't say them.

He mentioned our "being open to all options" several times and making the best decision where the children were concerned another few times. As I was listening to him talk, I tried not to let my mind get out of control or respond emotionally to what he was saying. It would have been the worst thing to do. Of course, as I listened my mind started telling me "he always does this, he always says something and then changes his mind on me, right at the last minute. I know what he wants and he wants it his way." I usually get so mad that I can't counter him and he ends up getting his way. All the time he spoke,

We spoke for about an hour and a half, stopping when we were both still amicable. During the last 5 minutes, we reiterated that we would do what is best for our family, what is best for our children. I told him (at last, to his visible relief) that I would consider and be open to all options.

That's not to say that I won't fight for what I want. I have thought about different options and I know which one is best for me and them. What I want is not best for him though. I need this to end. I need to come home and move on with my life. I've had enough of living in limbo, waiting for this time to come. I will need to do a lot of convincing. Using the education card will not work on it's own because he will just counter every pro with a con and every con with a pro. He's a good negotiator, really good and I'm loathe to be on the other side of his skills.

Of course, in the afternoon, my mind didn't stop running. I had a student and an English class at night to distract me and there was my sweet dance instructor and friends at night to listen to my crap and keep me busy.I didn't sleep well though and in the morning, after I came home, I locked the house up tight, put my air con on, took some xanax and slept full and deeply until 11am. I felt better after that. My thoughts more positive. My friend reminded me "the law of attraction, think about what you want". I will do that. Just because he's asked me to be open to all options, doesn't mean I have to accept them or that he won't consider that what I want is the best option.

But it's going to be hard. I can see that. Because when you hear him speak, he seems so reasonable, so level headed. You forget that he's not giving you what you want, he's that good. It's why I never discussed with him, my decision to leave in 07. If I had, he would have talked me out of it. But this, this I have to discuss with him. I hope I'm strong enough. If I'm not, it will break my mum's heart.

A list sort of...

Watching: Season 3 of Frasier. Love Niles, so quirky and funny, he made that show what it was.

Listening to: Still Adam - acoustic versions of his songs and trawling youtube for vids I haven't seen yet. Nothing else is satisfying, no-one comes close to his passion and range - not for me anyway. Occasionally listen to the radio in the car. No talk back radio here, just copies of stations from (strangely enough) Australian radio stations. Hitz.fm etc. Even the voice over station promos are in an Aussie accent.

Reading: The Art of Happiness: A handbook for living. by Howard C Cutler MD and the Dalia Lama - The Dalai Lama's take on how to achieve the big 'H'. Interesting seeing life through His holiness' eyes. His advice? become compassionate, see the world from another's eyes. Put your life into perspective.

Eating: anything without eggs. This rules out any commercial fried rice and some noodle dishes, which doesn't bother me. I did crave an egg the other day but got past it. The consequences are just not worth it. Apparently a late onset allergy to eggs is quite rare, or so they say. Lucky me. Also, chicken and roasted pork with steamed rice, chilli (just a smidge) and hot tea which we go out for every Sunday lunch. It's our one family thing we do each week.

Drinking: Teh Tarik - hot and strong - so good, for supper, but only one or two nights a week.

Concerned about: My daughter has a strange lump under her skin, directly over her spine. It's probably a cyst, though it looks like a bruise from the outside. You can't see it , only feel it. It's been there for a couple of months and because it's still there, we are off the to doctors this week, tomorrow in fact, to see Dr Foo, who is an excellent doctor. I hope he continues to be and can get this matter resolved.

Happy about: Getting back into my dancing class. The class is down to 3 now, so I have the instructor all to myself for almost all of the class. It's good fun, he's patient with me and never flinches when I step on his toes, which I try my best to avoid, though I'm not always successful. He smiles when I tell him I can't do the steps and talk at the same time. He could dance, cook and talk all at once if he wanted to. My friends are there. It's like stepping into another world.

Cooking: I made lasagna for the second time ever. The kids loved it. Ex can only eat a small amount because of all the fat in the cheese - his gall bladder does not handle high fat foods well at all, ever since he did the gall bladder flush about 2 years back.

Semi - adopting: the two stray kittens which are now on their way to being full grown cats. Blackjack and Muffin (formerly known as Pixie2) hang around the house and keep the mice and rats in check. I feed them meat scraps and bits of chicken when I have it. Muffin is already pregnant. Both cats seem intent on exploring the inside of the house but I can't let them so we have to scare them back outside. I'm not good with animals. They are icky sometimes. We'll get a dog or something when we get back to Melbourne. My boy needs a dog. My daughter likes cats, so one of each will be the way to go.

Thinking of: Nicola, who by now will be back in her home country, England, with her two boys, preparing to start the next chapter of her life. What a journey she's been on. I can't wait til she updates her blog.

Preparing for: Chinese New Year. It's just around the corner. With that comes some spring cleaning, putting up lanterns, red and gold decorations, the supermarkets are playing the old style Chinese New Year songs (not good) and tons of sparkly, new chinesey clothes are adorning the department store racks. It's the year of the rabbit. Must look up what kind of year I'm going to have.

Hope it's a good one.

Baby Steps

Every day since I've been back, I've looked for the opportunity to SAY SOMETHING and the time hasn't been right at all, until tonight. Ex is the kind of person that needs to plan. He needs a heads up, some notice so that he can prepare. So tonight I took the first baby step in a series of what I think will be many little steps.

I've been looking at this thing the wrong way. It's a big issue, this whole going back to Melbourne thing and I was thinking that I would have to talk about it all at once. Not so. I need to break the task down so that it's not as overwhelming for both of us. So tonight, seeing him in a good mood, prompted me to ask the first little question - I said "... and there's one other thing, we need to talk about some issues and do some planning for this year and I'd like to know when would be a good time for you to talk. There are a lot of issues to be covered so is it possible for you to give me a time when it would be good for you - because I don't want it to interrupt your work..."

He came back with "OK, but if there's lots of things to talk about then tonight is not good... "

Me: "No, I'm not asking for tonight, just want to give you a heads up and see if there's a time that is better for you than other times..."

Him: "Well, I know you want to get everything sorted all at once, but I can't see any further than two or three months ahead..."

Me: "Ok, just a time..."

Him: " Ahhhh.... look it will have to be in the morning when they go to school or at night after they've gone to sleep... but this week, we can start this week"

Me: "Fine, whatever suits you"

Him: "You let me know whether the morning or night is better for you"

So, one time this week, we will begin our talks. There are some rules I want followed. First, we don't assume what the other is thinking. Second, if we begin to get emotional, we're allowed to walk away to regroup. Third, we remain open, honest and keep it civil, allowing for opinions. Most importantly, we both act in the best interests of the children.

Baby steps, one thing at a time. There's no rush. Need to keep myself composed and not think of winning or losing, but think of what is best for the kids and why.

Also need to log progress here, lest we forget what we've said. I will also take notes because both we're both getting forgetful.

And remember, breath. You can do this.

Disasters

My mornings this week have been filled with watching the news of the QLD floods. 15 dead so far, countless losses in business and property, despair, grief and toxic water. Horrible. Enough to make you cry. Then I tuned into another news channel and watched more disaster stories. Floods in Sri Lanka with 18 dead so far and over 1,000,000 people displaced, the shooting in Tucson, Arizona, floods and landslides in Brazil, the people in Haiti still living in tent cities after the quake that killed 250,000. Countless other people around the world dead and dying because of one atrocity or another.

Unbelievable, unimaginable despair and disaster all over the world. Developing and third world countries lose so much when disasters happen and I couldn't help thinking that even though it's a tragedy in QLD, if they weren't prepared, it could have been worse. I've often thought that if we were ever unfortunate enough to be caught in a natural disaster, or any accident really, I'd want to be in Australia.

In Australia, we have resources. Those wonderful people from the SES, communications that get the word around, communities that pull together, buildings that have half a chance of not collapsing and skilled people looking after the dams and releasing the right amount of water at the right time. The people in Brisbane knew the floods were coming and Anna Bligh prepared them for the worst. I'm sure many lives were saved because of this. Their Premier is leading with strength and compassion. She comes across well on the international news. If you didn't know any better, you'd mistake her for the leader of the country. That's how strong she looks. Her words make sense. She knows the finer details of the disaster - water levels, towns, what people have lost, which businesses are affected, who needs to prepare and how, what those left behind need to do. I think she's doing a great job and those Queenslanders, even though they have lost much, have a whole lot to be thankful for as well. It could have been much, much worse.

Just stuff

I've finally solved the mystery of my itchy raw hands. Eggs. I'm hypersensitive to eggs. At least that's what my hands say. I'm ecstatic to have found at least one major cause of the itching and prickling that has, for the past two and a half years, turned my hands into a swollen, red and purple, raw mess that caused a gasp from all who noticed. I've tried every cream and remedy offered by my friends and acquaintances here, none of which worked. The only relief I seemed to get was when I took prescribed steroids or when I went back home. A few weeks before our holiday my doctor had told me to stop eating them for a while and I did and my hands cleared up but then I forgot about it. In Melbourne I didn't eat that many eggs and didn't link the itching that occurred when I did. Back here, the itching started on the first day we were home and within a week my hands were set to go ballistic when I remembered what the doc had said. I stopped eating eggs, something which we have in one form or another almost every day here and within two days, the itching stopped and my hands are on the mend again. I don't care that I can't eat eggs, even though it's going to be a pain to avoid them. I'm just glad this 3 year old mystery has had some light shed on it.

*

In other matters....

I think about it all the time. Every time I look at his face, speak to the kids about school, I go over in my mind how I'm going to talk about THAT to HIM. In my mind, I wonder if he'll ever raise the topic, if I don't. I wonder if he'll get angry at me. I wonder if my voice will shake or whether I'm doing that thing I do where I make things to be bigger than they really are (probably). I wonder what tone I should use, I go over the words. None sound right. All sound like I'm want to snatch the kids and just get out of here, which of course is not true.

I'm struggling to find the right words, the right time. I want the kids to be out of the house, I want to be able to have the mind space to deal with any emotions that come up and I want to be able to say it with calmness and be quietly assertive and confident. I can't be dithering about when I talk to him because that just gives him the upper hand and reinforces to him that I'm the idiot he knows me to be. I need to prep him on the questions the kids will ask him and make sure he knows that I expect him to answer them, rather than have me answer them for him. I want us to talk together first and then talk to the kids together so that they can ask him stuff. I want to agree on how much we tell them about us, our personal situation and then what we will tell them about moving to Melbourne.

The kids are starting to ask about next year. We had a conversation about it and I told them that I didn't know what was going to happen. I said no-one knew what was going to happen in the future and so for now, we need to live for now. My daughter cleverly came back with "well, even though that's good, don't you think a little planning for the future is good too?" Yes, yes I do, but I can't tell them yet. I'm not ready.I know I should be, but I'm not. Nearly, but not quite.

I spoke to a level-headed friend today about it. Our kids are friends and that's why we are friends. Even though we are not that close, we talk about stuff that matters. We have the same concerns about our children's education and she can relate to what I'm thinking when I tell her I want to take the kids back for their education. She too is considering educating her children somewhere else and will probably end up sending them to a private college in Kuala Lumpur. In fact, everyone I talk to (and that's not that many) is of the opinion that the school system here leaves a lot to be desired. There is one good thing though - the standard for learning Chinese is one of the highest. That means if my kids want to keep studying Mandarin, they'll be well equipped. I'm pleased about that.

Anyway, she had some advice for me, which I am thinking about. She said that we should just emphasise the education part of the move first. Like, tell the kids that we're moving back to Melbourne so that they can go to school there and that Papa will visit whenever he can but for now he has to stay in Malaysia for his business. When they are settled in Melbourne and going to school, then perhaps tell them about what's happened between us. On the surface, this sounded good. Not too much trauma all at once and it keeps the focus on the positive. But then, the kids might feel like we're trying to trick them or something and then be even more upset, when I eventually do tell them that we are apart for more reasons that just their education. I'm not sure that there's a right way to do this, which is why I need to think about it a little more. If there's not a right way, then there might be a way that's better than all the others.

Any advice? Melba?

It's a new school year

1200 kids. 600 parents waiting to pick them up after school. 1 gate, 6 metres wide. Do the math! It's a crowd unlike any other I've seen before. All the kids, from the smallest grade 1 kid to the tallest grade 6, all wearing the same thing - navy blue bottoms and a white, button down shirt. You can tell the boys from the girls though, the girls wear a tunic. Otherwise, at 1.20 in the afternoon, it's a sea of blue and white kids looking for their ride home. Every one of them has black hair, brown skin and brown eyes. I'm one of the lucky ones because I'm tall and white so my kids can spot me in a crowd a mile away, even if I can't see them. Even so, we have an agreed meeting point, the guard house. Yes, there's a real 'guard' there, but he's quite old looking so I don't know how effective he'd really be given an emergency. So we meet at the guard house and then walk against another sea of parents craning their necks to find their children, slowly inching forward in hopes of getting some small advantage. The inconsiderate ones bring their motorcycles into the throng, unaware of the complete stupidity of their actions. If one of their mufflers clash with a kiddie leg, it will not be pretty. We walk single file, the kids pulling their trolley bags behind them and me yelling out 'watch the motorcycles' every time we pass one. By the time we get to the car, we're a sweating mess. I unlock, start the car to get the aircon going, hustle the kids into the cool air and load their bags into the back. And then we sit there, catching up on the day while the 500 cars that belong to the 600 parents file past, moving little more than a metre at a time.

Oh, the joys of school. I can't wait til it's pissing rain and we have to do all this and get wet too! Fun!

Are your feelings stupid or something?

It doesn't feel like a New Year except for this - 5 hours! That's how much time I have to myself, every morning, because now that the new buildings in the school are finished all the kids can attend at the same time, where as before they had to share. For the longest time, I can't remember having such a big window of time in my life. I wonder what I'll do with it. Exercise? Housework? Write? Read? TV? I don't know yet. I do know I'm lucky and that I should use it wisely. But will I? I read somewhere once that what you do when you're by yourself is an indication of the real you. If I look around me and consider what I've done in the first 2 and a half hours this morning, I could honestly say that I'm a whinger who wastes a lot of time on the internet and hasn't the slightest interest in being healthy. That translates to instead of getting some exercise, I came home, ate my breakfast and got straight onto the computer. So guilty!

Ex is still happy, though for me, his 'happiness' is getting on my nerves a bit (I'm such a bitch). It's annoying when someone keeps on about how good this year is going to be, how we all have to embrace change and learn new skills, how we each need to strive to be better. It's OK to say those things, to write them down even, but when he turns every stiuation into 'a chance to do better' it gets, well, it gets annoying. And I feel bad about saying that because there's nothing wrong with wanting to be better, nothing at all and I know he wants to pass that onto our kids.

Unlike last week, his happiness is so forced now and there's an undercurrent of arrogance that is just so "ex". I know I'm whinging, but I'm so sick of the 'parent persona' that comes out when he's trying to make things better. Yesterday we went for lunch and he had his laptop with him, which he'd placed in the passenger footwell so that it wasn't visible to outsiders. As we were sitting in the cafe, with nothing to talk about, he told me that I should be careful when I get back in the car so as not to step on his laptop. He must have tried to tell me in 4 different ways, to make sure I understood what he meant. I actually got it the first time but he doesn't trust me to understand something so complicated, so he tells me again and again, using different words and phrases so that there's no misunderstanding. Ironically, it's this particular habit that gets me more confused about what he's on about in the first place. He says it in so many different ways, I end up not knowing what he fucking wants!

But I digress. Back at the cafe, I had to state categorically that "I will not step on your computer when I get back in the car." When we'd finished up and got back into the car as I was very carefully climbing into my seat, he removed the computer and put it on the back seat, "just in case". "I'll take this" he said "just to be sure it doesn't get damaged." "I wasn't going to step on it" I replied. "That's OK, it's not personal, there are no feelings attached to it" he replied back. So I threw my 'feelings about it' out the window and we went on with our day. What were those feelings? I, always, every time, feel less than I am and feel so stupid because he doesn't trust me to listen and understand him. I mean, what's the point of him telling me to be careful when when he was going to move the damn thing anyway. I must be a right mess not to have understood what he meant when he explained it so thoroughly. He might as well have said nothing and let my dignity stay intact. Also, my daughter notices these things and it prompts her to ask questions like "does papa think you're stupid?" and it takes all I have not to reply "Yes, yes he does!" and instead invent some lame-o excuse as to why he says things the way he does eg. no he doesn't think I'm stupid he just wants to avoid any misunderstandings.

I have the same feelings when, if I've asked him to repeat something, he does so, but in a slower, stronger voice. Like I'm a 'slow learner'. It really grates on my nerves, but he thinks nothing of it. He doesn't consider for a minute that it might be his accent or that fact that he's mumbled or turned his head away as the reason I didn't understand him. Could be too that he does think this and that's exactly why he's slowing down and firming up his words. So. I. can. understand. him. BETTER... but it doesn't feel that way.

It doesn't matter really though. So many times I've read that our feelings are not real, that they're just the ego talking and that you can't trust them. I think that's true to an extent, especially for defensive or over-sensitive people, but there must come a time when we have to listen to what that little voice in our heads has to say and do what our 'feelings' are telling us to do. I wouldn't be here if I didn't 'feel' that it was the best thing for our kids to be with their father. I wouldn't be where I am in my head (that I'm really an OK person) if my feelings said that all the things ex says about me are untrue (that I'm unlovable). If I didn't listen to my feelings about my kids needing me and that life is worth living, I wouldn't be here at all.

I've often wondered about and wanted, a life without feelings. We used to watch Star Trek: The Next Generation and a character, DATA, who was an android who sought to be more human, had to live an emotionless life. When he was given an 'emotion' chip to let him experience feelings, he chose to give it back. Feelings never served him well. Fear, doubt, anger - they all overwhelmed him to the point where he couldn't handle it, despite some of the positive feelings. And even though I know it's fantasy, I've often wished I could turn my feelings off for a while, just to get some peace.

DATA - emo-free.