What Advice is Good Advice?

I have this friend. She's a really good friend. She's been married to her husband for almost 10 years. They have children. They live in a beautiful house with their beautiful dog. From the outside, she appears to be really happy and "together," much like so many wives and moms would like to be.

This is why it is so hard for me to listen to her talking about the lack of trust in her marriage. At least I know she's having a hard time trusting him ... years ago, her husband strayed. He had a little fling with a co-worker. It didn't last too long, but when my friend found out, she was devastated. Now it's been years, and she's still having a hard time handling the situation. She, her husband, and his fling still run in the same circle of friends. They live in the same city ... hang out at the same restaurants ... and occasionally, they have run into this girl. While her husband swears that there is nothing going on now, my friend knows he has talked to the girl on a few occasions, whether it be on the phone or in person. My friend desperately wants to trust her husband. He is the love of her life, the father of her children, but she still finds herself wanting to check his email and cell bills. These thoughts have almost become an obsession of sorts. So she asks me what she should do.

I don't know what the right thing is ... I don't know what to tell her. I could tell her to just give him the benefit of the doubt; however, when she did that before, he broke her trust. I could tell her to confront him, tell him her feelings. But she is afraid of "rocking the boat." Like I said before, from the outside her life appears perfect. She and her husband always seem happy to others when they are out. They even seem happy to each other when they are at home. But it is so obvious to me after talking to her that she is so very unhappy. She goes out of her way to make sure he is happy all the time, but it doesn't appear to me that he reciprocates. She hardly ever gets time to herself, while he goes on guy trips every few weeks. There are so many things about her marriage that bother me ... but I don't want to give her the wrong advice.

Part of me wants to say, "Lay down the law! Tell him that if you find out that he has seen or talked to her again, you are taking the kids and leaving!" Another part of me wants to say, "Just talk to him, tell him how you feel." Then another part wants to say,"If he says he's not talking to her, then you should trust him. What's a marriage without trust?" I'm torn.

So I come to you, my very wise readers. What do I do? What do I tell her? I am the only person she has confided in; all of her family and friends live elsewhere. She is waiting for ME to tell her what the next step is. She has printed emails and phone bills with the forbidden phone number on them, and she doesn't know what to do with them. Can you, oh wise ones, please impart some wisdom? (She does not read my blog, so be as honest as you like.) I appreciate it!

Family dinners are growing on me ... finally!

Tim and I have some really great neighbors. We've actually always been blessed with great neighbors, but we have finally found another family with young parents and 2 kids. The dad is a lot like Tim -- he enjoys working in the yard, getting dirty on his 4-wheeler, and hanging out. The mom is a lot like me -- she was a cheerleader in high school, was a stay-at-home mom until her youngest started Kindergarten, and likes her girly time, too. Their two sons are absolutely precious. The oldest is a really great kid. As a former 6th grade teacher, I've been exposed to hundreds of pre-teens. This young man is one of the sweetest, most polite, and most considerate of any I've ever met. While most kids his age would run from the idea of "playing" with the neighbors' younger kids, this one doesn't balk at the idea at all. Every time we are outside, he says hello. When we hang out at their house, he's open to checking on the younger kids whenever asked. When we eat dinner with them, he lets Kendall pick at him and slap on him, even if it's getting on his nerves. And he even plays with Tanner, which is a big deal because there is a 9 year age difference. He never complains about "babysitting" at all -- well, at least not to me. The younger son is a real boy's boy. He's always going 90 miles a minute, but still never forgets to say hello when passing by. Kendall has always had a little crush on him. When she first met him, she was smitten. For months, she would only whisper, "Hi," as he passed by, never loud enough for him to hear her. It was so cute. Now that they are older and have gotten to know each other, she talks and plays with him. Though he is older than Kendall by two years, he includes her when she wants to be included, and that means a lot to Kendall and to me.
So now we have this new family to hang out with. It may sound silly, but Tim and I are very excited about it. We've always wanted another family to pal around with. And now that we've started spending time with them, it seems like we've seen them every weekend! I think it's great, even though I feel like they will probably get tired of spending time with us. Unfortunately, Tim and I don't have that many couples to hang out with ... our friends from college all live too far away or don't share our interests ... our other "couple" friends either don't have kids, have kids who aren't the same age as ours, or are always busy with other things. I think what makes me happiest about this new friendship is that the mom will say things that I'm afraid to say. For example, last time we had dinner, she mentioned to the men that we needed to start alternating weekends. One weekend they could go ride 4-wheelers and the next we could do something while they watched the kids. I would never dream of suggesting that to Tim. I don't know why, I just don't ever say things like that even though I think it all the time.
So hopefully this is the beginning of a really good friendship ... one that will last even after we move ... because I actually like their entire family. Our family dinners with them are relaxing and calm, even when the kids are nuts! I only hope that they know how much I enjoy spending time with them.

Mommy, there's poop in the water!!

Yep, it finally happened. My best friend used to tell me stories about how her daughter would do this every time they put her in the bathtub. I suppose the heat "relaxes" everything on the inside. But Kendall never did it. Not in 4 years. And Tanner didn't do it ...

Until last night. I tried to get him to sit on his potty before he got in the bathtub, just like always. He refused to sit on it, even though his diaper from the past hours was bone dry. I should have taken that as a hint that there was something going on in there. So I put Tanner in the tub and he squatted. Naturally, he peed in the tub (while that may sound icky to some of you, there's really no way to avoid it). I walked out of the bathroom to put dirty clothes in hampers when Kendall yelled, "Mommy, how did poop get in the bathtub? Is that poop?! Mommy!! Mommy!! It's coming!!!"

Ewww, ewwwww, and ewwwwwwww! When I got back in the bathroom, Tanner's poop was floating in the water. I had flashbacks from the South Park episode with the floating poo ...

At first, I wasn't even sure what to do. So I just reacted. I pulled Kendall out first, wrapped her in a towel and sent her to tell Tim to start the water in our bathtub. Then I lifted Tanner out, all the while, he was saying, "Sowwy, Mommy." I wrapped him and sent him off to the other bathroom. I started to let the water drain when I realized that the "poo" wasn't going to wash down the drain.

Oh, dear. So what did I do? Desperate times call for desperate measures. I used the cup for rinsing shampoo to chase down the poo. It took several tries before I was able to catch all of it. I flushed it down the potty and immediately sprayed down the tub and threw the contaminated toys in the laundry sink to be bleached. The rest of the night continued as planned.

But after I fell asleep last night, I had a dream about floating poo. Those of you who think this is disgusting, you are correct. But it is just one of those things that we do as mothers. Things that we would never do for anyone else, and sometimes not even for ourselves (ie. cleaning up vomit, pee, blood, or poo), we do for our children. Because we have to. And if we don't do it, no one will.

Just another one of the "perks" of being a mom.

I have a pottier!!

After writing that "woe is me" blog yesterday, I feel like I should share the silver lining of the day for yesterday. I'm promising myself to start focusing more on the good things that happen every day - not the bad ones.

Yesterday my little 2-year-old boy pee-peed in the potty 5 TIMES!!!

This potty-training is so much harder with a boy, but he's working on it!! I think he's finally getting the concept, though I'm not really pushing him. I just let him go when he says he wants to. It help too that his big sissy uses the potty!

So yeah for Tanner!!

PS - I'm taking an idea from Oprah (I don't like many of her ideas as of late ...) I'm going to make a list of my "favorite things." Look for that post soon!