Life's update

Over the past three weeks I have expereinced a lot of different emotions and feelings including love, happiness, frustration, and a sense of peace.  Since Rick and I got married I have expereinced being a "newlywed" in a different way than ever before.  My desire to make him happy and to feel his love, his touch, and see his smile motivates me everyday.  In a way I feel almost sad when we are apart.  I find this to likely not be very healthy since he has to work so I have to laugh at myself when I feel this way and move on in my days.  I have been working to understand why I am feeling this love so differently than before and I believe that the answer is not within Rick but within me myself, and who I am now, who I have become, the changes that I have made within myself, and the removal of the walls around my heart.  I have let love in to places that it has never gotten before.  Well, that may not be true.  I guess I believe it was there once but I was to young and immature to understand what it was, how to use it, and what to think of it.  Getting married at 18 was likely not my wisest decision in life, yet I know that I have my darling Samantha from that marriage and one of my many life leasons.  So I guess I can say that love was there once, when my heart was young and immature and not ready to accept and understand it.  Since then it had been closed to it.  Now that I have opened and love is in that special place in my heart again I feel overwhelmed by it, in a positive way.  The thought that I would ever allow myself to heal, find peace with my past, and feel such love for another man again would have made me laugh, even a few months ago.  Now I can't imagine my life without it.

With this new found feeling has come some frustration.  Frustration that now I am in this amazing and special place in my heart and my life, and my children can't share in it with me.  They have been through so much due to choices by others and myself that they are not willing or even able to enjoy and share this amazing place with me and feel it themselves.  Their desire to be loved fully by their father has over powered their willingness to let Rick in and to accept how much he loves us.  Some of the kids are much more accepting than others, however their desire for Troy to love them and be a positive part of their lives over powers the occassional glimmer of hope that I see of acceptance and happiness.  I fear so much that they have "walled" themselves up due to the hurt that others, including myself, have caused them in their lives.  We talk about this and the changes in me as a person, and they express their pleasure that I am at a healthier place to be a better, stronger, and happier person and parent.  Yet when they desire their father's time or help and get minimal to no response, so then any progress I make seems to wither away.  Rick desires to support them through positive and negatives of their lives.  He requires respect and effort from them that Troy has never required of them before and so they are resistent to this.  The only thing Troy ever required from them was for them to fear him.  I do believe that time will heal and our continued effort to share our healthy relationship and way of life with them will begin to seep in through the sadness and anger about life events.  I hope that they can continue to heal and find peace with the behaviors of others that are out of their control and that they take control of their own behaviors and lives and demand respect and love for themselves and of themselves. 

It amazes me the power of hurt and pain.  Each have so much control over someones life, even when that person believes that they don't.  I know many that say "I won't let my anger control me and my choices."  Yet, it will, in some way.  It will for everyone in some way, it's just up to us to get the help that we need, in whatever form it comes in, to ensure that it doesn't take full control of our lives.  We can allow anger and pain to be these little monsters within us that come out towards others even if they are not the ones that make us mad or hurt us, or we can take control of those monsters and in a odd way utilize them when we may need them yet maintain full control of them.  Whichever, they exist and I have chosen to stop fighting with them and I hope to help my children make the same choice. 
Love is a much stronger and powerful entity within us.  Love is what our lives should be filled with and it should be fully embraced and accepted.  And if someone chooses not to love us the way that we deserve to be loved then we must move on.  If that someone is a person that is a perminant part of our life, such as a parent or sibling, then we must empathize with them for their loss in experiencing the great feelings and emotions that come with love, not hate them for not loving us how we believe that they should.  Once you find peace with that you will find peace within yourself.  With peace comes happiness like you have never experienced before. 

Allison