it didn't take long for the disruptions this year, though this time one of them is welcomed to a degree and the other (which i really can't say much about at the moment) is something we've been aware that will be happening and can prepare for...sort of.
one thing that makes it easy to get back into routine and taking care of things is that the house has been relatively quiet again. youngest isn't living here, i watch our grandson once a week or so, and hub's schedule may change a little bit bit it's usually not enough to be disruptive (new day off? just move all the stuff I would of done to the old day off, pretty simple), but things are settled. even my son, who prefers a stable routine, can adjust to all this pretty easily. (to be fair, he's getting less tied to routine of late: the last 2 years of his sister being in and out and dealing with his nephew's baby growing and also being in and out of the house has made it easier to roll with it. we do see more stimming when things are disrupted, but he doesn't tantrum or have other major issues like he did when he was younger.)
and then my oldest got thrown out of her ex-boyfriend's grandparents' house.
this is not a bad thing. we've been concerned for her for years. we're pretty sure the relationship with the ex was abusive: he kept her away from her family, insisted that their "family matters" be kept private which meant she had no one to talk to, and we'd heard rumors of how he talked to her and treated her in general (so even if he never hit her, from people who were either living in the house or visited frequently and were friends of the ex, we knew he was verbally abusive—interestingly enough, none of those people are friends with him anymore). we'd also been told that at least on person saw him grab her forcefully at one point, and that he was cheating on her during most of the relationship (apparently he has admitted to his family that he's a serial cheater: he cheats on all his girlfriends). there was also the repeated needing of money for food while he spent money on mj. we were, for obvious reasons, appalled, but no one could seem to get through to her that she didn't need him, that she was abused and needed to get out. that's pretty standard (and even now, though she will admit to abuse, she doesn't seem to be doing anything to come to terms with it in a way that heals—she's ignoring it the way most victims do). and all this was while they lived in the same complex as us and she could run to us any time she needed to. they split as a couple after they moved into his grandparents' place, and there were incidents we were made vaguely aware of and one that we were clearly made aware of that not only indicated the verbal abuse, at least, was still going on and was also being perpetrated by his grandmother. the incident we were made clear on was a physical assault by said grandmother. at the time, we offered to let her and her kids stay with us, but for vague "you don't have the ability to handle us" combined with "we're trying to co-parent our child" (which, no, you don't need to live with an abusive prick to do) reasons, she chose to stay there (again, that victim mentality getting in the way). we were upset, but short of kidnapping her and the kids (which would have made things worse), there wasn't much we could do. she did send her older daughter to her husband's (yea, not yet divorced, primarily because of money) family.
yea, it's a mess. but when abuse and drugs, even drugs as mild as mj, are involved, things tend to be a mess. and apparently the grandparents tried to throw her out once before, but she'd lived there long enough to need an eviction notice (and it apparently pissed them off that she knew this). not sure why she chose to fight at the time and is not fighting this time, but she's been going through some positive changes of late. she's been trying to reconnect with her family, has started seeing a young man who seems to be good for her (though i will say, i do think she needs to take it easy with the boyfriend thing for awhile, take some time to come back to herself, heal, etc—she still seems to have the attitude that she needs a man in her life, some of which may be compounded by the fact that a person with kids can find it daunting to survive alone—jobs don't pay enough, child care/food/housing are all hella expensive, etc), and no longer seems as overwhelmed and as depressed as she once was, so it's possible those changes have given her the strength to decide it really is time to get out, and now is as good a time as any.
but she doesn't have the money saved for her own place. between her personal bills and the $125/week they were charging her to stay there, she couldn't save much. so, with no place to go, she called us (it's at least a year after we made the original offer, but hey! she called us!) and asked if she and her younger daughter could stay here. there have been a few hiccups since we agreed, but they should be here permanently starting tomorrow or sunday (she's definitely here saturday; we're picking up squirrely sunday, and we're pretty certain dad and company are going to try to prevent that. they can't legally: the two were never married (can't even be a common law marriage if she was never divorced from trin) and there are no court proceedings that give him custody (he has gone through the process to claim her as his daughter, but that just means he has to pay support, he gets visitation, and if he died tomorrow, she's the recipient of his estate), so by law, she has physical custody of her daughter. this doesn't mean they won't try to bully her into leaving squirrely with them, so i'm going with her to make the pick up, and the plan is to have a marshal there since, despite being retired cops, the grandmother, at the very least, doesn't give a damn about the law (and i know some would say it's because she's been a cop, but in my experience, not all cops, you know?).
so this past week has been a bit disrupted as we set things in place for them to be here full time. and the next couple of weeks will be even more disrupted as routines are adjusted. i did managed to write almost every day last week (missed one day), and so far all but one day this week (was in bed don't you dare try to do anything sick on monday). the exercise has been a little disrupted by hub's new schedule and realizing that filming days (for domytriesthis on youtube) will be all day affairs because of editing and etc. we've sorted that out and i actually now may have a regular filming schedule as a result.
anyway, once we get them moved in, we can start preparing more fully for the other thing that's going on, though on our end, it'll be mostly trying to deal with the fallout.
not even two weeks in and the bumps in the road begin. so far i think i'm managing them. was sick but got back on my feet the next day (relatively, anyway), and we've already made changes in the chore, workout, and filming schedules to account for hub's new days off. so, yea, managing. and i'm not feeling as stressed as i was towards the end of last year. i'm back to using my planner to help me with, well, planning and tracking. i'm not putting pressure on myself to lose weight, just to get back into my healthy routines. and writing! yay! writing!
more monkey wrenches will probably come our way, but so far, things are going pretty well. even with the bumps.
~*~
word of the moment: heliograph :: a device for signaling by means of a movable mirror that reflects beams of light, especially sunlight, to a distance;an instrument for recording the duration and intensity of sunshine.; an early type of photoengraving made on a metal plate coated with sensitized asphalt; to communicate by heliograph.
