Wow, y'all are ambitious. Get the turkey in, volunteer from 10 to 1, and then cook for everybody when we get back. Eat, then clean up and pack leftovers for everyone. I will suggest it, though,thanks for the suggestion. Maybe now that DD12 is old enough to help with the cooking, it'd be easier.

I hear you about the wonderful gift to my daughters. They do lots of other stuff, like collect can food for food drives, and collect change for unicef. Our youngest is 7, and I'm not sure if she'd be old enough to participate in this activity. That may be my reluctance talking, I could find out.

I think his intent is more to not feel bad about not spending the holiday with our families, and I can see how helping others would do that. I was thinking I could suggest volunteering another day, maybe not a holiday. And if it's that he doesn't want to be seen as the "bad guy" in my family, I think I could talk to my mom and explain that there are just a lot of hurt feelings this year, and I hope she understands. I'm not always going to be able to make everybody happy.

Wow, cat, I'm still thinking. I am grateful as heck that I get all the food all timed and on the table for everyone as it is. You really think that I could also work a soup kitchen the same day. I spent years running around like a chicken with my head cut off with ideas like that. I can't imagine signing up for that again.

I think I need to keep brainstorming. Maybe volunteer at the kitchen and go to someone ELSE's house for dinner I think that would resolve the issue with H not wanting to lose face with my family, too. My neighbor gave us an open invitation last year, maybe it's still open

Hi ears,

The cooking for everyone and packing up leftovers for everyone, I thought he didn't want to have relatives over and you were thinking of just having you two and DD's? I could see you being able to pull off a simplified Thanksgiving dinner with just the intimate family in addition to volunteering a couple hours. I think I've read in the newspaper of some families having that as their tradition.

I try (with sometimes a little success even!) to cook as much as possible the day before. For timing but also for space in the oven. You could have a couple of casseroles cooked the night before, or at least already "assembled" and ready to go, along with a pie. Then that morning, stick the turkey in the oven, go volunteer as a family, come back, stick the casseroles in, prepare the salad or what have you, stick the rolls and dressing in, everything is done shortly after.

Sorry, I hope I don't sound like I'm saying "Here's all you need to do, it's easy!" I just like planning menus.

Do you have the traditional southern casseroles, green bean, broccolli, squash, sweet potato? My H tells me I always cook way too much food. I like to have all the staple casseroles, PLUS whatever menu I want to try from epicurious.com, plus a couple different pies plus butternut squash soup plus homemade sourdough bread from scratch (and I mean from scratch, the way the pioneers did - no storebought yeast here!).

Like H reminded me, I start on Monday, usually enlist the help of every adult in the house including MIL, and we end up sitting down to dinner around midnight. So don't listen to me if you plan to eat before midnight! Like Stella keeps saying, I over-commit. You are prolly more honest with yourself about how much you can handle.

Where we used to live, the big grocery store would offer complete dinners ready to go already prepared, you just stick the different containers in the oven at the appropriate time.

ETA: and I never manage to clean up the same night. We're lucky to have freezing temps outside, we just stuck everything on the outside table, covered nicely so the squirrels and deer can't get into them. And stick the turkey carcass in the crock pot overnight to make broth for next time.

I agree with Jayne. I think the difference between us is that my Thanksgiving dinner (if I were to cook it any more, which I don't) would be canned green beans with butter and garlic salt, a turkey I start at 6am, mashed potatoes from those dried potato buds, and a bagged salad. Oh, and make the gravy from the juice. Maybe boil some corn for corn on the cob. Tastes just as good as creating everything from scratch, the family can't tell. Is it something personal for you to have to make everything from scratch, some sort of self-pride thing? I know people who that's true for. I know one woman who spends three days making her meal. That gets eaten in 20 minutes. And she spends, accumulated, about 3 or 4 hours cleaning up for. Just not worth it for me.

Thanks, jayne, cat. I like having a bunch of people over. Everyone brings food from their countries, or parts of the country. I make the FlyLady dinner she sends out the mailer on, the turkey, homemade gravy, hot rolls, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, stuffing, green beans. And then family and friends bring desserts, curry chicken and rice, mac and cheese casserole, Haitian rice and peas (don't call it beans and rice;)) and collard greens.

But POJA isn't about trying to redo the same thing that's not working for everyone. We went for a walk and talked about it, and it was about the tension with my mom's family. We're still processing, but I feel more comfortable that we're going to be able to find a win-win here. Actually, H said, "I understnd you want to spend holidays with family. Okay, do whatever you want" in a nice tone but I know better now than to do that.

There's a lot of undercurrent to this, we may make some headway with that. But I'm letting go of the response.

It hit me reading your posts, that Thanksgiving is not about how you cook the dinner! Two years ago, I posted about not wanting to do the same thing with our families, and H insisting that we do the same thing. I gave in Thankgiving, and then Christmas we went to a restaurant. Nobody liked it LOL.

Sleeping on it, I really do like the idea of helping as a fmaily at the soup kitchen. The kids liked the idea, too. I'll check today to find out if DD7 can participate, or if she's too young.

I'm glad you could see that that was what I was saying. My mom was the baby of her family and only could cook two or three things well; that was it. We grew up on TV dinners (before microwaves!), so food has never been a big deal in my family; i.e., not a source of pride like I see in so many women. Especially when it inevitably turns into men sitting on a couch watching tv while women are on their feet working all day. blech.

I regularly have D18 cook meals for us, so that she can learn to do it while I'm still around; 12 year olds are completely capable of cooking dinners, believe me.

I guess what I'm saying, is that I see your feelings about such things to be part of your self-view. Like many men receive their worth from their job, ability to provide, many women receive theirs from their house-type abilities. But is that working for you? Is it keeping you shackled to ideas or traditions that define YOU, rather than you defining your traditions?

This is not meant as a DJ, just an observation, but I see a lot of rigidity in your beliefs. Which is fine, if that is what gives you comfort and worth. But it seems like so many of the issues you bring up with your H are in part due to that rigid belief system - you want, or need, things to happen according to those beliefs or else you are miserable.

But I'd like to ask you, why? Why are you not willing to be more open-minded about alternatives? I'm not talking about giving in to H's demands for moving and such. Just more minor things like when a kid can go to a party, or what movie they can see, or what a punishment should be, or how a holiday should be observed.

I hope you don't think I'm saying what you do or think is wrong. I'm not. I'm saying that I see you endure a lot of unhappiness or pain because you're constantly struggling to align your life with those beliefs and if things don't fit, you stress. Then your H stresses. Then your kids stress.

Does that make sense?

Wow, this is really a light-bulb moment for me. I've always considered myself as a go-with-the flow kind of person. But reading your post, I really do see that, that I REALLY like when things happen in a predictable way, and I feel very uncomfortable and ill at ease when things don't go that way.



Cat, the cool thing is that a lot of men in my family also are excellent cooks, and even made the Thanksgiving dinner some years. This is a real source of happiness for us, men and women alike, to be able to recreate great memories with the smells we can make come out of a kitchen. My H is more traditional, so while some days he does cook great stuff, holidays are days off for him. Which is okay, because I am enthusiastic about and enjoy this stuff.



DD12 does make "breakfast for dinner" for all of us sometimes. And they both like to work in the kitchen, and make dinners with supervision.


Cat, I do hear you here. That I want to be aware and check my intent and beliefs, instead of having the cart pull the horse.



You hit the nail on the head here. Last ight, DD12 was doing homework at 10:30. I was very very uncomfortable, concerned that she wasn't going to get enough sleep. But my tension I think made it harder for her to get done. I wanted her to go to bed and finish it in the morning, which she did, because I was getting more and more anxious. Which wasn't letting go of the response.

As a kid, my mom made things very predictable for us, and my dad didn't, there wasn't the same structure. I didn't feel as comfortable when my mom wasn't home. Kind of like that expression caring and controlling mean the same thing, but caring sounds nicer.


Because that anything-goes feels like total chaos to me. Unmanageable, Then I'm left with piles and piles of consequences of actions that aren't my own. I was the oldest of 6, cat. My stepdad was alcoholic, out at the bar, and my mom working double shifts, for years. My next younger brother and I were totally overwhelmed, and could never get any sense of order or routine. I can't come home to that, now as an adult. That total chaos, not knowing what would be broken when we got home, without the knowledge or money or ability to fix anything.

I just want some predictability. Kids are in bed at bedtimes, so we are free to have UA time, or to sleep. Age-appropriate movies for the kids, so they don't think they have to act like the women with no self-respect that they see. I see that stuff as poisonous and dangerous. I acted out some stuff and had some beliefs as a teenager that wasn't authentic to my integrity, to be liked, and I don't want the kids to learn that through trial and error like I did. Order in the house falls into DS for me.

I lived in the midwest for 3 years. Those kids weren't insolent and disrespectful the way some kids here are. Parents weren't rude and insulting to their kids the way they are here. None of my coworkers were divorced, and folks spoke well of their spouses. Of course kids here are disrespectful, because their parents treat each other and the kids so demeaning. Name-calling, mocking making fun of each other when they ask for help, instead of helping. I wanted to bring that good stuff back with us. I have some great neighbors and friends who also are kind to their families.

I see what you mean, that I can increase my awareness, and look at why I want to say no to something, check my intent, first.

Cat, do you ever feel like that, that things have changed without you realizing, so much so you better get in there and assess and set it straight before the train goes off the tracks for good?

And then the reality is even scarier, that there is so much that we don't have any ability to protect our kids from. Even last year at 11, my older DD told me that some girls she knew were cutting. I don't want her exposed to that.

Cat, I don't mean, that I think I can protect the kids from everything. What I mean is that this is what I was feeling like last night, that this is yet another thing being taken away from us due to our never-ending dysfunction. But looking at it solution-oriented, I remember that there are win-win solutions here.

I stress out all the time. But I see my D18 doing it now, too. And I don't want her to live like that. So I'm trying to learn to differentiate between what has to be handled, and what can pass without real damage. For instance, until a couple years ago, I was adamant about checking grades; anything under an A meant partial grounding (taking away electronics); anything under a B meant grounding for the rest of the semester! Then I realized two things. First, whether a child gets a 3.4 GPA or a 3.8 GPA isn't going to matter in her life except for one thing - entrance into a college. And even then, if you go to community college for two years, you can get into the 4-years without needing a high GPA. So what does it really matter if she is straight As like I was?

I realized that I was putting my onus on her; I made As as a way to get my parents to notice me, cos they had their hands full with my older brother. Thus the descent into my goody two-shoes routine. My D18 doesn't need to prove anything to me, doesn't need to fight for my attention or approval - she knows wholeheartedly that I would die in an instant to save her, that she is my everything. She has other issues, but that isn't one of them. So the desire for straight As was MY desire, not hers.

I also realized that by stressing out over it, I was teaching her that her accomplishments were more important to me than she was - if she didn't achieve, I wasn't going to love her as much. I NEVER want to do that to her.

So I pulled back. Now that the pressure isn't on her, she is one of the most studious kids at school. On her own. Because she knows she needs to learn to succeed in life; nothing more.

I guess what I'm getting at is you have to decide where you maintain control and where you teach your kids to exercise their own control. You may think this is wrong, but I would rather my daughter be exposed to a cutter in her class and feel free to tell me about it so that I can talk it through with her and get her to see the folly of it; that way, I feel safer than ever that, when I'm not around (and that happens more and more each year), she'll already know it's a bad thing and steer clear and even steer her friends clear.

If I had protected her from such things by, say, putting her in a conservative private school and pretending that stuff doesn't happen, she wouldn't feel safe telling me about the girl who's doing it, because I'm pretending it doesn't happen, so as to protect HER. But it does happen and no environment is safe from it.

I think you're a wonderfully protective, supportive mother, but I wonder sometimes if the sheltering isn't putting your children at a disadvantage. Of course, I'm not saying to let them watch porn or anything. Just that they will sense your worries, pick up on them, and incorporate that worry into their own self-vision. They will also determine that 'mom doesn't like cutters, she thinks there's something wrong with those people, so I'm not going to let her know my friend Sara is a cutter, or she won't let me see her.'

If they sense you seeing the 'real' world but being confident that you can prepare your kids to avoid the pitfalls, they too will be more confident and sure of themselves when confronted with typical issues of today.

The bottom line is that kids withhold an amazingly large amount of information from us. They have a filter on what they're willing to include us in, and it gets thicker and thicker every year. If they sense a rigidity in your views, a non-acceptance of things, a judgment, a fear, a feeling of inability to deal with certain issues...they will keep any such information to themselves and deal with it themselves.

So I try to teach D18 that I will go with the flow. That if she messes up and tries out cutting with friend Sara, or sees someone with pot and doesn't tell on him, or gets dared into stealing a candy bar...she can come to me and we will solve it - together.

I hope that doesn't sound condescending. I don't mean it to be. I'm just trying to explain my worldview, which I suspect is a lot different from yours. I do that because I sense that your worldview is keeping you from seeking out certain solutions in your life that otherwise would present themselves. Such as how you and H deal with the kids, or other issues that come up and cause the two of you to feel that the other isn't caring or willing to negotiate.

I guess what I'm basically saying is there is NO one right way to do anything.

H and I grew up in a bad environment in a lot of ways, with a lot of violence and actions with big consequences. I made self-destructive choices. I didn't have the mentors my age in my life, that example of folks living by their values. My only mentors were my grandparents, and I did't understand that their values were good for my generation, too.

For example, my mom told me at 18 that it was a bad idea to live with then-BF, and I didn't understand, because I saw everyone shack up like that. The guy was a total misogynist, and I didn't see it. Only after I got older and more mature did I relaize that most of these rules are not hard things there to create shame and judgement. They are simple choices to make to give guidance to make choices that we can feel great about.

What DD12 learned about cutting was there are some situations that are bigger than we can resolve ourselves, that we need to get outside help for. I think she a similar message seeing me overcome the yelling by going to IC and Alanon. I don't think that she needed to see cutting to learn that we can get help when something is hard to do on our own. I don't know. I see sometimes that it takes what it takes. I am working to discuss my concerns with H, and deciding together how to address them, instead of deciding on my own and expecting him to agree because it makes sense to me.

But isn't that contradictory? She learned of the cutting situation, which allowed her to see that you need help sometimes, but you don't have to see something to learn to get help? Are you meaning not having to see it in person? I can agree with that, for sure.

I guess what I was getting at was trying to shield our kids from what really goes on doesn't give them the opportunity to discuss it with us. Kids almost always take on our values, even bad ones, lol. So getting to discuss a cutting classmate gave her the opportunity to learn from you a good way to handle it. But if she had felt that you didn't want to believe it happens, because you don't talk about it, or pretend not to see it, sends the message that she's on her own about it.

Mind, I'm not talking about you and your kids. This is just a general philosophical mishmash. I think it's great she felt safe enough to talk to you about it.

I hope you know I'm just worried for you, and this isn't me telling you your way of doing things is wrong. I just see you carry this burden of wanting to protect your children, have all the right values and decisions and responsibilities and traditions, and it just seems like you carry so much on your own shoulders because you're trying to adhere to all these things that give you comfort, due to FOO. Yet, because of that, you always seem to be under such tremendous stress. I worry for you, so I was thinking if you could find a middle ground somewhere where you're willing to 'go with the flow' just a teensy bit more, you could see that things would still work out, and in the meantime you'd be learning that it's safe to step away from the curb once in awhile.

Does that make sense?

Many times I wish I could take my kids and live in a cabin in the woods, homeschooling them far away from today's society.

Then again, I wouldn't be nearly as good for them if I had them 24-7 all by myself, as a good elementary school teacher would be.

I'm reading and learning from you guys. Thanks for sharing about such things here.

Cat, I totally hear you, that there's a lot more room to Let Go and Let God. I am glad that you point out when I'm not as far along on this road as I want to be. I had forgot that, that the kids do feel my lack of confidence. That's not what I want to pass down to them. Here's a cool song that I heard about this, not sure if I already posted it.

Cat, this was timely advice, maybe more timely than you realized. I'm glad that we talked about this this morning. I went home for lunch, and H said, that whether I'm going or not, he decided, when his current project at work is complete, he's going to California. He said, "you either come or you don't." I really feel like I'm at a good place of detachment with it. It's totally out of my hands. Like this stuff with the kids, there is a lot that's out of my hands, and it's okay to accept that.

{{{ ears }}}

I'm so glad you and cat have been talking about letting go of things!

So what is the timeline here? Are you considering going with or is that definitely out?

Jayne, I am still keeping an open mind whether to keep trying in the house or to separate when we're done with the counseling, with the goal of reconciling. I believe that H means what he is saying about going alone. I am not looking for reasons to leave; I am really trying to be open to what happens. But that would make it really clear whether we are moving to a POJA marriage or not.

He isn't clear yet what his timeline is. His current project does not have a completion date, but he estimates they only have enough work for the rest of the year.

And thanks for the hugs! I am glad that I agreed to stay through this counseling process. I feel a lot more at peace in the present than I did when I was trying to get away from the fighting. And I think we make a lot better decisions when we're not in turmoil.