Creates big problems down the line. — Grooming seems to be a pretty accusatory term. When it was used in my “Healthy Boundaries” training for my degree, it was focused on sexual predators. But in this instance, I’m talking about something quite different. This is about teaching children what healthy emotional boundaries should look like and how…

It’s nice to meet you. I’m a mom and nature lover, but more than that, I love the nature inside myself and how that has fed all of the other parts of me. My favorite places at home are in the barn, in the gardens, and under the silver maples…

doesn’t mean I don’t see the good stuff, too. — Over the past few years, the shadow side of everyone and everything in my life has found a crack to seep in and reveal itself. From a divorce gone completely wrong to being groomed and abused by a sexual predator, to seeing my own dark shadow with regard to my…

I learned something yesterday… — In the intersection of a comment from Martin Vulu and a reel from @financeality, I had another 2+2=4 moment. This is not a confession. It’s simply an exploration into the “why” behind one particularly large failing in my 2.5 decade-long marriage. The other day, I made a comment on a…

…and other post-divorce realizations — This past week, my older brother texted me, offering to help with a situation…a situation with my ex. My brother is a lawyer and is very good at it. I spied his gift at manipulating information and getting what he wanted at a very young age. He was 14. I…

Hard Choices in Post-Divorce-Land — Life is different now. I always knew it would be after the divorce. What I used to have to fight for, I no longer have the energy to fight for anymore. The money from the refinancing of the house is gone. I can’t get the ex to pay the bills…

another 2+2=4 moment — Okay…I’m not depressed like I-can’t-get-out-of-bed-and-function depressed. I’m pretty high-functioning. But the internal struggle, all day, every day is real. And there is good reason for it. For a while, I thought I fought this particular internal battle because the courts raped me in my divorce case. Yes…and... Then I thought…

…all I did for him and why — I woke up this morning in a different house, with a different man, my last child to leave the house, and our exchange student. All day, yesterday, I wrote a paper…an eternal paper. I love writing. Just about everyone knows that these days. It is life-giving. Except these papers. Ugh. …

The Death of a Country Prius V — I thought, after months and years of fighting over money, debt, children, and home, it had been over. I thought it was over two years ago. But is it really over? Two years ago, next month, the courts gave me the title to the car I had paid for in…