Category: MH vs Dating

The Game

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, Douchers, MH vs Dating, Relationships

Today while walking to a doctor’s appointment, I had an interesting conversation with a guy needing directions. After asking for directions, he said he could use my phone number. The rest of the conversation went something like this:

Me: my boyfriend doesn’t like me giving out my number to strange men.
Creepo: neither does my wife but what she doesn’t know–
Me: I love my boyfriend–
Creeper: love has nothing to do with this sweetheart.
Me: I respect my boyfriend…& your wife.

This guy was well dressed & drove a Mercedes so I’m guessing he’s not used to the word “no.” But this exchange made me feel badly for this man’s wife & reminded me why I’m fortunate to have my boyfriend.

He’s not perfect but he’s honest & faithful. I don’t have to worry when he’s not with me about who or what he’s doing & I trust him completely. I don’t need to hear from him every second to know “we” are okay (I may still check in, but that’s more because I like to know how he is than insecurity, i do it with my friends when I haven’t heard from them in a few days as well). I’m guessing this woman knows her husband’s a cad & panics whenever he leaves the house. My ex husband cheated on me during the course of our marriage & we could never really rebuild the trust. I can only imagine what this woman feels; judging by his confidence level, he has done it before.

What’s the point of wanting your cake & eating it too? All you do is degrade your partner & look cheap doing it. If you’re with someone, you’ve made a commitment to them, the least you can do is keep it in your pants. Don’t blame the other person, they owe you nothing. But your partner does & they should have the decency to not share their body with anyone else.

Relationships aren’t always easy. Sometimes you’re moody & not engaged & every little thing your partner does is driving you crazy. However, with communication, understanding & even space, you can get through those speed bumps together. No one said sharing your life with another person was easy; nothing worth it is easy. But if you can’t even show the person respect they deserve by not sleeping with someone else, then you don’t deserve their love.

Airplanes

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, Just Fun, MH vs Dating, Mommydom

Sometimes I like to post randomness based on random hashtags solely for amusement.

Once, it was 30 things about me, then five things I hate. Now, it’s going to be…

*drum roll*

10 places I want to go!

I want to go to many different places. I want to travel the world and see many things, but as I compiled this list I realized that there was more than just a location, some places are events where I just really want to go or see. So, I made the list with that in mind. It’s not always about location, but who you’re with or where you want to go.

1. Disneyworld. My goal in life is to take my littles to Disneyworld and show them Princess Aurora’s Castle and meet all of the characters and ride the teacups and all of that good stuff. It would be a dream come true for them and to see the looks on their little faces would sustain me for the rest of my days. I would probably feel my inner eight year old marking out with joy as well. There’s just something about the idea of taking the girlies there that makes me smile just thinking about it.

2. Antigua. The sand has a pinkish hue, which means it’s a girlie-girl beach! My kind of island! Honestly, if I could ever whip my butt into something bathing suit worthy, that would be my ideal destination for a romantic vacation/honeymoon if I ever chose to walk down the aisle again/girls only resort vacation. There’s a casino for cards (once I finally learn how to play), beaches for lounging and music galore! The idea of lazing near my one true love the sun while enjoying cocktails and island breezes sounds just too perfect; I’d have to be reminded to come home.

3. The Wedding Where No One is Betting On How Long It Will Last. The over/under on my wedding was three years. Honestly, out of all of the weddings that I’ve attended, I’ve only been to two where I thought “Wow, these two will be together forever.” Most people I talk to say they’ve never attended a wedding where they thought that the couple was going to make it for the long haul. I guess in this world of divorce and “Till we get really bored do us part” it’s hard to say that you see the “Happily ever after” at someone’s nups. However, I want to go to that wedding, where it’s two people very obviously meant to be together and you just know that they’re going to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary and still be freaking adorable. I truly hope I attend three; when all three of my daughters walk down the aisle.

4. Ireland. I want to travel the country side, drink whiskey with Bono and a guy named Seamus who promptly punches a guy named Galen and someone plays uptempo celtic music all day long! (Yes, I am well aware that U2 doesn’t randomly appear, and bar fights and random celtic pipe bands are not in Ireland, please don’t take this away from me.) My family’s lineage is Irish and I’d kind of like to see my ancestor’s homeland. I think it would be amazing to explore the old castles and pretend I’m some kind of princess (like I do in Casa Loma) and learn more about this country’s amazing history.

5. New Orleans. I want to go to the French Quarter and the graveyards and listen to jazz at night! I have always loved New Orleans and while it may not be number one on this list, it’s definitely my number one vacation spot. I don’t care if it’s Mardi Gras with my zany friends, a romantic vacation to the Quarter (which wouldn’t be fretfully romantic as my boyfriend would promptly abandon me for his date with Drew Brees) or even going by myself on some kind of weird pilgrimage, it would be a dream come true just to go. It’s got to be on my bucket list somewhere.

6. The moment fear is conquered. Maybe someday I’ll finally get over my fear of geese! Honestly, I would love to experience the moment that someone finally overcomes that fear that’s dominated much of their life, whether it’s my fear or someone else’s. Being part of that euphoric moment where the chains that have bound them are broken and the feeling of invincibility because they are no longer afraid is just something that is too awesome. Perhaps if you’ve experienced it, it’s something you understand. If not, think of that moment when you were little and you were riding your bike and you realized there were no training wheels and no one was holding on; that’s the moment. Imagine reliving it as an adult, knowing that fear that held you back is gone and you’re now free. Don’t you want to go there too?

7. A Manchester United Football Match. I don’t watch football. I have a dear friend who has tried to educate me for years. But I don’t want to go for the sport itself; I’m going for the fans! The MUFC have some of the most insanely loyal fans in the entire world and I want to see some soccer hooliganism first hand! I want to bring all of my MUFC loving friends and watch them go from intellectual minds to snarling beasts!  You’ve gotta love fan loyalty, it’s just so awesome!

8. Every province. I want to see my great nation (especially British Columbia). I think it would be awesome to just see each and every province and learn something new about my homeland. I’ve only been to two so far, so clearly I have some catching up to do.

9. Nowhere to do nothing. As someone who spends 95% of their day parenting, researching, errand running, learning, studying, etc. I have always wanted one day where I went nowhere in particular and did absolutely nothing. Literally…nothing. Cell phones stay in the car, car stays parked somewhere and you just walk enjoying nature and the wonder of being together. No one could call or text and ruin your perfect moment and there are no appointments or reservations. It’s just you and the person that you love most in the entire world enjoying the perfection that is nothing.

10. In MY Home. I have a house right now. It’s a pretty nice house. It’s painted pretty colours and I like living here. But someday, I want MY house, with MY name on the mortgage, the mailbox. I want it to be MINE. One of my major goals in life is to buy my own home for the girls and I to live in that is ours. A place that we own where we can plant our garden, upkeep our yard, paint the walls any kooky colour we want. It doesn’t have to be a palatial estate or Barbie’s Dream Home. Just a place in the world that is mine.

If I Could

by maryhelenc, posted in Just Fun, MH vs Dating, Mommydom, Relationships

There’s something to be said for “Do nothing” days.

I am a sucker for random adventures and zaniness and spontaneity.  My foster father was the best for random adventures. From snow days spent bowling or that Tuesday afternoon trip to a museum just because the sun was shining and we were all home, there was never a dull moment and it was amazing.

Keep reading this post

Save You

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, Douchers, MH vs Dating, Mommydom, My New Life As Me, Relationships, Seriously WTF?

Everyone has that moment where it all just comes crashing down.

That was me this week.

Everything I loved about my life (except parenting) suddenly fell apart & I’m left trying to understand.

I’m hurting, I’m wounded & I’m lost. I hate that I’m supposed to be the person that nothing affects but this week has really walloped me.

So, I try to remember all the lessons that I taught myself all of these months; that there’s always a shred of hope in the darkness & sometimes that shred of hope is enough to help you endure. When things look bleakest, you may be closest to your victory. That broken hearts mend & eventually things will be okay.

I know these things, but right now, I just want to feel okay.

Soldier

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, Douchers, MH vs Dating, Relationships, Seriously WTF?

Life is about lessons learned.

I’m always learning new lessons & trying to apply them to my daily life.

The latest lesson is learning how to open up to a new person after the old person messed you up so badly.

I’m very blessed to be with the person I am with. I have blogged about him more than once, and while I try to keep my gushing about him to a minimum, sometimes one can’t help it.

He’s a very strong, supportive & compassionate man who deals with my idiosyncrasies in a very gentle & comforting way. Every time there is a crisis in my life, he is by my side, rationalizing through it until a solution can be found. However, I find in many situations, he’s the last person that I will turn to, which I think may bother him.

I spent a long time reclaiming my individuality after years of being under someone’s thumb. Part of me fears going back to that. I’m always afraid that reaching out to the man that I love will result in him resenting me for being weak & sniveling, so by the time I do talk to him, 19 things have gone wrong & I’m a crazy, crying mess.

However, this man finds crazy, crying MH lovable, which is probably the sweetest thing I have ever heard. When someone can love the least lovable side of you, & only want to understand that side & not change it, they are likely your match. I’m not the easiest person to deal with. I’m goofy, kind of ditzy & sometimes over emotional. The fact that he can see these things not as flaws that need changing, but facets of my personality that need to be understood & accepted makes me love him more.

The other reason is simple; he’s a busy man. He has many commitments to many people & I don’t want to infringe on them. I don’t want to distract him from the degree he has worked so hard for or his beautiful daughter. I am only a marginal piece of his life & I don’t want to put too much pressure on him to be more than that. He has a million projects & sometimes he simply has no time for me, not even a phone call. I’m the same way sometimes. But I feel guilty when I have to infringe on his life, I feel so selfish when I do. I should be the lowest priority, not someone that requires a lot of attention.

However, the lesson here is knowing when it is the right time to let someone in. When do you have the conversations that are most personal?

For me, that time is now.

I’m slowly building a future with someone whom genuinely loves & cares for me & wants to understand me better. He wants to be there for me when things get rough, just like I want to be there for him. We are getting to the point where we know each other better than we know ourselves & accepted each other’s flaws & foibles. We’re at the point where one bad day/week/minor issue won’t tear us apart & I need to be more open to talking to him, even about the stuff that I don’t tell even my closest friends. I spend so much time trying to be Super MH that I forget that I don’t have to be; my friends & beau appreciate that I’m actually a bit nuts & over emotional. Perhaps if I opened up @ the time things happened & let people understand why I feel the way I do, maybe they wouldn’t feel like I’m high strung. Maybe I wouldn’t be.

Loving someone means loving the parts of the person that aren’t very lovable. Flaws are part of a person too & whether it’s a small flaw (forgetting to call) or a major one (over emotional crying), if you love that person, you embrace their flaws as well as their goodness. If someone can love the parts of me that I hate, then he’s someone I can do damn near anything for.

Give Up The Grudge

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, MH vs Dating, My New Life As Me, Relationships, Seriously WTF?

The more time I spend with people, the more that I think half of the universe is bitterable.

Bitterable is a word that I invented which is a hybrid of bitter and miserable. It makes me sad to see so many people that I love so unhappy with the state of their lives and yet, I can’t do anything to help them out with it.

I often get questioned by the people in my life by my ability to trudge along when things get sucky. A recurring conversation between myself and my beau is my indifference towards a former friend who stopped talking to me abruptly (and even took my copy of the Hunger Games and never returned it!), but I never say anything negative or show any distress at their departure. I simply have more important things to focus on than someone who obviously didn’t care enough about the friendship to have a conversation. This applies to many things in my life. I’m quick to forgive and move on because once someone has apologized for said wrong doing & we’ve talked about it, we should probably go forward.

Several people I know are still angry with their partners for things that happened months, even years ago. Things that should have been resolved at the time. I’m not talking about the residual hurt or the rebuilding of trust, those linger for months on end. Mentioning residual hurt doesn’t have to involve throwing it back in the person’s face, simply expressing that you were hurt and that’s why you do certain things or get emotional about certain things is well enough. If someone cares enough about you (and has any self awareness at all), they should have some patience for your concerns. I’m one of those people that will annoy someone with questions such as; are things fine, are we good now, do you mean it, etc. and chances are I drive the other person absolutely bonkers, but it’s my way of feeling secure again after something goes wrong. There’s nothing wrong with needing reassurance, or even with feeling hurt long after the action/infraction is over.  However, holding on to the residual anger, or worse, stewing for years is just a ticking time bomb. If you’ve said you’ve forgiven them, then drop it and try to overcome the hurt, because they’ve acknowledged their wrong doing, why make them suffer? If they were truly sorry, then they’ll demonstrate the appropriate behaviour and you’ll feel better and more secure eventually, but it’s up to you to feel better, not the other person to make you feel better.

Holding a grudge is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die; you’re only hurting yourself. The person you’re angry at likely doesn’t know or care that you’re still pissed about the infraction from years ago and that’s why you end up bitterable. I think about people who are still angry about things that happened in high school, even though they graduated 10 years ago, or are still mad at their relationship crumbling a year later. I can understand hurt, or not ready to open oneself up to a new relationship, but to still be angry is a little silly.

My foster father once said that if it won’t affect you three days from now, or an apology can fix it, it’s not worth being angry about. It’s a lesson I’ve tried to adopt into my daily life. I still get hurt and angry, but I try very hard not to let it impact my relationships with other people. I’m simply too busy to end up bitterable & I would be very upset to learn that people were still angry with me for things that I had done and apologized for.

Part of Me

by maryhelenc, posted in Dear Blank, Douchers, MH vs Dating, Mommydom, My New Life As Me, Relationships, Seriously WTF?

A year ago today I made the biggest decision of my adult life; I ended my marriage.

I’m not a “look back” sort of person; I’m not going that way. However, I couldn’t help but look at where I am right now as opposed to then.

He said I was worthless & wouldn’t last 10 minutes. I’ve been on my own for a year. Maybe I didn’t make the best choices every time or carry myself in the best way but every choice I made was mine and mine alone, with no fear of being called names or spat on.

I have an amazing group of friends who supported me & weren’t afraid to call me out when I was doing something dumb. I wouldn’t be the person I am without them, especially Drew. He was my cheerleader, therapist, companion & sounding board. He helped me see I was okay on my own & because of that I’m a better person for it. I can’t ever tell him enough how much I appreciate him. I found someone who wants me & my daughters because of who we are, not because of what we can give them.

A year ago, I wondered who I would be when I wasn’t a wife. Now I know; I’m Mary-Helen. I’m a mom. I’m a friend. I’m a girlfriend. I’m a writer. I’m a klutz. I sing too loudly with the radio & tell unfunny jokes. I apologize too much & I suck at math. I’m not perfect, I screw up, I irritate people but I’m well meaning & in the end, that’s what matters. That’s me & I think that’s pretty okay.

Mine

by maryhelenc, posted in Celebrity Fluff, Dear Blank, Douchers, MH vs Dating, Relationships, Seriously WTF?, Social Media

Arms Bumalang of AM 800 posed an interesting Facebook question this morning: would you be upset if your partner “checked out” an attractive person when you were with them?

One woman said she would break up with her boyfriend on sight, that he broke the trust, the end. Other responses were that looking is fine, it’s the touching that bothers them.

I generally don’t care. I’ve been called a flirt & I’m not ashamed to admit that I find Chris Hemsworth more than a little attractive. My boyfriend is also a shameless flirt & recently explained his plans to marry Sophia Bush. We laughed. I’m really not a jealous person. I won’t unless I have a reason to be. If you don’t give me a reason to feel threatened, I won’t. We both have a lot of friends that are of the opposite sex so when we started dating, we discussed what we considered acceptable & what was crossing a boundary. We were pretty much on the same page.

People are visual, they’re genetically predesigned to react to visual stimuli. To flip out when they do is asking a human being to deny what makes them human. To the women who claim their partner noticing a pretty girl is cheating, I ask this; do you practice what you preach? You never look at another man? Zack Efron didn’t make your stomach flutter? Do you expect him to only look at you while you ogle construction workers & celebrities? If so, then the issue is you, not your man.

I don’t care if my guy ogles Sophia Bush, Katie Holmes or the waitress. As long as he loves me for the things that actually matter in life, then we’re good.

Maybe I just expect very little, but I think that love means that you don’t expect something from your partner that you can’t give yourself. So, unless you can assuredly NEVER look (no, not even at the celeb you swooned over in high school), then don’t expect your partner to do the same.

Marry You

by maryhelenc, posted in Celebrity Fluff, Dear Blank, MH vs Dating, Mommydom, My New Life As Me, Relationships, support Windsor!

Weddings. Ugh.

One of my best friends celebrated her one year anniversary this week. I visited her the day after their anniversary and she said to me, “It’s been a year, but I love that broad more than the day I married her.” I had to crack up at the sentiment.

The same day, my middle daughter looked at me @ the dinner table and asked “Mommy, will you and your boyfriend get married? Because I think you should.” I choked on my food.

This all comes on the heels of my friend Nikki (from MisterMamaSir) showing my beau the wedding invitations that she decided would be perfect for our wedding. (They are nice, check them out HERE) He seemed interested; I may have thrown up.

I’ve made no secret that I really don’t want to remarry (despite my beau saying that he thinks he could change my mind if he suddenly wanted to) but my happily married friend this week actually asked me WHY. My therapist asked the same question and I couldn’t actually provide an answer. I really didn’t know “why”, just that it seemed like a really horrible idea.

I’ve been married and I’m finalizing my divorce. I’ve always said I can’t say never, because the person who says never usually does it. However, the whole idea scares me. I can gladly picture my entire life with one person. I see no problem with the idea of spending my life with one person. I’ve talked about spending my life with one person and nobody needed to breathe into a bag. But mention marriage and I turn pale and hyperventilate.

I guess there should be a reason, right? It’s not just the idea of the legalities that closes off this idea to me. But the fact that I’m totally cool with someone telling me they want to spend the rest of their life with the girls and me is perfectly okay, just not the idea of the wedding and the insanity and the in laws and the fighting and stress of planning with no guarentees that it’s going to work out…of course there’s no guarentees that any relationship will work out.

I hate when I have to tell Drew he is right, but he is; I need to address my fear of matrimony…and my fear of geese. I’m not saying I want to get married now (or ever), but I think I do have to be more open to changing my mind about the subject (I’m not open to the idea of embracing geese though, those things are just evil). Much like other things within a relationship, when one firmly says “No dice” on something with no option of compromise, whether it’s something as small as dinner reservations to as large as kids and family, you’re closing off the ability to grow as a couple, or so the therapist keeps telling me. So, being more open to options and your partner’s wishes gives you the option to be more successful in your relationship. Things change all of the time and you need to be willing to change with it. If you really love someone and want to be with them, you have to evolve with them. If one of you continues to grow while the other remains static; the relationship fails.

So, while I currently have no desire to walk down another aisle or hug a goose, I have to be open to the idea that it may be something that I want someday. Who knows? Maybe I won’t and my partner won’t and we’ll be like Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell and live in sin until we die, because that’s how we both want it, not because one is unwilling to consider any other option.