Month: April 2020

It’s a national holiday. We’ve been in this country for nearly four years and the community has been so good to us.

The holiday includes paying respect to those that serve or have served in the armed forces. I always feel strongly that the family should take part. Despite my aversion to fighting, there are people who risk their lives to keep us safe and protect the freedoms that we enjoy daily. However Charlie refuses to let the children attend any events. We’re not of the same nationality apparently so it doesn’t count.

I am so frustrated, I just want to show respect and teach my children that not every nation in the world is so fortunate to be as free as ours. Instead it turns into a petty squabble and it’s the children who miss out again.

Somehow we managed to get onto Charlie’s favourite topic today. Families. This is a complete red card topic, there has never been a single conversation that I can recall where talking about our families hasn’t resulted in torrents of passive aggressive remarks or worse from Charlie. I try to avoid the subject of families like the plague.

Today is no different. Charlie tells me straight out that her family is more important than mine. The reasoning is that her family were closer to us before we moved away. I don’t mention the reason we ended up near her family was because she practically walked out on me 10 years earlier and moved to be near them. I followed at the time to try and make things work.

Charlie has no appreciation of how I feel about my family, no sense that I might actually want to be able to have a normal relationship with them some time, maybe be able to talk to them without Charlie trying to listen in. Maybe if Charlie disruptive and having meltdowns any moment my family was in the moment. Maybe lots of things, but I know it is not likely to happen.

It turned out that Charlie found out the children have been talking to my family on a regular basis. Each week Charlie goes out for a club and the children get an un-interrupted chat with their cousins or grandparents. Charlie announced the same day that she is quitting her club. – And she did, she never want back to the club again after this week.