Reading the book on indoor air quality and its affects on allergy sufferers compelled me to get down in my basement and do what cleaning I could yesterday. Last night I slept in my youngest daughter's bed to see if that would help me breathe easier. I normally take allergy medicine before I go to bed, but last night I tested what would happen if I didn't. Although I didn't sleep as well as I could have, I slept better than I do in my own bed. I'm going to order allergy casings for our beds. We used to have these, but to make a long story short I sold a set of bunk beds because I thought we were going to be moving and the allergy coverings we had were so old one of them had disintegrated on the underside of the mattress.
Anyone is free to disagree with this, but the more I learn and read about possessions the more I understand the relationship between things and problems. This doesn't mean that we can only have the most utilitarian existence possible, but when I think about the basements, garages, and other storage 'solutions' I've seen in the homes of my family and friends, I'm amazed that more people don't have serious health problems from the mold, dust, and microbial growth these places can unknowingly harbor. Sometimes it isn't the items in a basement, but the inability to see what's behind them that is the true culprit. Believe me, after reading this book I am on a mission to eliminate as much food and moisture as I can for pests, insects, and other organisms.
This next part is bitching so skip it if that's not your thing. My ex is an extremely talented, very intelligent, workaholic. He's self employed and there's always work to be done. It seems like he's better since he got a girlfriend who gets him to the gym and out of their (his) condo, but my guess is he still doesn't get the kind of sleep he needs. One of the most infuriating things about him is his tendency to start a new project before he's finished a previous one, buy everything under the sun that could possibly be needed to finish a task, and then let things sit at some percentage of completion. When he redid our kitchen he left the tops of the cabinets open without installing molding above them. Below the cabinets there are no toekicks. As you might imagine food falls and gets kicked or swept under our cabinets and islands.
We've needed new windows since we moved into this place back in 1998. Recently we received a letter from our homeowners insurance company telling us that we needed to repair the broken and missing windows in the garage and make some other fairly minor repairs. He owns this house, but I live here. I could move out and probably should. The reason I don't is partially due to affordability. I could get a job and will, but simply removing myself from the situation without addressing these issues means my kids will be exposed to the same things I'm having trouble with now. In my codependency book it speaks about the consuming and resentment that codependents feel when they try to get even with the people they're trying to control.
Last night I wanted to kill my mom and my ex. I feel as if they have deliberately and actively contributed to poor life quality and continue to do so by being irresponsible in the case of my ex, and insensitive, unempathetic, and abusive in the case of my mom. My refrigerator went out because we have the wrong type of outlet behind it. For someone who knows how to swap out an outlet it's probably a pretty minimal project. Yesterday I called and sent him a text asking to please call when he has a minute re the refrigerator. So far I haven't heard anything from him which is a technique he uses to avoid responsibility. This is a simple thing he could do, but won't, and this is one of the reasons why I have so many issues with him.
A girlfriend of mine said it sounds like he's unreliable so I have to stop depending on him. I know she's right, but it galls me to no end to have to spend my time and money fucking around with shit that he should be taking care of since this is a property he owns. I'm sure a large part of my resentment stems from the fact that I know he's spending time scraping the texture off the walls in the condo because he doesn't like it. Whether it's footwear or home maintenance I get really angry when people are more concerned with how things look rather than how safe or clean they are. When we were getting ready to sell our home our realtor told me that I had a nicer kitchen than homes that were being listed for more than a hundred thousand more than mine would be.
Considering that I had no idea what I was doing when I picked out the cabinets, flooring, appliances, and countertops, I did pretty well. I have angled maple running from the hall beyond my kitchen all the way through my kitchen, dining room, and down the hall to the bedrooms. I get a lot of compliments on it and because we have windows along the Southern wall that let in a lot of light my house feels very light, open, and airy. I have a lot of cabinets, a large pantry, a huge fridge, and an eight foot island that I wouldn't ever do again since horizontal surfaces are an invitation for clutter to accumulate. On the opposite wall I had a butcher block slab installed, under that I have two barstools, I can easily fit twenty people in my kitchen and dining room when I'm hosting a party without it feeling too cramped.
I do a lot with essential oils, yesterday I used ylang-ylang to try and calm myself down, it helped, but only up to a point. I hate feeling like this. I hate knowing that my own anger and frustration at these people that I have to deal with are able to whip me up into a frenzy of unhealthy emotion. I'm proud of myself for doing the cleaning that I did down in the basement. I swept, I wiped down a lot of surfaces in the laundry area, and did a lot of laundry. I emptied the water in the wash tub and cleaned out the traps that the manufacturer recommends. This was not a fun thing to do, they make these things next to impossible to clean, but I did it and feel better for it.
If I was talking to a friend or one of my kids I would explain that even though it looks like people are getting away with things, and often times they are, they have to live with the consequences of those decisions. My goal is to move into a place that's close enough to downtown so I can walk to the grocery store and my daughter can walk to school. I'll still have to give or find rides for my oldest, but that's my goal. I can't take his bullshit anymore. I've lived in this place for long enough, screamed enough, cried enough, thought my heart was broken, felt as if my soul was shattered, I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired so that's my goal. I've searched for apartments before, I need to have money for a security deposit. That would deplete my savings if I moved out now.
This is a game, I'm competitive, and I'm going to do what I can for the health and safety of my kids before I kiss this place and it's headaches and heartaches goodbye. If I had the money and owned it I could make it a really cool place, but I can't spend my time and energy on a dwelling that someone else won't invest a dime in for the sake of his own children. More than anything that bothers me. The fact that he doesn't even care about his daughters enough to do some of these things just blows my mind, I don't know why this still has the power to shock me after so many years of evidence to the contrary, for years he didn't floss his teeth and told the girls that they didn't have to either. Unsurprisingly they fail to see the importance of good oral hygiene.
I'm so angry today. But I'm not going to let him win. I'm going to keep cleaning, keep reading, keep writing, keep going to therapy, just like my mom found ways to live with my dad, I'm going to find ways to cope and rise above him being a selfish and immature jerk. I can only do what I can do. I can't waste my life being furious with him and my mom, they aren't better off for being the way that they are and I'm not better off letting these emotionally stunted people upset me like this. I know I'll feel better when I'm done. I know I can find people who support me in real life as well as online. My neighbor said she would take a cabinet that's out in my garage as well as the playhouse that my children have outgrown. I have to focus on what I can do instead of the things that are out of my control. I can do it. I can do anything.