My Username, peaceatlast, no longer feels right for me. I am not at peace at all and it is badly affecting my health, to the point where I think I need to get away from everything in an effort to stop thinking.
Thinking is my biggest problem, constantly having conversations in my head, day and night despite trying to think of other things.
I'll try to summarise. My daughter and her husband recently split up and I found that so hard, mostly on behalf of their 3 little boys (2-9). They had their reasons, I know, but I don't think I was really given both sides of the story now. He has moved out, locally, with the intention of having the children to stay regularly. It appears to be amicable at the moment but who knows? She already has a new boyfriend. Fair enough, she lived with his drink issues for as long as she could stand and I don't grudge her that at all. The problem is that the children have been spending many nights with various (very willing relatives) over the summer in order that they can work, make money to support two homes. That would be fine except that, as well as having the children stay elsewhere for work reasons, this also includes weekends away for social reasons. They are both very popular, attractive people and both love a good social life. In my opinion, the oldest and middle boy are already showing signs of stress, saying that they just want to be in their own home. My daughter gets very defensive if I try to talk to her. I like to think that I'm not confrontational but we both end up in tears as she takes the discussions badly so I try to make her feel better by saying she's a really good mum but that's not how I feel inside. She used to complain that her husband put his drinking and football above his family (he did) but now I feel that she's putting her friends above the children, spending too much time away from them without much nurturing going on. I see a lot of them but now don't want to have them to stay overnight as I feel they should be in their own home instead of being ferried about to enable their social lives. They must have wakened up in at least 7 different places during the school holidays and this seems set to continue while she gets out and about with "the girls" and possibly her new man. I feel for everyone, my grandsons have always been highly strung and sensitive but now it's getting worse and I think there will be trouble ahead. I really don't want to fall out with her, but I can't understand why she finds it ok to leave her children so often.
I'm lying awake, stressing for the situation and feel physically ill and heading that way mentally. I'm even considering moving far away so I don't have to watch this car crash of a situation but I know the boys would miss me too much and add to their stress.
I really don't know how to handle this any more.
