This is my journal, and as such requires a more gentle response than on the general boards.
Link to my old journal: http://lightwave.proboards48.com/index.cgi?board=journal&action=display&thread=1188920113
If you're interested in where DH & I have come from, our history is shared there.
December 23, 2007
Well, the holidays are upon us. DH worked this weekend, and only has Christmas Eve off, then works Christmas Day and Wednesday. Needless to say, with Daddy working or sleeping and no preschool the next two weeks, Babymazing & I are at each other's throats. He did fall asleep with his head on my lap while I knitted downstairs, so I've had a little "me" time for the last hour and a half or so, in which I accomplished very little except remaking my old ticker and finding myself an appropriately "beachy" avatar.
The last few weeks, I've been scarce on the board. This is actually because the board helped create a financial crisis in my little life (I know, one must accept responsibility for one's own actions).
At the end of August, my husband had tried my last Amazing Grace-filled nerve. We'd been on this "recovery" journey since April, which still consisted of numerous lapses into p & mb for him. Not the nightly affair it had been, but still too much for me (since I'd told him to choose between p or me). I found No-Porn.com and downloaded the Ten Keys book (read the whole thing in one afternoon). From then until recently, spending time on N-P pretty much daily had become a habit for me.
Unfortunately, I was spending time on the board when I should have been knitting & sewing to further my home business, which funds my son's pre-school tuition and my own occasional purchases: taking the family out to eat, my gym membership, website hosting fees, etc. I didn't bring in any money in the months of October or November, so I started to become indebted to our Home Equity Line of Credit. I've never not paid off a credit card, so this was definitely not something either DH or I usually do. At 8% interest it may not be exactly the same as a credit card, but each month with Pre-school tuition and then my credit card, I was drawing more and from the HELOC.
I finally had to decide for myself that during the hours I'm paying to have my son at pre-school, I will not spend time on N-P. I also had found myself somewhat "voyeuristically" reading almost every new "Hi, this is my story" post on the general and recovering addicts boards, and I was taking away some of the frustration I felt at seeing more new names, more hurt women, and turning that irritation towards my own DH, who has only had one slip since August 28.
The happy end of the story is that I finally got my behind in gear, posted things on my website & eBay, and have set aside tuition for next month, payment for my coming Visa bill, and have paid down the HELOC loan from almost $2000 to $235.
The money thing has created some strain between DH & myself. I thought he knew what was going on (I had told him some half-truths along the way), but the secrecy and my use of the HELOC as my personal piggy bank was really disturbing to him. I finally realized yesterday that he needed complete honesty from me, so I went though my financial records and typed up a two page explanation of how I'd gotten here and what I'd done to fix it and prevent it from happening again. He, in turn, apologized for accusing me of "embezzling" money from our family and "stealing" from us. (That was a lovely discussion!)
My in-laws are coming into town for the weekend after Christmas, and much of this week will be spent clearing out the guest room which serves as my work room most of the time. Since we haven't had any guests since the beginning of August, that's going to be a chore!
Well, it's obvious I haven't had a chance to "talk" much recently. I'm looking forward to having the old board close, just so that everyone moves over and I'm not so confused about where I need to be posting!
