XNH's Next Round: HIS Moveaway ...? -- XFIL Has Died

[changedspirit]

hey new wings:

i've been reading for the past day and a half and I have to say that your burden - the weight on your shoulders is heavy and dense - like you are being pulled forward and back and up and down --- and my deep  mom primal instinct feels so deeply for your situation.

Let me tell you a bit about what I went through with my daughter about 11 plus years ago when she was 12-13ish, and my husband had just pre-bankrupted us,  because of his embezzelment and fraud inside his own former company -and we went from Cameolot to 'one step before being thrown out on the street...."  I could no longer be the fuzzy cookie girlscout leader soceer  mom -- I needed to roll up my sleeves and work my butt off so that we as a family unit could keep our house, get a college fund that was solid and pay off the enormous legal, administrative and financial /hole that my NH has put us in.  My daughter was livid that her status had changed.  She blamed me for not being a good enough mom anymore and for being so preoccupied with work and money.  It was devistating, but SOME ONE had to take charge and be the adult.  To this day, (she is now 24 and living in South Korea -yikes - teaching English as a second language), she knows deep in her primal soul that after all that is said and done, she can and does come to ME, call ME, vents, (she was scared like crazy two weeks ago during the NK  - SK war escallation ) I know at the end of the day, on a deep REAL level, she resonates with me for her sanity and safety.  It really hurts to see the chaos and drama and convolution that the NH (xNH) do  She calls him also, and he brags about her being there and being independent, blah, blah, blah, but after all at the end of the day, I know she knows what the real deal of unconditional love looks like ......hang in there, you are strong and solid and deep inside she gets it.  Hold your breath till it's time to exhale.....

With Warmest Regards - changedspirit

[NewWings4MeNow]

 

Changed,

Thank you so much.  I'm feeling you reaching toward me and it means a whole, whole lot.  Yes, I've been pulled every which way.

I feel so very fortunate that there are women on WoN who are willing to bare their spirits, their souls, their lives, to help.  Don't know where I'd be through this without you all.

Changed, one of the life lessons I encourage d to adopt is to "take the long view" and you're showing me just that.  D does know what I've had to deal with, live and suffer through.  She does know what it meant for me a year ago to be at my last week of money before we'd lose this apartment.  She knows that I've gone without health insurance to pay the rent and get my company going.  I've pinged her on occasion to make sure she's been comfortable to invite her friends here (where we're all on top of each other), and d's been compassionate enough to tell me (when she's not enraged) that what we have is "good enough", that our basic needs are being covered -- and now she's seen me have a quite successful month of business to dig the company out of debt and to capitalize on so we can live on its revenue come 2011.  

Because my biz is e-commerce it means my schedule is my own, but when I pick d up from school I go back to my computer until 10P and she goes to hers -- so we're together but not doing anything because I have to work.  It's the best I've got to give at this point, to at least be available.

To read your story again really hits me, since I'm sure you understand what it feels like to completely lose a lifestyle.  I can empathize with a mom who hears from a child in distress elsewhere on the globe as I traveled in college and after and my folks didn't know much.  I'm so glad for you that your d finds you to be her safe place.  This is what I've hoped always that d would find in me at the end of the day.  I've told d that if she called me from anywhere I'd drop everything to help her.

Thank you, thank you.  I'm hanging in there ... and curse my own menopausalness and periods of weakness when I'm sure I'll collapse from exhaustion or a heart attack or now-sagging wrinkles -- when what I/we really need is (as I said to d last night) ... a vacation.  Some time to have everything taken care of, to be able to relax, to have no worries hour by hour.  Sometimes it scares me to think that there's no break in this, no rest, and I wonder if I'll be able to now physically handle it.  Then I wait until the calm returns, I take the problems apart and ground on "Just for Today" and other inspirations.

I'm humbled when d and I have conflicts like we've had.  I feel shame that it still hurts so much that I let it show, but I'm doing the best I can with the intensity that d now brings as she continues to increasingly exert herself.  I've told her that I can and will grow and change as she does so.

So much to think about while I'm holding my breath.

You've lit a candle in my evening, and I'm so grateful to learn your story and how you found your strength to Make It Happen -- you seem to have persevered handling a much, much heavier load than I'm dealing with now.  What an inspiration.

NewWings4MeNow

[RB22]

NewWings,

When X would get nuts and make demands and well just do what he could to exercise control over my D's or some other aspect of my life... well... I would loose it faster.  It comes with control being taken from us.... and in some respects our control over our life is being challenged/thwarted/or worse dismissed.

When my X would contact me, I would get to feeling worthless... or less than... pretty quick.  And it would contaminate my dealings with my D's... especially the one who is most like me(personality and looks) but is the one child (out of 4)  that resembles him. She really resembles me.. but has his round face and even rounder eyes... even though her coloring is all me.   Anyway because of her similarity to her dad... she identifies with him.  And that identifying with him.. she also recognizes the bad ways she is like him... and needs to justify it ... to me. So she uses the same verbage that he did.  which only adds insult to injury.

Honey is right... once I stopped talking about him..when she realized it.. life got easier around my house. 

Hugs,

RB

[NewWings4MeNow]

RB,

Loss of control, contamination, d's personality resemblance to XNH (she also physically resembles him, but this doesn't bother me).  These are all very key.

I've not been as good as I should be (and have been) lately at not referencing XNH.  When we have weeks/months when he doesn't figure center stage in our plans, our lives are much, much smoother.  It's a matter of my personal discipline.

Thank you for your example and reminder.

Tonight I spoke with d and she really needed me to acknowledge certain things and talk about minor changes in our focus, which she supports.  I'm hopeful that we'll get there (until the next hormonal surge).

NewWings4MeNow

[RB22]

I had a reminder smack me in the head this week... LOL.

Senior night for girls soccer was this week... X told middle d (the one I talked about) he would NOT be attending...never gave her a reason why... but he announced it to her AFTER she told him that the coach told the girls only 2 people to walk them across the field.

In another senior night in years past... X had a huge hissy fit over the fact that his Ds' did not wish to have his wife escort them across the field.  So he refused to attend and walk with them and I across the field. If she couldn't escort, then he wouldn't.

And he didn't. Which tilted those rose colored glasses his Ds's wore just a bit more and gave them a true view of N reality.

So I have been having angst over the future senior night.... and so has she. She began preparing her speech to him about NOT wanting his wife to escort her, since the end of last year.  She has been gearing up for a fight.  And he took the wind from her fight by telling her he wouldn't be in town and never giving her a reason. 

Younger D was the one to tell me that he would be travelling for work.  I passed that on to senior D.  She seemed almost relieved.  I think he didn't tell her just so she could be drawn into his web just a bit deeper by her own emotions.  Yanno the ones where she thinks her dad isn't coming and is actually going to be away because he is mad at her.

This week, there is a lighter element to her game.  She is always an intense player... this week she has been having fun and the girls she is playing with are having a good time. (the only kiljoy is her coach... another N, but she deals with him by ignoring him)  It is good to see, it has been a long time since she has been this light. 

Senior night was tonight... she played awesomely... and at one point was laughing so hard she couldn't get up off the ground.  There were hugs all around.. and it was good. She even called me up to thank me for senior night.

It can change tomorrow... and it probably will... but for now, I'll bask in the glow of this evening.

and only one more senior night to go... in 2 years.  Did you feel a collective sigh of relief from the south east? 

I confess to NOT wanting to think about it... but thinking about it and it making my emotions unstable... maybe even uncontrollable.  Either way I know I wasn't my best when I was thinking about walking across the field with him and her on one side of my D and me on the other side... because X would never stand for my BF walking with us...he isn't even her step parent... like that has any reason to be there....

anyway... it happened, it went well, but not before I think she and I probably had KNOTS in our tummies thinking about it. 

Hugs,

RB

[RB22]

NewWings,

Tomorrow is another day, good thing we get a chance to start over again on another day.

We all need that reset button.  ( I LOVE that IDEA)  And I think it is something I need to teach my kids. 

Do something to mark this reset time... a long bubble bath... a workout, a hike.  Something that calms your emotions, and feeds your soul.   I find when I can create a moment in time that does those things to me..... well it resets my blood pressure, the butterflies in my stomach take off their combat boots, etc.  And when things get a little tense, I can think back to the reset time and breathe in the calming vibes.  It helps to not go too long without a calming endulgence.

When X was at his most demanding, I was hiking and gardening (not a weed on this homestead  ) and soaking in a hot bath with lavendar smelling epsom salts.  I was relaxed and the lavendar helped me to sleep. Some nights it was the only way I could manage more than a couple of hours. 

Everyone uses different coping mechanisms... I have to remind myself that my D does things very different than I do to cope.  She gets angry, intense, has to control things.... when she gets control, it doesn't ease her anger or make her less intense. sometimes those things are exaggerated even more because she is angry that she has control.  This scenario is especially volatile when she deals with her parents. Especially now... she is almost 18.   She is trying to be the adult, but still she wants her parents to stand up and be parents, but also to let go and let her become the adult she needs to become. 

I think raising teens thru these transitions is the hardest thing I have to do.... and there is no right or wrong way to handle this.... especially as the kids need to be our guide... and they are clueless to what adulthood is like. 

When she went off on X this past summer, 2 of my other D's were witness to it. One D even asked dad, "why do you let her talk to you like that? She needs help, are you going to take her to therapy?"  His answer was "your mother was supposed to do that, and D said if she went, she wouldn't talk, so taking her to therapy would be a waste of money."   So nothing was done, as a result she knows he has no boundaries, and since he didn't stand up for himself.  D has come to the conclusion he is worried about loosing her like he lost older D.  And the discussion about therapy was 5 years ago... at the beginning of a teen transition time, when she exploded and showed me her broken heart.  And she was taken to therapy, and her butt was parked in a chair... and lo and behold...she did talk to the therapist.  I think it was a good thing that I never told anyone about her going to therapy. 

But I did like the way X still managed to bring ME into his relationship with HIS D. So did the D who talked to him. She also told him that I do NOT allow any of the girls talk to me the way he was letting middle D talk to him.  She also reminded me the last time anyone of them talked to me that way (herself)  I slapped her face.  I also slapped middle D... but she wasn't around and I try very hard NOT to advertise those less than stellar moments of my kids growing up.  Positive discipline is still a cornerstone of my parenting.  I try anyway.

Teens push the limits again and again. Teens of divorced parents have more ammunition. Teens of N's know just how to use that ammunition to gain the maximum advantage for themselves.  My therapist also reminds me that these kids had to have that maximum advantage (otherwise called abuse) heaped on them a time or 2 in order to learn just how to use it. 

Stay strong NewWings....yesterday is a memory....today is a new day...... time to start over.

Hugs,

RB

[NewWings4MeNow]

RB,

I've read over and over what you've written and recognize the difficulties in having multiple daughters dealing with an N dad.  I've wondered how different things would have been had I had more than one child at our split, and if d had had a sibling to talk with and deal with her father together. 

Like your bath idea -- I try to take a hot tub pretty regularly at night.

I can see that d is in a transition right now, and my goal is to help her through it but also back off in areas where she must be the driver and live with the consequences of her actions, words and choices.

When we first split and XNH put d into therapy, his purpose was to have her express that I was an incompetent/inappropriate parent.  That didn't happen, but he kept her in it for years; when he told me she'd remain "without end" I knew it was punishment, a tool, a public forum for him to argue his case. 

I can see from your example, "... because she is angry that she has control," that d is at that precipice point where her control simultaneously gives her Voice and frightens her because of its ramifications for the future -- so she puts it off.  All I can do is ping her for her most current truth and preferences, to not make myself crazy by setting off on a particular path based on last week's/last month's wishes, only to find that I have old information and that she hadn't really, truly decided that yet (though her words to me at the time were absolute).  This moving target situation is utterly out of my comfort zone and distracts me from taking care of the business of the day, and I've told her so.

Like your d, my d told me about 1.5 years ago, crying, that if she changed custody her father would reject her, how bad he'd feel, how angry/upset he'd be -- it was all about him and his wants/needs, and she saw it as a debt she needed to repay him for all the years he'd invested in being with her. 

I'm glad your d benefited from the therapy when she did go at last; d definitely benefited this past summer when the therapist became her ally instead of XNH's proxy.

You describe a typical N reaction that just because a d uses Voice against him therefore she must have "problems" with everybody (including you) so therefore she must need treatment.  Not attributing the issues at all to himself -- this I've dealt with for years as XNH's utter lack of humility or compassion, or acknowledgment of any weaknesses or inabilities on his part.

D has shown me her broken heart this past year, but I've shown her that we survive it, we grow around it, the things we fear are absolutes and forevers aren't necessarily so, and she can pick and choose what kind of/the extent of an R she wants to have with her father, and with me, for her lifetime.

Are you saying in your last paragraph that our kids need to actively be burned by N parents multiple times so they know how to combat it or use that burning on others?  Or are you referencing your punishment of your girls?  Confused.

Wish I had more happiness in my memories and future.  It's hard when all you've got is your inner joy -- mine's a bit too weighted down and overwhelmed right now and its strength sustaining me has waned a bit these past couple of months.  Midlife.  Mortality.  The big issues.  I'm back looking for the pony in there somewhere.

NewWings4MeNow

[Julia]

RB, thank you so much for your stories. They both worry and reassure me  as I head toward having three teen girls myself (9, 11, and 13 now).

Wings, I think RB means that when the teens of Ns rebel against authority, as all teens do, some of the time they do it abusively because they have been abused. Abusive techniques are normalized for these teens (silent treatment, punching walls, yelling rages, extremely hurtful comments, manipulations) because they have received these same abuses from the N parent, or seen the N treat their mom or the OW with that way.

It is what it is.

My girls will all reach their teens right as I hit menopause, so that is another fear, how much patience can one person have, even if they love their kids more than life itself? We do not help them by being doormats to their rages, exaggerations, and accusations, and yet we do not want to answer abuse with more abuse. Reaching out lovingly just doesn't work with a self-righteous 13 yr old who has worked herself up into a fit full of denial, entitlement and bitterness.

Julia

[RB22]

NewWings,

Julia was right in my interpretation.  Teens of N's have seen by example just how much the N gains when they dish out abuse.  They also know how it feels.... they don't like it. But they repress that memory, as we all do if our mind let's us.  I have had to remind a D a time or 20 about a memory where things did not go to her liking and the retribution that was dished out, and ESPECIALLY her own feelings when it happened to her. 

I think the site WWW.Angriesout.com  was helpful when they were young teens... look thru the bullying section.  I could usually find a situation similar to what was happening in my household.  when they were shown it... most cried.. one or 2 tried to justify.  Only to come back to me at a later time and apologize.

Julia, I have been where you are... give everyone patience.. especially you.  I learned deep breathing about 50 times seemed to help... say INHALE EXHALE when you do...if that didn't work.. I spelled them SLOWLY.

No easy task raising teens... but when the start to seek you out cause they haven't heard from you in a while.... well, it feels good.  It took a lot of time to get here... but worth it.

Hugs,

RB

[NewWings4MeNow]

Julia,

I feel you and I get what you're saying.  The parts of d that worry me the most are the mean manner of her conversation, her lack of basic manners, her lack of daily interest in working/participating as a team member in our household.  In these things it is as I anticipated some years ago:  I've been her only example of "my" upbringing as she's had virtually zero exposure to my relatives at all, and yet has dealt with XNH, NW, XILs, XNSIL and her family -- so the circumstance was stacked against me having enough of an impact on d a very long time ago.  Thus I won't be surprised at however she turns out.  

D and I have had our moments when we've each retreated to our rooms.  I've made it a point to keep the door open, to resolve things, and have also stayed away when it was entirely appropriate for d to come to me first.  D knows the details of how XNH has treated me and she's been subjected to his "monthly rages" for years, targeted at her or not.  In any case, she's basically experienced a man who's got quite a mysogynistic streak accompanying his entitlement, now bolstered further by being the oldest male of his family line surrounded by all women except for XBIL.  

I do not want to answer d's abuse with more abuse.  I'd rather withdraw, but not for good.  D has reason to be bitter, though the life situation she's lived in is one that she herself requested.  

As your girls enter that stage and you're menopausal (night sweats are rotten), please count on me to provide you with the support you've given me all this time.  

RB, because d isn't consistent in what she tells me is the real situation at XNH's, and for a while I'll hear that "everything's fine", "things are quiet", then she'll tell me that XNH has raged monthly for "years" and it'll be the first I've heard of it, I'm convinced that she's bottled up, pressed down and taken inward a whole, huge heckuva lot about how she feels about both of us.  Inconsistency?  She's volunteered to me that she's lied to me about things in the past and ongoing.  This week I e-mailed her that I've always told her the truth (because I have).  She e-mailed back that she has also.  And I thought about it and thought, "This is a prime example of her inconsistent communication."  And for the life of me I don't have a solution for it -- d will just have to live with the ramifications of her own style.

BTW, today at Starbucks I happened to bump into a woman (60s?) I knew some years ago when I was doing RE renovation and she'd been my escrow person.  We sat and chatted.  She went through a D with a "pathologically narcissistic" XH and described so much of what I experienced with XNH and what we discuss here.  She said that at one point they'd saved $2M and, some years later, she said that there was only $90K left and she had no idea where it had gone and her XNH lied to her.  She said that until the last year of their marriage she though they had a good and healthy R, then he became repeatedly violent, she wondered where it all came from, he called her the crazy one and he would disappear.  Of course she discovered OW and that there had been many.  He ruined their business, she was left with nothing, courts didn't care and she now does bookkeeping for seniors at minimum rate and is a personal assistant, lives w/o insurance and shares a condo she can't pay for scraping up $100 at a time, with a 10-year SO gentleman whom, she told me, she can introduce to anybody because she knows he'll be OK to talk with people and she won't have to warn people to "watch out."  It was so good to be able to speak, today, with someone else who's been through it and who understands -- and who happens to live in my neighborhood, of all things.  She also has three daughters, younger than I am.  (And she may have family who'd be interested in helping grow my business.)

NewWings4MeNow

[Sweatheart]

NewWings,

I read your development about your d's rebellion and I am so sorry!

You asked these two questions: "Don't know what it is about me that I've happened to find myself in close quarters with people who absolutely detest me.  What does it take to be able to live in one's own home with people who actually LIKE you?"~NW

I felt as if I was the one who asked them because I do ask myself the same questions over and over again now and then. And I want to share with you what I think here. We attract complimentary people. I always was wondering - why when I am all strong and invincible my husband relates to me as if I am some sort of Golden Woman? However on my weak days, when I would use some support - he treats me absolutely differently - MUCH worse. He says vulgar and sometimes even nasty things to me, his tone changes. This is the least I need on my weak days. And I was wondering why? And I figured that when I am invincible, I attract positive energies and he (also Gemini) communicates with me from the point of high respect and even admiration. When I am weak then I attract his negative side. As simple as that.

Daughter needs in you an example, a figure of strength, a figure of authority. When you stay tall, she most likely would not rebel. When you feel victimized by situation, she treats you as a victim. This is how I see it. And the only way to stop it is to show her that N does not have a strength to affect your perceptions. Naturally you do worry about your d's perceptions of N, but may be you should let it go and do have a faith that one way or another your d will live her life. My mother always was explaining to me how bad my father is, I used to agree with her (my father is nuts), but now I am not grateful for that. I am not sure why this woman spent so much of her time and energy trying to convince me that my dad is a bad person. I could see for myself where he was inappropriate. Why it was so important for her that I would perceive him through HER EYES? Everyone is entitled to have their own experience....And I agree - I did not need a friend in my mother. I needed a mother in her.

I am not talking from the point of great wisdom, I am not even sure that what I am sharing with you will survive a journey I am taking, but for now this is how I see it...

My heart is aching for you, it totally sucks when the whole world seems to be against you. The only sensible advice I can give her - stop reaching out at this point and find your balance on your own. This will set everything back in place. And your d is just scared for you, she feels for you and needs you and may be when she was talking about FAITH, she was really talking about HER faith in you, that was in danger. Hence, the lashing out.

Hugs,
SH

[RB22]

I've wondered how different things would have been had I had more than one child at our split, and if d had had a sibling to talk with and deal with her father together.

NewWings, I doubt your experience would be much different.  Only divided among your children. Not heaped on one child. 

The interesting thing in dealing with my kids dealing with Ndad..... NO one has the same perception.  If he rages in front of all 4 of them... The only thing they agree on was his rage.  What caused the rage is varied.  As well as their reactions, 1 D is so embarrassed by him, she comes to me earlier than the planned time.  1D thinks it is the other persons fault and dad was right to get 'upset'.  Another D pretends she doesn't know what is going on. Last D will tell you, "he's a Narc, what did you expect him to do? Give out praise?"  They are all over the board..

I find that fascinating, and in some ways scary. 

Hugs,

RB

[NewWings4MeNow]

Sweat,

Very interesting and insightful comments, and I appreciate you sharing your own experiences with me. 

Personally I have no problem with showing weakness or being on the receiving end of bad or N treatment.  It's how I handle that treatment in front of d that matters to me most.  My education of her re: XNH is to not have her current fog permanently cloud the facts of my *and our* experiences with him these past years up to current time.  Certainly she needs to see and experience the good in him, but more importantly (as an woman in the park this AM told me about N abuse she suffered from her father), d needs to keep to facts, reality and Voice and recognize that XNH's behaviors toward her can and do change on a dime without her still recognizing his real motives. 

In a healthy R when someone is in a weaker place they attract compassion, care and commitment, as they do what they can to also help themselves.  I don't feel that when a person is operating from a weaker place that it is somehow their fault that they attract negative treatment that they somehow deserve <-- this, I believe, is PD-style treatment.  If anything, PDs are a reason, for me, why packaging like "The Secret" is generalizations because someone could exude positive energy and still come upon/deal with a PD'd person -- that's why the book When Bad Things Happen to Good People was written.  "Energy" can only take us so far ....  And if what we know to be positive energy within the culture in which we were before is then taken as negative energy in a culture into which we move, dissonance happens.  E.g. I as a New Yorker never had people comment before about me being direct or blunt, but where I live now it's seen as a negative.  E.g. I as me before my marriage to XNH was never

Surely d needs to see me strong, thoughtful, consistent and faithful.  I have not/do not ask her to hate or revile XNH as I have; my efforts have focused on teaching her human behavior traits to look out for and to remain observant and with her eyes and ears open.  I'm concerned about whether d is willing/has the strength to follow through on her longer-term assertions when her shorter-term behaviors don't match and when I know XNH is using those behaviors, reeled in by him, to support his future claim to fight a custody change.  Unfortunately that does take a level of maturity in d which she might have to learn the hard way is required for her to not get pummeled in 2011 by XNH's opposition ... when he declares that she still isn't old/mature enough to know her own mind because she's been so inconsistent -- with him too. 

RB, if you have 300 people in a room you'll get 350 opinions, right?  I can see where all your girls would interpret differently as we're each so individual, which likely just multiplies the complication and makes creating a unified front vastly harder.  We have at least 12 personality types as sun signs, archetypes, personas, even abuser profiles.  And within each one an array of tendencies.  The permutations may be endless. 

What I've found fascinating through my years of D/post-D XNH dealings is the population's perception, based on where they sit/their own life's experiences, of what constitutes "abuse", how anger looks v. rage, even what "violence" and "manipulation" mean.  Ultimately we have to find folks whose minds and perceptions align with our own and hope for the best in those strength of numbers.  Having four daughters in your case, just two agreeing constitutes a "majority".  I would think that quiet times are the most peaceful so you can re-clarify what's in your own head(!)

NewWings4MeNow

[NewWings4MeNow]

D called tonight to let me know that XNH spent his birthday today in the emergency room with a sprained ankle from squash, in pain and miserable from that and his father's death.  A relatively non-birthday.

I recall his "Every time you do sports you get injured" marital complaint ....  (Was it last year that he had to have pins put in a finger from severe injury?)

Now XNH is aging, cosmic payback's a b*tch, and I sit back and don't have to actually do anything.

Where are my empathy and compassion?  Having a cuppa cocoa.

NewWings4MeNow

[RB22]

Where are my empathy and compassion?

I think they are exactly where they belong..... with the people who would feel it. 

I can have empathy and compassion for X, I just don't extend them TO him, well anymore.

Hugs, NewWings.... how is your D taking his non-birthday antics... or maybe he is too doped up on painkillers to celebrate his birthday?

RB

[NewWings4MeNow]

Hiya RB, and thanks,

I should have included a "LOL" after my post above.

D was very low key and noticeably hesitant about it when I spoke with her.  And get this:  Her only birthday gift to XNH was a framed copy of a magazine article about him and his company, with his photo in it.  NNNNnnnnnn????????  (Read:  'Here dad, here's how good the world thinks you are.')  I still don't really think she understands the meanings of these kinds of actions and messages.

The "celebration" was reading Harry Potter by the fire.  "Escapism-R-Us" (not that I don't like HP, but it hasn't changed my world and XNH is totally into escaping reality).

Actually, it was only 9P and d said she was beyond exhausted and was going right to bed.  VERY unusual for her ....  I'm sure that was her way of coping with XNH's multiple setbacks.

Compassion for her, zippo for him.  (Truly, I imagined myself seeing XNH hobbling across a parking lot on crutches, and the only reaction I could think of was to ... laugh at him uproariously, publicly, pointing, and keep walking.  Lower than I should?  Yeah, but it's my turn.)

NewWings4MeNow