The Day The Boys Were Told....

Had to force a family meeting about an hour ago to tell the boys officially what is going on. They are taking it HARD, especially Salamander. But after XTB decided to make the boys active participants/co-conspirators in his *grand scheme of double life fibbery", I had to decide that *enough is enough*. XTB's move out is starting next week.

Things happen when they are supposed to happen.. there is obviously no good time for any of this, and I was very MAD earlier today for having the *how and when* pulled away from me.. but I am OK with it now.. it's done, so now we can move from here.

Potatey is AMAZING. Yes, he's upset, and he will be upset for a while to come and he'll have his angry, why, *I want this to be fixed* moments, but he's already processing, asking all the appropriate questions, thinking HARD already on how to make the best of the situation as is....
Salamander however is taking it very very hard. He's blaming himself, he even asked me today 'Mom, is this because of me?". How do I answer that? As yes, he, or more precisely, how each of his parents have dealt and deal with what is going on with him is a big part of it..

I assured Salamander as best as I could, that no this is NOT because of him, that this is because of me and because of his dad and that while we cannot fix the issues in the husband/wife relationship, we will now work HARD on making sure the parent relationship becomes what it needs to be, for Salamander and for Potatey (and I said a lot more to him than what I can capture here right now).. Salamander is not convinced.. he's a smart kiddo (and this is where counseling will be so incredibly important for him).

The boys and I have a long and bumpy road ahead of us. But I for one, am glad that we are finally getting going..
###

Potatey is so so so so sad tonite (I knew the reality of it all would hit him at some point). My heart is breaking for him.... but I can't fix this or make this better... we'll just have to get thru it to the other side..
###

Boys have been sleeping OK so far. I DID have the "these will be the boundaries that will not be crossed, which are KEY as you're basically living in my backyard' talk with XTB. He seemed to accept my ground rules, but I've learned the hard way that acceptance/agreement in verbal conversation and actually respecting/complying in deed are two entirely different things.

I'll have to continue to stand my ground and not ever get 'lulled asleep' (aka get manipulated by the 'I'm a good guy who wants the best for you all' act) again. As they say "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice (and needless to say we are waaaaay beyond twice here), shame on me."