Kat, don't read this.

God, I'm having a shitty day. At first I thought it was some sort of mom karma for my last post. I woke up ready to cry and it was one of those mornings where Gremlin was crying that she was hungry and then threw everything I gave her on the floor. Then I had an unexpected nervous breakdown while I was stirring Gremlin's second bowl of oatmeal. She had never really seen me cry before so she laughed nervously from her high-chair. I couldn't help myself and I said something like "No, honey, mommy's not feeling very good". Then her little bottom lip puckered out and she started crying. I must have scared her. I felt like such a horrible mom letting my emotions affect her in that way. So I picked her up and she wrapped her arms around my neck and we both cried for a minute. I hope I didn't traumatize her...

Then as the morning went on I decided we needed to get out of the house. So we go to Starbucks and Gremlin throws a little shit-fit because she was SO offended by a piece of banana that I tried to feed her. I got embarrassed that my child was screaming in public, which she RARELY does, and whisked her away and took her right back home. It was definitely a mistake for either of us to make a public appearance today.

At home, I went into Gremlin's room to put something away and when I came back out she was standing in front of a book case gnawing desperately on a book shelf. Then I realized, duh! She's teething... and she's been constipated. And she can sense that some thing's not right with mommy. Then when I put her down for a nap I decided it might be good for me to get a good cry out by myself so that it didn't sneak up on me in front of Gremlin again. That's when I realized why I'm so upset.

Monday I'm planning on driving down to the cemetery to meet family at my dad's grave. Every night for the past few weeks he's been on my mind right before I go to sleep. And I tell my self 'don't think about it' because it's still to hard for me to face. But I keep picturing him. I keep remembering things that were said. And as much as I've pushed all those thoughts away, I just can't avoid it. I miss him so much. More than I thought I would. Today it all just happened to culminate and I've had to realize that this avoidance tactic will only work for so long. But it also doesn't seem to do any good to face it. Both options suck.

And my brother, you may know him as 'Baby Marine', has had it way worse than me. He's stationed near the cemetery where our dad is buried. Whenever there is a funeral that requires a Marine present he gets put on that detail. AND this weekend he was told he has to be on the Color Guard and go around the cemetery with a bunch of boy scouts while they place American flags at the grave sites. The other day he attended a funeral where a father had died in his 80's. He stood there stoically listening to the family cry about how unfair it was. And I'm sure it was. But it made the unfairness of our father dying at 53 stand out a whole lot more. What a shitty detail...

On top of all this I've been having a recurring dream that I talk with husband somehow. Either he comes home earlier than expected or he is able to talk to me on the phone. Every time he tells me that he's failing and he's not going to get selected. This is just my unspoken fear coming out in my subconscious, I'm sure he's doing great out there. It always makes it more difficult when he's in a school that allows him NO contact whatsoever. And part of me doesn't want him to get selected for SF. I miss him. I want him to lose interest in the Army so that we can get out next year and actually be together as a family. That's not going to happen though. Still, I fantasize that he comes home, with a box of warm, fresh, chocolate donuts. Then he takes Gremlin to a park while I nap at home and have some much needed time to myself. And then we get a call from his commander that the deployment in July is cancelled and everyone's taking a month of leave.

Psh.

But! In reality, Gremlin's a mess, I'm a mess, and Husband won't be home to give us a break from each other because he's somewhere in North Carolina working his ass off in humid, 80+ degree weather.

1 week to go.