Upsetting News

I thought I was doing pretty good with the grieving process. In fact, when I looked at the different stages, it appeared that I had been through them all - which seemed quick to me. What I think I have learned since then, is that sometimes you are going to swing back into some of those stages depending on the moments of the day.

Our first part of Christmas where we spent it with my family was really good. I found all the visiting distracting and other than a few moments of shared sadness with others, I didn't dwell on what had happened too much. Our second "phrase" of Christmas had three sections divided by our travelling. The first section was an overnight stay at my Aunt's where my Grandma also lives and my cousin's son was visiting too and he's the same age as Dexter. Plus my brother and his son were there, so it was another fun and distracting night. The next day, December 23, we headed out to Cypress Hills, SK where we were spending four days over Christmas with Tyler's family. We had rented cabin's and there was 28 of us including all the kids. Due to finances, Tyler and I were sharing a two bedroom cabin with Tyler's brother Tyrone, Tyrone's girlfriend of 10 months Bobbie, and (depending when he got them), Tyrone's two daughers who are 5 & 2.5 years old. 

I'm just going to interject here, that some have called me "strong" and "brave" for writing about my experience with Wentworth. I personally haven't felt like either of those two things. All I know is that I am a sharer & talker by nature so blogging and getting feedback has helped me come to some peace with everything. Plus, there isn't really any consequences for sharing this experience. HOWEVER, the second half of this blog entry is what I would consider brave, because I am going to be 100% honest about how I felt when we got some news. There could be some reprecussions for this as I'm sure my brother-in-law Tyrone and his girlfriend won't like what I have to say. It's also possible that my mother-in-law may be hurt by what I have to say. BUT I have decided that I need to make this entry for my own therapy, so the readers of it have to choose to continue reading at their own risk. I will do my best to only write the truth, but keep in mind that this is my perspective so what I consider truth may not be someone else's.

So, when Tyrone arrived at the cabins with his GF, he came over to my mother-in-law's cabin where a bunch of us were hanging out: Mary (mother-in-law/MIL), Sherry (sister to Mary), Jen (daughter of Sherry), Justin (finance of Jen), Jonathan (son of Jen & Justin), Tyler (my hubby), Dexter (my son) and me of course. When Bobbie (the GF) came in, she handed Mary a gift and said "it's not wrapped in Christmas paper because it's not a Christmas gift." Mary has a few different interests, so my first assumption was that they had found something for one of these interests and decided to gift it to her early. Tyrone took out his camera and started filming Mary opening the gift. It was an elephant holding a baby elephant (Mary collects elephants), which to me symbolized that they were announcing that Bobbie was pregnant. Tyrone did this same "big announcement" before with his first baby mama 6 years ago using Christmas gifts so I figured that was his signature. Mary didn't catch on right away and most of us in the cabin figured out what was happening before she did. Once she figured it out, they handed her an ultrasound picture and said she was eight weeks. I was super upset as soon as it was confirmed, but I held back my emotions until I could get away from the group. Tyrone and Bobbie appeared completely oblivious to the fact that I may be upset by their news and even Tyler didn't seem to think it would upset me (which is weird I think). Unfortunately for me, I was sharing a cabin with the two of them and they went there to fix some drinks, so I ended up crying by myself on the trail outside waiting for them to leave (I didn't want them to see how upset I was or anyone else in Tyler's family).

My reasons for being upset were/are kind of multi-layered. For one, I'm obviously upset because I had just lost Wentworth 12 days before. I was/am still healing from giving birth and all I had to show for it was a box of ashes in our room and an urn. Secondly, I was hurt that they were oblivous to the idea that I might be upset, and she was only 8 weeks so they could easily have waited four more weeks to make their announcement, and it just seemed really self-involved of them.

Thirdly, they have only been dating a short time, and in my opinion they have no business getting pregnant (on purpose) already. I'm not religious or old fashioned so it's not that I think they need to be married, but I do think they lack a strong foundation or committment to each other and it seems very impulsive and selfish to get pregnant right now. Tyrone also has two children already with another woman (who he was also not married to and had been dating for an even shorter time, clearly he has a pattern) and he hasn't been living up to his Daddy Duties with them. He has never paid any official child support for them (him and baby mama have been split since oldest daughter was 1 year old, they purposely get pregnant with second daughter when they were not dating) and his emotional involvement with them is sparse & sporadic in my opinion. When him & first baby mama were together, I often heard complaints about his lack of parenting effort too. As a woman, I don't understand why Bobbie would think that Tyrone is going to do any differently or better with her child. On the few occassions that I have been with Bobbie and Tyrone I have heard him be downright rude and insulting to her. Tyrone has also been chronically unemployed for most of the last five years, though he has had a job in a casino for the last 10 months. Also, the last time I had seen Bobbie she told me she just finalized her divorce so I don't understand the rush of getting pregnant. I completely lost any respect for her I might have been building when she made this dumbass move.

On top of that, Tyrone & I don't have the best history together. I am very judgemental of his lack of ambition, bag of excuses (aka victim mentality) and consistent mooching off of other people. He is very opinionated (of course he is "right" about everything) and can be downright difficult to get along with. We have had some out and out explosive arguements together. The only reason we don't anymore, is because I have practised not caring what he says, thinks and does and therefore try not to instigate any discussions with him. In my defense, although it may appear that I am very one minded about Tyrone, I could list dozens of names of people who know him who think the same as I do. The only person I know who has given him a pass on everything is his mother. I am not trying to be self-righteous, but at least with the majority of other people I know who have made mistakes, their's aren't intentional decisions.

So...if someone else had announced their pregnancy news, I might have had a different reaction. But as it was, it was them and I can't help but feel that it is total universe bullshit that we lost our baby and these two fuckups (pardon my french) will likely have a baby before I will. Shortly after it was apparent that I was upset (cuz I stayed in my room for the rest of the night rather than let anyone witness my tears), Tyrone tried to tell Tyler and his mom that "they weren't sure if they should have made the announcement." Their excuse for why they went ahead anyway was that they didn't want Mary to be mad that she missed the opportunity to tell all her family in person at Christmas. And that they had a last minute ultrasound so they felt comfortable telling. In my opinion, this "remorse" is too little and too late.

Piece of advice: if you're questioning if you should do something, it's probably reason enough not to do it.