Relate-tionships

Yes, I know it has been a while. I am sorry. This full time work malarkey sure is getting in the way of my blogging vents. For the first time I ever, I hesitate to write about something. Strange as I should hesitate more often when I speak - less of the old foot in mouth moments - but normally when I blog I just throw it all out there - lock stock and dirty barrel. Thing is, I know lots of folk who read my blog - and what I am about to write - I imagined them all reading and it made me feel a bit... well vulnerable or naked or something. But then I thought - I am crummymummy, I wrote this to be true and honest about life, love and motherhood - so if I can't be honest here - what is the point? Those that know me who read this tend to be lovely supportive warm fuzzy types - so what have I to fear?

Monday evening - Husband and I had our first Relate session. Yes, I am a tired cliche - but am determined not be a divorce statistic - so I made that call. It was after one particularly vicious rowing weekend - and a Monday that just didn't improve (bit like the summer weather). We had the initial 'meet and greet suss you out' kinda chat weeks and weeks ago - but this is where the ball starts rolling. Weekly chats for us to vent and bitch and get it all out there onto the table and somehow work through that resentment and anger that has festered and grown and sometimes squeezes the joy out of our extremely limited time together. I'll just say here that out of respect for Husband, I won't go in to the ins and outs of the machinations and recriminations that we fired at one another - but I will say how it made me feel.

Husband had been nervous all day - he kept asking of I was just going to bitch at him for an hour - at the end of which he would pay £40 for the pleasure? He could hardly look at me in the car on the way there - his nerves curtailing any humour he might have about the whole awkward situation. We were taken to a room that had no windows but oddly had a sunny yellow curtain that covered an entire wall and an air conditioning unit that filled half the space but apparently was too loud to put on. This room became a furnace. We boiled our way through the chat regardless of rage. Our counsellor type woman was lovely. Cheery, ruddy, good humoured - not dissimilar to the Farmer's wife in Babe (thought not as curvey)- she immediately clocked Husband's reticence. Behind that wholesome kindness though, lay a smart cookie who knew when to pipe up and when to let us rant. She was horribly fair and completely neutral - and appeared to be immune to the creeping temperature. I didn't want the session to end. I got the sense that she felt she'd be seeing a fair bit of us for a while yet optimism shone from her every pore. I bet she is the kind of person that all her friends tell secrets to.

Softly softly she hooked us in and then before I even saw it - boom! She had opened up Husband to the point I couldn't get a word in edge ways. Was it weird? Well having been in a small room listening to peoples' woes as a Samaritan, it didn't seem odd. I forget that Husband is a man - and Auzzie one at that, and isn't so in tune with the spilling gene us women have. The hour flew by as we danced in the merry circles things have become. I almost felt sorry for our Zen Lady. She feels like a safe pair of hands. I wonder how long this will take? Will it work? I'm pretty sure that both Husband and I don't want to jack our relationship in, nor do we want to damage it in any irreparable way - so this is.... a way to work through the fog. To come out the other side stronger and surer and happier. We have hope. We have time. This marriage game is for life as we see it. Husband is changing his ridiculous work hours in the next two weeks - which is the biggest breakthrough yet. As cheery lady said at the moment we 'have no time.' Robbed of time how can any relationship be well watered and continue to grow?

I'm thinking of this Lady as our Baby Bio. I'll keep you posted on how well we flower. The roots are pretty strong though...