I don’t want to let my previous post stand without adding a clarification. In all fairness, I have not told Dex that I am so near the edge. I am certain he hasn’t read about it here. [He doesn’t read my blog although he is welcome to. He just doesn’t.] I know I need to tell him. But see, that’s what I am hung up on. I keep thinking maybe the stress will ease a bit, maybe it’s not THAT bad. We’ve made it this far, surely we can make it a bit farther.

Then I imagine spending yet another winter here. I close my eyes and picture February school break. All the kids home, the wind howling, the snow blowing, the icicles hanging from the porch, the layers we’ve donned just to hudle in the living room….

In part, I feel like by telling him things need to change this fall, I will be letting him down. And in part, I am fighting against my own resistence to drawing a line. This is not easy and I imagine he’s going to be angry and disappointed and - worst of all - will do all he can to prove to me that we can keep doing this for as long as we need to (that being a promise of change, the same promise that has been hanging over our heads and that has kept me going to this point).

But I have to tell him. I owe it to myself, to our kids, to him. I owe him the opportunity to respond, as opposed to me acting in response to what I imagine he will think and say.