When Disappointment Happens

I posted this on the blog my bestie and I have about our relationships, or lack there of, but I felt the need to share it here as well. This morning I experienced something that I never fully understood, and until you're a single parent who is dating, I don't know that you can ever fully understand it. I've had some pretty not so great dating experiences in my past, and this relationship seemed as if it was almost my reward for having put up with so much crap. I know that there are always ups and downs, and this is in no way a full reflection of our relationship, but it's what I'm feeling right now, so I felt I would share it here on my "mommy issues" blog as well:

Well, I hate to say that I called it. I began to believe that I had pegged this one wrong.  I was so convinced that I had it wrong, that I blacked out in Michael's and asked E if he wanted to meet the kid. Yea, you read that correctly, I asked E to meet my kid. The meeting was scheduled for Sunday. I've been nervous about this, because this is huge. All of you who read this know that I don't let kiddo meet just anyone. It's not something that I take lightly. E seemed excited. I kept asking if he was sure because I wanted him to tell me sooner rather than later if this was something that he wasn't down for. Let me tell you, asking someone to meet your kid is a whole new level of exposing yourself that I got but didn't fully get until this morning.

All week E has been telling me how excited he is about coming this weekend, how excited he is about meeting kiddo, etc. Even as late as yesterday, things were still on. This morning he sends me a text telling me that he can't come because he doesn't have the money to make the trip. A few things went through my head as I dropped to floor and started crying. Granted, I had been trying to prepare myself for this. Even when this started, I was under the impression that when E was done with school, he would be done with me too. I didn't want to believe it, but I kept it in the back of my mind and tried to prepare myself for that to happen. (It's probably just a major coincidence that he finished this week, right? RIGHT?) The next thought was that it's one thing for someone to reject me (it's happened plenty of times before, so I'm not shocked when it happens), but it's another thing to feel the rejection when you're a single parent and you've offered for someone to meet your kid. The rejection cuts deeper and it's not something that can be easily fixed. There was an extreme amount of trust thrown out there that I felt got thrown back in my face with a bullshit excuse this morning.

Here's why I find the excuse to be a bullshit one. If it was a money issue, it would not have just arisen this morning. This would have been an issue all week, and should have been addressed earlier in the week. I'm less likely to buy that it's an issue with money when you tell me the morning of that you can't come. I also find it hard to believe it when a few hours into talking about it you still offer to come. If you didn't have the money to come earlier in the conversation, you don't have the money now, so why make the offer? That's just pouring salt in the wound.

Do I believe that it really is a money issue? Honestly, I don't know what I believe right now. All I know is that I'm extremely hurt. I wasn't prepared for this to happen this morning, and I should have been. I've always kept myself prepared, kept a few walls up to make sure things like this morning wouldn't hurt me when they happened. I guess that's the point many of you have tried to make to me over the years is that if I'm not willing to put both feet in, then I'll never experience the REO Speedwagon moment that I try to pretend I don't want. You may be right.

Before the texts starting flooding in, am I upset that E isn't coming this weekend? Of course, I'm upset. I thought things were going well and that this would be a good thing. I was looking forward to it, and it's not going to happen. It's no different than being told it's pizza day only to be handed a pb/j sandwich. (Ok, so maybe that scenario is worse...) The thing that I'm most upset about it is that this could have been prevented if E had just told me earlier that it wasn't going to happen. I'm more upset that I trust him enough to meet my kid, but he doesn't trust me enough to tell me he can't do this. I'm upset that a possible real reason is looking more like an excuse because of poor timing. The thing that upsets me most is that he let me get my hopes up when he knew he was just going to back out later. I think that's the part that hurts the most.