This realization makes it my last post.

  It's only been recent, that I've been able to look beyond and see the real you.

  There's nothing I can do about it, nor do I really give a shit anymore.  So why am I typing still?  Because the regret builds and this is a constructive way to let it out.  Express how I feel and what I think.  A few times, I thought I had come to this before...  usually when you would do something inconceivable.  Something, I never would have imagined would come out of you.  Despite how many times you had assured me, regardless of our relationship... I was the kids dad.  You'd never take that away.  It didn't take long for all of that to change.  Obviously justified, as you made up excuse after excuse to being an influential part of our childrens' lives.  Even the most fair thing, you took.  My time with them.

  It's never been out of your mind that I don't love my kids.  Sure, maybe now you claim that this was part of me, all along...  but you were relentless and it never ended.  It was only a matter of time, before I gave up.  I'm not indestructible.  It only managed to make me cry more, each night that you would pull another stunt to take me out of their lives.  I was a great dad and while you may not admit it, you know it's true.  I miss it more than you could ever imagine.  But, I don't want anything to do with you anymore.  It makes me sick to think about you.  It makes me sick to even think that I loved you so much, I couldn't bare to watch you leave... and I lost myself in the process of grief.  I said it before...  it's like you died.  And if we were together and god forbid something ever happened to you, this is how I would be.  It was something I ever dreaded thinking about.  I was scared to imagine, not having you in my life.  And just like most fears in peoples lives... there's a time that there's a proverbial snake in the room and you're frozen with fear.

  Unlike a fear of heights, creepy animals or even something completely unexplainable like riding a bus alone or elevator...  being abandoned and having the ones you love the most, taken away from you is far worse than I would ever wish on someone else.  It literally wears down your soul and is a reason, I haven't yet been in another relationship...  told someone I loved them... or even thought about anything else in life, but the inconceivable loss.

  Do you know that I haven't spent a single Christmas with my kids since you cheated?  It's been 3 years and I'm missing the Santa parts of their lives.  My son and daughter are growing up, knowing another daddy, even before their daddy left.  I mean...  seriously...  what the fuck...?

  More than anything... I'm realizing that I absolutely meant nothing to you.  I'm worse than any person you've ever come across in your life.  Above your sister that would try to steal your boyfriends and deny us a home, when we had none...  above your aunt and grandmother who created a world of bullshit, pain and untrust by the people we should trust the most.  By your dad, who managed to be a complete asshole your whole life.  Lie to you and keep you from your mother, much like you're doing to me and my children.  Ohh wait... there's Skype, right...?  Ohh yeah, you've allowed me be in their lives.  (bullshit)  There's a long line of people who've used and abused you over the years...  and still...  despite all your bullshit that I put up with over the years.  You wanting to fuck a dog,  hitting me, threatening my life with a pair of scissors, lying and deceiving me about a hidden relationship...  you treat me the worse.  It's so easy for you to just pretend that I meant nothing to you at all.  That I for 6 years, was a fluke, a fable, a false sense of love, emotion and passion that wasn't real.  I never was your soul-mate. And now  I finally regret you.  I regret ever falling in love with you.  For choosing you as the person I wanted to spend my life with.  I regret that my children call you mommy, because if they knew what kind of person you were... they'd resent you as much as you resent you dad.  They'd know that it wasn't about fairness, trying to do the right thing, or even to make the parenting work between 2 people who weren't in a relationship anymore.  They'd know that you were a liar, selfish and used them to hurt the person who loved the 4 of you more than anything else in the world.

  Stay out of my life.  Don't ever let me see your face again.  If my children do one day see me...  ensure that I never need to see you again.  I don't want a single word to ever come out of your mouth to me.  Pretend literally, that I am the nothing you paint me to be.  Pretend that I'm that drug using, wife bashing, lazy asshole that got you pregnant and watched you do all the work.  Instead of being the loving, caring, listening father to 3 children who read them stories every night and sang them to sleep.  Who rocked them when they had bad dreams, changed thousands of diapers and was more of a father than most of the friends we had... even when blood-relation wasn't part of the equation.  Instead of being the stay-home dad and recreational pot-smoker I was.  That I never lifted a finger in anger towards you and did everything I could to be your soul-mate.  It certainly is; The Sweetest Lie.  And since it's so popular, you should just keep telling people the horrible man I was.  The horrible father I was.  Please... give me more reason to just keep you away from me.  It started with my family and keeping them and their caustic nature away from me.  Now it's time to cut my ties with you.

Just keep doing what you're doing and I'll be just fine.  Goodbye to you.  Goodbye to the pictures and videos.  Goodbye to the memories and to the dreams.  I don't need them anymore.  I don't need anything anymore.

Another Merry Christmas.

  I avoid writing in here, everything I want to write in here.  It's been 5 months and while I could go on and on and on about my changes...  It's not why I write here.  It's a release.  Almost a way to talk to you, without talking to you.

  I'm no different than the last 3 years that I've spent Christmas alone.  I hide, shelter myself from the joy and excitement that goes on around me.  Bury any Christmas spirit in the fact that you're not here and neither are they.  It's amazing how 3 years I ago, I never would've imaged during Christmas, that I'd be very alone.  I never saw any further than my box and those that I thought would be in it forever.  Considering divorce rates, I shouldn't be surprised...  but, I am.  I guess I had really believed that you were the only one for me.  It takes 2 to think that way though... and I was unaware and confused when it all came to light.  Immediately, every memory flashed before my eyes and the want to be closer to you was stronger and at the same time weakening me.

  I still think about you every day of my life.  It's so painful to even think about, that most of the time I am doing what I can to ignore it or get past it.  As I said back in April...  I really do wish I could erase my memory.  I wish I could erase you as you erased me.

  I'm beyond the stage of bitterness and a love that will never die nor never bloom.  I am beyond the level of missing everything and more or less, questioning if I ever really knew you.  I mean, let's get over the fact that you're not with me any more.  Something I've had to swallow hard on and still I wish it wasn't true.  But... what you did with the kids...  well...  that speaks for itself.  You took a dad that loved his kids and made him disappear.  Just like you wanted.  You moved far away, broke all of your promises and did everything to lie and deceive me the whole time.  When there's never been an ounce within our 6 year (5 years and 10 months) relationship that deserved that.  Maybe some stretching of the truth... but always honest, even when I knew you'd raise your hand to me. 

  You can't blame the pot, when you were such an advocate for it for years, not to mention the environment I met you in.  Let-a-lone try to explain to the children that the smokers they see commonly on the streets in Seattle... that's why you left and took them from their father.  It's ultimately my fault to giving up...  for dying as their dad and not keeping up with my hopes and dreams.  I am utterly ashamed of myself because of it.  But... and a big but...  I didn't just get here by myself.  I was pushed.  I was pulled.  I had court against me while I sat alone, praying that the courts wouldn't take away the people I loved most.  I had, being alone in that court room...  on my shoulders.  No husband... or his family that came in to stick up for a woman that was cheating and lying the whole time.  Making stories and tales up about a man who never put his hands on his "wife" in anger and passing them throughout the community, like it's a justifiable reason to cheat.  I had you... the person I loved the most... hating me.  And for what? 

  You took my life Kendall.  And everyday when I wake up... that's what I realize.  I gave you all I had.  My trust, my patience, my love... and well...  I don't have it anymore.

Merry Christmas

~John

I couldn't begin...

  I've been realizing more and more as time goes on, how significant my life was.  How important my children were...  the feeling of lost and hopelessness that takes over when I think of you.  I'm confused in what ways, I didn't show enough love.  I have dreams that constantly reply the night everything happened.  I still wake up some nights, almost expecting you to be there.  I've said it before... I know... but still, it happens.  It still has yet to fade.

  More than ever I miss the kids.  I realize, I could end this distance I've accepted by moving to Seattle.  That I could call.  That I could skype.  But more than that, I realize that you want me gone.  You want me to disappear.  So I am.

  Father's Day this year was very difficult.  I couldn't do anything but remember my first Father's Day with Alora in Bellevue Park.  The pen you gave me along with the framed picture of me holding Alora.  I had remembered, meeting you...  the risk I took loving another man's child and trusting you.  And now, I am lost... because you've shown how easy it is for you to take that away.  To take a child, I see as much as my daughter, as I see Kylie and Johnathan.  I couldn't begin to explain to you, how much I miss them.  How much I think about them daily, in everything I do.  How much I wish they would remember everything about me.  I'm their daddy, but you've made sure that I'm not anymore.  I couldn't begin to explain to you, how much my whole life I wanted children... and having them with you was a blessing.  Until you ended it.  Until you cheated, lied and tore my world apart.  Until you flipped the world into believing the worst out of a pothead like me...  a loving father and "husband"... suddenly became the worst thing, after you met "him".  How you could turn the children against me.  How you could use them to hurt me, just like you wanted to.  How you could hand over my family and live this life, happily ever after... that you started with someone else.

  I couldn't begin to explain the hell I went through for you.  The fights I had, just to be by your side.  The people I fought against, because I loved you... and did all I could to prove that.

  I couldn't begin to explain to you... how hard it is to not love someone, who instinctively you want to love.  You've told for many years you've loved and meant every minute from the first moment I said it.  I couldn't begin to explain the torment my heart and mind has gone through, as you've done everything to get what you want out of all of this, promising everything and delivering on nothing.  I couldn't begin to explain how tired of crying, I am.  How tired I am of loving someone, whom seemingly never loved me, if she guided this fate this way.  I couldn't begin to explain how exhausted I feel, confused and careful.  How lonely and afraid I am... to even try again with someone new.

  I couldn't expect you to understand one single word of any of this.  To know how any of this feels.  To watch all of it unravel at your feet and watch literally all the things you love... the best things in your life, to go away.

  I couldn't get you off my mind if I tried.  And I have.  Besides, erasing my mind... I am stuck with memories with you, that remind me every day how amazing and in love I was with you.  Skinny dipping, karaoke, nightclubs, drinking, camping, watching you give birth to my children.  How I wish I could give those memories back.  To someone more deserving of them.

  I couldn't imagine... thinking this way my whole life.  Which seems to go by faster each year...

  I can't imagine... missing you one day more.  But, I will.  I will until I don't anymore.

  I don't want to do this any longer.  I'm not crazy.  I loved someone with everything I had... and well, now... you have everything I love.  If there was a reason to go crazy... I'd say that would be good enough.  But instead, I'm just giving up. 

I'm just giving up.  You win.

Somewhere I shouldn't have gone...

It's been 2 years, 4 months and 25 days since I've slept next to you...  And still I haven't been able to get a full nights sleep.  We spent the better part of 6 years only being apart once, more than 24 hours... when I was in the Army at A.P. Hill.  The only other time I recall, is the day you punched me in the face and I went and stayed at Jason for the night... when you called me crying to make sure I was okay.  Even in those times of you being so completely mad at me... you've never done, what you ultimately did to me.

Not a single day has gone by, where I haven't thought about you.  Some days I miss everything I once knew about you.  Other days, I am so completely upset and mad that you've done this to me.  You've taken away the things that were most important in my life.  I've grown to understand why you felt the need to run.  It doesn't make it any easier, but harder.

I'm left here with a thousand memories with you.  Memories, that I wish I was lucky enough to forget, like so many of the girlfriends I've had... have forgotten so easily.  And as the years pass...  you'll continue to forget more.  You'll forget that I loved you with all my heart.  That I never left your side and that I did anything that you wanted me to.  That you, besides my children were the most important and amazing person in my life.  I wish I didn't have to live with this hurt and pain being without you... but it was worth it to be with you.

It's been a while, so I needed to say that.

My life has been a mess lately.  My relationships with friends have fallen in many degrees to areas, I never let happen before.  I've grown bitter and mad at the world.  I've lost motivation.  I've lost the feeling of being a father.  Honestly, I miss that the most.  I feel like life has become so dull, dry and gray since you've left... and each time I've tried to add life to it... it wilts in my hand.  I have no stability, though I've completely quit pot.  Haven't touched it in months.  I know saying it won't make you believe it... but I just don't need it, I'm not around it... it's gone.  Hopefully for good.

I've stayed away from my parents, as everytime I go... they drag me into depression and exhaustion.  I was only ever there, because there was no where else to go.  I made decisions to do the right things, constantly leading to the wrong thing.  As I said before... I couldn't fight you in court.  Even knowing what I know today and how this has all played out... I still wouldn't have the heart to try and keep the kids from you.  To act, as if there was never anything at all between us.  And in those moments in court, I never felt more alone.  No one there, to hold my hand and tell me it'll be okay...  no one to keep pushing me, for literally it all.  And you got it.  My whole life... playing at your feet.  Learning daily in school.  Everything I hold dearest to me... is with you.  Funny how that works, when it was always with you anyways.

Why am I going on like this...?  I cracked open the broken hard-drive.  Full of pictures I doubt you have...  videoes of our childrens births... even pictures of the more personal adventurous selves... being completely vulnerable with each other in broad view of the camera... and no... I have never showed anyone.

I found myself, sobbing like I haven't been able to in so so long.  It's been more than a year since I have been able to cry and let go.  It's been more than a year, since I could allow myself to enjoyable look at your pictures and remember how amazing to me, you once were.  And I miss it, though I know there's absolutely nothing I can do about it.

I still love you, though I know I shouldn't.  I still dream about you... and some mornings, I awake with the impossible wish that you would be beside me.  I forgive you, if you forgive me.  For everything.  I understand you, if you understand me...  And I pray that one day, this will not continue to be.

I know I am not talking to the kids...  but it's not because I don't love them.  I love them more than I love myself... more than I love you.  But, I need to take this time to better myself, until I can see them again.  I need to take this time to fix the broken things in my life, since you've left.  I need to fix the broken man I've become, as I'm hearing it more and more.

I am going to hang this up.  I've said enough...  but Kendall...  I miss you.  I miss you so ungodly bad, it hurts so incredibly much...  I just want this pain to end.  I want to feel alive again.  I want this to stop.

~John

Woke up crying...

  It's been on my mind all morning.  A dream, that I wish I never had. 

  Kendall is in my dream, which is usual when it comes to dreams about the kids.  Even in my dream, I can't face her.  I want to cry almost immediately when I see her.  The kids are there.  So little, as I know they're not that young anymore.  In the beginning of the dream, it's me... just asking to see the kids.  To spend time with the kids in anyway I can.  Then time passes, months, years.  Will's out of the picture somehow and it's just her.

  Fighting to see the kids is impossible.

  I remember the last night in Baltimore.  The fight we had because of the stuff I found.  Finding out that someone you love, is loving another.  I felt my life needing resuscitation then.  And then somehow in the dream, I have the kids.  The shoe is on the other foot.  Kendall is knocking and crying at my door.  She's banging on it, as she pushes the door with force.  But I won't let her in.  I won't let her see the kids.  I won't let her touch them, hold them or her tell them that she loves them.

  The neighbors hear.  They're big.  They're watching.  She's screaming and I'm being an asshole.  With intentions of cutting her out.  She's crying and screaming like she was in Baltimore, when I went to get Johnathan from her arms.  I hate it.  I hated it.  It makes me well up, even thinking about it.  Baltimore was different.  I never had intentions of withholding the kids from her.  She's their mother...  how could I?

  I'm pushing her out my door in the dream.  I'm saying the most hurtful and hateful things I can think of.  I am fighting and pushing...  I know, I'm not being fair.  I know it doesn't have to be this way.  But, I don't care.  I want my kids.  I want them so badly, I have to be this way to keep them.  I'm not crying... because then, it would show my weakness.  And far too much, have I shown that.  The croud gets bigger, helping her.  Trying to reason with me through a door of arguments.  The kids are upset and I'm trying to calm them down.  I send them to go play or lay down, but anything and everything to stay away from this.  Even outside of this dream, this is the way I wanted it.  Possibly the reason I didn't fight for them.  I didn't want them to see me fight.  I couldn't anyway.  I still loved her.  I couldn't...  I just couldn't.  I gave up long ago, holding onto any little thing I had.

  People are helping her push the door open, ready to take the kids from me.  I'm fighting with all my might and I'm overwhelmed.  They rush in, she takes the kids and runs with them.  There's no negotiations.  There's no compromise.  She takes them and runs.

  I was up against my biggest fight last year and no one was there.  I asked for help.  I had hoped, someone would be on my side as even the wrong people are on hers.  I am doomed to lose them.  I am doomed to lose them from the start.  I did nothing wrong except want to be their daddy.  To continue on being a father.  I love it and miss it.  No one is there to hold my hand and tell me it'll be okay.  To pay my lawyer.  To help fight against someone who is defenseless, weak and brokenhearted.  I'm as alone as I am in my dream.  The outcome is the same.  My parents weren't there.  And the one person who should have been there, is the person who filled my head with "soulmate".  The who called me "baby boy".  The one who listened to me, understood me and loved me once greater than herself.

  This dream made me wake in tears.  Ones that won't stop from falling.  I've never been more alone.  I guess I should have seen it coming.  It would have happened one way or another.  And the memories, love and nobility to try and do the right thing, didn't make a single difference.  Promises that were quickly broken and how easily I was forgotten and made to feel like I was the real problem.

  Despite what can be blamed...  I didn't cheat.  I didn't lie.  I loved, up until the last moment I could.  I didn't mistreat.  I wasn't disrespectful.  I didn't steal my family away from someone else who felt it was just as important to them as it was to me.  I didn't give it to someone else so easily.  I just finally gave up from losing.  I finally threw in my towel, because she absolutely wanted me out of her life completely.  Because, I fought too much to keep her, it only made her run more.  I had never loved someone this way.  To this degree of never giving up.  But I did...  cause I don't want to anymore.  I don't want to even think about what's been done.  I could never imagine doing this to someone I love or once loved.  It's not in me.  It's not possible, even if my dream says so. 

  I went to the Cardiologists yesterday.  My heart is only getting worse and they're a little worried about it.  He says the stress has been getting to me and that I need some medication.  I refuse.  I have this thing about pills I don't like... so I'm not going to take them.  My release has been writing and crying.  The only 2 things, I am really capable of doing without hurting someone else.  I stopped talking to the kids.  I'm ashamed of myself... but I'm crying more lately and I don't want them to see it.  I hear her voice and I want to cry.  I want to just talk to her... though I don't.  I want to tell her I'm sorry for everything.  That I was shitty to her and that my love wasn't enough.  I want to get mad because of the distance.  Lori is going to girl-scout camp in the summer.  It's her way of making sure I never get Alora for the summer.  I raised and loved Alora with all my heart.  I can't bear the idea of her not coming along... so I decided that I am not taking Kylie and Johnathan.  It wouldn't be fair.  It's not fair to me.

I'm so ashamed of myself.  How could I just give up on them?

I have to.

~John

 

The understanding...

  I did something I never thought I would do.  I decided, that I simply cannot do anymore.

  I didn't give up.  But I did.
  I didn't erase...  but I am.
  I'm doing exactly what you did.  An operation that erased all the good about me.  The things that you fell in love with first and then left me alone for.  The things that created much of who I am today.  6 years of laughs, arguments, thoughts, dreams, ideas and complications that slowly consumed our lives.  Nothing fades, regardless of the time that flies.  While many things may takes its place, upon concentration of said things...  I still feel little different.  Am I awaiting for something to change all of this and at some point for you to somehow magically wonder back into my life?  I doubt it...  I don't even think I hope for it.  I've accepted what is, to be what is.  I've become mad and bitter at the constant feeling from the way  that things have molded themselves into my life.  Under the hardest drugs, I've never felt more disconnected than from myself.  Perhaps it's no one elses fault other than my own.  I am in control of me and my fate after, all right?

  Still...  when I close my eyes, my dreams cloud me.  Always your hair.  Your smile.  Your impractical way of thinking.  I'm past admiration.  I'm past remembering how we became... though I still remember the first few moments of when we met.  The first moments of intimacy and vulnerability.  It' as if it were yesterday, I slept and today I am simply reflecting on what was.  It's not 6 years ago to me.  It's yesterday morning... and between the time of sleep to wake, a whole life happened before my eyes.

I went on a date Saturday.  So much of her reminded me of you, yet... still things differed to the point where I found admiration for her easily.  She was amazing...  fantastic...  and because my mind had a difficult time leaving you and the kids, she could notice this within me and realize that I have something that will be difficult for her to pass.  Not my job, finances or anything relevant...  but because she could sense the emotions of the kids and you, that have drained my smile and tainted everything I've ever come to know.

I don't blame you.  Well, some things I certainly do.  The overbearingness of emotion and impulsiveness.  It reminded me so much of the women I dated when I was a kid.  You ability to ignore whatever once was...  to become a list reassured of things that used to be.  The kids no longer think of me in the manner of father, but only know me as such through biological means.

I've been made to feel that the only way to come through this, whole, motivated and patient. though none of those things have a stone tablet.  They're liable to chance as each days passes and they continue to fade with the age.  Like a bad grape in wine.  After 30 years of aging, it'll be unnoticeable.  It'll be long and forgotten.

Also, by no means could I ignore such things.  This is life and I need to do what I can to smile my way through it.  Through the mistakes I've made and the ones that others have made for me.  This is the fate, I didn't believe I'd ever have.

I gave up.  I sent you a message that 2 years ago, I would have been ashamed of myself for.  I quit.  I let you win and wake from my life, what you wanted to take.  I have tucked down the pride and created little than air, as it's outcome.  It's quite the difficult thing to do.  I always imagined myself as being moral and proper, extending to know what I claim to know.

I am not perfect.  I know here my loyalties lie as I stride to find myself able to find an ounce of someone new.  Who knows...  I'm no expert and neither are you.  I can only pray that the things that I do turn out for the best.  That someone will understand them and give me the push I need to fight hither neither...

I loved you, but anymore I'm not sure what I do.  I pray to be done...  so erase what I have and go away with it. Provide it to someone willing to build my pieces.  Alright with my inconsistencies and ignore the importance.  Assume, she's different.  Experience sun shines and rain.  Imagine a work, where nothing is nothing...  would you still think of me.  Would it really matter?

Kylie.  I love you.  Amazing you'll always be in my eyes.
Johmathan, you share more than similarities.
Lori.  I did my best.  I love you.  Forgive me.

This will be my end of trying.  After this day, I'll be doing what I know I can do.  So forgive me of my discrepancies.

I love you all...  and never forget for a second that I am not thinking of you.

~John

Where are you when I need you?

  I've kept away from this journal for months.  I'm debating if I can even publish this when I am done.  But, I need to talk and this is the only way I can let out what I am thinking and feeling.

  I went to the hospital today, after having a tightness in my chest.  After about 45 minutes, I collapsed in the waiting room.  I was seen immediately by a doctor.  In no way, a ruse.

  I've tried a thousand ways to get you out of my mind.  I've lied to myself, even.  I still love you, as much as I hate what you've done.  My mind and body are constantly torn and still... I cry.  2 years and I am still broken. 

  The doctors told me that my heart is having lots of problems, though I have more tests to do over the next couple of weeks.  Even though I saw both already in Christiana, they want me to goto a specialist.  Cardiologists and a psychiatrists.  It was hard to not cry in front of them as the fear built up in me.  I could only think about being away from the kids... and I just kept imagining that you were there with me, holding my hand.  I'm scared.  I'm very scared in fact...  neither had anything good to say, but say that tests will determine more.  They wanted to admit me, but you know how I am with hospitals.  I insisted that I leave as I could not imagine being in that room alone.  It's driving me crazy...

I need to rest.  My chest still feels heavy and my head is killing me.  Where is the woman I knew?  That pagen goddess I remember?

~John

 

2 years... goodbye.

It was 2 years yesterday, when my life began to fall apart.  It's still an open, fresh wound... making it difficult to have motivation or happiness.  I've died inside, over and over again.

I decided, that this is it.  I simply can't keep coming back to you and reminding myself of everything I was ever lucky enough to do with you.  Every kiss.  Every fight.

The fact that I never thought about anyone else, but you.  Once you were mine, you were my everything.  I never wanted to be with another person.  And now, no one compares.  The women I date, don't last long... because they're not you.  They don't have even the slightest ability to get me as excited and alive, as you made me feel.  Which is why I need to stop this blog.  I need to take the time, to let it go, just as I've ignored old letters, videoes, pictures and everything connected to you.  It's why I've been distant with the kids, though it kills me inside.  I understand I make my choices.  You don't do that.  I have the ability to be strong or tired.  But to say that these events in my life hasn't affected me, would be simply a joke.  It wouldn't be fair to say that I did this to myself.  Life did this to me.  The little and big decisions that I've made and others have made for me. 

I haven't stopped thinking about you.  I still notice you.  I can't help it.  I hope it goes away, just like everything else.  I hope it slowly fades and becomes no more... because this is simply miserable.  I have no flare.  No happiness... I'm faking my smiles and choking back tears.  And I'm so tired of living this way.  I'm tired of "rehashing" (which you so eloquently put, just days after we ended.)  I know that I made the decision to leave that night as it was unfolding, but learning about everything hurt me so unbelievable bad.  I could not believe someone I loved, would hurt me this way.  And it's only gotten worse since I found out.

I need to make changes, so I don't feel this way.  So this is my last post about you.  So I should get it out now and walk away.

You were the most amazing person I have ever come across in my life.  My love was an addiction.  I was proud to be with an intelligently beautiful woman.  Why I wasn't as amazing in your eyes, is the most painful question to ask myself.  I don't think I'll ever stop asking it.  I don't know what will happen in the future between us or my children... but I wish that you were the same amazing person I once knew.  I pray (to nothing specific) that our children aren't warped to thinking that their father was a bad man, as your father put in your heads.  I loved them with all of my heart and you aswell.  I didn't do my equal share and I lost you, losing them in the process.  Had I known things were so bad, I would have done more.  Had communication been better.  I took on each situation to the best of my abilities.  I love them and miss them very much... I always wanted to be a father and now that I am, I'm not...  They are the greatest gift I have, and that I'd give up anything in my life for 5 minutes from them.  I miss it all... the little things I did as a father are the things I miss the most.  Bedtime specifically.  I miss you singing to them, like I know you do every night.  It will never be the same.  I wish you the best of luck.  I'm sorry for all I've done.  I'll keep trying my best, but this is goodbye blog.  This is goodbye emotions and memories.  This is goodbye to you my love.  I'm letting it go.

~John

Merry Christmas.

  It 3 days away.  I've yet to feel any realistic Christmas spirit.  It's hard to do this year.  Maybe harder than last year, which was more of a surprise finding out that I wouldn't be spending it with my kids.  You went back on your promise, like all the ones you made.

  I don't want to, but I still think about you.  I still dream about you...  I want it to stop.  I want to forget you.  I want to stop crying and feeling, the emotions I've had for so long.  I want to stop loving you. 

  It's unbelievable how my heart went through hell...  and it still harbors an ounce of care for you.  It's remarkable, that you meant that much to me.  Since January 9th, 2011...  you've done absolutely everything you can to hurt me.  You have taken my life and destroyed my soul.  I have little motivation and very little faith in even myself.  I have cried more than every moment in my life, combined.  I really just wish it'd go away.  I really just wish it would stop.  Last week would have been our 6 year anniversary.  A day that I could never forget.  Asking you to marry me.  This whole week, I have been completely out of it. 

  I'm so lost.  I'm so broken.  I lost my bestfriend and I'm not over it.  I miss my children.  I love them.  I'm afraid of what other ways you plan on keeping them from me.  I still don't understand why you did it before.

  I miss Lori.  I miss Kylie.  I miss my son.  I miss holding them, smelling them, watching them grow up.  Why did you take them from me?  Why did you lie to me, deceive me and give my family away?  You must not have really loved me, if it was so easy to simply take everything and give it to someone else.  And in the manner that you did it...  wow.  How could you ever believe you're a good person?

  I hate saying it, but you've become a lot more like your father.  I don't need to know him or your mom.  A grandfather who never gave a shit about his grandchildren.  A father who never gave a shit about you.  A sister who never gave a shit about you.  A grandmother and aunt who never gave a shit about you.  You hurt the one guy, who gave every bit of a shit about you.

  I wish you'd just go.  Go away and never enter my life again.  Don't ever come back.  Don't ever say you're sorry.  Don't ever try to fix the mess you've made.  Just keep going.  I want absolutely every reason to think you never loved me.  It's the only excuse for all that you've done.

  *sigh*

  It's only because I feel miserable...  that I know you meant something to me.  If I just walked it off...  I really didn't care.  Just like you.  And despite all the similarities that both of us share... this will never be one of them.  You were my family.  I was disposable.  My life was yours for the taking.  Fairness and consideration are not in your creed.  And damnit, do I hate it.

~John

Lost? Yeah...

  I've only realized recently how lost I am.  How so far disconnected, I feel from my life.  I pass the days, without a care... when I'm in trouble in many ways.  I've lost touch of what I really want and need in my life and grown accustomed to feeling the way I do.  Lifeless.

  This is for a lot of reasons.  Of course, because of you.  But, I don't even feel like much of a father anymore.  I miss being a dad.  I miss them waking me up in the morning, with tickles on my feet.  I just miss them, so incredibly much.  I haven't been able to cry.  It would feel good to do so, but I just haven't been able to.  I've distanced myself far from the things that remind me of you.  I have to...  you're gone.  I've distanced myself from them...  just so I don't think about you.  How could I not?  They have just as many of your beautiful features as they do of me.

  Will we ever happen again?  Is there a way I could go back in time and change things?

  I think about you when I don't want to.  Even when I am trying to hide you, from my thoughts.  I could go on, in a million areas of how I miss you.  How I remember everything as frozen as the day it was over.  I'm mad at myself...  that I believed and trusted you as much as I did.  That I even tried to be with you, when it's obvious that you weren't as great as I thought.  You betrayed me so horribly...  you broke my heart and ripped out my soul.  You took what was most important to me.  And you have no regrets about it at all.  You would do it over again...  regardless if you knew how badly this has affected me.  How close I've come to just giving up on myself.   You manage to hurt the person who loved you the most.  Who went through hell with you and still walked out holding your hand.  The times you yelled at me, abused me, treated me horribly and never seemed to listen to anything I said.  You were my world...  and that didn't matter to you.

  Now, I'm lost.  I'm scared to even try with another person again.  Getting emotional and trusting them is the most difficult thing I can do.  I haven't gotten past the dating stage in 2 years.  Maybe it's why the women I am dating, give up and move on.  I understand...  I'm just not ready.  You were supposed to be it.  Supposed to be the fate, that you and I both felt.  You were my soulmate.  And I hate telling myself that there is possibly another.  I felt you were it.  I knew it.  I still do.

  But go.  Doesn't matter what memories I have... or the things I wish, believe or care about.  I don't want you back.  I don't want to see your face.  I'd sooner prefer to just say, you don't exists to me anymore.  You've destroyed my life and our childrens, just so you could have yours.  So you can justify the deceiving and lying you did to me.  But, hey... I'm sure your family is happy about the outcome as they helped you with your decision.  My love wasn't enough.  But it doesn't matter.  I'll never forgive you.  I'll just go on pretending, you mean absolutely nothing to me and see where it gets me.  It's all I got left.

~John

Always comes back around...

  I'm sitting in a basement with Mike.  He's mixing this amazing music, that I can feel just coursing through me.  My body moves as it always has, to the music.  Flowing.  And a memory hits me.  It has you of course... and I couldn't help it anymore than I could help the weather today.  We went to the Lagoon.  Stevie B. was there.  We had some drinks, danced the night away and then ended up at Melissa's Bosses house.  You and I were so adventurous back then.  We swam in the pool... and soon we were naked and couldn't get off one another.  So much passion.  So much love.

  It feels forever ago...  but only because of how far you've gone.  I remember the nights I was away from you in the Army.  It was the most time I would ever spend away from you.  And still, I needed to see you.

  Now, I can't.  I want to, but I can't.  I can't do anything that remotely comes close to the thought of what we had, what our life was and where it's all gone since then.  I'll cry and it won't stop.  So, I hope to forget.  A million memories, I slowly am erasing.  It's impossible.  It's so hard.  So fucking hard.

  I saw a glimpse of you, though I wish I didn't.  I would have been much better if your beautiful decieving face, didn't bare itself to me.  Nevertheless, I endured.  I waited.  I love talking to Kylie and Johnathan...  but truly missed talking to Alora.  Being able to for the last few months has unfortunately made this move, worth it.  And now, we're back to not talking.  I don't know why...  I don't know how...  I just hope this is temporary.

  I don't want to say it, but I'll admit that I miss you.  I find myself still talking about you from time to time.  Or, us.  I know it's gone.  It kills me to admit that.  I know...  but, still.  Despite everything, you were the most amazing person in my life.  And I miss you.

  I know you're not the old you.  Maybe that's what I miss.  This person I see now, looks miserable.  Shackled and chained down.  I don't see you believe your beliefs.  I don't see you, be you.  That amazing woman I knew.  You seem so exhausted.  I know, I wasn't worth a cent of a dime...  but was it worth it?  Do you ever miss me, like I miss you?  Probably not.

  It was worth a shot.

~John

I realized...

...  that I don't look at many pictures or videos of the kids.  Besides talking to them on the Skype...  I can't.  Whenever I do, I only end up crying.  My thoughts never leave them, as I've never forgotten that I'm a father.  And regardless of how far away they are...  they know, I will wish they were by my side.

  I've questioned a lot lately.  A lot about you.  Sure... the why's don't stop...  but moreso, who you are and who you used to be.  I've noticed a few things that have made me feel completely uncomfortable.  As if, my wishes with the kids are completely disregarded.

  When we got together...  the choices that we made to raise our children were set in stone.  Their religious beliefs were to be as open, as you and I.  You believed in your Cards, Natural Magic and some Pagen beliefs.  I was raised basically agnostic, though I have been told otherwise.  Little to no church in my life...  even still, I remain moral in many senses, without the need to involve a church or bullshit idea onto myself or those I care about.  I consider myself to be nothing less than an upstanding person.  Trustworthy, kind, generous, caring and only ask the same in return.

  It didn't dawn on me, that Johnathan recently was holding a bracelet... with crosses all on it.  More than likely given to him by his Step-Grand Parents.  And then it stuck with me more... that Kendall had talked to me before about religion on the kids.  Even telling me to take them to church.  Which just baffled me.  It went against everything we've come to know for the last 6 years... and just that quickly, you've changed. 

  Will's parents didn't like you.  Look at the mess you left behind.  Look at how you cut out our childrens father.  You weren't thinking of the children... you weren't thinking about their father.  You were thinking about yourself and that asshole you married.  I call him an asshole, because any man chasing after a woman who has a family and life...  accepting videos and "I love yous" over the internet, while you were already grounded... is something an asshole would do.  He's been aware of how the children have been taken out of my life.  Which I am sure is just as much his idea, as it is yours.  It went against every promise you ever made me.  It has made you a person, I don't know anymore.

  Whenever I get that urge to think about you...  miss you...  or try to shake the love I've held in my heart...  I think about how you've changed.  That you're not the woman I went to New York with.  You're not the woman who was open sexually.  You're not the woman who had the courage to tell the truth... but hid it, knowing how fucked up it really was.  You're not the Kendall I know.  Just some bitch, who unfortunately is in control of our childrens upbringing.  Worrying me daily.

  You and I both know, you were never much of a mother.  Passing along duties of taking care of the kids, with anyone willing to accept it for a time.  Not to mention, that I'd really prefer if my daughter wasn't raised by a whore.  No offense... but with you at the wheel... I'm afraid, she'll turn into her mother... and by 18 or 19, she'll get pregnant.  I read you're journal.  I "knew" you inside and out.  You're past, which isn't much different than mine.  But still...  I never...  never... would have done to you, what you've done to me.  And I'm positive, that karma will come back and bite you in the ass one day.

  I realize, that you're just not worth it anymore.  The person I loved, was amazing.  She was the most amazing person I've ever known, as my journal has dictated.  But you're not her anymore.  Just a shell.  Just a shell.

The truth.

  My mind has been filled with a lot of social crap lately.  An election is right around the corner...  And while, I know I should... I won't vote.  But, that doesn't matter now.

  I miss the kids.  And dealing with presidential elections, everyday life and even having to hear Kendall's voice, is all motivated for that one reason.  If it wasn't because of them, I wouldn't be here.  I've come close to losing my mind, after losing my life.  I haven't had a stable ground, though I've tried...  but I fall off.  I cry for days and what feels like, I have to start over... by telling myself, it's all true.  I have to come to terms daily, where they are... and why they're not with me.  I don't particularly blame anyone.  While there are plenty of things, I can blame before... it's pointless.  It's the things after it was over, that have blown me away.  That made me believe the very thing I've asked her...  "Why do you hate me?"  When it ended, I asked this to her, over and over... in hopes of some realistic answer as to why my family was being torn.  Let-a-lone through some online affair.  But seeing the reactions of her...  her disconnection to me, taking my time from the kids and eventually my involvement altogether.  I shouldn't be here.  I shouldn't even be breathing.  I've drowned in the misery... and I simply, just shouldn't be here.

I've thought about it every morning when I woke up...  everytime I've eaten dinner...  every night before bed.  The things I would do with my kids on a typical basis... gone.  No more bedtime stories or tucking a child into bed.  No more, goodnight daddy.

You can literally cry your soul out.

A question that will never leave my mind.  Why did I think you loved me, as much as I did to you?

I miss the kids.  Just, so much waiting I have to do.  So much, trying to do the right thing.  Except pot... you got me there...  that thing, you've supported since you met me.  That conversation you never brought up, about wanting me to quit.  Yeah...  I was such a horrible man.  Completely involved in your family, as my family.  Your brothers, as mine.  My life...  the people I loved, taken from me.  All because of Will... and New Years, the videos, didn't want a 3some, I don't love you... I love Will.

  I used to pray...  I used to wish...  I used to believe, that if I wanted something bad enough, I would get it.  I believed there was a woman out there, that would make my life so fantastic.  And then I met you.  Life grew so complicated.  So troublesome... and you were always there beside me.  You loved me.  And I felt so comfortable...  I found you.  I thought you were fate...  that through my series of events in my life, I was supposed to meet you on purpose.

  I just never imagined, that I'd have to let go.  To feel these feelings, that are so hard to describe...  it's still so unbearable.  I honestly, wish I had a scream room like I thought about years ago.  A room where you can go and scream and feel better.  I would definitely cry, scream and then take a nap.  I've got to get through this.

  I've been making big strides.  I submitted my application to school and start in the Spring.  I've been working a little part-time thing.  It's tough work and not for much, but finding another job has been damn near impossible.  I've been saving for a plane ride.  So far, I'm at 46.98 and that's only after a few weeks.  I might have the money to fly out to the kids, though I have also been considering a Christmas in July.  I don't really know...  just trying to prepare myself a little.

  I asked a woman out on a date.  It's been almost 11 months since I have been with any woman.  Beth was the last and only 2, since Kendall.  I would count Trish, but honestly, I don't remember much from that night.  I'm afraid to even consider another relationship.  I honestly don't really feel, I need another woman, after investing everything into Kendall.  And now, I'm just a man with baggage.

  Her name is Jess.  I've known her for a long long time.  She's got a great, open and exciting personality and she's sorta dealing with the same situation from her ex.  He got another woman pregnant and doesn't really want anything to do with his son.  Which, personally... I just can't understand.  Literally, if Kendall called me right now and said "Cut off your leg and you can have the kids... "  They would be in the mail the next day.  I'd probably send both... just in case one gets lost in the process.

The truth is.  I'm trying to make so many changes in my life.  Motivation is tough, when you don't feel like there's much to shoot for.  I still think about you.  I still think about the 1000 things that would amaze me.  The 1000 memories I was lucky enough to have with you.  I think about everything I've gained in my life, because of you.  I truly believed myself to be extraordinarily lucky and special to have had you... but, I can never go back.  I've cried more than I could imagine someone crying.  I begged you.  I've dealt with all the blows you've given me and still strive for the same thing.  To be a father...  maybe not the best, but better than most.  I didn't and don't deserve all that is the way it is.  I got fucked over, by the one person who shouldn't have.  And there's nothing I am going to do about it, than to love my kids and to do the best I can to be me.

Want to be done.

  Nothing hurts, like watching the one you love... love another.  Throughout this year, I've seen my fair share of it.  It can be a torture... if you can't change your way of thinking.  If you can't put to the side, forget all the memories, forget the lives, forget the steps through life... it can eat away at your soul.  It can eat you from the inside out.  And depending on when it consumes you, depends on your inner strength.

  I've done okay.  Sometimes, I worry if I am able to make it through.  And then I remember, that I made it this far.  That there have been other women, who've done something similar in my life.  Those that have lied and eventually put me into the positions I was once in.

  Does Katrina know how tough it was for me to let go of her?  Does she know that I still harbor small feelings of remembrance?  And then I remember, how things were so very different with Kendall.  That for a long time, despite all that we had gone through... I still didn't think, the end was near.  I had honestly believed that the situation we were in, would only make us stronger together.  That we'd stick together and fight.  It was a shock to me... as most of the bullshit is that happens in my life.

  I still miss Kendall.  So many years together can make it difficult to forget.  It could have been more...  it should have, if I had done a part better.  If I had more communication and guidance as to what it was that she expected.  I still miss little things... and things everywhere remind me of her.  Walt has a bottle of her shampoo in the bathroom.  Sometimes, when I am feeling down and confused... I open it, take a breathe of it.  It reminds me of her so much, that sometimes I cry afterwards.

  But... in the end.  I am doing what I can to forget.  She's doing the same, right?  Packing away my pictures, momentos and forgetting that at one point, she loved me more than I could comprehend.

  I wish it were different.  I wish I didn't have to see her in my children.  I wish I didn't have to see her, or hear her, or even relate in any form or fashion with her.  I want to be done with the love.  I want to forget it and focus.  Get my mind set back on the proper path, whatever that is.

No Title

Normally, I know the title of what I want to talk about, before I talk about it.  I put it up first, almost always...  but tonight, I am stumped on a title.

I didn't really think I would be typing at this time in the morning.  I should be in bed.  I'm tired enough to be in bed, so why can't I sleep...  Well... the answer is why I am writing in my journal at 4 something in the morning.

You.

After a year and half of a living hell...  I still playback everything you've said.  Before... and after all of this.  I think about everything before it was over.  When you were all I knew in my world.  Our family.  I think about all the things you ever told me.  Soulmates.  Getting old together.  I can honestly say, that there was never a second or time... when I questioned, if I wanted to be with you.  I knew it from the moment I met you, that you were something special.  Something I needed in my life.  I play back the births of our children, when I held your hand as your brought them into my world.  I cry, when I think about it... because with those moments in my life, I never imagined that you'd be gone today.

I must have been horrible.  I must have made you disappointed in me.  I must have been the scum of the earth, for you to fall out of love with me.  For you to hold that knowledge from me, until you filled your heart with someone elses love.  I must have been a disgusting human being, for you to deny me, time with our children.  To keep Alora from me, any means necessary.  You must have hated me, wanting to cut me out of my own life.  Wanting to change their birth certificates, so Will was their father.  Encouraging them to call him "daddy".  You must have dispised me, flaunting Will in my face while I brokedown.  "He knows Russian"  "I gave him anal."  You must have wanted to hurt me, if you broke every promise you ever made to me.  If you took me, out of our family.  Cast me away and claim, I'm unfit as a father.

When did you love me?  When was the last time you needed me to tell you, I love you... or can you remember?  Do you sleep sound at night, knowing?  Do you think of me at all... or am I Mike?

God Kendall...  I never saw it coming.  I knew it was hard on us.  I knew life, had this way of constantly kicking us in the teeth.  But never, did I equate that it would be connected to how you felt about me.  I stuck through it with you, dealing with the hard too and I never felt any different.  I never needed someone else.  I needed you.  It's the only thing I thought I would ever need... and sometimes, despite everything to this point...  I still feel that way.  How am I going to make it the rest of my life, without the person I love with all my heart.  The only person I've ever asked to marry me, had children with and considered closer family than a single family member of my own.  I still know you, better than you know yourself.  Sometimes, I wish I didn't... and other times, I'm glad I do.  It reminds me, how much I loved you... to want to know every little thing about you.  To know how intelligent and persistent you are.

I never knew, you weren't in love with me.  I didn't know, until you told me in the bathroom...  3 days before you left me.  3 days, before I woke up at 2 in the morning with you no longer in bed and a message on your phone to a guy, you'd never met... 9 days after you sent him videos of yourself, that you sent to him from my parents house... while I slept in bed with our children.  You hid it from me, knowing what laid in store.  A letter, where he would secretly come and meet you, by plane.  He loved you... and you loved him.  And I was just there, to watch it all fall apart.

Every moment I ever spent with you.  Every thought and memory.  Every word you've said, throughout all the years... feels like it was for nothing.  I said it before...  It's felt like you died, when you left me.  But you're not dead.  Making it so much harder than grieving over a loved one would provide.  You've removed yourself from every aspect of my life.  And I've been forced to watch you move on, instantly... with someone new.  Replacing me.  Getting pregnant.  Get married.  Take the kids slowly from me.  Have your new baby.  To talk to me through a lawyer.  It has been... the most impossible thing in my life to deal with.  Something, not even others have gone through before...  so I have no one to talk to or relate.  Most people can't even believe it.  I can't.

I knew you better than anyone... and even while I know the bad...  I never considered it that.  I loved you.  I took the bad.  I accepted it, just as I did the day I met you.  That's what you do, when you love someone.  You accept it.  I saw all the great in you, as I wish you had done for me.  I saw your intelligence.  I adored you because of it.  I saw your love for me, which didn't really seem to go away like you said.  Christmas as Nana's was the first time you pushed me away, ever... and even then... there was still a night when all of us, sat in the living room and I held you for a while.  I never stopped loving you.  I don't know if I ever will... and I don't think that replacing it with hate, would change it.

I don't know if I ever want anyone else again.  I gave you all I had.  Every ounce of me.  I never held back.  I've tried...  but, I just don't think I can do it again.  I'm so lonely... and still so crushed.  I don't want to propose to anyone else.  I built up so much to do it to you.  I still remember it so clearly.  Was Will as surprising and special with his proposal?  Did he ask your dad's permission?

It's rhetorical.  It doesn't matter.  I just sometimes wonder...  did I ever do anything right?  Do you ever think about me?  Is there any ounce of you, that still loves me?  Tell me that NYC, was as amazing to you... as it was for me.  Tell me something... anything.  Please.  Please, just stop my crying.  Hurt me more, if you have to... just so I don't feel this way.  This completely lost feeling.  I am completely lost without you.  I miss you so much.  I don't want to do this anymore.  I don't want to cry and think and ... anything.  It's just so fucking hard.

I sound so pathetic.  The tears build up, roll down my cheek and I think of everything I wish I could ask you, in front of me.  I wish I could put my hands on your shoulders, pull you in tight for a hug and kiss you with the passion that's been burning away in my heart.  I wish I could show you, how wrong you are... for believing and telling me, that I didn't love you enough or at all.  I wish you had given me a second chance to prove how different I could have made our lives, rather than giving up on me... the one and only time.

I wish I had a picture of you, where I don't breakdown in tears and sob for hours over.  I wish I could tuck my children into bed, stand beside you and sing goodnight songs.  I want to hear the "Dark Song".  I want to hold your hand.  I want you back, so badly...  that I'd amputate my legs, if I knew it would happen, knowing  I would never walk again.  I would gouge out my eyes and be blind, if it meant I could reach my hands up to your face and feel your lips love me.  I wish...  I wish, I wish, I wish...  I had 1 more hour with you.  I'd give my entire world for it.  I've given so many tears... I wish they amounted to something.  But you'll never read this with the pair of eyes you once had.  You'll cast off with disbelief and maintain your ground.  I never loved you... right?  And that's why you never loved me.  That's gotta be the answer.  Right? 

I don't know if I'll ever get the answers.  I don't know how much more of this, I can take.  Waiting... for you.

So until then, I'll keep writing...  and crying.

~John

My Vault

  Is essence, that's what it is.  It's just a storage unit, but still...  it houses my treasures.  I have to goto it today.  For the last year, I've avoided anything having to do with it, because it has everything from Kendall.  And as things progressively got worse and worse, I wanted to see it less and less.  A lot of things are from the move out of Dave's.  Which had a lot of her pictures, memorabilia, mother's things and a bunch more odds and ends.  Things that people would want to keep.  When it ended... which I don't know any other way to explain...  I felt responsible for trying to keep some integrity and do the right thing.  I was crazy over losing Kendall, especially the way I did... but thought we'd always remain somewhat close.  We always were tied to one another with the kids.

  Now they are gone and she is gone.  And I'm left with a unit full memories, I'm unsure if I could handle right now.  I just can't believe how this has all happened.  I can't believe I lost someone so important to me.  I still miss her so much.  And I wish I didn't.  I'm honestly, tired of crying.  I'm tired of questioning, was she my "one"?  Because, I knew the answer...  I knew I would love her and she would one day, stop loving me.  It was a fear.  And as, we grew together... that fear grew.  Losing her...  losing her and the kids.  Losing everything I loved.  I thought about it a few times.  If her and the kids were driving and would get into an accident.  I would call, just to know they were okay.  Or ask for updates, so I would know if something took longer than it should.  I knew, how it would feel... to lose my family.  But, I didn't know it would be like this...  I didn't know that it would be so much harder than  I ever imagined. 

  I never considered us soulmates.  She would say it all the time and I would believe it... but I could never say that I gave her my soul.  I sold my soul to have Kendall.  Someone who would brighten up every ounce in my day.  She was my greatest.  And so are the things she gave to me.  But, in the end... it would never be the thing I asked for.  She thought gifts were the way to my heart... but it was always the little things.  She bought me flowers a few times.  She'd do something special.  We'd spend our lives together and smile, while surrounded with the kids. 

  And all of these memories, sleep in that vault.  I haven't been able to keep a straight face with this letter.  I'm isolated, just so I can comfortably cry.  I felt the need yesterday in the car, just knowing that I'd have to go through clothes, pictures and memories.  The kids, already are so big.  They've grown so much... that I wonder... why am I still crying?  When will I stop?  I miss the kids...  I really miss my kids.

~John

 

So I punched him in his eye.

  He standing there.  We're arguing and she's packing things to take the kids away.  I can feel the emotions welling up inside of me.  He talks as if, he knows me... but all the things he's been told are basically lies.  Lies to change who I am and who he is.  A glorified hero.  A glorified desperate measure to get out of the life that was so hard.  She replaced me.  In all the areas that she could get you to replace me.  She doesn't love you anymore than she loved me.  You're just the next step.  A chapter... which, if you knew anything about her family... you'd know it's a short step.

  I cock back my arm.  I feel it so tense, like a paper could break it if the wind was strong enough.  I push it forward with all of my might.  I can feel the tears, waiting to come out the second there's contact with his eye and my fist.  Plow.  He's shook up.  Good.  That's how I've felt for the last 2 years of my life, while I watched this asshole take everything away from me.  He talked to her more than he should... she talked back, more than she should...  she couldn't just end it... leave me... be single.  She had to walk into another mans arms.  She's not as strong as I thought, but very weak.  Very incapable of doing it on her own.  No logical thought.  Just selfishness.  Forced the kids to move so far away.  Far from those that love them.  All for her selfishness.

  She's in shock.  I don't think she's ever seen me strike anyone like that.  Ever...  Never have I raised my fist to another human being in her presence...  not even her.  Sometimes, I should have...  but I've opened my mouth before and I ruined it for her in the process.  So, this time... I did it for me.  I told him the things I needed to tell him as he held his eye in disbelief.  "Those are my children.  I love them with all my heart.  Don't ever fucking forget it.  You can keep her... she's only ever done me wrong, while I loved her with all my heart."

  Yeah... so what.  It was only a dream.  A dream, I have never felt more alive from.  I woke up feeling so refreshed.  I literally jumped out of bed.  And that NEVER happens.  I feel great.  Not because I punched someone, even in my proposed dream.  But, that I stuck up for myself.  Which I wish I could have done in real life.  I was more in a state of shock when she left, the way she left.  It was like I never mattered.  And it's definitely like that now.  All those nicknames she's calling him, she called me.  All those things she tells him, she told me.  I still know her better than he does.  I still remember a million things about Kendall, though I wish I could flush them all down the toilet.  I just want to say, how hard it is to stop loving someone.  It's almost impossible.

  Small victory in my dream.  Thanks for giving me one...

~John

Too much sometimes...

  Nothing has been constant in my life for a while now.  It's been such a mess...  And I'm getting exhausted.  I still play back the entire situation, over and over in my mind.  I try to block it out, because of the mood it puts me into.  Sometimes, I still want to cry... sometimes I just want to be left alone.  I've stopped reaching to friends.  It's not gone.  I swallow hard and just tell myself to get through another day.

  I spent 6 years.  6 years, by your side every day.  And, waking up to another day not by your side is depressing.  I play back every moment together and regret little.  Baltimore wasn't easy on us, but never did I question you're love for me.  Especially not after NYC.  I felt closer to you.  We weren't relying on anyone... it was just us.  I never thought or knew you weren't in love with me anymore...  and I definitely had no idea about Will.

  I read the letter that night and just shook.  I couldn't handle it, finding out that you were loving someone else and I had no idea about it.  How could you not know, I loved you?  I was by your side, every step of the way. 

  It shocked me so painfully, I haven't snapped out of it.  I still wish you were with me.  I still miss you with every ounce of my soul.  I don't know if I could ever be with you again... but, I would have given anything to not have this happen and to still be by your side.  Pregnant... Married...  Were you over me that quickly?  Did I mean that little to you...  or did you honestly believe that you meant that little to me?

  So many questions.  So many things I wish I could say.  How, could you hurt me this way?  How can you hurt someone who loved you with every breathe...?

  I miss the kids.  I miss them so much, I get sick thinking about them.  How I can't hug them or be their "daddy".  I can't see my daughter on her first day of school... and unless I plan something special, I probably won't be there for my sons 3rd Birthday.  HOW?  How am I the one losing, when I've been morally right, this whole time.  I've reacted.  You left.  I reacted.  You took the kids.  I reacted.  You kept the kids from me.  I reacted.  You moved away.  I reacted.  You made all the decisions that went against every promise you made to me.  You've lied to people about me.  You've lied to yourself.  You turned me into someone else, just so you could hate me.  I never laid my hands on you in any manner that was abusive.  I loved you... why the hell would I do that?  Even after the times, you've stepped over the line.  When you would physically hurt me?  Punched me dead in the face and I did little.  I still remember that day.  You punched me.  I walked out.  By midnight that night, you were calling, crying and apologizing.  I loved you and almost instantly forgave you.  Sometimes, that was us.  We're both too much alike.  But, I would have never done this to you.  I always imagined you in my life, getting old with me.  You were my fate.

  Now, you're the only reason I cry.  You're the only reason, I feel empty, insecure, tired and worthless.  You're the reason, I have such heartache and pain.  You're the reason I have 200 memories, I wish I didn't have.  You're the reason I hold in, not saying "I love you" anymore, when I do.  You're the reason the kids are far away from their father...  missing him horribly.  Or can you not see that?

  I still... just don't know what to do.  It's so hard to see you.  To see pictures of you.  I opened a video game case and found a photo from "Believe It or Not".  We're both sitting on beams with hardhats and kissing.  I just fell to pieces.  I couldn't keep it together and cried for 1/2 an hour.  It wasn't even that long before you left me.  7 months and you were gone.  How?...  How??

  I never ask God for anything...  sometimes, I could completely careless about him as I assume he does to me.  But, if there's anything I would ask him...  it's that I can stop feeling this way.  To stop crying and wishing for something, that'll never happen, never come true.  To let go of this feeling that only I have ever had, since the first day I met you.  Since you gave birth to my daughter, as I watched her grow in your belly.  Since you gave birth to my son... and again, I watched him grow and was filled with so much joy.  I have the videos of them.  I have the pictures.  I have the clothes.  I have their life or what it once was.  I was a great father...  I know I was.

~John

I still cry.

  Amongst many of the feelings I have gone through in the last almost 2 years...  I am still lost.  I'm still in shock.  I still cry, dream and think every day of my life, about you.

  Tonight was triggered thanks to Marissa.  She posted a video of your birth with Will.  And I just cried.  It felt like, Johnathan or Kylie...  seeing those emotions and almost hearing your cries as you gave me my 2 kids.  Remembering that I have never left your side in almost 6 years.  I while, we fought, I never loved you a day less than the others.  That somewhere, along the way... you lost your love for me.

  I was where, Will was and is.  And I still don't know why.  Why have you called me names, taken my children and my life.  You took my family away and still, I don't have a reason why.  I've been part of your life, through your 21st birthday and both births of our kids.  I've worked, cooked and cleaned.  I have held your hand and been a shoulder for you to rest your head on.  I've never been dishonest.  I've never hurt you, more than you've hurt me.

  Why...  did I lose?  Why did the most important thing in my life, walk out the door without a second thought or chance to fix our life.  Why didn't you ever talk to me and tell me the problems and issues in our life or your fears?  Why did you just abandon me?

  Will I ever know?

  Will you ever know, how much I loved you?  How I've missed you...  How I wish some days you would just leave my thoughts?  How I wish you were more honest to me...  You hid the truth.  You lied.  You cheated.  You broke my soul.  You made me believe we were soulmates.  You made me trust you, while you slowly took my life from me.

  I still cry.  I still get so upset and crawl into a corner to be left alone.  I still go through the thousands of memories in my mind, where you are there smiling at me... wondering... when you'll be back.  Did you know this would happen to us?  Did you know everything that would happen when you left me?  Do you regret the decision you made?  Do you miss me?  Even a little?

Arg.  Fuck.  Goodnight.

~John

The bad...

  It's taken me a long time to accept what has gone on.  Things that I haven't seen or just surprised me.  I'm often reminded, why my life has become what it has become.  Someone else made you smile, in a time I made you cry.  What has followed has only been something that has made me cry everyday of my life in some degree or another.  I forgot, exactly what it is, I loved so much about you.  Why...?

Why?  Because, I've been accustomed to replacing that love, with things that have only hurt me.  The bad...  You're slutty ways.  I read it in your journal.  One, of which I hold in my possession, when you left this town with literally nothing but our children.  Journals that hold all the secrets of you.  You're words, spoken on paper, which I read, shortly after you left... as Dave and I were leaving the home you just about grew up in.  Grew up with me in.  You were messing around with other guys.  When you brought Will to my home, like it was no big deal.

Was I insecure?  Yes.  Absolutely.  You brought a man, that you claim to love over the internet and hardly in person... to the place where we raised our children.  Where you began initiating this "daddy" complex with.  The beginning of this journal. 

But, that's not the bad.  The bad, is how I have begun to see you.  I no longer see you in the same light as I once used to.  The same love and admiration, I spent years building for you... which wasn't the same in your eyes.  Somehow... just the opposite.  I begin to speak lately, as if you are the bain of my existance.  I didn't realize until today, that this is how I have begun to speak on your behalf  and in no way, do I like it.  I miss loving you...  but it seems the only way to get through this properly is to begin hating you.  To purposely forget, everything that was so fantastic about you.  This is in turn, exactly what you did to me.  You got to a point where you ridiculed me.  You laughed at me from the background as you took everything I loved away... because, well... you didn't love me anymore.  I have no other way.  You won't allow me to talk to you like an adult.  Like the friend you thought I would be when you ended this...  you won't give me an ounce of lee-way as you took everything from my life, including our kids... including Alora.  Which seems, that you cannot stop the way she sees me.  I am her father, blood or not... and it must burn you up inside to see that you still considers me as such.  In a time, when you constantly encouraged it to the point of belief.  In her eyes and in your own.  Does it bother you that I want a relationship with her?  That I loved to you to such a degree that, I took something that soley came from you and made it mine too...  I did raise her.  I did love her no different... no little, no more than my own.  I love her, like I love them.  She is mine... and the way she talks to me, even after 9 months of not talking to me has proven, I've made a place in her heart, much the same as I once made a place in your heart.

I speak the bad.  I talk about you in a way, I am in no way proud of... but ashamed.  Very.  How could I act this way, about someone I sadly... still love.  That I would drop my life for and accept in a moment... all of the inconsistencies as I once accepted you for.  You were in no way perfect...  and neither was I.  But, I still loved you with all my heart...  and this is the only way I can rid that idea.  Stuff it away and forget.  That's what you want... isn't it?

~John