Oh the Drama!

Why can't things just go on without conflict?  Seriously!

My stepdaughter's graduation is in a couple weeks.  We've been planning on going.  We wouldn't want to miss it!  My stepdaughter tells me not to bother.  I told my husband this morning that I got the feeling from that conversation that she didn't want us there.  He said that he thinks she just wants him there (never mind her four siblings or the stepmom who helped raise her and who she doesn't remember her not ever being there for her in her life).

Ouch.

I predict that if she gets the guts to do it, she'll not give us two tickets to her graduation ceremony. I  think she'll put her dad in a tough spot by only giving him one ticket, after we drive to their state, to either see her graduate without me or not allow her to manipulate him and not go. 

This is what years of manipulating and pressuring does to kids.  They get forced to choose.  They get forced to pick sides so they feel "safe" with the alienating parent.  They eventually start to believe the crap they're fed and turn on the other people in their lives who love them.

It makes me angry (at the ex mostly but at the kids sometimes too who are old enough to know better now) and I vent here where it's safe.  I never take it out on the kids or show them anything less than love but damn does it hurt.