Feeling better

My LP ended up being the usual 13 days, so I started off the new year the way I really didn't want to, with my period. Oh well. That makes today CD11 and I'm not expecting to ovulate for at least another 10 days - but sooner than that would be nice! I've long accepted that I'm not pregnant, although it was incredibly disappointing at the time because all the signs looked good. It's just one of those things, I guess. Better luck next time :-)

Life here is back to normal. Our foster pug, Max, was adopted on Friday. I had a really hard time letting him go, I really bonded with him. It just about broke my heart when we left his new home, I cried all the way home and still get teary-eyed when I think about him. I hope his new home works out for him, though. I want him to be happy. While he was with us, he lost about 4 pounds I think - he weighed 35 pounds when he came to us, and around 31 when he was adopted. Still very heavy, but it's a massive improvement. He is a big pug, tall and broad - it's not all fat!

We went to collect our new foster, Tien Ping, a few hours after Max left us. He's 6 and such a cutie! We collected him from his original owner, who said she didn't have enough time for him anymore and he'd been living mostly outdoors. Poor little guy. He's thrilled to be at our house, he hasn't been sad at all. Within an hour of getting here, he was playing with our pug girls. I think he's just so happy to be indoors and part of the family. I'm sure he'll be adopted quickly, he's just lovely.

My dad left last Tuesday, which honestly was a huge relief. Eleven days of not very much to say or do, plus him yelling at me in the street because I dared to stand up for myself re: my bitch of a MIL, and I was completely done. I was actually done after 5 days, when we had that argument.

My relationship with my dad isn't the greatest, and since I moved to the US it's deteriorated somewhat. When I lived in the UK, he would piss me off on a pretty regular basis, but the way he's acted since I moved has been worse. Before I moved, he actually asked me to change our wedding date because he hadn't booked the time off work when we'd given him the date and couldn't get the vacation time when he actually attempted to. We flat out refused - who really expects someone to change their wedding date for them? Especially when it's virtually paid for as well. Come on! Then there was the whole BS while he was visiting last time, which was a shitty 10 days because of his behavior. Then he never bothered to contact me, which was annoying. I think what was worse was his "I miss you so much" crap that he'd come out with after a whole month of no contact (because I'd stopped making the effort since he couldn't bring himself to pick up the damn phone himself). Actions speak louder than words!

The way he acted since he booked his trip, 3 months before he arrived, was terrible. Virtually every time I spoke to him (on Skype) he'd do his very best to piss me off. His behavior, even by email, was horrible. His shitty attitude and insults got old very quickly, and I shot him down every time he came out with his crap, but it didn't stop him from doing it again. I realize now that I should have given him an ultimatum - treat me with some respect or you will not stay in our house. I totally should have done that; I wish I had. Instead I seemingly allowed him to get away with his behavior, because although I voiced my displeasure over his demands and the insults he would "jokingly" deliver (not joking really though, I'm sure) I never gave him any real consequences for what he was doing. I should have hung up on him, or told him he's not staying with us with that attitude. Better yet, I should have told him I wasn't going to talk to him for 4 weeks (we usually talk on Skype once a week) and that if, after that, his behavior hadn't improved, he could cancel his vacation.

There was a consequence for his behavior while he was here, though - as a result of the way he acted prior to his visit, and while here, we barely made any effort to make sure he had a nice vacation. When I say that, I mean we didn't take him on loads of sightseeing trips and we didn't bend over backward for him. We didn't take him out for dinner or anything like that. The effort we made was in providing a comfortable room and feeding him for 11 days. I let him use my laptop virtually every day to Skype with his wife, I rented a couple of DVDs for him to watch and downloaded movies that we have available through Dish (only free ones, not pay per view!). I even did his damn laundry for him, twice. More fool me. It took him 2 days to say thanks. It sure as hell didn't take him that long to see what I'd foolishly done for him - I'd folded his jeans, boxers and sweaters, hung his shirts up (I didn't iron them, screw that) and paired his socks up - they were all on the bed in neat piles. So yeah, it pissed me off that he couldn't even thank me in a timely manner for doing all of that. He's the one who made the conscious decision to bring carry-on only, when he could have (and should have) brought a suitcase and plenty of clothes. He's also the one who told me I was "too lazy" and should "want" to do his laundry all the time while he was visiting because I hadn't seen him in a year. Yeah... Why the hell did I allow his rude self to stay here?!?!

There must be something wrong with me because despite the shitty way he treats me, I still want to please him. I hate that, it really needs to change.

The big argument we had was my breaking point, I actually wanted to kick him out after that. My FIL was coming over for dinner that night, without MIL since we're still not speaking to her after she tried to bully us into her 'religion' (cult!) in September. Before my dad came here, he asked me a couple of times if he would be seeing my in-laws. He knows the situation with MIL - and I told him he'd most likely see FIL and BIL but not MIL. A few days after he got here, he brought it up again with me and my hubby - he said he felt 'awkward' not going to see MIL and that she would think he was being rude by not visiting her. We both agreed that given the situation, there was no way that he could go and see her without causing us more problems. Remember, he refused to hire a car. We weren't about to drive him over there, or even call to arrange anything for him - we're not speaking to the woman! What's so difficult to understand about that?! We figured that was the end of it, but hubby and I discussed it again privately and still both agreed that it wasn't going to work having my dad go visit her.

Two days later I was walking the dogs with my dad and I mentioned that FIL would be arriving at 5.30. Well, he took that opportunity to lay into me because it's so 'awkward' for him not seeing MIL. I reminded him that we'd discussed it already and it wasn't up for discussion. He started shouting at me in the street. I had to tell him not to shout at me. Within a couple of minutes he was shouting again and I had to tell him to stop for the second time. His favorite thing to say to me, whenever I disagree with him, is that I'm "being ridiculous", so of course that was his response this time too. I told him that just because he was here, it didn't mean anything had changed with the MIL situation - we would see her when we were ready to, not because he was pushing for it. He kept going on about what my MIL might think of him if he didn't see her, so my response was "Don't you care that you're upsetting me and my hubby by bringing this up repeatedly? It's an awkward situation to begin with!". He got all defensive, saying "Fine, I won't see her!". I told him he could walk himself over there right now - of course he didn't. He would never bother to initiate a meeting with her himself, he fully expected us to just say "Oh, well if you feel awkward about the situation, we can't possibly allow that! Let me pick up the phone and call her right now, we're being so silly to not want to see someone who's been a total bitch to us aren't we?!"

For the record, he's only met MIL twice, a year ago, for about 2-3 hours each time. They haven't been in touch since. It's not like they're best friends or anything! I doubt she'd even give a crap if he didn't visit her! And since she's fully aware of the situation, she most likely wasn't expecting to see him anyway. Don't get me wrong, I'm not expecting people to take our side, but they should at least respect our position and shut up about it; especially if they're staying in our house and eating our food!

He also came out with this gem: "If she died tomorrow, you'd be sorry". I replied, "So just because anybody can die at anytime, that means we have to let everyone treat us like shit? I don't think so!"

I also asked (politely) that he not bring up the subject to FIL, and he flew off the handle again, saying he can say whatever he wants. Um, as a guest in our house, I really think you should be doing your best not to piss us off even more than you have already. Seriously. What kind of houseguest would even argue about this in the first place?

I challenged him to bring the whole thing up with my hubby again - and he didn't have anything to say to that. I told him he was undermining me/us by continuing to bring this up, and he said "I've only brought it up twice!" - "Twice too many," I replied. I hate the way he waits until he gets me on my own and then treats me like crap. He wouldn't dare yell at me with my hubby in the house, so he waited until we were walking the dogs. What a fucking coward, seriously! He had to ambush me when I was alone.

Five minutes after we got back to the house, and I'd told my hubby everything, my dad was asking "What's wrong?" - as if he didn't know. Oh, I guess I'm supposed to just forget all that BS! Sorry, not going to happen. I said "Nothing," in such a way that it was very obvious that I was pissed off with him. I know that's kind of passive aggressive, but if I'd said "Gee, I don't know, maybe I don't appreciate being yelled at in the street like a naughty child!" he'd have said I was "being ridiculous" and WW3 would have ensued. Maybe I should have said that, and then kicked him out when he spouted more crap. My hubby looked up hotels right after I told him what went down on the walk, too. Anyway I barely spoke to him for the rest of the day, which was awkward because I acted completely normal with FIL and my hubby but pretty much ignored my dad. I was just seething at him - what an asshole.

So after that, I spent the rest of his trip counting down the days until he was leaving. He kept treating me like some kind of maid, asking for drinks while I was clearly busy making dinner etc. I had to clean up after him all the time because he has no respect for me whatsoever. It didn't matter that I'd just finished cleaning the kitchen, he'd come and get something to eat and make a huge mess which he wouldn't even attempt to clean up. I'd love to see how he'd react to someone acting that way in his house...

He also kept making comments like "I won't be visiting again for another 3-4 years because I can't afford it" (my thoughts? Good! And, he totally could afford it if he didn't insist on paying so much extra for unnecessary travel upgrades). Another of my favorites was: "The next time I see you will be when you come to England. I'll probably be waiting 20 years" (which he said at least twice). I wish I'd said, "No, we'll be visiting England sooner than 20 years from now, but if you keep acting this way we sure as hell won't be visiting you!" Why is it that you think of the best comebacks after the fact?!

So, I guess since it's Wednesday I'm supposed to be talking with him on Skype in, oh, about 2 hours. Great... I'm very tempted to just not log in, honestly. But then, on the other hand I kind of want to because I'm pretty sure that now he's had a whole week to discuss his vacation with his wife, he'll probably let me know how awful we are for not doing more for him. You know, because he always has this "woe is me" attitude and he never takes responsibility for his actions. No matter what he does, he always ends up turning it around on me to try and make out that I'm the one at fault. His wife will no doubt have been stirring things up, saying that it's awful that he spent all that money and flew over 5000 miles only to have us not bend to his every whim. That's how she is - she loves to stir things, especially when it involves me. She's always had a problem with me, for the last 15 years since they got together; he's just too blind to see it. Anyway, I'm kind of hoping he does say something bad because I will have a good excuse to lay into him if he does. I know that probably sounds bad, but it's the truth. He was such a pain in the ass and that argument just took the piss. I'm done with the way he treats me, honestly.