I am very sorry to hear about your mom - but now she is in peace How are you taking everything? OK I hope. The diuertics Yes it did help me, at first I tool them every day, Now (2 years later) I only take them when I am swollen. You can tell if you take your shin & press on it with a couple fingers ( right next to the bone, in the middle) hold it for a couple seconds, let go and if there is a dent & it takes a couple seconds to level off. You have allot of water in you system, take your pills. When I was prescribed the water pill (Bumetanine 1mg), the doctor also prescibed a pill that acts a loop to keep my potassium level up(water pills can lower your potassium) This pill was called Spironolactone 50mg. So I was told to take them together. The fruit is very good & don't worry if this is all you can eat, you body will tell you when you need something else. (sometimes this is all I eat) The Lactalose- Yes it is BAD it make me sick too! this is a laxative, but it also works with to fight the ammonia in the blood (which can cause memory loss) I never did take it very much but I was prescribed a power drink (Cholestyramine 4mg Powder)Two timea a day & it helps me a lot better. Constipation- Yes you have to always stay on top of that!! you are suppost to have 3 or 4 lose bowel movements a day. If I get constipated The bile backs up into my blood & causes me to itch, BAD! I bleed from these lestions on my skin. Its really bad I had to take light treatments 3 time a week with UVB rays, This did help. The AC - this is normal I did the same thing! Hes very sick. Never thinks about drinking again - this is great so if you have to deal with his smoking so be it , One thing at a time. When I ws in the hospital they told my mother I was not going to make it though the night, but then I did, but it seems like I have such a different out look on things, and I too said I would never drink again. And I still say that, matter of fact, I do not talerate drunks!! ANyway I started smoking too, but now I am thinking that I am going to quite because I am in tune with my body, and smoking is only hurting it, PLUS I just found out it is a big factor on liver cirrohsis. and I think to myself if I stopped drinking over night I can stop smoking too! What are some of the meds he takes? I have read & I take Ursodiol/Actigal 300mg 3x a day. this is a galstone med, but I have read a lot of people say this has helped there itching a lot. Night walking - I do the same thing & I eat most then too. They gave me sleeping pills. The thrush mouth, I get this every time I eat something that is not good for me. Recipes - Yes I will type some and send them. should I type them in this or e-mail them to you? OH! what is DB? What is your bothers name & how old is he? if you want you can let him ask me some stuff that is bothering him. that helps me a lot when I can talk to other people with the same. Can he use a computer? Take care, talk to you soon

My parents were married for 25 yrs when they divorced. Their marriage didn't come first at all. I don't know that even us kids came first...LOL. My mother has not re-married, but my father has. I have been on both sides of the fence with step-families. I was an adult when my father remarried. I have taken my approach with my SS's from what I have learned as a child of divorce, and from the mistakes his wife has made. 1. The marriage to my DH is of equal importance as his children. 2. The children need one on one time with their father regardless of how good our relationship is as a family. Whether intact or not, children need one on one time with each parent. 3. If anything were to happen to my DH, the chilren will recieve all monies from his life insurance policy, any items of his that they want, etc. It has been made clear to me and my siblings that we are not welcome to a personal relationship with our father. We are allowed to have one with him AND his wife (which is fine, but sometimes you need one on one with your parents) When I got married the first time, my father was dating his now wife. He brought her to my wedding. That was the first time I met her. They had come from out of state (about 1,000 miles) to our wedding. I welcomed her openly. She was awful. Very rude to my brothers, my mother, and disrespectful to my grandparents. She made it clear that she didn't feel that I was old enough to get married, and that she would never allow her daughter (same age as me) to get married. (I was young...21) Six months later, her daughter married a meth addict. Nice.... Anyway, over the years she's pulled some pretty crazy stuff. Alienating one of my brothers totally, and pi$$ing of the rest of us. Here's the thing. I still invite her to all family functions becuase she's my fathers wife. I remarried a while back, and she was invited to the wedding, and she sat with my in-laws, etc. I would never dream of treating her with any disrespect. I don't have to like what she does, but she is my father's wife, and that is the choice he made. My relationship with my father isn't what it use to be, and that's pretty sad, but that is his choice. I love him regardless. So, understanding both side of things, my goal is to foster a positive, fulfulling relationship between my DH and SS's. They all deserve it. What's funny, is that my DH would never allow me (or anyone else for that matter) to come between him and his kids. Nor would he allow my SS's to be disrespectful to me. I've been lucky, my SS's are very good to me. I don't know what I'd do if they weren't. I know I'd be crushed. I just don't think it's ever OK to exclude a bio OR step parent. When my SS had his 12th b-day party, he was mad at his mother still (he had moved in with us a yr before)and I told him "you invite your Mom, or no party...period". He got the message. We're teaching him tolerance. It can go a long way, just like manners.

I completely understand your jealousy with bm now being involved and the kids acting like bm was never gone. My skids bm has been in and out of their lives for years and each time she called or saw them they acted like she was so wonderful and was mom of the year. Nevermind that it would be months till the next call....or that her boyfriend would be drunk the whole time the kids were there...or that bm would just sit them in front of the tv all day and the kids heard "noises" coming from bm's room during the day when the door was closed (afternoon quickie perhaps??). Anyways it would upset me so much down deep to hear them say anything good about her because all I could think about was the bad!! And how much time and energy I was putting forth to do the motherly things she did not do. It just about killed me for her to get any credit! There is no easy was to deal with those feelings. You just have to let them go somehow. Realize that the kids love you both. And she gets it easier because she is the bm....she has their unconditional love. And they will put the absent parent on a pedestal and hang on every good thing that parent does. But when they are grown they will have so many more memories with you and remember all the things you did for them. When they have their own kids they will remember talks you had with them and things you did. As for her babying them, well you can't change it. Just keep on with your normal routines at home and they will soon see that they can do XYZ at their moms house and they have to do XYZ when they are at home. But look at the bright side. They are getting to see their sober mom and have a relationship with her, which is better for them in the long run that having her absent and them blaming themselves for it. And if she spends the whole day playing with them be greatful....she could be spending the whole day sleeping and letting them do god knows what! OR she could be having boyfriends over all day.

Ashleys X can dethrown my ex who certainly earned father of the year in 2007. I don't want to hijack your post, just share with you my similar experience... When I was 8 months pregnant with my son, his dad quit his job because they wouldn't give him e/o weekend off for his visitation with his then 3 yr old daughter. He didn't work for the next three years. He was a SAHD to our son..Really he had a 3yr vacation to smoke pot and play video games--After 3 years I'd had enough and left. He claimed he couldn't afford to stay and would have to move cross country to live with his parents and of course... I was the worst person in the world for taking his son away from him. So, figuring I'd been supporting us all for 3 years anyway I didn't need him to pay child support. I took the state minimum $25 mo told him to get a job, get on his feet here, and we could reevaluate in 2 years. For 3 years all I heard was how poor he was, how he couldn't afford anything when I took him back to court I found in 2006 he made $47,000 And paid $300 in support-for the whole year! All the while sending my son home in rags that were too small and keeping the clothes he arrived in to refresh his wardrobe there. Sorry, I'm a little off track here..when it came time for modification he gave the first judge a sob story about how he didn't have time to fill out any of the paperwork he'd gotten. He had the same 20 days I did but whatever the judge gave him an extension-but my ex wasn't available to come to court one month later- because he would be on vacation with the kids out of state so the judge gave him two months :) I was hot, but to pacify me the judge ordered he pay $100 for each of those months. DCS distributed it to his daughter-whatever. So 2 months later we show up in court again the judge orders him to pay around $500 and he starts running his mouth about his other children he pays support for....His 18 year old son who he no longers owes support to, and the daughter that he pays $56 month for!!!The judge didn't find that any reason to discount his support to this child so he started complaining about childcare telling the judge that he wants receipts for my daycare expenses because I leave our son with my then 12 yo daughter totally implying that I'm a bad mom. WHAT AN IDIOT!!! Child support and Daycare are two seperate issues here. In the three years we were separated I never asked him for a dime for our son for anything, not daycare, a pair of shoes, not a cough drop and for him to try to smear me infront of a judge got me so angry when the judge ordered $465 for support the state's attorney recommended an incremental increase so I'd get 1/2 for 3 months before I got a full month and I said NO and asked the judge to say NO-she did, then she ordered he pay that full amount back to the day he didn't have his paperwork ready. Then I went home and gathered all my daycare receipts and mailed them in for my 58% reimbursement, and recently DS had an ear infection requiring drops that were not covered by insurance- the cost $73. You bet I sent that receipt to DCS too. Sometimes I feel a little guilty about what I get from him now -- then I remember how hard it was for me all that time on my own, that our son wasn't worth 1% of his 2006 income and I think of him rambling on in court and I feel just fine. And my X has not once since then whined about being poor. I know it sucks to do with less for now, especially in these hard times and I'm sorry. Hopefully in a couple years he'll have a better job and you can modify and he will pay more-in my state it costs more to raise a 12yr. and support is greater.