Well it's another weekend of Dave being miserable, and yelling at everyone. I am getting so sick of listening to him rant and rave, from the minute I open my eyes Saturday morning, till I close my eyes to sleep Sunday night. I spend my whole weekend trying to stop him from yelling, and berating the kids, and I end up having him blame me for making him act that way, because I'm always bitching at him. I can't win. He can't see or won't see what he is doing to us, so he just get's madder at me, because as far as he is concerned, I'm bitching at him for no reason at all. I wish he would get some counselling, I can't do it, I'm to close to the problem. Yet he expects me to just magically fix his problems. When I do try to give him advice, he always gets mad at me. So there is no point. I have said the same things to him for ten years, and he just wont listen. His first wife left him, and a girlfriend he had after that left him because of his mood swings and instability. He just doesn't see that he pushes people away because of the poor way he treats people. He pulls this poor me, everyone hates me crap, and yet he acts like a know it all, and makes people feel really uncomfortable around him. He talks down to people, and then expects them to like him. He has no friends and I have lost friends because of him. He is pushing his family away now too. But he just doesn't care, he would rather loose his whole family than admit that he is wrong. I can't help him and I can't protect my kids from his abuse. He just wont see what he is doing to everyone.  Now of course he just comes back in and starts getting nasty with me because I'm bad mouthing him in my journal. It doesn't occur to him that I'm venting and this really is the only place that I can talk about my problems. When I'm at the clinic I listen to other peoples problems, when I'm at the doctors, he's usually to busy to talk about anything to detailed, and trying to talk to Dave is just impossible. If its not about him it's not interesting enough to pay attention to. He just went out and bought a laptop and just like the Christmas he bought the palm, I was suppose to get a present from him and of course by then we didn't have enough money toby me anything. So far he has bought an mp3 discman that was suppose to be for me, but he used it all the time. Just before that was his palm, then he buys a digital camera that I could not figure out. Now the laptop. He was suppose to give me the palm but then realized that he still needs it for his phone numbers. Of course Amanda has a computer in her room, and an mp3 player, and a dvd player and a TV. My son Dylan has none of those things. Amanda gets new cd's made for her all the time and Dylan has to beg for weeks to get just one. Zayne is two young to care about any of those things, but he is starting to see that Amanda is the golden child. She has Dave wrapped. He will do anything she asks, he lets her get away with everything, and he lets her talk to him like he's a moron, and he just takes it. I feel like I am in competition with my step daughter for my husbands affection.   I  hate this, I hate living in this mess. I just wish Dave would be happy, and playful like he used to be. I love him more than I have ever loved anyone, and yet he can make me so unhappy. I want us to be happy and have fun on the weekends. He thinks that I like being angry at him and being unhappy. He is so twisted.

-Debbie