Trying to balance

I am doing the best I can.  I am trying to balance work, being a mom and being a woman.

I spent the first 20 yrs of my life mostly unhappy & turned to drugs & alcohol.  I spent the next 20 yrs married & raising kids, a lot of that happy but the last 7 yrs not happily married.  Sort of dying inside. Living life for my children, who I love more than life itself.  But they are growing up.  They have lives.  Early this year I spent so much time in bed being depressed and alone, while they were out having fun.

Then my step dad died.  That was like a huge jolt.  LIFE IS SHORT.  We need to LIVE LIFE NOW WHILE WE CAN!!  NOW I have a new chapter to start writing.  Discovering who Demery is.  I felt like I couldn't change or grow for years.  That I was stuck being who I was for so long.  Now I feel like I have the chance to break out of that comfort zone.  To meet new people, to have fun, to break out of being the shy person that I have hated for so long.  I am not just a mom, I am a woman too.  Doing dancing on Thursdays literally has made me feel like I am alive again.  I wake up Thursdays with a smile on my face and the greatest mood in the world.  If there is a band I like on Saturdays, I go then too. It is keeping me sane.

My children are upset.  They think I am abandoning them.  I am selfish and irresponsible.  That I am making them ill with stress.  They don't like me leaving at 8:30 at night but to me, it is after we have had dinner together.  We often watch a show together.  I will help with homework if needed.  WE SPEND TIME TOGETHER.  Usually at the time I leave, everyone is in their own rooms.  What does it matter if I am sitting in my own room being lonely, or if I leave to go have fun and reenergize myself?  What if I am hanging by a thread and leaving for awhile is the only thing holding me together?  I have tried sssssssoooooooo hard to explain this to them.  Do you know how much better my body has felt since I started dancing??

Last night it was like world war III in our house between my eldest and me while the younger sat there crying her heart out and rocking back and forth, refusing to talk. She needs to talk and she won't.  When she finally said something, she said she was conflicted because she sees both sides, but she wouldn't expand. 

They both were gone all day yesterday, doing something they enjoyed.  I sat at home all day, by myself.  Alone.  At around 3, I got invited to go somewhere at 8:30. I was very happy and looking very much forward to it.  The arguing started at 8.  I had to cancel my plans.  We were done about 9:00 and I got to go back to my room.  Alone.  Why can they do what they want, and have fun but mom is not allowed to?  I went back to my eldest and asked her that and she wanted to know why I was trying to make her feel guilty.  I said that I wasn't, I just wanted to know what her thinking was.  She didn't really have an answer.

I have a friend they are very close that offered to talk to them and explain what she went through when she got divorced.  She needed to go out a little and discover herself.  They lover her to death.  The eldest is refusing to have anything to do with talking to her about this. 

I just don't know what to do.  If I keep going out, it hurts them.  If I stay home, I will be resentful, and dead inside.  I feel dead today. Well, dead but about ready to explode with tears.