I got myself hired into a customer service call center, and in spite of the graveyard shift, and the occasional irate customer, I am doing fine.

Finally, my ex-wife has ceased giving me the emotional stress by acting like I was the one who abandoned her and the kids. Au contraire, I continue handing out my salary for their needs, and I regularly take them out and have fun at the nearest arcade.

What matters most is that I still put faith in Our Sweet Lord that He will be the Greatest Parent for my Kids. That they will be safe in my absence, and when I have better lodgings and income, I will be able to take them in and let them stay as long as they want. Foremost in my mind is their education.

I have told you that it's either I perish spiritually, psychologically, and physically if I continue staying with my in-laws like an overstaying unwelcome guest, all in the name of love that my ex-wife seems does not know how to cultivate or to at least bolster me in my carrying of the burden, but she seems to be loath to show me support in front of her mother and relatives.

That's kind of funny, the person left behind cries tears of regret at the time when one leaves, not when they see that one is apparently wilting in their garden.

My health is rebounding, except for some occasional headaches, which come when I am thinking of the kids too much. Having time to pray and to visit the The Lord in church truly helps.

It's like He's telling me, you need not worry about separating, for you truly only belong to Me. I have written about this before, that Our Best Love should be to God, who made Us, to whom we owe our life. True, we love the person He gives us, but still, we should strive to distinguish the love we give our love ones, and the Love that We Should Give to God.

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I have called out to You, My Dearest Sweet Lord! And you have given me strength. You have made the sky blue and bright, and it gives me comfort. My Dear Jesus, My Lord, and My God, I will never deny You. You are my Life, my Love, my Strength. Without you, I will have no meaning, no direction in life.

My suffering, my pain, my loneliness, only makes me acknowledge that the True Comfort in this Life is You, that Only You can complete the life of Your Children, whom You Love So Much, so much that You died for us on the Cross. It makes perfect sense that like a Parent, you would sacrifice for Your Children. That You yourself would suffer for Your Children, so that We would be Safe Spiritually, for Our Lives are Born to Return to Our Heavenly Home someday. It is foolishness to deny You Adoration, Love, Attention, by putting the ephemeral, material, and perishable in the heart and mind rather than believing and dwelling on the Eternal, Loving, and Waiting Lord that is You.

I Love You, My Lord! I am glad that I have realized this in this life, I can never imagine my life, what it would be, had I not accepted what my conscience has been telling me ever since, that I belong to You, that I would return to You, and I will feel the Love that I miss so much in person.

I am feeling so much pain in me, and reading your messages have given me the much needed warmth, when my self was not so much as a flickering candle flame on a cold windy night.

You see, I lost my job at the office. My boss fired me for being distracted during the day. I'm waiting for my back pay.

I can't help but get so confused and disturbed with the most recent events that they just all decided to let me go.

My heart is wrenched when everytime I go to give my child support, my ex-wife carries with her my kids, and those short little hugs and kisses on my cheeks makes me want to just collapse on the mall floor and just bawl my heart out for making me experiencing this when in my youth I just saw such things on tv or just heard tell of it about a neighbor going through it. Now that I am in it, my mind and body is just getting weaker and weaker.

My baby son keeps asking when will I go home, a house where I am nothing but a caged bird while she and her relatives just milk me and walk all over me.

She had used my kid against me before, knowing I am very fond of my son. My son's voice and questioning look when they said goodbye lingered in my mind that I can't think straight anymore.

And then she has the gall to say she loves me, she cares for me, when she basically let her relatives mistreat me and treat me like a freeloader in the house where I spend a lot for their needs! It's too late to return when they all hate me now, as if they not like sadists with their in-law.

I don't understand. I risked myself for loving her when I moved in with her and them. How can she say and feel she loves me when she's having a lot of omissions, in our relationship? When she's ignoring the hardship that I'm going and she's not lifting a finger to comfort me, help me out, or even stand up to her relatives? She could have run away with me but she chose to bring us to her fold just so that she'd be faithful to the faith that denies Our Lord Jesus Christ?

I am so torn. I got a nightjob where I get to watch a warehouse. I don't much sleep during the day. I feel that I'm losing my confidence. My asthmma keeps going worse during the chill nights and the hot days. I cannot bring my children to live with me.

Despite of all this, the only thing that keeps me going is the hope that my sweet Lord Jesus Christ will see my fidelity to Him despite of all this pain and isolation from those I love, that He will save me for having returned to the Faith with Him in the Center, wwhen with them, He's just considered a prophet.

Vicky, Ron, and those who are reading this, please don't feel pity for me. I just need your prayers (Thank You!) and the knowledge that you, my bestfriends here, are all doing fine and are serving our Most High God and through this, you're gving light to your fellowman. I'll be fine. If I get enough sleep and my brain is not going through a spate of migraines maybe I can go the computer rental shop more often and visit you.

I just want a little bit of peace in my mind and I know God will grant me that soon enough.

My Love and Prayers to You always. If ever I won't be able to write here anymore, don't be sad. We'll meet each other in that Place where there is no more sadness or conflict or separation, and finally hug each other at last.

Peace and Love of Jesus Christ be with YOu,

Tom

Sometimes, you think that someone loves you unconditionally, entirely, and feels the same way for you as you do to him or her. What happens when all this time, the relationship you've been having was not founded on mutual sacrifice, concern, and exclusivity, but more on the decisions of persons other than those people who are supposed to be in love and would support each other emotionally and physically?

My heart is wrenched everytime I miss my kids. I can't see them anymore without being mocked by the people I thought have viewed me kindly.

My real situation is this. I have been living with my wife and her relatives for almost two years now, after getting married in October 2007. We had had a romance for 8 years before we finally hitched.

The reason why I had to share an abode with a family aside from mine was first, my wife chose to follow the wishes of her mother and aunts rather than help me set out on our own and support each other independent of her or my relatives. Second, I acquiesced because when we had our first kid, I really wanted to be a father to my son, and somehow, I overlooked the misery that would follow once I live with so many people in a house not my own. Third, at the time when I had no place to go, and I was living with my mother, I was so psychologically battered by my mother that I took my then girlfriend's offer to stay with them as a lesser evil to what would happen should I continue to stay with my mother. Fourth, due to my frail health, I am too poor to support myself, find a place, and feed my kids. I can't hold a high paying job. Yes, I am taking my Master's Degree but that is because of the generosity of my older sister. So I took the plunge, got married, and lived with my wife with our kids, her mother, her half-sisters, and her half-brother, in one two story house in the city.

I was doing well for quite a time but quite suddenly, I found the absurdity of my situation.

Her relatives scoffed at me. Either behind my back, or simply not treating me or communicating with me as an equal. I felt like some unwanted stray cat around them. Intuition usually tells you what is not said. This gave me additional stress on top of my health issues and fatigue from work.

On the other hand, I had been trying in vain to get my wife to help me with the expenses especially the kids are fast growing up, but she just let me reminders pass her hearing and just stays at home all day. I understand how taxing it is to take care of children, but they are well past the weaning age and her snobbish mom, can't she take care of them while both of us are working to make ends meet? So you see, all of them are aware how hard up I am trying to make a buck and they both act like I should bring home Pizza Hut or MacDonald's everytime I come home, or shell out bucks during someone's birthday, something with my salary can't support. They know I froth at the mouth whenever there's a strong odor at the house because of my asthma, but they seem to have iron lungs or noses because they just the garbage and used clothing stink, they just chat with neighbors and pick up each other's headlice.

I am shocked with myself later on for having put up with their lethargy and indolence while I was thinking I was doing this all for love for my wife and children. But, what did I do to deserve this? I gave my wife all my love, my money, my time, but all that happens is I work myself to death and I still don't have savings and I end up feeding the bunch of hangers-on in the house and my wife is doing nothing to help me or to even start moving out of the place. It's as if she wants to live with her relatives forever!

I fell disillusioned. I felt that my noble intentions were all for naught. I try to scold my kids but it was to no avail because my wife and mother-in-law just let them run wild all over the neighborhood. I've spoken with her to find a job and help me, she's even healthier and physically stronger than I, but, no, she'd rather stay home and play socialite.

I am devastated because it has been five months since I moved out. I have been drinking a lot. Yes I am praying, hoping I can get the answers from Him, but it seems, it is His Will that I do this my way. Sometimes no answer is the answer. I do it, I take responsibility for my actions. I know myself, I know what's best for me, I do what I had to do. But, sorrow, depression, prayer can only do so much. God takes away that sorrow, and my life becomes less real.

God gives you a trial you can always bear. Not the other way around.

So I wallow in my sorrow, in my desolation, amid some moments of happiness. I feel a great loss for my family. I had received a text message from my wife, and she said, she loves her mother. Short of saying, yeah, I can't go with you because I follow my mother more than you. So much about leaving family and being one with the spouse.

I am in denial sometimes, that everything's okay, that things will be fine, but, I know, the moment I moved out, thing's have started to change. Her family now hates me. My children barely know me at all. My wife is texting someone else and of course, has no good news for me of even considering working with me.

Is it His Will? I don't really know, someone please tell me. I love my kids so much, but I am only a frail human being hanging by a tread of morale and ephemeral physical strength that anymore stress from my wife's quarter will shut me down emotionally and physically for good.

I thought I could handle it, that I can just brush their behaviors aside and just enjoy my time with my kids and my wife, but, the burdens on my being there, they strike at my mental condition and my health, earlier on wracked by my own mother. Now, I have no where to go.

I am so unbearably sad I cry in subways, on the bus, inside my office cubicle. I call to Him and He gives me comfort. I ask for no miracles, not now. I ask myself, why do I have so much sadness in my life? Is it not enough that I have a sad childhood? Is it not enough that I have a droll high school? That my own college life lacks any romance? That my first wife made love with a neighbor on our own bed? What have I done to suffer so much while others get everything on a silver platter?

Forgive me for my outburst here. You are now my only friends now. The few that I have left laugh at me for being a fool.

One more thing that hurts me the most is that my wife would not go with me on account of her family's religion. I have grown up knowing Jesus Christ my Sweet Lord is God, but her family recognizes Christ as only a prophet and a man. I have shoved my Faith deep into me when I foolishly allowed myself to be baptized in their faith, but everytime they profess salvation to theirs and damnation to non-believers, my heart gets pressed like a prune. Everytime Christmas comes and I can't sing Silent Night or We Three Kings or Angels We Have Heard On High I feel my muscles go numb whenever I hear them sung by carolers or in the mall, or even at the office, while she and her relatives just deny Our Savior's Primacy. I have pretended for so long and now, even if I am not an avid churchgoer even during my conversion to theirs, I cherish the thought that God came down to Us to Save Us From Ourselves. I can't just stay in their church anymore to hear their ministers predict perdition for the rest of humanity while they the elect few will reap the eternal reward. No, not for the sake of my sweet and kind Dad who died smoking and drinking while withstanding my mother's harsh words, no, I would not leave the Faith in Jesus.

How I wish things were better, but they ain't. Give me time to figure this out and live with the consequences. Your counsel, my dear friends, will be most welcome. I did love her, my wife, but eventually, I ceased to be a Man for her, and wound up as just a provider, a sickly, poor provider at that, scoffed, oppressed, insulted, browbeaten, and deprived by her relatives, abetted by her own inaction and lack of initiative. I tried to hold on as long as I can, but my health could not. Followed by my intellect and emotions.

What shall I do now?

Before anything else, let me wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy and Blessed New Year!

I am very happy with seeing my son growing so beautifully before my eyes. He is always hugging me and kissing me, always calling me that I am praying that God watch over him always, guard him against all harm, and keep him safe. May he grow into a loving and responsible man who loves You O Lord Almighty God.

I am grateful that my supervisor had given me a new lease in life before serving me a termination notice, after having finished my reports on time and helped up the statistics. Otherwise it would have been a jobless holidays for me. I was crying in my cubicle when my boss dropped by and said, "My, you get to stay with us a bit more after all..." Thank You Dear Lord for giving me the strength despite my chronic fatigue and mental exhaustion.

I have paid off most of my debts to people, and there are no balances in the cards to worry about. Thank God for the strength to work all those hours and extra jobs to feed my family and to pay those obligations. Looks like I would be starting on a clean slate this coming year and hopefully, we will be able to save for our kids' future.

Our Pastor has told us, His Goodness we could not recompense by any of our possessions, but Our Minds can be connected to His Loving Heart, and that is more than enough!

Thanking the Lord is all we could do, for we can never pay Him back, His Goodness and Mercy for Us is beyond any accounting. Communicating with Him by praise and gratitude, remembering His Eternal Goodness, makes Us in oneness with Him, much more those who don't care about Him at all, although they can't do anything with the Love that still benefits them. It's like saying We're Here Dear Lord! We're here for you! We want to be with You! And that, like a Father seeing a Toddler running to him and calling Him Daddy, is the most undescribable but most exquisite feeling in the whole Universe.

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU O DEAR MOST BEAUTIFUL AND LOVING LORD! MY GOD EVER SINCE THE BEGINNING, I OFFER MY LIFE TO YOU AND TO YOUR CHILDREN! MY YOUR ALMIGHTY NAME BE PRAISED AND HONOR AND I AM SO VERY GRATEFUL FOR A NEW YEAR OF LOVING YOU AND PRAISING YOU ONCE MORE!

Take Care EVeryone! See you Guys Again!

We never fail to notice that Death, especially this coming Halloween, would not come with golden wings or that shining countenance, but with a leering face of a skull clad in a formless black hooded cloak. I recall, throughout the ages, from Durer's woodcarvings, the Bible's Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, or even the gorgeous pale faces of vampires and other mythical figures of death seem to instill in the mind the darkness and unpleasantness of dying. It ought to fit, since we, as material beings, in spite of our Spiritual Progeny, have in us ingrained the emotion to hold on to the material world, to those people and things we hold dear, and the sheer terror of the unknown beyond the last breath. Thus, death has come to appear as something so odious and has nothing of the human in it.

We can recall that in the Bible, when the Apostles were filled with intense fear during the storm that was endangering their hapless boat, Our Lord Jesus Christ admonished them, "Ye of little Faith!" It is a tall order to have that calmness of spirit in the face of death, but dying is in itself a test of faith. For those who believe in Jesus Christ as the Way, the Truth, and the Life, we should see our passing as the way to a Spiritual Joy of Being Reunited with Our God, Our Own Creator, the God so full of Love that He so waits for Us in His Kingdom, whence all things came.

That's why there are many instances in the Bible that death comes through an Angel. An Angel is not only a messenger but as the guide that would bring our souls to the Father. We may not understand the time and the reason for the time being up, or even the circumstances allowed for it to happen, but one thing is sure, it is time to leave the material world, IT IS TIME TO COME HOME.