Resuming Hostilities with The Bitch.

We are here, together, in a beautiful Bed and Breakfast called Bella's Country Place in Narrogin.  Our hosts, Lizette and Faan, are a delightful South African couple who are restoring the old hostel annexe that used to house students from Narrogin Senior High School. We have the B&B to ourselves, which is an added bonus.

We have had a lovely day. After having a full thirty-six hours of rest and relaxation at the House that Rocks, we were ready to tackle the Dryandra Art, Food and Wine Trail over this Mothers' Day weekend.The outback trip, albeit exciting and exhilarating, was too much moving and stopping and packing and unpacking. And neither of our anxiety levels seemed to reduce as we'd hoped.

Hence, my hopes for Michael reducing his puffing of the evil smokes didn't eventuate. In fact, he was gradually smoking more. I tried bargaining with him, weedling with him, appealing to his better nature and logically pointing out the bleeding obvious. None of these tactics worked.

Last night was pretty horrible for us all. The Bitch is back with all her conniving, destructive, divisive forces. She has Michael by the short and curlies. He knows this, he knows I know this, but his addiction has become so intense again (why?) that he appears unable to fight her. A confrontation between The Bitch, him and me ended in tears. Not theirs.

So I have decided a different tack. I will fight The Bitch and I will fight her with every weapon in my arsenal. I will not directly cause Michael grief, but neither am I going to make life comfortable for him.

He has command of the fags, but I do not wish to see them. He can smoke away from me and not kiss or cuddle me until he doesn't smell like a bushfire. He is going to help more around the house. If he chooses to smoke, then he's obviously fit enough to help me, regularly, with mundane chores like washing dishes and cooking and putting away his clothes for me.

Not to mention, it is so not my fault he didn't pack a jacket to come away this weekend. He is a big boy and he has to smoke outside because he has to smoke,,, I told him he couldn't borrow my cardigan but he did so. This is not going to happen again. I think he may come to realise that although I adore the ground he walks on, his relationship with The Bitch is his alone and I will not condone it.

In the meantime, I still love him more than my life. As ever.

The enemy

His justification

My response

Please, Michael, be mine instead.