hoping it's enough, knowing it's not and praying like hell that it all works out

Life is hard, now I know, no one said it would be easy. I hear my child downstairs crying this morning and I ask him what is wrong. I know what is wrong. Stress has engulfed our lives and he's just a mixed up nine year old trying to sort through the wave of crap that has consumed us and I feel like a horrible Mother for not having the bandaid fix to make it all better instantly. I fight so hard to hide my hurt and despair for their sakes and I try to stay positive and have faith in the fact that doing good and putting good out there will yeild good results, but I am reminded quite often that no good deed goes unpunished.How do you look into your crying child's eyes, when all you have to offer is tired hurt eyes looking back at him telling him that you are doing the best that you can (hoping it's enough, knowing it's not and praying like hell that it all works out in the longrun).Divorce is hard. Even harder when your spouse was an abuser. Harder still when he makes it his mission to retain a hold on your life and make your situation as desperate as possible. I am fighting to flee the reach of his grasp and get back to a place where even if it is terrible to start over with nothing... at least it is a start. I am fighting to get back home, with no home even, just to put us in the center of friendly faces and leave behind the mountain of despair that he comfortably hangs over our shoulders.I try to look at things from his side, maybe I am a fool. I try to make some sense of the things that he is doing and the things that have transpired. I guess I think some how that if I can wrap my mind around it that I will be able to anticipate what is going to happen next... as you can imagine I am not having much luck anticipating the next blow. I feel much times like I am fighting a losing battle. I feel like a horrible Mother.. inadequate if you will and looking at their faces a million thoughts rush my mind about the up coming holidays and how empty and different they will be for us this year.I wish I could fast forward and see that it all turns out okay and hold that thought firmly in my mind. I wish that I could be stronger and that I had anyone that I could rely on to get us through.It's hard enough being a kid and how unfair it seems to me that they have to go through any of this. I have people (DV advocates) telling me that it is not my fault and I didn't ask for this, but I can't help feeling sometimes that I have no one to blame but myself. Poor choices have seemingly been my forte consistently over time. Equally as many people that are there to tell me wonderful things there are people  a plently that are none too hesitant to blame me for all of this. My husband's family, and my children's family on their father's side blame me totally. I should have never left ohio. I should have never gotten married. I should have suffered silently with our abuser and I wouldn't be in the mess I am in now. They are right, but then we might not be alive either and that's the hard cold reality of it. The life we are living now is no life.. well I can't really argue that logic; but I am trying to have hope.Words are powerful weapons. They stick with you. It's a kind of soul burn that is not so easliy healed. I've been a victim of words and unhealthy situations almost my entire life. I watched my Mother be abused and I always thought that was ending with me and I would not live the life my Mother had, but like her in so many ways I continually find myself in those shoes and with less grace I might add. I don't want that for my children. More than anything I want to take the necessary steps to prevent them from experiencing the hurt and disgrace that I know all to well. I want them to be empowered to find the happy healthy relationships that I have found myself searching for too many times and to be so strong in their conviction and values that they will never find themselves settling for anything less.I held my oldest son for about an hour this morning as he wept in my arms. Afraid to tell me that he was worried about losing things that mean something to him. Afraid to tell me that he's scared about facing the unknown. Frightened to share that change is something he is not comfortable with. He's 9 and shouldn't bear this burden, but he worries a lot like me. I had him at the doctor earlier this week as he was having troubles with his tummy and what it boils down to is stress. Stress is a monster illness, I know all to well as I watch my hair fall out in handfulls every day. There is no miracle cure for stress and worry. I guess it just has to run it's course. I try to comfort him, holding his hand in mine and stroking it gently offering comforting words in a calm tone and biting back tears as even I breathe the words to him that it is alright to cry. He feels alone. I can't help but feel like I am failing him. My shoulders feel weak and I want to break down too, but inside I feel like the only option I have is to try to be strong. I hear in the back of my mind my Mother's voice saying to me that if I am okay with it they will be okay and sometimes it's just better to fake it until you make it. Be strong ! So many people tell me that I am strong, but I am not really. I am good at putting on a smile face and trying to perpetuate a radiant happiness, i joke, i laugh; it all seems legit. but when I am alone - I break.I need help up. I feel largely like the last month or two has been spent resourcing as much as possible to try to find some sort of relief or aid from this circumstance. I was surprised to find that there are a wealth of organizations available to address the very issues that we are undergoing, but distressed to find that they are exhausted of funding in the county where I reside. More so than that that any orginization that  would potentially be able to provide aid here would only be able to be proactive about us staying here. New Jersey is a dead end street. The cost of living is extremely costly and I have no resources, family or even friends here. I'm told that a support system is extremely vital to rising like a phoenix from this incident and the only place I have that at all is in Ohio. I'm scared.I'm so scared I can't breathe sometimes.I just want everything to be okay. I'm doing everything I can and it doesn't even come close to feeling like enough. Go to a shelter in Ohio. Leave behind most of our memories and treasures. Risk losing  my children's pets. Begin again with nothing but each other. It sounds so simple - I assure you that it is not. I need a miracle...and i need it in less than a week. I need a hug, one of those squeeze you tight never let you go hugs... I barely remember having one it seems so long ago.I know I am not alone. I know I am not the only person that has been in an abusive relationship and lost everything trying to escape it. I am certain there are people that have had a worse go at it than I. Even as I sit here and write this in a feeble attempt to unburden my mind with the weight of these emotions I can hear the words that my husband's aunt wrote to me the day the police removed him from the home.. I am not supposed to tell anyone how I feel but rather keep it to myself, bearing my heart to people " is sick and a testament to your low self esteem and character! " I never responded to that and I probably never will as it would only incite her to further verbally bash me. It makes me not want to say anything to anyone and I find myself holding in more than I can hold. I don't want to be that person that everyone feels sorry for.. I just can't bear to hold in my hurt. Leaving is difficult under any circumstance. It's hard to love someone and have them hurt you. I changed so much and so rapidly that I barely even recognized myself when I looked in the mirror. I thought if I kept changing it would get better and be enough. People look into your life outwardly and they have a lot of "should have's" to offer you. You should have left when... you should have fought back... you should have never married him.. It's a good thing that I don't think about the should have's every day. What's that they say about hindsight being 20/20? Of course it is easy to look back now and see where there might have been a better option to prevent it from getting this out of hand. There are a ton of different things battling you when you are inside of that situation though... I felt frozen, powerless and worse obligation. I took the stuff that was dished out to me and set it aside arguing with myself that I was sacrificing my happiness for a better life for my children. I was so mixed up and confused in the wake of my Mother's passing that I can't even begin to rationalize how I made that be an okay thing in my mind. I wish someone could just open up my head and reprogram my head to think wiser.Sigh... back to packing.