the WTF happened post
sooo, most of you could probably care less (and I dont blame you!) but a few of you have tracked me down and wondered what happened to me, well here's the scoop: (feel free to flame away, i'm pretty much expecting it 🙂 )
The long-awaited 'WTF Happened to You' Post:
Back in May, I began a journey of sorts. Feeling trapped in a marriage I no longer wanted I took a mini-vacation from Southern Suburbia USA to visit who would fast become the love of my life in Canada, one I met on where else? The internet of course! Live Journal to be exact. The mini 3 day vacation lasted for a blessed week due to car and financial difficulties before I sadly had to go back to face my life. I tried to put what effort I could into rectifying my marriage if for nothing else the sake of my children. As expected, it didn’t take.
So in June I trekked back to Canada and stayed for another week. One more week of stolen moments and utter contentment. Alas, once more I had to go back to my life in Chattanooga. I knew my marriage was over, but I wanted to end it as 'best' I could.
A week later I had an interview with T Mobile on a Monday morning. As always, my life had to be planned around his work/sleep schedule, so I took the kids to my mom's while I interviewed and sold all of the CDs/DVDs in the house to pay off a cash advance I had taken out. While I was in Canada the second time he had cancelled the bank account and effectively left me with no money whatsoever, none for gas or food for anyone in the family. So I did what I thought was necessary to pay off the loan and give us some running money for a little bit. While I was in the interview he had come home from work, found the CDs & DVDs gone & flipped the f*ck out. He went to my mothers and TOOK the kids and then came to where I was interviewing and TOOK the car with all the stuff in it, graciously leaving me with the truck.
I came out to find my car gone, my ONLY means of ANY cash taken and worst of all my kids were ripped from me. For two days I tried to get in contact with them via my father in law (a corrupt ex state trooper with LOTS of good ole boy connections). He refused to take my calls or let me in the gate to his yard and called the police on me every time I went to his house. Once I went there and my kids were there. The cops were called and my father in law was told that i DID have legal right to them. I was given permission to take the kids but ONLY after I had gotten car seats for them (they were 5 & 6). So I left to buy car seats. When I got back my ex husband had come & taken the kids to an undisclosed location. I was not allowed any contact with them and was not able to take any recourse as they were with their father who had as much legal right to them as I did. I wasnt allowed to do anything but wait.
On Thursday I was awakened by a police man who was there to ensure legal papers were served on me. I was given the petition for divorce along with a restraining order. I was not allowed to come within 100 yards of my ex OR my kids except for two hours every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and 5 hours on the weekend. And the visits were to be in a public place (i.e. McDonalds) and supervised for 'their protection'. The man who threatened to take my head off with a baseball bat had unfettered access to my kids while I was kept far from them.
Once more Live Journal enters the picture. It was due to my trips to Canada and my list of sexual preferences that I was deemed ‘dangerous’ to my children. Because we all know that those into SM are deviants who frequently include their school age children in their sexual goings on, right?
What’s more, he claimed that he had no means to provide any other shelter for them so I was to vacate the house ASAP and was only allowed to take personal belongings (read clothes and NOTHING more). So I left with nothing more than a truck bed full of clothes and moved in with my sister, her son and the various ne'er do wells she housed at any given time. (read: drug addicts, dealers and thieves)
I busted my ass and got a job at the local newspaper within a week. It should have been a sweet deal, base pay plus commission. In no time I would have my own place and could petition to get custody of my children reinstated. But it didn’t work out that way at all. Due to corporate panic and restructuring, the pay scale ended up being barely minimum wage. The office was all the way downtown, while my sister’s place was in the middle of nowhere forty five minutes away. All of this in a Ford Ranger that loved nothing more than to guzzle the outrageously overpriced gas that we all grumbled about this summer. It was taking almost half of my pay just to keep going to work every week. I was literally working to keep getting to work. With gas and food I had not one penny extra to spend on much of anything, much less an apartment or anything of my own. Which, as it turns out, was the major problem in me getting more time with my kids.
As I obviously couldn’t afford an attorney, I researched how to file papers myself. But even if you do it yourself assuming you do it properly, which in the age of convoluted torts is near impossible unless you are Rain Man, it still costs hundreds of dollars to file the documents. So I was at a decided loss. The only way I was eligible for legal aid was if my ex was known to be physically or sexually abusing the kids. Didn’t make a lick of difference that he was physically abusive to me, he could have been on trial for attempted murder & it wouldn’t matter. No help, period. Not that the ex had the money for an attorney either. His dad was bankrolling the whole deal.
His lawyer was a rather nice lady. She talked to me a couple of times saying that until I had my own attorney she was free to discuss things with me. She asked me when was I going to Canada? I told her I wasn’t planning on it, that I was staying in Chattanooga., which I was at the time. I wanted my kids back, I had never had any intention of absconding with them to another city much less another country. She then told me that the biggest hangup was my living with my sister.
I did what I could to keep seeing the kids. I was there every visit at my allotted time, though it killed my self esteem each time. To be watched like a hawk by two malice driven males who took notes on my every movement while I was trying to spend what time I was allowed with my own kids. No matter the actual facts, there is no way you can do that and not begin to wonder how many of the ugly words said about you are true. I KNOW I was a good mom. I KNOW I didn’t deserve this. I KNOW I was better than how I was being treated. But it wears on you.
The emotional toll was being compounded by a genuine concern for my physical safety. By August I was routinely being awakened by sketchy characters who dropped in at 4 am to shoot & snort coke with my sister who had revved up her habit exponentially over the summer. She had been facing a meth charge that she had skirted by agreeing to probation with drug screens. When 2 or 3 of her screens turned up positive for drugs, she decided if she was gonna go to jail she was gonna have as much fun as possible before she went. So she went from a mild pot smoker to a hardcore coke head almost overnight. Her 4 am visitors were not the fun, kinda kooky stoners seen in the movies. These boys were hardcore, old school and knew they were going back to jail at any moment so lived like there was nothing left to lose.
I went from a somewhat resolute disenchantment to full out panic in now time flat. I had nowhere to live, I had noone who could or would help me, I didn’t have my kids. By this time I wasn’t even seeing my kids on my ‘assigned’ days. The ex had the phone cut off, saying he couldn’t afford it. So I had no way to contact him to set up the visits. His parents refused to take my calls and noone would reply to an email. I was not allowed at the in laws house and was restrained by court order from going to my own home. I was lost with no real way out.
The only things that whole time that kept me moderately sane were the fantastic friends I made in Chattanooga and my (as the ex put it in the papers) ‘paramour’ in a land that felt so very far away. David & I talked daily, texted constantly, IM’d every night. He is the only reason my wrists are still intact today. He kept me together and gave me a reason to keep going. But even that was wearing thin. So finally, when all seemed lost, I took a chance. It was my last chance at sanity, happiness and life.
At the end of August I drove to Canada for the last time. This time with no money in wallet for the return trip. I had $300, a gas guzzling truck, a tank of gas, a few bags of clothes and a laptop. That was it.
While I was here, he filed bankruptcy on ‘his’ part of the debt (including the house & both cars) which led to the repossession of the truck. As seems to be the tradition in this twisted tale of marriage gone sour, he did it all without me in any way. He defaulted on all of our joint possessions without me. I’m still puzzled by most of it, but ecstatic over the last bit of his solo legal adventures. Without me being served another paper, with my lack presence in the courtroom, and without me ever being notified he got the divorce finalized.
After all of this I am now a free woman once again.
And that’s how it all came to be. There’s more of course. Lots of side plots, various conflicts, other characters and a myriad other details. But not much else matters these days. I now live in Southern Ontario with the love of my life, I talk to my kids as much as I can by phone and I have a slew of awesome Northerly accented friends.
And it is more than enough.