Thursday, May 26, 2011
2 days and counting and counting and counting...
Today marks 2 days until my daughter leaves for the summer to go to Virginia to visit her dad and my anxiety level is increasing as the days until she leaves decrease. I am going to be an utter wreck on Saturday after she leaves. I hate having her gone for so long. I can feel my heart rate increasing and my emotions are unstable. I know that she is going to have a great time but I still can't help but feel helpless when she is so far away. What if she gets sick or injured? I am 1,600 miles away. A 6 hour flight but a days drive, even though I still have family there and they would be there at the drop of a hat, it still doesn't ease the I just want my baby with me if anything bad were to happen. This time of year leaves me feeling drained and emotional, neither is a feeling that I enjoy. So as we count down the days until her stepmom's arrival...I am stuck with feeling torn between my daughter's happiness and my own disconcerting feelings.
Monday, May 16, 2011
My mistakes and the reaping of the consequences
In my life I have made many mistakes...way too many to count, however some stand out and smack me in my face on almost a weekly basis. My biggest mistake was not listening to my family when they told me that the guy that I was having a baby with was not for me (of course that is the nice way of putting it). I love my daughter she is one of the most precious gifts ever given to me and I would never change the decision I made to bring her into this world. However, I would go back and tell myself...do not stay with him...do not marry him. This was almost 9 years ago. Let's go back to the beginning.
I was 19, freshly out of business school looking for a career...working as a waitress. Through friends I meet this guy and we start dating...as this is not necessarily a pleasant memory I will be leaving out the details of our first date and such (it wasn't always bad). Well, within 5 months of dating I was preganant...now working retail at the mall. I was still living at home with my parents, who were much more supportive of my premarital pregnancy than I thought they would be, but they are awesome. In May I am 5 months pregnant and we find out that we are having a girl and decide that it is time to move in together. This is the beginning to the end. As finances begin to dwindle and bills begin to pile up we begin to argue, little things at first, mostly about where the money is being spent. In June I find a job working for a moving company in the office, making more than my retail job and much closer to home and this job offers benefits after 90 days of employment. As we approach the birth of our daughter our roommates move out into their own apartment and we get our daughter's room ready for her arrival. On September 9, 2002 at around 11 pm, I wake up with a very sharp pain in my side, I am 37 weeks pregnant, I try to wake him up but to no avail, I call my mom who live a whopping 6 minutes away and she is there in a flash. We speak to the doctors and they say come on in and get checked, so that is what I do. I try to wake him again to say I am headed to the hospital with my mom but again he will not wake...can we say hibernating bear?! As they check me out (45 minutes away) they say that we can not figure out what is causing the pain but since I am 37 weeks along they want to induce my labor...if I had known all the outcomes of this decision I would have held off, extensive medical bills and doctor's appointments, not directly caused by the meds or the doctors but the timing of it all. On September 10, 2002 between 2 and 3 pm, my daughter was brought into this world. Hands down one of the best things that has ever happened to me. He and I get married a couple of weeks later, I can not give you an exact date as I do not remember (I know this sounds bad.) After we bring her home there is a case of jaundice which sends her back to the hospital and more bills, no insurance yet. I have been dropped from my parents insurance and they would not cover my daughter (I do not blame the ins. company, they are just doing their jobs) My insurance with my job would not kick in until 3 weeks later at my 40 week mark for pregnancy. So these bills mount up and my parents help but still the money he makes keeps disappearing. My checks are covering, day care, my car payment, car insurance and a few of the bills. His money was to cover the rest of the bills yet there never seemed to be enough. I don't know if it was that he was spending his money on items that he should not have been or if we just never budgeted correctly and which way the money was not there and again my parents helped us out. I am sure that if I did not have my parents in my life I would have had no where to go. The arguments got louder and longer and just never seemed to end. After months of arguing and getting no where, after counseling and an affair (I am not perfect and as I said I have made mistakes, I will not get into the details as they do not have to do with where I am going with this, I will save this for another time, and please do not judge as until you have lived the same life you do not know what you would do.) I decided that I could no longer take the constant bickering and arguing and wondering if I was going to have a place to live, The first weekend in June 2003, I moved back into my parent's house and seperated from my husband. It was difficult she was about 10 months old and working and paying for what was needed was difficult and I never regret leaving. I do wish that in the process of our divorce I had let the state handle collecting child support. This is where my current predicament (consequence) is. In 2005, 10 months after my second child was born (to a different father, who I am still with today and is the most amazing husband and father) we finally settled with the court on her custody and child support. He allowed me to move to Texas to be with my fiance and we agreed upon a custody arrangement that will still allow him to see her roughly the same amount as if he were to get here every other weekend except in longer stints as we would be 1600 miles away. I agreed that as long as he made the regular child support payments directly to me that we would not get the states involved in collection (another mistake made on my part in my attempt to have faith in him) for the first 11 and 1/2 months I received regular child support payments. Then at the end of the first year I stopped receiving payments. I asked, I begged, I pleaded that they be sent being told that he just needed a couple of more weeks and he was waiting to be paid on a job. As this was the same excuse every time we had an issue with paying our bills when we were together I should have seen through it but I chose to believe him and have faith that he would support the daughter that he helped create. Apparently I was wrong. I have tried to be nice and just keep reminding him and never refusing for him to see her. We always arranged for her to visit when the time came. I especially did not want to get in trouble for keeping her from him no matter what everyone was/is telling me. He is her father and she loves him, and I refuse to be the one to tell her that her father is a deadbeat. After 3 years of non payment I finally contacted Virginia about having the support collected, however because I was a resident of Texas now they told me to get in touch with the Texas Attorney General and have them handle it. I did this and still nothing. They can not get him to send a payment, although he has said that he has, I have never received a payment and they have never posted one to the account. The TX AG is now in contact with VA, since VA has the original order there is something they must do to help TX, to get the order enforced. I have called a couple of time and have also tried calling VA to find out but no one can give me an answer as to where the case is at. In August it will be 6 years without receiving a child support payment. I ahve even offered to take the payments over to my local AG's office and have them applied to the account yet he tells me that he will do this he has yet to and continues to dig the hole deeper he currently owes more than $30,000.00 in back child support. I am extremely lucky to have a husband that loves my daughter as his own and has never had an issue with supporting her, however I believe that her biological father (or sperm donor as many call him) should be responsible.
So today I am at a loss for what to do...should I ask him to sign over his paternal rights...continue to fight for the support in which she deserves...or just plain give up. She is a beautiful 8 year old girl and I can not believe that I should ever give up so now I guess I must continue to push forward fight for her.
I was 19, freshly out of business school looking for a career...working as a waitress. Through friends I meet this guy and we start dating...as this is not necessarily a pleasant memory I will be leaving out the details of our first date and such (it wasn't always bad). Well, within 5 months of dating I was preganant...now working retail at the mall. I was still living at home with my parents, who were much more supportive of my premarital pregnancy than I thought they would be, but they are awesome. In May I am 5 months pregnant and we find out that we are having a girl and decide that it is time to move in together. This is the beginning to the end. As finances begin to dwindle and bills begin to pile up we begin to argue, little things at first, mostly about where the money is being spent. In June I find a job working for a moving company in the office, making more than my retail job and much closer to home and this job offers benefits after 90 days of employment. As we approach the birth of our daughter our roommates move out into their own apartment and we get our daughter's room ready for her arrival. On September 9, 2002 at around 11 pm, I wake up with a very sharp pain in my side, I am 37 weeks pregnant, I try to wake him up but to no avail, I call my mom who live a whopping 6 minutes away and she is there in a flash. We speak to the doctors and they say come on in and get checked, so that is what I do. I try to wake him again to say I am headed to the hospital with my mom but again he will not wake...can we say hibernating bear?! As they check me out (45 minutes away) they say that we can not figure out what is causing the pain but since I am 37 weeks along they want to induce my labor...if I had known all the outcomes of this decision I would have held off, extensive medical bills and doctor's appointments, not directly caused by the meds or the doctors but the timing of it all. On September 10, 2002 between 2 and 3 pm, my daughter was brought into this world. Hands down one of the best things that has ever happened to me. He and I get married a couple of weeks later, I can not give you an exact date as I do not remember (I know this sounds bad.) After we bring her home there is a case of jaundice which sends her back to the hospital and more bills, no insurance yet. I have been dropped from my parents insurance and they would not cover my daughter (I do not blame the ins. company, they are just doing their jobs) My insurance with my job would not kick in until 3 weeks later at my 40 week mark for pregnancy. So these bills mount up and my parents help but still the money he makes keeps disappearing. My checks are covering, day care, my car payment, car insurance and a few of the bills. His money was to cover the rest of the bills yet there never seemed to be enough. I don't know if it was that he was spending his money on items that he should not have been or if we just never budgeted correctly and which way the money was not there and again my parents helped us out. I am sure that if I did not have my parents in my life I would have had no where to go. The arguments got louder and longer and just never seemed to end. After months of arguing and getting no where, after counseling and an affair (I am not perfect and as I said I have made mistakes, I will not get into the details as they do not have to do with where I am going with this, I will save this for another time, and please do not judge as until you have lived the same life you do not know what you would do.) I decided that I could no longer take the constant bickering and arguing and wondering if I was going to have a place to live, The first weekend in June 2003, I moved back into my parent's house and seperated from my husband. It was difficult she was about 10 months old and working and paying for what was needed was difficult and I never regret leaving. I do wish that in the process of our divorce I had let the state handle collecting child support. This is where my current predicament (consequence) is. In 2005, 10 months after my second child was born (to a different father, who I am still with today and is the most amazing husband and father) we finally settled with the court on her custody and child support. He allowed me to move to Texas to be with my fiance and we agreed upon a custody arrangement that will still allow him to see her roughly the same amount as if he were to get here every other weekend except in longer stints as we would be 1600 miles away. I agreed that as long as he made the regular child support payments directly to me that we would not get the states involved in collection (another mistake made on my part in my attempt to have faith in him) for the first 11 and 1/2 months I received regular child support payments. Then at the end of the first year I stopped receiving payments. I asked, I begged, I pleaded that they be sent being told that he just needed a couple of more weeks and he was waiting to be paid on a job. As this was the same excuse every time we had an issue with paying our bills when we were together I should have seen through it but I chose to believe him and have faith that he would support the daughter that he helped create. Apparently I was wrong. I have tried to be nice and just keep reminding him and never refusing for him to see her. We always arranged for her to visit when the time came. I especially did not want to get in trouble for keeping her from him no matter what everyone was/is telling me. He is her father and she loves him, and I refuse to be the one to tell her that her father is a deadbeat. After 3 years of non payment I finally contacted Virginia about having the support collected, however because I was a resident of Texas now they told me to get in touch with the Texas Attorney General and have them handle it. I did this and still nothing. They can not get him to send a payment, although he has said that he has, I have never received a payment and they have never posted one to the account. The TX AG is now in contact with VA, since VA has the original order there is something they must do to help TX, to get the order enforced. I have called a couple of time and have also tried calling VA to find out but no one can give me an answer as to where the case is at. In August it will be 6 years without receiving a child support payment. I ahve even offered to take the payments over to my local AG's office and have them applied to the account yet he tells me that he will do this he has yet to and continues to dig the hole deeper he currently owes more than $30,000.00 in back child support. I am extremely lucky to have a husband that loves my daughter as his own and has never had an issue with supporting her, however I believe that her biological father (or sperm donor as many call him) should be responsible.
So today I am at a loss for what to do...should I ask him to sign over his paternal rights...continue to fight for the support in which she deserves...or just plain give up. She is a beautiful 8 year old girl and I can not believe that I should ever give up so now I guess I must continue to push forward fight for her.
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