Today would have been my grandpa's 93rd? birthday. It also would have been the day my husband and I had a Trial Setting Conference in the morning, and then a custody trial regarding our daughter in the afternoon. But, my now-ex husband actually settled with me last week. I had to take a bath on the financial settlement, but I knew that my coming down on money would mean that he'd come down on visitation demands. My accepting far less than what he owes me from our marriage, and a subpoena blitz I sent out through my attorney a couple of weeks ago, seemed to have done the trick.
For a while there, we were going to court every 2-4 weeks. It was awful. The reasons we were going were for normal hearings for child and spousal support, mixed in with two bullshit (non) emergency motions my ex filed, claiming I had violated our parenting time orders outright, when I hadn't. I had additionally filed one emergency order of my own out of concern that my ex was still drinking, learning that he had recently purchased a firearm, and now having to send our daughter to her dad's house to visit, which is a 350 trip from my house to his now. Needless to say, because our daughter wasn't bleeding and the cops hadn't been called, all of the emergency orders were dismissed outright.
Months of stress, of document prep, of going back and forth with attorneys, and of just general bullshit and attempts my ex made to manipulate our daughter into thinking that my enrolling her in soccer was keeping her from him (it wasn't because it wasn't even on his time), or that I was keeping her from him because I wasn't taking her to visit... Months of that, plus complete alienation from my stepkids, and now...*POOF*! It's over. He settled. The settlement has gone down to the courthouse for a judge's signature. And as soon as she signs it, we are DIVORCED!
It's a bittersweet feeling, that's more sweet than bitter, but last Thursday, when all of the signatures were finally on the settlement paperwork that I wrote up myself, I felt a little...sad? Confused? No...definitely sad. I had really liked being married. Or rather, being able to say I was married. But honestly, I hated being married to my husband. He was an asshole and I'm relieved to be rid of him. I didn't see it for the longest time because I was right in the thick of it and trying to make things work. But no, he was an abusive asshole who I'm realizing now assaulted me on several occasions. I didn't see it as assault at the time because he was drunk and didn't mean it, right? And he apologized, usually, days later.... He was and is a shit dad. Sure, he shows up, but he sucks the life out of you while he's buying you things and taking you out for nice meals. I mean, he shows up, most of the time, to important events, even though he leaves early...but he shows up and he even posts on social media about how proud he is when you're winning! So that means he really cares and is supportive, right? Except, he does the bare minimum, and grumbles the entire time.
Now our daughter has a set schedule where she'll see her dad about 58 days out of every year because he chose to move 350 miles away. And I'm glad, as I've always been, for every inch of every one of those miles that previously kept my family away from a crazy person (my ex's first wife) and now shields my daughter and me from the same. I wish my stepkids would have chosen to stay closer to me, but biology is strong, and for my stepson, because he's only 16, there's only so much power he has, especially when he's able to get the attention he's been practically begging for from his dad for his whole life, now.
So tonight, it's a school night, and my daughter has been in kindergarten for about a month, and I've always been crappy about letting her stay up too late but hey, single moms do what we need to, and we both crashed out at 5:30pm. I woke up about an hour later, but she's still passed out as I write this after 8:30. I don't think it helped that her dad was in town yesterday (because he'd clearly planned a trip out here weeks ago for the custody trial that now wasn't needed) and last night when he took our daughter to dinner, it turned out he brought his girlfriend out with him (who he had gotten together with as our relationship was dying -- she's greaaaat), and had planned for my stepdaughter (who is now 20) to be in town as well. My stepdaughter's boyfriend (who she's been living with for two years, and who she snuck around with for a year when he was 21 and she was 17 and we said they couldn't date) is from my city and his parents live here, about a half hour from where I live. Apparently my poor kid, who thought she was just going to dinner with her dad, got thrust into a dinner with her dad, the girlfriend, my stepdaughter, her boyfriend, and the boyfriend's parents. She reported it being "a little much, but a little fun." I'm glad for the fun, but sheesh. Some warning would have been adult, which is also why I know I didn't get any heads up.
So today, I didn't worry about court. Hopefully that won't bite me in the ass. I just got to worry about actual work, and I got some rest. And my kid got some rest. Because we're tired. Maybe tired from life because I've been keeping us busy, or maybe exhausted from stress. I can't tell. But either way, sleep is good, and we needed it.
