Thankful 2012

Disclaimer: This is a happy blog! Shocker, I know…

 

I figured I wouldn’t do the “I’m thankful for this” and post it on Facebook every day. I wanted to do a blog instead… This way I can elaborate more on each topic than I could in a Facebook status.

 

Day 1: First and foremost, I am thankful for my husband. He may irritate me and get under my skin every now and then, but what husband doesn’t? We have our obvious differences – gender, political affiliation, and things like that – but we also have a difference of opinion most of the time. Over the years, we’ve learned to tolerate each other and somewhat compromise. It’s harder than it sounds since we’re both incredibly stubborn people. But besides that he is my foundation, my support system, and my best friend. There will never be anyone else like him and I am thankful every day that he chose me to be his life partner.

 

Day 2: I’m thankful for the boys. Granted they aren’t biologically mine, but blood isn’t always everything… I know from experience. We are a family and that’s all that matters. 

Day 3: I’m thankful for our home. We live in an 1800 sq. ft, 3 bedroom, 2 bath home with an equal size basement. The house has a huge living room and an eat-in kitchen. The master bath has a Jacuzzi tub, a shower with two seats, a dual vanity, and two walk-in closets. Brian laid the brick walkway and the wood floors in the kitchen and laundry room himself. He also removed a concrete slab that was outside the garage door and we all worked to put down a new brick walkway in its place. We have hosted Brian’s family reunion the last two years and have had room for almost 80 people. Yes, it was slightly cramped, but well worth it.

 

I may fuss about wanting to live somewhere else, mainly because I want to be closer to town or closer to Brian’s work, but I still like the house that we have. We’ve turned it into a home.

Day 4: I’m thankful for my furry friends. My cat has been in my life through some really difficult times and sometimes was my “shoulder” to cry on when I needed it. I found Shadow in the middle of winter 2006. I worked at a fast food place and there were a bunch of feral cats that ate out of the dumpster. He had gotten into a fight with some of them over some food and they had attacked his tail. I fed him and he wouldn’t go away… he even kept trying to climb in the drive-thru window to get inside. So I took him home. When I moved back in with my parents after my ex and I split up, I couldn’t take my cats with me so Shadow went to the lady next door to my parents. After she moved out, I moved in. While I was bringing things into the apartment, my mom yelled for me… Shadow had walked up to her on her porch. I said his name and he came running back to me. At that point, I promised him I wouldn’t ever let him go again. A few months ago, he got an infection in his jaw bone and the vet told me it was likely bone cancer. He told me the best thing for him would be to put him down. The only reason he gave me antibiotics to try was because he had a slight temperature. If I had listened to the vet, I would have ended my cat’s life long before it was time for him to go. But I wasn’t going to give up on him like that, just like he didn’t give up on me.

Our dog was something that took a lot of “convincing” to Brian to get. He was avidly against getting a dog. But he finally gave in and we got Rico when he was 8 weeks old. He has been a member of the family since. We put in an invisible fence for him which gives him about 4 of 11 total acres to run around. He wrestles with Brian, is a pillow for the kids, lies in bed with us sometimes, and is afraid of the dark. But regardless of how sweet he is, he is still very alert and lets us know when there’s something around the house that shouldn’t be whether it be a bunny rabbit or someone walking through a neighboring field. He especially lets us know when there is a combine within hearing distance. He doesn’t bark at cars driving by… just combines.

Day 5: I’m thankful for my job. In these economic times, it’s hard enough to find a job, let alone stay with the same company for 4 years and have the ability to advance within the company. At this moment, I make enough to pay for health and dental insurance for the four of us, put 3% into a 401k, $250/month into a health savings account ($125 of that each month goes towards paying off Timothy’s eye surgery bill… more on that to come), $183/mo cell phone bill, $85/mo for phone and internet, $80/mo for student loans, $443/mo car payment, and $250/mo in gas. And I still have enough to spend about $300/mo on groceries, household items, etc. After that, there’s normally a little left over. None of that would be possible without my job so every day I’m thankful that I am able to contribute to our household.

Day 5: I’m thankful for my health. Even though I have had a struggle with my weight, I finally have it under control. I have a little more that I need to lose, but as of this morning, I have lost 55 lbs since March.

Day 6: I’m thankful for my family. Without them… all of them… and the decisions they’ve made, I may not be where I am today. That being said, there are certain people in my family that have been there for me through thick and thin. We may not see eye to eye all the time and may have gone periods of time not talking, but it’s nice to know that they’ll be there in the end.

Day 7: I’m thankful for my friends. It’s hard to find people that are true friends, and I think I’ve been fortunate in that area. I have friends that I don’t see as often as I would like but we can talk like the last time was yesterday. There’s a few people that actually understand me and it’s really nice to be able to have an ear to listen and to have people to unwind with occasionally.

Day 8: I’m thankful for Timothy’s sight. Last year, he had to have surgery on his eye. He had somehow managed to get something into his tear duct and it had gotten infected. His pediatrician told is initially that it was pink eye and prescribed medicine for it. The medicine hadn’t started working by the next morning, so back to the doctor he went. At that point, we were referred to a specialist at Dayton Children’s. He got more medicine there and needed to be seen again the next day. The medicine started working, but not enough to where the doctor was comfortable leaving it alone, so he was in surgery that week. Up until his follow up appointment the next week, he had told us that his vision was really blurry. But thankfully, his doctor was able to remove the infection and clean everything out without compromising his vision.

Day 9: I’m thankful for the boys’ overall health. Neither of them have any physical deformities or mental disorders. They are able to fit in normally, aside from normal peer pressure situations. They do not have to deal with extra challenges that would accompany a deformity

 

Day 10: I’m thankful for the boys’ teachers. Both of the boys have incredible teachers this year. Thomas has a teacher that is very understanding and patient which is great for him because he can be a handful at times. She’s figured out ways to get his attention and keep it. Timothy’s teachers are able to challenge him without it being too much. All of them are very open to new ideas and have the boys’ best interests in mind.

Day 11: I’m thankful for Springfield Ford. Without this place, Brian and I never would have had the chance to meet.

Day 12: I’m thankful for the boys’ individuality. They are both their own person. Timothy is the baseball/ tennis playing artist. Thomas is the football and baseball playing/ wrestling jock. They like a lot of the same things, but have their own individual likes and dislikes. Thomas is a cheese-a-holic. Timothy is anti-cheese (unless it’s white cheese or if it’s on “straight macaroni” or pizza. Thomas really doesn’t draw too well. Timothy can look at anything and draw it – and make it look just like the original. Timothy doesn’t like contact sports. Thomas loves sports, as long as he gets to knock some people around.

Day 13: I’m thankful for Brian’s job. Yes, it’s further from home than I would like and I dislike the time he has to spend driving, rather than at home with us. But it also is a means to support our family and I can’t complain about that.

 

Day 14: I’m thankful for my heritage. There are a lot of different kinds of European and some Native American. Granted I’m not into genealogy very much, but I wouldn’t be who I am without all of it.

Day 15: I’m thankful for my experiences. Some people reading this may think “she’s only 24, she couldn’t have experienced much”. It’s ok to think that, but the truth is, I’ve experienced a lot up to this point. Read my other blogs if you don’t think so.

 

Day 16: I’m thankful for Brian’s sobriety. Our relationship went through some serious trials while he was drinking. But I’m thankful every day that he made the decision to stop and followed through with it. He is a much better person because of it.

Day 17: I’m thankful for stability. As I said before, Brian is my rock… my foundation. I know he is here with me through everything – no matter if I’m right or wrong or if he’s right or wrong. We are in this marriage together and are stronger together because of it.

Day 18: I’m thankful for food… obviously… because I like it.

Day 19: I’m thankful for social networking. Sounds silly, I know. But it gives me a way to keep in touch with people that I wouldn’t normally be able to. I can follow my sister’s pregnancy this way. I can keep in touch and see pictures with my other siblings that don’t live around here and I can keep in touch with friends that are deployed.

Day 20: I’m thankful for mountains. I grew up in the mountains. There isn’t a season where the mountains aren’t absolutely beautiful. They are so green and lush in the summer and have the biggest variety of colors on the trees in the fall. Springtime brings all of the multi-colored wildflowers. And the snow on the bare trees is breathtaking.

Day 21: I’m thankful for Brian’s family. My family wasn’t the only ones that had an issue with our age difference… I know no one in his or my family expected us to work. But over time, my family has accepted Brian and I feel accepted into his. His family has been there for us more times than I can count. I appreciate them every day.

Day 22: I’m thankful for flowers. I love flowers, especially the ones in my garden. They smell delicious and are beautiful.

 

Day 23: I’m thankful for Brian’s ability to give me a perspective other than my own. I may not like his perspective all the time, but it at least gives me another side to look at.

Day 24: I’m thankful for technology. Technology has given me a shower, a toilet, my flat iron, washer and dryer, dishwasher, etc. Ok, so maybe I’m spoiled, but I like the amenities.

 

Day 25: I’m thankful for our material possessions. I know, I know… material items aren’t everything. But there are a lot of people out there that don’t have much, so I’m thankful for what we do have.

Day 26: I’m thankful for my sanity. Granted, it may temporarily leave… but I don’t have dementia or some other kind of serious break from reality – regardless of what my husband tells you!

 

Day 27: I’m thankful for chocolate. This one should be self-explanatory. It helps me during certain times of the month. And it’s delicious.

 

Day 28: I’m thankful for the sun. Yes, for the basic things such as it’s needed to support life in general, but it puts me in a good mood for the most part.

Day 29: I’m thankful for my past. Everything that has happened and has not happened has led me to this point in my life. I love my life and the people that I choose to have in it. But if one thing had gone differently, my life could be at a very different place.

Day 30: And finally, I’m thankful for Brian’s past. This one and the previous one go hand in hand. If he had not made the choices he did or had been in a different place at a different time, we may not have ever had the chance to meet.

Inhumane

Via WHIO....

 

 

 

 

Warrants issued for pair charged with throwing dogs off bridge

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Story posted 2012.11.20 at 09:54 AM EST

A couple charged with animal cruelty for leaving puppies near a bridge, two of which were dropped over it, did not appear in court today.

 

The magistrate in Miami County Municipal Court on Tuesday morning issued warrants for the arrests of Shonda Lee, 39, and her boyfriend Steven Bixler, 32. Both are Piqua residents.

 

Bixler faces four counts of abandoning animals and two counts of animal cruelty. Lee, the owner of the puppies, was cited with one count of animal cruelty by the sheriff’s department and charged by the county dog warden for failure to license the mother dog.

 

A deputy assigned to the Miami County Park District was on foot patrol Nov. 9 at the Farrington Reserve when she heard the puppies yipping and a car speeding away. Two of the puppies were dropped 15 feet over a Peterson Road bridge guard rail along the bank of the Great Miami River.

The other two Labs were left on the roadside.

 

The two puppies dropped from the bridge fell about 20 feet, according to reports. They were not injured and were put in care of the Miami County dog warden.

 

Both Bixler and Lee were located after a citizen called Miami County 911 Center and the Miami County Animal Shelter Saturday morning after recognizing the puppies.

 

The Miami County Animal Shelter, 1110 North County Road 25A, Troy, received an “overwhelming response” from people wanting to adopt one of the puppies, according to Debbie Hale, Miami County deputy chief animal control officer.

 

For more information on adoption at the shelter call (937) 332-6919.

Story posted 2012.11.20 at 09:54 AM EST









Sigh..... where do I even begin with this one?

I know, I'll start by taking a deep breath. *Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale.*

Ok, done. Time to rant.



Anyone that knows me knows that I'm an extreme animal lover. To the point where I really can't stand to use mouse traps in my house. I'd prefer to let my cat catch them, get them out of his mouth before he kills them (by putting his face over a bucket and making him let go), and then take them down the road and let them go.

When the birds build nests behind our outdoor lights on the deck or inside the lid to the propane tank, I check the nests all the time for babies. And once there are babies, I check the nests all the time to make sure none of them have fallen out. If so, I pick them up and put them back in their nest.

Once when I was little, I was walking to my babysitter's house up the street to go to school and I heard a wheezing noise in some tall grass. I went back to the house and got my dad. He went out there with me to look and we found a squirrel with a hole in its neck. Apparently the cat from down the street had gotten ahold of it. So instead of leaving it there, we brought it back to the house and put it in a shoebox with a little towel, put Neosporin on the wound, and wrapped it with gauze. Granted the squirrel had passed away while I was at school that day, but at least we made his last bit of time as comfy as we could.

These were PUPPIES. They weren't grown, vicious dogs that had been trained to fight or that had attacked a child... they were PUPPIES. They hadn't even had a chance to learn how to be house broken, let alone live any kind of substantial life.

My animals are as important to me as the boys are. They are a part of our family. My dog is the most spoiled animal... ever. My cat has been with me through some really hard times. They are my babies and Lord help anyone that tries to hurt them.

How in the world do people like this live with themselves every day? These people are pure evil. Their excuse was how they couldn't afford to take the puppies to a shelter... but the shelter doesn't charge anything! Maybe they should have done some research rather than making assumptions. And instead of owning up to their actions, they show their cowardly side and don't show up for court which is just going to result in more charges for them. So not only are they evil cowards, they are now fugitives. If they will do this to some poor innocent puppies, then who knows what they would be willing to do to a child!

People like this need to be rounded up and put on a deserted island and left there so they can just torture each other instead of doing harm to living things around them.







 

Psycho, Part 4

......... Continued from part 3...

She ended up writing them a letter about a month later. She sent a list of 10 questions to each of the boys to answer... questions like what’s your favorite color and food and sport. They asked us why their mom sent them a homework assignment. But still, they wrote responses and mailed them back to her.

Then towards the end of September, we got something for her in the mail from the courts. I called the court house and tried to give them an address but they told me to write the new address on the piece of mail and return to sender. I sent her a message on facebook to let her know so I could “do the right thing”. She researched it and called me to tell me it was a past due notice for her court fees she was supposed to pay. (She ended up getting two of these notices. If you look up their divorce online, you can see that the payment ended up coming from her new boyfriend/ fiancé.) We were on the phone for three minutes. Not once did she ask about the kids or how they were… she was more concerned about telling me how her daughter’s father stopped paying support to her. About an hour later, she messaged me asking how the kids were and wanted to talk about the possibility of her talking to them on the phone again. I told her that she needed to stick to the letter thing for a while before that would be an option again since she had only sent them one letter up to that point. She asked if she could text or email pictures to them. I told her that if she wanted to include pictures, then she needed to send them along with her letters. Besides, the kids like pictures they can hold and look at. (They both have several pictures in frames in their rooms that have her in them... Timothy has the majority of them, but Thomas has some also.) She sent them another letter a few days later. She did not include any pictures but did include promises of printing off some and mailing them later. The kids wrote their responses and mailed them two days later. The same day, I noticed on her facebook page that she had taken a picture that I had uploaded of Timothy all dressed up and his hair with gel in it and uploaded it to her page like it was a picture that she had taken herself. Now, if she would have asked to use it, then that would have been totally different. But to take it and try to pass it off as your own is just plain wrong. If she would be here, then she can take her own pictures and share her own memories, but don’t take mine. So I asked her to remove it. But it was excuse after excuse as to why she couldn’t do it... including how she couldn't remove it on her phone and how she didn't have access to a computer to take it off. As far as I know, it’s still there and that was on September 25.

 

 

Around this time, she did ask me what size clothes the kids are into so that she could order them some outfits from the internet (but she didn't have access to a computer?) I told her that the kids don't need any more clothes, seeing as they both have a full closet and a full dresser - Timothy's has 9 drawers and Thomas's has 8 drawers. Both closets have double doors. She told me that didn't matter, because it's something that she wanted to do. I responded and told her that if she wanted to send something to them, then she should send something that they need. She asked what they needed and I told her that all of the material things they need are already taken care of. Brian and I have been taking care of that and will continue to take care of it. But they need things from their mother that we cannot give them. I told her to send them a letter or holiday cards or birthday cards - they need those more than they need an outfit from her. She told me that she didn't need me to be rude. So I told her that I don't really care what she needs... I care about what the boys need.

 

The boys have still to this day only gotten two letters from her since she was given that as her option to contact them in mid July. Hence the reason I checked the “return home” box on the permission slip for the letter that he wrote to her at school. She hasn’t written back to him and I don’t want him to get his hopes up and think that if he sends her letters all the time that it will make her write him back. So if you want to think that I’m a horrible person for it, then that’s fine. But my first and foremost priority is the boys and their well-being – physical and mental – and I made a decision based on what I thought would be best. (He did save the letter and was told he can send it once she writes him back.)

 

 

 

Epilogue:

Since the school assignment/ letter, the most recent drama with her was about a week or two ago. She called Brian about some website that people were apparently talking trash about her on. I don’t know exactly what she wanted him to do about it. Once Brian told me about it, I texted her to ask why she thought it necessary to call Brian over something like that. She didn’t respond, so I followed with one that said she is no longer married to Brian, he is my husband now, and she has a third husband-to-be that she can run to when she wants to whine and complain.

Then a couple of days later, she texted Brian asking if she had gotten any mail from the court at our house. She had missed a payment to CSEA and they had sent something to the shelter that runs the place where she is living. (She lives in a “transition house” through a battered women’s homeless shelter even though her “battering experience” was well over a year ago. Her cop fiancé lives there with her, even though he’s not supposed to.) She said she was afraid she would go to jail for 30 days because of the missed payment. So again, I texted her and told her that had nothing to do with the kids so she needed to quit texting. She tried to tell me that it’s between her and Brian, but it’s not. It’s between her and CSEA. Brian has no control over what they do and in fact, they’ve told him that he really doesn’t have to do anything anymore – they’ll take care of everything. The conversation ended with her telling me not to contact her phone anymore or she’ll turn it into the state police and file harassment charges. (Big surprise there… she’s called the police and tried to file harassment charges on me before but they’ve pretty much told her that she can’t do anything about it. But she’s now trying to use her fiancé’s title as a Michigan state trooper to get what she wants.) So I told her that she can do what she wants but her fiancé can’t do anything about it. She responded with that she’s turning it in for harassment. So I ended the conversation with “For the harassment thing to stick, you can’t contact me anymore either. You should know this by now with how many times you’ve threatened harassment.” Haven’t heard a word from her since.

I’m sure once I start posting this blog, either Brian or myself will be getting more messages threatening harassment, how this is slander and defamation of character, or something to that effect.  But it’s a blog, not a newspaper article. And all of this is true to the best of my knowledge. Again, the timing on a few things in the earlier part of the blog may be off, but that doesn’t change what’s happened or how I feel on the topic.

 

 

Epilogue #2:

Scratch that… Brian heard from her again after I posted part 1 of this blog. She called him (at work and had him paged instead of calling on his cell phone like a normal person) to say that this is slander and she has sent money to a lawyer to take care of it. I have to say, I’m pretty proud of my husband because he told her that for it to be slander, then it can’t be true, which it all is. And if she has money to send to a lawyer, then maybe she should start making full support payments (she sends $160 something when she was ordered to pay $183.00). I do think it’s funny though that she has the nerve to call Brian and whine and fuss and threaten but she won’t talk to me directly about it. But then again, she’s continuing to throw out the whole harassment threat. So for some reason, she thinks it’s ok to contact Brian but then tell us not to contact her or it would be considered harassment. Doesn’t make much sense to me.

 

 

But it is what it is… no one is going to be able to do anything about it. She’s going to be how she is and act how she does with no regard to anyone else, especially her children. All we can do is hope that she won't continue to play this game of "Tug-Of-War" with their emotions because it really is detrimental to them. Brian and I are trying our hardest to give them a loving, stable home where they can learn and grow without having to worry about all the drama. All of this is entirely too much to put on the shoulders of a 7 and almost 10 year old. They need and deserve better.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Psycho, Part 3

........ Continued from Part 2...

There was a year and a half that went by that she didn’t see her kids… didn’t even call them, even though the offer to see them at a public place still stood. I even (still) pay for a third phone on my cell phone plan so the kids would have their own phone that they could talk to her on without her having to call our phones. If they answered, then they were available. If they didn’t answer, then she could leave a message and they could call her back once they were done with whatever they were doing. But she didn’t take advantage of this dedicated phone line often. They have all the different numbers she’s used saved in their phone (I believe it’s up to 5 or 6 now and they don’t have her current number saved in there.)

One day towards the beginning of May 2012, we got a letter in the mail saying that CSEA was taking her back to court to find her in contempt of her support order because she hadn’t paid anything after CSEA took the tax return. She had been required to turn in at least 20 applications either per week or per month to be in accordance with their requirement to get a job, so she asked for a continuance and cited that she needed to obtain legal representation beforehand. Right before the hearing, she did end up getting a job at a gas station. The hearing was postponed for two weeks.

 

Conveniently a few days after we got the first court notification, she texted Brian’s phone asking if the kids had gotten her last couple of messages… after an entire year and a half with no contact. Timothy had used the cell phone to go to baseball practice and turned it off afterwards instead of leaving it on, so the phone never rang. I was working at home at the time and Brian called me to ask if I could check the phone. Once it loaded, it showed that there were three text messages from her and no voicemails. She texted her 9 and 6 year olds instead of calling them. They didn’t even know how to text then… In fact, they still don’t know how to. So I responded to her texts to let her know the phone had been off and they hadn’t gotten the messages, but they would get them that night. That evening came and we sat the kids down and talked to them for about 30 minutes beforehand. We were trying to prepare them for her to suddenly walk back into their lives. We let them read the text messages and then let them call her. Timothy went into his room and talked first but it only five minutes or so before he came out to give the phone to Thomas. Thomas got on the phone and went to his room. We asked Timothy why he didn’t talk longer and his response was that he ran out of things to say. Thomas took about ten minutes and came back out and handed the phone to us without an active call. He also told us that he ran out of things to say. They started asking when they could see her again and asking if they could start calling her every day so we told them that we would talk about it. But then all hell broke loose. For them, it was like an old injury that had mostly healed being broken all over again. Timothy was upset but it hit Thomas the hardest. He went back to his room and cried – not a little sobbing whimper cry, but a full on, chest heaving, snot dripping, torturous cry. So I went in and laid down with him and planned on staying in there with him until he fell asleep – which took a good 2 hours to get accomplished. Meanwhile, Brian went off on her. He told her that she can’t just go away for such a long time and the pop back up whenever she wants anymore.

 

The next day, they wanted to call her again after school. We waited until after we got practices and everything done and settled for them to call her. Thomas talked first. He told her that she made him cry the night before and he didn’t like it and that he didn’t want her to do it again. Mind you, he was only 6 years old and had the courage to say that. He talked for a few more minutes and gave the phone to Timothy. They were only on the phone for around 20-25 minutes total.

 

Brian and I talked that night about frequency of them calling her. We decided that if she was going to talk to them again, that the boys needed to be eased into talking to her again instead of it all being at once. So we settled on Sundays from noon to 1PM is when they could call her and if she wasn’t available, then she could call them back during this time. We figured this way, if they were upset or something after a phone call that it wouldn’t ruin the rest of their weekend and would give them time to settle down before going to bed that night. She surprisingly agreed.

During the first week, I reached out to the Family Liaison at the boys’ school. He was a social worker at the school and someone that both of the boys knew. He spent a couple of hours on the phone with me and answered any and all questions that I had. Our main concerns were how to ease back into contact, how much was too much, if they should see her again, what to do if she disappeared again and how long to wait for contact if she did disappear. He said that as parents, we have a job to protect the kids, not only from physical things but also from mental things and the way she was treating them was definitely mentally unhealthy for them. He said once a week would be good for them in multiple ways…it will show how willing she is to commit to a schedule and it would be a slow integration back into contact with her. When I asked him about visitation, he told me to do what we thought would be best… if we thought they would be ok with it, then do it if the chance presented itself. He also suggested a two week timeframe… once she missed two Sundays in a row, then her contact with them needed to be strictly written communication instead of getting their hopes up every Sunday and then being crushed week after week. But what kinda caught me off guard was when he asked if she was a drug addict. I hadn’t mentioned drugs at all, but he proceeded to tell me that his on again off again behavior is typical for drug addicts. So that told me that this man really knew what he was talking about.

The time came for the child support contempt hearing and she asked if she could see the kids since she was coming to town the night before. Brian told her that we would talk it over and get back to her. We decided before we made a decision that we would ask Timothy what his opinion was. We figured Thomas was too little and that Timothy would think about it a little more. He said he would like to see her, but he also told us that he wanted us to be there with him. So her and I talked and came up with meeting at Chuck E Cheese the night before the hearing (we had originally settled on her and her daughter coming to our house to see the kids but we normally take the kids to Chuck E Cheese on their birthdays and it was Thomas’s birthday so that’s how we got to that point). I told her we would be there at a certain time and we would be leaving at a certain time because they had school the next day. She texted me every day, including the day of, to confirm plans, give me updates, and things like that. But at some point, she ended up telling me that she thinks that I’m a great person and that there’s no reason why there can’t be room for both of us in the boys’ lives. (If you don’t believe me, I still have the messages and can show you… but it was definitely not typical behavior from her.) We got to Chuck E Cheese when we were supposed to and she was running about 30 minutes late, so we went ahead and got the kids some tokens and got the food ordered. When she finally showed up, she dropped off a present for Thomas at the table and went to go say hi to the kids. I sat at the table and watched. Neither of the kids knew her at first. She went up to them and stood there and both of them had a really confused look on their faces. The only reason they figured out who she was is when she talked and their sister ran up to them. (This is even worse because Timothy has a family picture in a frame on his desk in his room from before their divorce and still didn’t recognize her.) She asked if she could get more tokens for the kids, asked if she could get Thomas a cake, and even asked if he could open his present. This was very non-typical behavior for her. Normally, she would have came in and tried to take over. We ended up staying about a half hour later than planned so Thomas could have his cake and left when they started to close. The kids said their goodbyes in the parking lot and she gave them a blanket with her dad’s name on it and gave them some pictures. She even hugged me…

Court went as expected the next day. She had managed to get a job at a gas station just prior to the hearing (which she conveniently got fired from not long after the hearing so I have no idea how she’s actually managed to continue to pay any support at all) and was ordered to pay $33.00 per month more to start paying her back support. This brought her total to $183.00 a month. She was also told that if she didn’t make on time child support payments for an entire year after the hearing, then a warrant would be put out for her arrest and she’d have to go to jail for 30 days.

She did good with the phone calls for about a month after the hearing and then didn’t answer or call back one Sunday. They tried again the next Sunday and the same thing happened. Someone even texted from the phone saying that it wasn’t her number anymore. I responded asking if they knew her or how to get in contact with her but I never got a response. So she had gone two Sundays without talking to the kids and didn’t bother to contact Brian or myself during that time, even though she could have sent an email or a message through Facebook. And even if she didn’t have access to the internet, then she could have borrowed a phone since she’s never been able to forget Brian’s phone number or she could have sent the kids a letter. There’s no reasonable excuse as to why she blew the kids off yet again.

 

The next day, she texted Brian and told him that she hadn’t been available for the last two Sundays because her and her boyfriend were breaking up and she needed to get another phone. He told her that wasn’t a good enough excuse to leave the kids hanging again so if she wanted to talk to them, she would need to write them letters for a while. Apparently she didn’t like that answer from him, so she texted me and tried to get a different answer from me – which didn’t happen. I told her that no matter what’s going on in her personal life does not give a reason to do that to the boys again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

......... To be continued...

Psycho, Part 2

.......... Continued from part 1...

In December 2009, right before Christmas, she told Brian that her and her boyfriend split up and she had to move out, was staying in a homeless shelter, and was thinking about moving back to Michigan where the majority of her family lives. He told her that if she was going to move, then she needed to sign over custody of the kids so that he could take care of things with them without her needing to sign off on anything. It took a little bit, but she agreed. She signed over custody in either February or March 2010. Brian had to pick her up, take her to the lawyer’s office, and then take her back again. (I don’t think she ever actually went to Michigan at this time.)

By that time, she was bouncing back and forth between different friends’ houses and homeless shelters. (She had even asked Brian if she could move back in to our house the next time him and I had an argument!) So since she didn’t have a stable place to live or to take the kids, one of the conditions of her visitation became that we would take them to see her at a public location (the mall, a restaurant, a park, etc.) so she could see them and then we would take them back home. Of course this was unacceptable for her because she was their mother and tried to tell us that she could take care of them. But she refused to see the kids like that so her visitation with the kids dropped dramatically. It was minimal at best before but it became almost non existent. She would still come to a sports event every now and then but even that completely stopped.

Eventually she got a place of her own and wanted the boys to come and see her there. Brian agreed. So we took the kids to this new place which she told Brian that she was buying, but was really doing a “rent-to-own” deal. We didn’t tell the boys that we were taking them to see her so they were really excited once they figured it out. They came back to the car all excited because she had her own place and they even had their own bedroom, even though it was all full of boxes. She stayed there 2-3 months before she couldn’t pay her rent anymore and was evicted. (I found out much later that this was never a rent-to-own place… it was a boyfriend’s house who was a truck driver and wasn’t ever home. He came home and caught her cheating on him with his best friend, so he kicked her out. He told her to take what she could that day and the rest went to the trash. Friends of hers came to help her get things out of the house and took her to someone in Fairborn’s house who just happened to be a drug dealer, so she offered a joint as payment instead of gas money because her money just happened to be left in the house.)

Sometime in summer/fall of 2010, she met her second husband. Brian looked up his record, like he did with any guy that she decided to get involved with, and found all kinds of things both in Clark County and Champaign County. Those things include, but are not limited to, multiple domestic violence charges, drugs, and breaking his nephew’s jaw. So of course the kids were not going to go to this man’s house… ever. She tried multiple times to tell Brian that she was changing her life around for the better and that the boys should be able to come to her new home, but she was repeatedly told no and reminded that she could see the kids at a public location.

From what I understand, he was beating her on a regular basis and she called someone and asked for that person to help her get out of the situation. That person complied and her family came down from Michigan to get her. But for whatever reason she let him talk her into going back to him, so she did. A few weeks later, she told Brian that they had made up and she was going to marry this guy. She requested that the kids be at her wedding. I didn’t think it would be that great of an idea, but since there were going to be other people there, Brian decided to let the kids go. We dropped them off at the nursing home she was getting married in and stayed in the neighborhood in case we were needed. (This was when the kids met her husband and is the one and only time they have been even around this man.)

Christmas was the week after the wedding. She kept asking for the kids to come over to her house and open presents because they had already been around her husband at the wedding. But again, they weren’t going to go over there and be alone, so Brian reminded her that she could see them at a public place. For whatever reason, she didn’t understand that the kids’ safety was more important than what she wanted.

Fast forward a few months to tax time. At this point, she had only paid one month of support since signing over full custody. Someone had paid to get her license reinstated so we assume that CSEA found her and sent a letter saying that she had to start paying again or they would revoke her license again. So she paid one month - $150.00 – and moved to a trailer that was bought for her so that CSEA couldn’t find her again. Since her and her husband were married, they filed a joint tax return. Needless to say, CSEA found her. She had been ordered by the court to get a job but for whatever reason, she decided that she didn’t have to. (She’s not disabled or anything like that so she can work.) Since they couldn’t garnish her wages, they took his tax return. He obviously didn’t like that, so he beat her up again and put her in the hospital this time. She called Brian and wanted him to bring the kids to the hospital to see her. Uh, NO! The last thing the kids needed was to see their mother all beat up. I’m pretty sure the hospital got the police involved while she was there because Project Woman ended up putting her up in a hotel. Once she was there, she called Brian again and asked if the kids could come to the hotel where she was and go swimming with her (while she supposedly had a broken hip/ leg). But we felt that this was not the time for the kids to go see her because of all the crap she was dealing with and she didn’t need to tell the kids all about it and use it as an excuse as to why she hadn’t seen them. We felt it was more important to keep them away from the mind games.

Not too long after, she packed up her daughter and her father (She had taken her dad out of the nursing home he was in and moved him into the trailer with her and her husband but then left it up to her husband’s family to take care of him) and moved to Michigan again. Her family got her dad situated in another nursing home. She called Brian to tell him that she knew her husband would try to come get her once he was out of jail and wanted Brian’s opinion on if she should go back with him or not. He told her to make her own decisions. Then one day, her and her daughter disappeared from up there and reappeared back in Springfield and back with her husband.

 

A couple of weeks later, Brian got a random phone call from the Champaign County Job and Family offices and it was her. She said her husband was there with a knife and was threatening to kill her. Brian told her to call 911. Neither of us really understands why she didn’t do that in the first place. He went back to jail; she got a restraining order, and then went back to Michigan.

After he got out, she pulled the same thing with him that she would do to us every now and then. She called him over and over and over and over again. She could do that because the order wasn’t against her. But when he called her to tell her to stop, she called the police and told them that he had contacted her and violated the restraining order. He was put in jail again but this time he didn’t get out. He went to court and she testified against him. She had brought her latest boyfriend to town with her and so before the hearing, she called Brian and asked if the kids could come visit her at her hotel room. He told her no, but if she wanted to meet the kids at a public place then she could. She didn’t like that answer so she hung up on him. But while she was in town, she called again and asked if they could spend the night with her and this man in their hotel room. That answer was more of a laugh and then a “hell no”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

........... To be Continued...

Psycho, Part 1

Disclaimers:

-          If you’re one of those “once a biological parent, always a parent” activists, then please do not read any farther because we will completely disagree.

-          If you decide to continue reading, please keep in mind that these are my opinions and I have formed them from experience from both sides. There are certain things that I feel very strongly about and this is one of them, so no amount of arguing over it or trying to convince me that I’m wrong is going to change my mind.

-          These things happened over a period of several years and it’s difficult to keep it all on a specific timeframe without the use of our calendars at home that has all this crap marked on them. I know there will be things that I’ll leave out – not from choice, just from not remembering while writing. So I apologize in advance if it sounds like I’m rambling or if the timing doesn’t quite match up.

 

 

 

I got blindsided by a paper a few weeks ago. It was a permission slip/ letter from one of Timothy’s teacher talking about how they’re learning how to write letters in class and the student was to fill in the blank on who they wanted to write the letter to and it gave an option of to allow or not allow the student to mail the letter when they were finished writing it and then gave spaces to write addresses. Underneath the address space was a place to check mark and next to it said something to the effect of please send the letter home. I checked the “no permission” box and put it back in his backpack.

Before you start ranting and raving about why this is wrong, you should probably know details. And in giving you those details, you need to know history.

                                      

When Brian and I started dating in November 2008, he had shared parenting with his ex wife where he was the residential parent and she was the one with “visitation”. She was supposed to have the boys every Tuesday night, Thursday night, and then Friday and Saturday nights would alternate from week to week. Key word: supposed. Realistically, she only took the kids once a month… twice a month if the boys were lucky. Even then, any time she would have them, she would call or text Brian and tell him that he needed to come get the kids early, regardless of if he had plans already or not. There were countless times when we had to drop what we were doing so he could get the kids. It was extremely hard to make plans to do anything because she would talk about taking the kids on one of her days… even up until right before we would leave to take the kids to her house and then she would cancel. And then Brian, not her, was left to deal with crying and upset kids. She would always try to get him to bring them to her on days that weren’t ones that were hers. He would do it sometimes, but wouldn’t if we had already planned something for that night.

 

At one point, she called Brian and asked him for some money. She had gotten a van in their divorce and Brian offered to buy it back from her. He came to work one day and asked me if I wanted to “repo” a van with him that night. So I went with him to go get it and drove the car with the kids back to the house while he drove the van. He had gotten it from her with the intention of reselling it, so he started cleaning it out either the next day or that following weekend. Brian found a small pipe in the center console that had burned pot in it. He called her to ask her about it and she told him that it wasn’t hers so it must have been mine. So according to her, I put it there to set her up. (Just for the record, I have never done any type of illegal drugs. I’ve had many, many friends that did, but I never saw the point in it.)

This went on for quite a while… until Brian’s unemployment benefits from being laid off  when Springfield Ford closed down was up which was about a year and a half after Brian and I decided to become serious. Once he told her that he was going to be going back to work and that I would be the one to start taking the kids to the daycare in the mornings and picking them up, then she decided that she wanted to take them like she was supposed to. This went on for a few months.

 

Clothes were a major issue for me. The kids would always go over there in nice clothes that they would wear to school, but somehow once they got to her house they would be ripped or had “gotten dirty” so she would change them into something that was old, stained, smelling of cigarette smoke, and didn’t fit. It was hard because I wanted them to look nice when they went to school but had no idea what condition the clothes would be in the next day when they got home. On the weekends, it wasn’t too bad because they could go over there in play clothes and we wouldn’t have to worry about if they were going to get torn up or not. There were many times where Timothy would come home in Thomas’s clothes so they were too small for him and Thomas would come home in Timothy’s clothes so he would be swimming in them. And she would never send their clothes back home. She would keep all the nice clothes at her house and on the rare occasion that she would send clothes back, they would be clothes that weren’t ours. Eventually, we just started sending the kids back to her house in her clothes in the hopes that we would get the nice ones that we had bought back. We got a couple things back, but not all of it. And when it was cold, they would come back without any coat or sweatshirt to keep them warm.

Her support of the kids was another issue that I had. Granted, since they had a shared parenting order, she wasn’t ordered to pay child support. But she never bought clothes for them or helped out with school fees or sports fees. There were a couple of Christmases (the first one that I was with Brian for and ones before that I believe) that Brian bought presents for the kids and gave them to her to give to them so it would look like she had gotten them for the kids. She would never come and pick up the kids or bring them home so Brian had to do all of the transportation. She would even call Brian and ask him to stop at the grocery to get things for her on the way over to drop the kids off because she “didn’t have enough food in the house for them to eat” even though she had her own car to get back and forth to the store and had a boyfriend she was living with that could have gone to the store instead of her calling her ex husband. And of course Brian would do it because he wanted the kids to be able to see their mother but didn’t want them to go hungry in the process.

Another issue was how she took care of them in general. They were trick-or-treating with her one time and was taking them around in the van she had at the time which she had FULL of junk… so full that the kids had a hard time getting in and out of the vehicle. Thomas ended up falling and hitting the corner of his eye on an old, rusty tool box which put a deep gash there. She never called Brian to tell him and then stayed in the car when she dropped the kids off. So when the kids got in the house, we noticed a band aid on his face. Brian called her and she told him that she had a friend who is a nurse look at it and the friend told her to put a band aid on it instead of taking him to the doctor. He has a scar there now. Anytime the kids needed to go to the doctor while they were with her, she wouldn’t take them. Instead, she would either call Brian to have him get the kids or she wouldn’t say anything and we would figure it out once they got home. And from what I gather from their doctor, they used to have ear infections all the time from being around cigarette smoke. But she never stopped smoking, so the kids would come home from her house smelling like smoke and we’d have to watch them more carefully to make sure we took them to the doctor at the first sign of anything.

A big safety concern was on the rare occasion that she would come to get the kids and she wouldn’t have car seats/ booster seats. There was a time when she came to get them while Brian was at work and she brought the cops with her. (I had caught her going through our garage once after she dropped the kids off and told her I was going to kick her ass if she ever got out of her vehicle on our property again, so she told the cops that she was “afraid for her life”.)  But when she came to get them, she didn’t have seats and I refused to let them go with her. She tried to tell the cop that since I wouldn’t let them go with her, that I was technically kidnapping them from her. The cop laughed and told that that if the residential parent left them in my care and I thought that the situation wasn’t a safe one, then I didn’t have to let them go. That was the last time she tried to come pick up the kids from our house.

Eventually, she quit taking the kids again and was back down to the once to twice a month and then dwindled to even less than that. She would show up to the occasional baseball game or soccer game but always wanted to start trouble.

There was one baseball game where Brian had left Thomas with me while he was coaching Timothy’s team. I was sitting with Thomas on my lap with some of Brian’s family members on the bleachers – on the top – when out of nowhere, she ran up behind the bleachers, reached around me, grabbed Thomas off of my lap, and ran off with him. She didn’t say a word, so of course I ran after her. She stopped and I told her that she couldn’t just grab him and take off like that because Brian had left him in my care. If she had said something, it would have been a completely different situation. So I held my hands out for Thomas to come back to me… and he tried to. He had his arms out so I could get him, but once I got my hands under his armpits, she whipped out her cell phone, dialed 911, and told the cop that I was trying to rip her son’s arms out of his sockets. In the meantime, one of Brian’s family members was yelling to him to get his son. He got over there while she was on the phone with 911 and took Thomas back to the dugout with him so she couldn’t take off with him again. Eventually the cops did show up and came over to talk to me. I explained to them what went on and they told me that she had no right to act that way and I did what I needed to do. They also apologized to me because they felt sorry that I had to deal with her. A report was filed, but no charges were filed.

Another time, she had been at Timothy’s last baseball game of the season and he had gotten a trophy. The kids were going to her house afterwards for a couple of hours and then we were to pick them up and take them to their grandmother’s house. Timothy asked if he could take his trophy to her house so he could show the people there. He was obviously proud of it, so Brian agreed – even though I had strongly disagreed to it. When we picked the kids up and they got in the car, Timothy didn’t have his trophy. We told him to run in and go get it so he could show his grandma. He went to the door and she answered. He talked to her for a minute and came back to the car – again without the trophy – and said that she wouldn’t let him bring it home. That pissed me off. I got out of the car (the ONLY time I have ever gotten out of the car at any place she has lived) and went to the door. Only this time she wasn’t the one that answered… her boyfriend did. He was screaming and had a gun in the waist of his pants without a shirt on so the gun was visible. He told me repeatedly that I did not have permission to be on his property and that I was trespassing. I tried to tell him that Timothy wanted his stuff, but he refused to back down. We both ended up calling 911. He told them that I was there threatening them – which I did not do – and I told them that he wouldn’t let Timothy have his things. We went down to a local school and waited for the cop to get there and she told us that since the trophy was in his house, there was nothing that we could do about it and that Timothy couldn’t even walk in and take it out if he wanted to. 

There was also a debacle with the school. She had seen me driving towards the school one day during my normal work hours so she called Brian to ask why I wasn’t at work. He was busy and preoccupied, so he blurted out that I was headed to the school to help plan Timothy’s first grade class Halloween party. That set her off. She called the school and went off on them for letting me be a part of the planning process because I wasn’t their mother and she didn’t want me anywhere near the school. The school ended up telling me that because she requested it, I couldn’t be at the school without Brian. (So I wasn’t able to help with the other parties the rest of that entire school year, with the exception of the end of the year party. Timothy’s teacher told me that since she had thrown such a fit and then never decided to participate in anything, that there was no reason to deny me being able to help out.)  She showed up to the school’s parade where all the kids walk around the back of the building in their costumes wearing a tank top, a mini skirt, fishnet stockings, and black boots that came up to her knee and had a tall heel. Other parents were asking me if that was the boys’ mother and why in the world she would show up to a school dressed like a hooker. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

.................. To be continued...

Moron

I was on break today and read this article via a link on WHIO's facebook page and it seriously irked me. Read for yourself....

Man flies flag upside-down to protest election outcome

---

Story posted 2012.11.07 at 11:01 PM EST

A Mitt Romney supporter has chosen a unique way to express his dissatisfaction with the election results, and neighbors are taking notice.

 

News Center 7 received calls Wednesday night from residents in Beavercreek who were not happy about their neighbor flying the U.S. flag upside-down.

 

One caller said it might not be illegal, but it's offensive to the people in the neighborhood.

Despite what his neighbors think, Ray Lewis said flying the flag upside-down is an international symbol of distress and he felt compelled to do it as a form of "peaceful protest" following the re-election of President Barack Obama.

 

"I feel that my country is still in a dire situation and it's my way of silently protesting that we're still in trouble," Lewis told News Center 7's Kate Bartley. "I was a Romney supporter … I'm not sure what's going to happen next, but we're still in dire straits."

 

Lewis' upside-down flag is not the only one stirring controversy a day after Election Day.

A McDonald's in Follansbee, W.Va., temporarily flew its flag flying upside-down early Wednesday. The flag was taken down later and the franchise owner told local media it was a mistake made in the dark and was not meant as a political statement.

 

Lewis said he got the idea from a movie he saw years ago.

 

"Just a few more days until I can regain my sanity and we'll straighten it back up," he said. "We're Americans first. But today it's like, 'God help us.' "

 

 

 

 

 

There's multiple issues in this that I would like to address:

 

1. Please pay attention to the last section.... "Just a few more days until I can regain my sanity and we'll straighten it back up." Regain your SANITY?! You're really going to say THAT to a news reporter and think that it won't end up in the article?? In my eyes, that made the man look like a complete idiot, regardless of what message he was really trying to send.

 

2. The election is over and done with... get over it. Obama won in electoral votes AND the popular vote so obviously the majority of America thought that Mitt Romney wasn't cut out for the job. This really just makes this guy look like a little kid that's throwing a fit after not getting his way. (Trust me, my kids do it ALL THE TIME.)

 

3. He got the idea from a MOVIE??? Didn't his parents ever teach him that you don't always believe what's on TV?? Maybe TV is what warped this man's brain into thinking this would be ok to do...

 

4. That flag is there because hundreds of thousands of men and women over hundreds of years have been fighting for this man's rights. If it weren't for them, he wouldn't even have the damn flag to cause a ruckus with in the first place! So what's he do? He takes a symbol of all of their hard work and sacrifices - which includes sacrificing their lives - and makes a mockery of it?? How incredibly disrespectful! That's not only disrespecting them, but their families also.

 

Personally, I feel if this man wants to make a scene like this that completely disrespects the people that defend the very rights he's using to justify his actions, then he needs to find a new country to live in because he obviously doesn't appreciate the rights he has.

 

5. I saw many comments on WHIO's page about how liberals can burn flags and that's protected by out right to protest and that this shouldn't be any different. Well, I'm a liberal and I think it's appalling that someone would burn a flag... and I am equally appalled that someone would treat our flag in this manner.

 

 

 

 

 

Bottom line... this man needs to get a grip. If he doesn't like how the election turned out then he can go elsewhere... there's no law keeping him here and he's not imprisoned. So either he needs to suck it up and deal with it or get the hell OUT!!