Mission Accomplished

I spent most of the night gathering my documents and filling in the necessary forms. My dad takes my son on Tuesdays so he went over all the documents with me to make sure I did not miss anything.

I barely slept. I kept thinking of new things I needed to include. I also had a presentation with my son at his school early the next morning. I knew I would have to drop my daughter off at early care, get to my son's school, try to help make his presentation fun, and then finish what I needed to do for court by 11am.

The presentation at my son's school went well and I tried to stay calm as I prepared all the documents at my office and made all the necessary copies. At the last minute, I found a notary who was happy to help me (I was literally walking out the door, late.)

I went down to the courthouse and the time I was supposed to be there and was told that they didn't have time to help me because they were going to close for lunch in 20 minutes. She told me to come back in about an hour. I decided to try to eat something, but I could not.

I went back and stood in line. I was the first one so I was able to see the clerk first. I thought I had all my documentation ready but he seemed perplexed by something. It seems that he thought my expenses were inconsistent with my actual income and that raised a red flag for fraud.

At that point, I lost it. I could not hold the tears back. He asked me if I had documentation of my mortgage, and I did not think I did. I was just about to give up when I remembered that I had pulled a copy of my credit report that morning to show the damage that has been done to my credit history.

While he was away to verify everything, I completely lost it and started bawling right there in the courthouse lobby. It was one of the most humiliating moments of my life.

The clerk was able to use my information and grant me the waiver. He obviously felt bad and gave me some tissues and tried to make me laugh.

I went into the next line to wait. That was somewhat less humiliating, although I was still in the same lobby with all the same people who had just witnessed me sobbing.

The clerk had me help him paper-punch all the documents, told me I was done and wished me good luck.

I think I did everything correctly. It will be interesting what the response from my husband and his attorney will be. Neither know I filed yet. I suppose they think they will have an automatic win tomorrow as planned.

Instead, they will get copies of my response.

This was a humbling day but it did give me strength to know that I can do this. I can fight back even if my husband and his family try to cripple me financially. These are my children. It is my duty and my right to protect them as their mother. It takes some research and perseverence to represent yourself, but I do believe that the truth always wins.

Sleep = A Clear Mind, finally

I finally got a full night of uninterrupted sleep and am thinking much clearer. It has been months since this has happened. I usually take hours to get to sleep and wake up 4-5 times during the night. My mother talked to me yesterday about how important it is for me to sleep well, and she was right.

If nothing else has come out of these stomach pains, it is the realization that I have not been taking good enough care of myself. I have told myself I am doing better than most under the circumstances, but I was comparing myself to other Al-anon-ers - not most normal people. I am going to take a look at how I can do a better job.

My mind has been wandering with all these scenarios that "might" happen. I realized this morning that it really is not up to me. I have children. And, as my husband likes to remind me, he has "rights" as their father.

I can control the situation somewhat with my children now because my husband has not been an active participant in our lives. But ultimately, if we divorce, a judge will decide everything.

I have given my husband a guilty verdict in my head again and again. But ultimately, it will not matter what I think. Only the facts will matter.

I can present my truth to a judge, and it may or may not matter. Some things are undisputed. My husband has a felony conviction for cocaine possession. My husband has been in rehab twice for a total over 5 months during the span of our relationship. My husband has relapsed or "slipped" (as he likes to call it) several times since then. My husband has driven drunk with us in the car. My husband slept with 3 women without a condom. All of these things I have proof of. The rest, all the little bitty things that I have been fixated on, are not going to be relevant in court.

The judge can subpoena my husband's bank records and he can explain where the money has gone. He can give an account line by line. And I can explain all the sacrifices we have made and how many times I have had to make his children pasta or macaroni and cheese. I can show the 401ks that I had to liquidate to stay afloat. S/he can look at my bank records and see that we were left with nothing.

A judge can talk to the school. S/he can talk to the teachers. S/he can talk to my son's counselor. S/he can talk to the people at our church and in the Muslim community. S/he can talk to anyone and see what the patterns have been over the years and what the effects have been on our children.

A judge can look at all of this and make his (or her) verdict. And that will dictate what happens from here on out. If my husband does not pay support, he will go to jail. Our State is very tough on this. All of this is very simple. I have been making it hard, but it is very simple.

And once that happens, we can move on with our lives. There will be no more "what ifs". We won't have to wait for him to pay the bills or beg for money. We will know what the law allows for every month and the State can take it straight out of his check.

If my husband continues to read my blog and harass me about it, a judge can address that as well. If my husband verbally abuses me, sends me menacing text messages and/or voicemails, or physically attacks me again, there are measures a judge can take about that as well. I do not have to just sit here and continue to take it, and I won't.

It can only get better from here.