Our Divorce

What an absolute shit show. I met Ex about a year and a half after his divorce with his first Ex-wife and spent years living their divorce aftermath and ongoing custody disputes. I watched Ex poke and poke and poke and then Ex-wife’s explosive responses and at times retaliatory retribution for his cruel provoking. Ex had perfected provoking her then pointing out her ‘crazy’ behavior. Ex-wife had an inability to let Ex have the last word. To her absolute detriment, Ex-wife had a drug and alcohol problem that jaded everything and gave Ex that added oomph to point out crazy.

And here I was reliving Ex’s divorce and custody 2.0. But I don’t have a drug or alcohol problem and I’m typically able to allow Ex to poke without response. Ex was playing the same plays from his original playbook and it wasn’t working the way he planned. One would think he would already know how it would play out. After all we were 19.5 years into me acquiescing to the rages, the silent treatment, the poking and provoking. I had learned his game years ago and I didn’t want to play. I had not only learned but had started calling him out and that infuriated him. Our divorce was no different. I had no desire to play his games. Ex is controlling, mean, hateful, condescending and just all things Narcissistic, and now I find out an adulterer to boot and I just wanted out.

After finding Ex’s pathetic and juvenile email to his married work whore, I retained a divorce attorney about a week later. The attorney was a referral from a church friend. At the initial consultation I told the attorney my Ex would be an extraordinary A-hole, maybe the worst he had ever dealt with and would refuse to settle throughout the divorce. I had all the past experiences with his ex-wife to go on and I knew what I was in for. I remember that subtle glaze pass over the attorney face. The yeah right, I have heard it all before face. But he agreed to take my case and I charged the $5500 retainer on my Discover card.

Ex walked in from work on the exact same day I had retained my attorney with the craziest divorce proposal. He wanted me to agree to not retain attorneys and settle amongst ourselves. All I could think was, too late. He didn’t know about my attorney yet. Ex’s proposal offered Ex signing over sole custody of our two joint children to me in exchange for me agreeing to release Ex of any spousal support obligation. It said Ex would agree to ‘allow’ the kids and I to live in ‘his’ house for a few years with me making the house payment, while I got my feet under me, but after I believe 5 years the house had to be sold and all the equity goes to Ex. The proposal even stated that if I remarried my new husband ‘owed’ Ex all the house equity and he would have to immediately refi in the new spouse’s name and pay Ex the equity. Ex had a retirement acct thru work that he considered ‘his’ alone. That retirement acct was more valuable than the equity in our home. Ex’s proposal had Ex retaining 100% of that acct. I questioned him about the retirement acct. Ex very matter of factly stated that’s his work acct and is funded by ‘his’ wages therefore it’s his and will not be part of the divorce negotiations.

Apparently Ex never considered that I didn’t want to date, didn’t want to remarry, would reject his insane proposals, just wanted him out and gone. He never considered that I would view his infidelity as my catalyst to my freedom and independence. I never, not even once begged him to stay, begged him to reconsider his affair, or reconsider the divorce. I wanted him out of our house, and that threw him completely off his game. He wanted me to cry and beg, throw myself at his mercy. His ego took hit after hit. I don’t believe he wanted me or wanted to stay, but he did want me to beg and grovel at his feet, tell him I couldn’t live without him. He wanted open ended opportunities to berate me and tell me all the reasons his infidelity was entirely all my fault. I popped his bubble. He was on the defense, trying to defend and justify his affair.

As I stood there in the kitchen reading this insanity, all I could do was shake my head and silently wait for my divorce filing to be served on Ex.

I asked him to move out. I asked him to go live with his affair partner. He said no, this is his house and if I don’t want to live in the same house with him during the pendency of the divorce I was free to leave, but he’s not going anywhere and the kids stay with him. What I discovered later was my finding Ex’s email letter to his whore jump started the divorce process before Ex had a chance to cement the relationship with his whore. She was married and still living with her husband and didn’t seem completely on board at the time with ending her marriage. So there was poor poor pitiful Ex. His wife knew about his whore, wanted zero reconciliation and wanted him out and his whore wasn’t agreeing to end her marriage for him. During that first few months Ex seemed completely lost. He flipped back and forth between attack dog rage and pathetic victimhood. I didn’t know which I was getting from minute to minute. But one thing was absolute every single night, his drinking turned him into a rage monster later in the evenings.

Shortly after I found Ex’s letter to his affair partner, he came in from work with his signature smirk mouth and informed me he had changed the password to his email because ‘’you tend to get into other people’s things’’. Without missing a beat, I laughed and said well, you tend to put your dick in other men’s wives so I guess that makes us even. His smiley smirk mouth remained although now twitching, but his eyes turned to angry solid black, and he appeared speechless for a moment.

As the days passed he became more and more agitated and angry. The threats were constant. He flipped between begging me to sign his proposal so ‘we can get on with our lives’, the life where I had the kids and he had all the assets. And on the flip walking around the house stating if I didn’t agree to his proposal he was going to take everything including the kids and make sure I was out on the street with nothing. He name called, chased me around the house, yelled, screamed, told me I was nothing. I changed out the master bedroom door handle to a key lock. We had a large 600 pound gun safe in the master closet and I changed the keypad combination. Ex was demanding his guns. He was following me around screaming ‘gimme my guns’ on repeat like a petulant 4 year old having a tantrum. He was continuously taking things from the house to a storage unit and wanted his guns to take to the unit too. He was terrifying.

One Sunday afternoon I took our two youngest and two of my older children out to dinner. Ex had left on Friday evening and hadn’t returned. While we were out I saw on our Ring camera Ex had returned to the house, stayed for a bit, then left again. Upon return to the house, I found a set of keys on the kitchen counter. I went upstairs to see if everything was intact. Ex had broken into the master bedroom, splitting the door in the process, but the safe combination had been changed. It appeared he had come prepared with the new door handle to change out after breaking into the bedroom. Shortly after the kids and I returned home, Ex reappeared and in a rage. It went downhill quickly. He was yelling and cursing at me, repeatedly calling me a fucking bitch among other names. Ex started calling my two older children names when they told him to leave me alone. Ex kept calling my son a ‘fucking pussy’, telling him to come closer so he could put him on his ass and teach him who’s in charge. ‘Come here little fucking pussy so I can take you out’. For context, Ex is 6’2’’ and son is 5’7’’. Ex repeated his profane challenges over and over and over. Our joint 17 year old daughter was witnessing the whole scene with her mouth wide open. Our disabled son was telling Ex ‘be nice to mom and brother’. My older daughter was telling Ex to leave older son alone so he started calling her names too. I called the police. Ex’s behavior in front of the police was on some levels shocking, yet really not. It was his typical Jekyll and Hyde MO. When the police arrived Ex became calm and cool as a cucumber. He told the police my kids and I had done all the things he had done and he was this helpless victim who was being ganged up on. Ex literally stated to the police, my son was telling Ex to come here little fucking pussy and that I was calling him a fucking bitch. Ex said we all conspired together to get him in trouble because I wanted him to move out. Our joint daughter kept saying he’s lying, it was all him. Ex told the police I had brainwashed his daughter against him. The police told him it would be best if he voluntarily moved out, but Ex had this cockamamy story about how if he moves out he will forfeit his claim to the home equity and its his house and he intends to stay with the house and claim all the equity. The police were useless and wouldn’t do anything. Unfortunately, that afternoon’s events were becoming a regular daily occurrence.

I think it was shortly after that Ex emailed a second divorce proposal. This proposal was still financially lopsided in favor of Ex. In exchange for me taking sole custody of both kids, I would forgo all support from Ex. I would keep the house and the accompanying $34,000 solar lean on the house but I would have to refi both in my own name and I get to keep my financed vehicle. Ex would keep everything else. As an alternative, Ex proposed we sell the house and split the equity between us and Ex keeps everything else including ‘his’ retirement plan. Ex is big into spreadsheets so he included yet another spreadsheet showing how he’s at a complete financial disadvantage and how he generously is giving me the upper hand. There was no way I would be able to afford to keep the house under his scenario. In fact there was no way for me to be able to afford a rental for the kids and I either. My attorney hadn’t filed the divorce yet, and Ex still didn’t know I had an attorney. I sent Ex’s new proposal off to the attorney. Attorney’s opinion was similar to mine. The proposal was relatively fair as far as assets go, but without support from Ex, the kids and I wouldn’t be able to survive financially. And the attorney said a judge wouldn’t approve of a decree written as Ex wanted it. Ex made well over double my income at the time. So I just decided not to answer Ex and wait for the divorce filing.

Ex was impatient. Demanded I answer. Kept telling me he was offering a generous offer and I wouldn’t get any better by holding out. He eventually went to the courthouse and filed for divorce, outlining his latest proposal and filing for mandatory court mediation. My attorney had also filed but Ex hadn’t been served yet. Apparently the court called Ex the next day to let him know I had filed first and wanted to know if he wanted to proceed or withdraw his petition and get a refund on his filing fee. He chose to withdraw and wait to be served.

Around this point in time, Ex’s mother group texted Ex and I saying she was planning dates for her and Ex’s stepdad to fly out in June for a visit. I texted back and said I was surprised Ex hadn’t told her yet, but he has a married girlfriend at work and demanding a divorce so he can be with her. That was the very last entry to our group text. She called me later that day and said she had spoken with Ex and he had said the woman was just a ‘friend’ and they just talked occasionally at work. She was pretty upset asking me to give Ex another chance because he hadn’t crossed the intimacy bridge. I told her I found a letter he wrote describing past physical intimacy and that he’s looking forward to more. I told her his letter said he was working to eliminate all obstacles to be with her. His wife and family being the obstacles and that he was waiting for her to make the decision to leave her husband. Mother in law coughed and I think I heard her choke.

Editing to add: Cause I forgot this detail until now. Over Spring Break, March 2021, my older daughter, younger daughter and youngest son took a road trip to Yosemite National Park. It had dawned on me that for the first time in almost 20 years I was free to travel and none of us had ever been to Yosemite. We kept our plans quiet until the absolute last minute. Ex was as indignant as ever when he found out we were leaving. He told me I wasn’t leaving until I turned over his guns. I told him I would consider giving him the guns if I came back to an intact house. I knew he would struggle to get the safe out of the house intact. We had to remove the door when it was originally moved into the house and up the stairs because of its size. Now it was fully loaded and he didn’t have the combination. He was following me around demanding his guns right up to driving away. We drove all day to get to Yosemite. We had found and reserved online a really cute motel just outside the park. It was cuter in person and because of the Covid slowdown very reasonably priced. That first night we were playing card games and my Ring app kept repeatedly going off. It was Ex. He was kneeling down on the front porch prying the Ring camera off the house. I asked him through the Ring what he was doing? He said he was taking the Ring with him. We argued over the stupid Ring for about 10 minutes, until I reminded him I would only consider releasing his guns if I came back to an intact house. This is a screen shot of him prying on the camera that day. I really don’t know if he was actually trying to take the Ring or if he was just attempting to ruin our trip. Or maybe both. He knew I would be able to see what he was doing. His attempt at ruining our trip was laughable and sad.

On our second day at Yosemite, stepson called older daughter. They hadn’t spoken in many years. Almost as many years as Ex and stepson hadn’t spoken. Stepson was fishing for dirt on me for his dad. Truly amazing. Ex and stepson were actually bonding over Ex’s bad behavior. Who knew? Was this Ex’s second attempt at ruining our trip to Yosemite?

Once home from Yosemite, Ex started up the relentless ‘gimme my guns’ again. If we were both at the house at the same time he followed me from room to room shouting for the guns. If I entered a room and shut the door, he stood outside the door shouting at the door endlessly. I could hear ‘gimme my guns’ ringing in my head. I took lots of pictures of the guns for my records and gave up and gave him the guns and he hauled them off to his storage unit.

Ex and I filed a joint 2020 tax return in April 2021. Putting solar on your home comes with a 24% federal tax rebate incentive. The solar loan from the solar Ex had installed in November 2020 was structured to have a lower initial payment awaiting the federal incentive return which needed to be applied to the loan to keep the payment the same for the loan duration. Otherwise, if the federal incentive isn’t applied to the loan, the payment increased by $55 per month for 15 years. The tax refund was scheduled to be deposited in our formally joint checking acct, Ex had removed his name from and was now my acct. alone. Ex hounded me. He wanted the tax refund which was approx $9800. I told him it hadn’t cleared yet but it was owed to the solar loan. We were receiving letter and email reminders from the solar finance company that the deadline to pay the 24% incentive was fast approaching. Ex was relentless. He wanted the money.

Our temporary divorce hearing was set for May 2021.

Living in the same house with Ex while waiting and waiting for court relief was unbearable. Some nights he stayed out until late, other evenings he planted himself in the living room. No matter where he spent the evening he was completely drunk. There was no getting around the fact he was drinking and driving on the nights he stayed out until late. He arrived already toasted.

Ex had until 5:00 pm on the 30th day. He stayed until 3:30 pm that 30th day. I think the only reason he didn’t stay until 5:00 was his mother and stepfather were coincidentally arriving at the airport that afternoon. Ex had been out for a few hours that morning. When he returned he just started grabbing things and running them out to his truck, locking the truck and running back in for more stuff. When 3:30 arrived he grabbed two of the family dogs, one of which was our 7 year old Golden Retriever we had had since she was 9 weeks old and most definitely the family dog. I said she needs to stay with the kids. He looked at me with pure hate and sneered, ‘Im taking the dog and I will make sure you never see her again’ and he took her and locked her in his truck. He came back inside for something. I asked him to please leave his house key. He screamed ‘I’m your landlord. Landlords have keys to the houses they own’. I said you are restrained from entering again. There’s no reason for you to keep keys. He said ‘Fuck you’ and headed back out the front door. On his way out the door, he stopped, turned around and screamed ‘thanks for making me homeless you heartless fucking bitch’, slammed the front door as hard as humanly possible and was gone. I took all the exterior door handles and had them rekeyed.

Ex was relentless with our 17 year old daughter during that time as well. Daughter must have been around 12 when she started really picking up on Ex’s behaviors. She’s a really smart intuitive young lady and Ex never gave her credit. He mistreated me openly in front of her. He was short and snappy and very critical of her. No matter how hard she pushed herself, no matter how good her grades or how well she did in sports, he never had kind things to say. Instead it was a critic of how she should have/could have done better. And she was old enough to see how unloving he was to my older children, her half-siblings, and how much he favored his oldest daughter over everyone including her. Daughter got so upset watching how he talked to me, and didn’t miss his silent treatment towards me. She commented frequently why does he act like this? As she grew older she asked on occasion if I thought it was time to leave him. She always quantified those statements with she wanted brother and herself to go with me if I left.

Once Ex’s affair was out in the open, I watched a new more confident side of daughter emerge. She was not happy with her father and for the first time in her life she started speaking up. Having Ex still in the house with us gave him ample opportunities to corner her, screaming ‘I’m a good person’ and ‘why cant you see what a piece of trash your mom is?’ He had her cornered against a wall one evening yelling so loud I could hear him in the master bedroom upstairs, saying ‘because your mother is such a piece of crap mom and wife, she broke the marriage vows years ago and I was free to move on. So it’s not ‘cheating’. Once I heard the screaming, I made my way down stairs, and as I rounded the corner to the stairs I saw he was just inches from her, with his long arms outstretched making air quotations when he said the word ‘cheating’. I had never heard daughter talk back to her father before that night. She told him he’s not a good person, she has been watching him for years mistreat everyone. She said he is always angry and she’s seen how horrible he treats her mother and how often he completely ignores her mom. She then said give me examples right now of how mom is a horrible wife and mother. Right now. He stuttered, stammered then went silent. She said see, you’ve nothing but excuses for your bad behavior. He still had her backed against the wall. I walked down the stairs, squeezed in between them and told her to go to her room. She didn’t waste any time and ran upstairs. Ex then started spit screaming at me, how dare you get in the middle of conversations between my daughter and I? I told him screaming at her, he’s a good person wasn’t having a conversation, it was harassment. He just left without much else to say. He continued to look for opportunities to corner her and found one a few weeks later. It was a typical day. I was at work, daughter was home from school on one of her early out days and getting ready for work at 4:00. The Ring app notified there was movement on the front porch around 3:30. My initial assumption it daughter leaving for work, but it was actually Ex entering the front door. Ex had no business being at the house at 3:30. He had left work early to catch daughter at home alone. He knew she was at home and I was at work. My stomach dropped and turned upside down, because he wasn’t having normal conversations with her at this point. He was verbally attacking her at every opportunity, resulting in extremely heated arguments between them. She had made it a point to not ever be home alone with him because of how volatile he was. I told my boss I needed to leave and rushed home. I knew it wasn’t going to be good. I was too late and my heart sank. I passed daughter as she was leaving our neighborhood headed for work. She called me when she saw me. Daughter was so upset. Ex had gone home early to catch her while he knew I wasn’t there. He cornered her in her bedroom not allowing her to leave. It was more of the same telling her he’s a good person and berated her for not taking his side. He wants her to reject her mother. They argued and she ended up darting past him, ran out of the house and left for work.

In the midst of the divorce ramping up, was guardianship of our disabled son. He had turned 18 just a few months prior to the divorce. I had been a stay at home mom, right up until the two youngest were in high school. Son requires 24/7 care and supervision. I did take a part time job during the school day with the school district the kids attended once our youngest entered 2nd grade. This job allowed me to be off at home in the mornings, at afternoon release and off all breaks. Even after the kids entered high school, I was able to pick son up at the end of his day. There was approximately a year and a half I worked full year, before the district made cutbacks and my scheduled was again following the school year. I had attended every single IEP, IFSP, ISP since his birth. Of the 33 total meetings, Ex had attended 3. We know this because meeting attendee have to sign the attendance roster. I was on the board of directors for 12 years for our local disabilities chapter. Of the doctor’s appointments since birth, and there were a lot, Ex had attended one appointment. I have taken son to family disability summer camp every year, Ex attended our very first year and refused to go again. I have been heavily invested in the disability community. I take son to everything I possibly can to keep him involved with his community. Ex has never shown much interest in being involved and rarely attends anything, even now. Ex has played organized Bocce with son a few times, but other than that nothing. If left it up to Ex, son would sit on the couch watching TV and little else. When we made it to court Ex stated both in his court memorandum as well as verbal testimony that the only reason I had been the one to attend everything was it was more convenient to have me do it. It backfired on him somewhat. He testified that I had all this time off and he worked full time so I was the one to go. This may be somewhat true, but Ex’s job afforded him the ability to flex his hours pretty much any time he wants. But the real hiccup in his theory is I worked too during the week when all these appointments are scheduled and had to take either personal time or sick time to attend. When Covid hit I was working full time. Due to Covid rules son couldn’t be at school if he even had a slight sniffle, which is common for him. Even allergies weren’t allowed to be in the building. Ex very rarely offered to take the time off to be at home with him, so I ended up using every single accrued sick day, personal day and vacation day I had to stay home with son. By the end of Covid I was actually having to take DOC time because I ran out of paid time off. Ex just didn’t want to, so he did not. Ex spent years telling me every single time an appointment or sick child came up that his job is more important than mine. Every time he further said that we had to cater to his job because if he lost his job we would be homeless and living in our car, but if I lost my job it would be inconvenient and tight but we would survive. He never waisted an opportunity to degrade or pat himself on the back. And this was one of his completely obtuse testimony talking points.

The day I retained my divorce attorney, I had asked what would happen with our disabled adult son. The attorney advised that he wouldn’t be a part of the divorce because son was already an adult. He stated that whoever filed for guardianship first had a leg up and the opposing party would be playing catch up. He wasn’t a guardianship attorney and I couldn’t afford another retainer for a second attorney so I filed on my own. I served Ex with the guardianship filing. He was furious. After all, he had been trying to bargain uncontested ‘custody’ in exchange for no support.

My guardianship filing generated a court visitor. My filing had been fairly benign. I was still in that mindset that talking about Ex’s behavior to the outside world was taboo. The visitor came to the house and met son and I. I had listed I believe 11 witnesses in my filing. She interviewed every one. She also interviewed Ex and Ex’s only 2 witnesses, his 2 adult children. I don’t know if the visitor was new to her employment role or if she favors father’s or if she’s just really gullible but the most likely reason she appeared to be just really bad at her job. I don’t know. All my witnesses stated the same things. I did everything. Son’s doctor, son’s case worker, disability directors, EVERYONE said I did everything. After the report was issued, I read that the visitor had interviewed Ex on 3 separate occasions. Ex had requested the visitor recommend son be placed in state guardianship instead of with me. He had said that I was greedy and money hungry and just wanted control of son’s SSI. The visitor’s official recommendation listed in her report was state guardianship because of how at odds we were and that it was dad’s request. I was floored, but I had witnessed Ex’s treatment of his first wife. He is the win at all cost guy. If he couldn’t win, making me lose was still a win. I used to ‘sort of’ joke Ex was willing to set himself on fire if it meant he could burn Ex-wife down. Now it was me he was trying to burn down. He never cares what’s best, he just cares about coming out on top.

The court initially put a guardianship hearing on the books for April.

What Ex did next kinda sorta surprised me. But God is in the details, and He took what Ex meant for evil and turned for good. Just before the April hearing date Ex filed a 6 page single space typed objection and rebuttal to my petition. He was contesting my petition for guardianship and filed for guardianship for himself. He actually stated in his petition that he did not want another court visitor to be assigned because he accepted the previous court visitor’s report, which was weird considering her recommendation was state guardianship. Maybe he just didn’t want to have to pay the mandatory $400 visitor fee. His counter petition turned out to be blessing in disguise. The state requires a court visitor assigned with each and every petition. Ex’s 6 page objection to me being named guardian was a bazillion word essay on what a piece of crap wife I was. There was almost nothing about how he would be a better candidate for guardianship. One of his incredibly few bullet points outlining why he’s the best candidate: ‘he takes son to do his most favorite thing ever’- to eat a Costco hot dog and ice cream. I filed a rebuttal to Ex’s objection, but this time I didn’t hold back. I was honest about Ex’s extreme drinking. I outlined my involvement in Son’s life. I included the court case number for Ex and his first wife outlining Ex’s children with Ex-wife testimony in court that their dad was mean and abusive and that they wanted to live with their mom. And the fact that Ex and step-son had been estranged from each other over 10 years at that point. I included both of Ex’s divorce proposals offering to trade off sole custody to me in exchange for no support from Ex. Step-son also filed a notarized objection and faxed it from the Army base he is stationed at. He stated things like his dad is primary care giver to son. Aside from a few hours at step-son’s wedding, Step-son hadn’t even seen son or Ex in approximately 11 years, let alone the fact he lived exclusively with his mother prior to enlisting in the army. Stepson had zero first hand knowledge of anything pertaining to his father or our family since approx. 2007-2008. Kind of amazing how a father and son can bury the hatchet and bond over the father’s infidelity and subsequent desire to destroy the soon to be Ex-wife/stepmother. Im journaling Ex, Ex-wife, step-daughter and step-son’s journey under ‘His first wife’. Their story is a doozie.

Ex’s petition did two things. It generated a new court visitor and the courts combined our temporary divorce hearing and the guardianship hearing to run concurrent in May rather than be two separate hearings. The new visitor wasn’t new to the game. Turns out the second court visitor is a retired circuit court judge. A huge difference from first to second visitor was the second called me to let me know every time Ex called her to give me equal time. He called the visitor repeatedly. It was still Covid. The court visitor wanted to stick to phone and/or Zoom. Apparently Ex was demanding a face to face with her. She called to let me know they were meeting at a local outdoor park and she was requiring masks at all times. She said she wanted me to know so there was complete transparency. A far cry from the first visitor who met with me once and Ex 3 times and I didn’t find out until her final report. I wish I had reported the first visitor. She was extremely unprofessional.

The following Friday, Son’s teacher called to let me know Ex had shown up at school unexpectedly and signed son out for the day, so I assumed this was the park interview. Son’s teacher knew of the guardianship dispute because she had been interviewed twice by the two court visitors. Daughter called me while I was still at work to let me know her dad had dropped son off with her and had left. She said it didn’t appear the meeting with the visitor had gone well because Ex was very agitated and angry. He said he wanted the face to face so the visitor could see how good he is with son. He called the court visitor a man-hater. Then he left and didn’t return that weekend.

The second visitor’s report was very detailed which was also a far cry from the first visitor. Nearly a whole page of her report was her interview with Step-son. It was quite obvious she didn’t find stepson credible.

Step-son is every bit the liar his dad is. He told the visitor he was 12 when he testified in his parent’s trial. Step-son was 3 weeks shy of his 17th birthday when he testified in early 2008. Step-son had run away to his mom’s house at approx 16.5 yrs old mid 2007 and refused to return to his dad’s house. Ex-wife refused to make him return to dad. So for approx 6 months leading up to the trial Ex and step-son had no communication. At the trial, step-son told the judge if he is forced to return to his dad’s house he will run away again, and if the judge wont allow him to return to his mom, he will just couch surf, because living on the streets was preferable to living with his dad. Step-son stayed with his mom and Ex and step-son did not speak. Ex began stating that step-son was dead to him and that he no longer had a son. Step-son enlisted in the army and left shortly after high school graduation. Ex and SS had no communication ever. SS returned for approx 3 days about 2 yrs later to marry his high school GF then returned to the army. Ex and SS did not begin to communicate until approx 2019 and then only phone calls at birthdays and Father’s Day. No it wasn’t until Ex’s affair became public knowledge that SS apparently thought he could swoop in and save Ex’s day with a bucket full of lies. SS had no knowledge of youngest son whatsoever, but he sure tried to make the court visitor believe he did.

It didn’t appear the court visitor found Ex credible either. She noted that she had asked Ex why he had offered to sign custody over in exchange for no support obligation and now that I have filed for support, he is fighting custody. His answer was that he needs money to set himself up in life and have a place to host his kids. But now that he may have to pay support he wants custody.

Ex was a walking talking oxymoron. Because of youngest son’s disability son qualifies for paid hourly Support Services. On the one hand Ex filed an objection to me having guardianship, countering with first the state having guardianship then later him having guardianship. But for our temporary divorce hearing, which was to be held concurrent with the guardianship hearing, Ex filed that I was son’s primary caregiver and that I should be claiming 100% of son’s support hours in addition to my job salary. Ex imputed son’s support hours in addition to my work pay and according to Ex he shouldn’t be required to pay any support because once the two wages were combined I actually make similar wages to him. Son’s support hours were going to his support persons supporting him while I was at work. Son had barely enough hours to cover my work hours. Yeah, the math wasn’t mathing. Also, Ex was voluntarily relinquishing sole custody of our daughter to me.

The temporary hearing in May ended up being divided into two dates because Ex rambled on and on during the first day, so it was continued to a second day about 10 days later. Our joint daughter spoke with the judge in private during the first hearing day. I wasn’t privy to her exact conversation, but she did say she told the judge that I did everything for son and that her dad was drunk all the time and she worried who would be there to take care of son if her dad had his way.

Ex called step-daughter as a witness during the second May hearing. She was taking some criminal justice college courses at the time and I heard some legal mumbo jumbo jargon during her testimony but by and large I feel her testimony hurt Ex more than helped. She hadn’t lived with us since 9/2019 and really hadn’t spent much time with the family since then so her first hand knowledge of 9/19-5/21 was incredibly limited. Plus during the couple years prior to 9/19 she was gone every weekend and out late during the week with her boyfriend. She was asked about who took care of things when she did live with us. She matter of factly said I did. I took all the kids to doctor appointments, went to their school meetings, signed them up, attended, made dinner, helped with homework, did all the things. Not her dad. She did lie about Ex’s drinking though. She said she hadn’t witnessed any abuse of intoxicants in our home. It was an odd way of phrasing it: abuse of intoxicants.

The judge ruled at the end of the second day. I was awarded sole legal guardianship that day. On the divorce case, I was awarded temporary spousal and child support as well as sole occupancy of the house pending our divorce. I was ordered to cover the mortgage and related expenses pending the divorce. State law allows Ex 30 days from the judges ruling to vacate our home. I said 30 days???? My attorney said his experience is spouses ordered to vacate the family home usually run home, pack up and are out in a day or two. I told my attorney- you don’t know my husband he will stay until the bitter end and will make my life a living hell. Attorney said no, Im sure that wont be the case. He doesn’t know Ex like I know Ex. Within a couple minutes of the end of the hearing, Ex group texted his two daughters, his mother and his affair partner that I had taken everything and that he now had only $1600 per month to live on. He is the victim. Total lies. But lies and victimhood are Ex’s mantra.

Our divorce trial is set for December 2021.

Ex not only stayed the entire 30 days, but moved himself out of the spare bedroom and into youngest son’s room with son.

With the slamming of the front door that June day, life changed dramatically in so many ways. The first real aha moment was taking over all the bills. There was enough money to pay for everything with a little money left over. And Ex had his money too. I kept thinking, how can this be? I had money left over every month and Ex had his money too. We had lived for some time with all the money I now had exclusive access to commingled with the money Ex now had exclusive access to, yet Ex had claimed for years that we were too broke to do anything, go anywhere, buy anything. The years of lies all laid bare. It was liberating, yet sickening at the same time.

Ex spent the next 6 months living in his oldest daughter’s mud room. He was soaking up every ounce of sympathy he could muster. I don’t know how in the world they pulled it off. Stepdaughter’s house was 670 sq ft. Teeny tiny little house made even smaller considering they had stepdaughter, her boyfriend, Ex, 3 very large dogs, and son every other weekend too. Ex was storing his 2021 $50,000 Forest River travel trailer instead of living in it.

Oldest daughter, youngest daughter, youngest son and I started planning a trip to Grand Teton, Yellowstone and Glacier National Park for July. Oldest daughter and I agreed to split the Airbnb and gasoline in half. Youngest daughter threw in some money too. We stayed with my oldest daughter’s grandmother while in Wyoming. It was a group effort to make the trip happen. In the 19.5 years of living with Ex, we had taken only one vacation, and that was a summer of 2019 trip to Wyoming. Ex had throughly ruined that one and only vacation and I wanted do over. Ex called son numerous times during that trip making snarky remarks that his mother was stealing Ex’s money. Always trying to ruin anything and everything.

Ex ramped up sending me horrific attack emails and texts with attached spreadsheets on a consistent basis. No two spreadsheets were the same. He drug our daughter into the mix of his group texting madness.

I think it was August 2021 that the 2020 tax refund finally arrived. I really didn’t know what to do with the money. After talking to my attorney, I decided to move the refund into savings and hang onto it until our upcoming December divorce trial and let our judge decide if we should split the cash or pay on the solar loan. The very next morning after moving the refund over to the savings acct, Ex texted and said that he saw the refund deposited and he had withdrawn $5000. Big lesson learned that day. Double and triple check banking information. At Ex’s request earlier that year, the bank had removed Ex from the checking and saving acct, but hadn’t removed him from the online access to the saving acct. although they had removed him from the checking online access. It was 100% the bank’s error. I went to the bank and told them to reverse the transfer. The bank manager told me it was too late and I was out of luck. He could have reversed it but refused. I filed a formal federal banking commission complaint online against the bank. Things moved pretty quickly after that. First a commission representative contacted me within about an hour. The bank officially removed Ex from online access and refunded the $5000 into my acct. They froze Ex’s accts., that afternoon demanding repayment of the $5000 immediately, furthering that Ex had committed fraud.

Ex had spent the money within minutes of transferring it out of the savings acct. He had hired and paid a $5000 retainer to of all the attorneys- his Ex-wife’s former attorney. This attorney was and is unscrupulous. I guess Ex thought he needed what his Ex wife had: an attorney willing to get low down and dirty.

Well, the first ding to his retainer was the banking issue. He sent me an email copying both our attorneys stating that was his acct he withdrew the money from and he had no idea what anyone was talking about because it’s impossible to commit fraud by withdrawing money from his own acct. I responded with screen shots of emails and texts between us referencing him taking himself off all our joint accts as well as the bank ledger notes when he requested removal. We eventually settled up. He had to pay the bank back. He was refusing to apply the money to the solar loan, so the payment went up. Not that he cared, I was responsible for the monthly payment. He kept 1/2, I kept the other 1/2.

Sept 2021, Ex filed to have our divorce judge removed from our case. His filing stated the judge was biased against him and he didn’t feel he could get a fair settlement at our divorce trial. It was too late for this move but wow, they were going forward with it. The judge denied the motion. They filed to have another circuit court judge make the decision. That judge denied the motion too. So they filed a mandamus brief with the state Supreme court requesting his removal. My attorney had to respond to all these filings. Fees were running up. My attorney said he had absolutely no doubt Ex had already blown through his initial retainer and then some. He said the moves Ex’s attorney was using were unscrupulous and he would never advise a client to go thru this process. I told my attorney- I warned you at the beginning. Ex will do whatever it takes to win and he retained that particular attorney specifically because she is unscrupulous. They drug the judge thru the mud. He voluntarily recused himself. Ex and I were put back in the draw and assigned a new judge. My attorney said Ex may have ‘won’ getting rid of the original but he didn’t win anything with the new judge. He said the new judge is fair and will rule what’s best for everyone. I think we were into November 2021 by then.

Early December 2021, Ex’s attorney filed for a trial reschedule because she will be on vacation during our trial date. She said her vacation was on the books before our trial date was scheduled, yet she waited until December to speak up. I don’t remember the exact month of the reschedule but I believe it was sometime in May 2022.

Ex moved out of stepdaughter’s house and into his travel trailer.

Our joint daughter decided to buy her father a Christmas gift. When Ex showed up to pick son up for Christmas, daughter sent the wrapped gift out with son asking him to give to dad. We were on the porch and could hear son tell Ex the package was from daughter as he got into the car. When son returned from Ex, daughter’s gift to Ex was inside son’s bag still wrapped. Ex had sent it back unopened. At least he didn’t do what he did with his older children and throw the unopened package. All the same though, I know that hurt daughter’s feelings. Daughter returned the gift to the store.

In January 2022 Ex sent a group text to both daughters, his mother and his GF that our family Golden Retriever had died. She was only 7. It was a long rambling text all about himself and his feelings. It said they all knew how important she was to him. And he was true to his word that last day at the house. He had made sure I, and daughter, never saw our sweet dog ever again.

March 2022, Ex filed a motion to end all temporary support, to have me refund all support paid so far and have me charged with ’ fraud’. First thing my attorney filed for a continuance because he was on the one on vacation this time. Ex fought the continuance and they had to have a hearing. More attorney fees. His attorney argued that if my attorney couldn’t be there in person then they wanted him to attend electronically so the hearing could go forward as scheduled. Judge granted the continuance to April.

Ex’s ‘fraud’ argument was that ‘lied’ about son’s support services hours and that I should be working those hours in addition to my job which would nullify any support obligation on his part. In court, when asked how I would pay for a support person for son while I was at work? He testified I should pay for a support person out of the money I made working son’s support hours. So essentially his argument was I should work all of son’s support hours on my off time from my job, collecting those wages for the hours worked, then pay a person out of pocket to work for son while Im at work, and this grand idea releases him of a support obligation.

Ex moved out of his travel trailer and in with the adultery partner GF.

We both had to submit financials again for this hearing. Ex had taken a $22,000 loan from his work retirement acct for additional attorney retainer as well as ‘living’ expenses.

They also made a huge deal about my youngest son from first marriage living with me and contributing to the household. The same son who was living with us when Ex was living with us.

We could have already been divorced back in December 2021 if not for their continuance. We could have been divorced in May of 2022 if not for these shenanigans. All this did was push our divorce trial out to September 2022 and Ex was forcing me to rack up exorbitant attorney fees. Ex was spending thousands of dollars fighting the temporary support orders. Ex’s behavior at the hearing was beyond the pale and fortunately in direct line of the judge’s sight. Ex kept his eyes of me at all times with those solid black eyes squinted in a look a pure hate with his mouth curled in its signature smirk. A look I knew well. I don’t believe it went unnoticed by the judge. In contrast, when it was time for Ex to take the stand, he turned himself towards the judge, used his long arms to accentuate every point he was making in his whiniest voice possible. It was literal Jekyll and Hyde right there in front of the judge.

The judge ruled by letter about 2-3 weeks later. The judge said there was no ‘fraud’ and he imputed the $300 older son was contributing as shard living towards my income to be recalculated. That’s it. It was a 2 sentence ruling. But hey this whole ordeal probably cost me at least $3000 in attorney fees and no telling how much for Ex.

Ex was paying his support by personal check at the first of every month. He was writing little notes in the note section of the personal checks every month. ‘Cunt’, ‘good for you Christian’ , ‘WW’ (wicked witch), etc. I recognized wicked witch right away because that’s what he had his first wife in his phone. The picture for Ex-wife was the green wicked witch from Wizard of Oz and labeled ‘cunt’. He had, and may still have, me labeled ‘cunt’ in his phone. I know this because son came back from his dad with pictures of Ex’s phone opened to our text messages. I’m labeled cunt in Ex’s phone.

Ex took it upon himself to deduct $300 off of the total support the next month following the judge’s letter. He seemed quite pleased with himself. He handed son the check at son’s baseball game to hand to me. He stood there waiting for my reaction when I looked at it. I told him it was the wrong amount. He laughed, his whore laughed. Then the two of them skipped away holding hands. Not joking. They skipped.

I contacted my attorney. I said judge’s letter says to add $300 and recalculate. Doesn’t that mean add to income for child support calculator? Attorney said yes thats how he interprets judge’s order. My attorney contacted Ex’s attorney. She argued nope it’s straight $300 off. She sent a letter to the court stating her interpretation and our interpretation and asked judge to clarify. Judge issued a second letter stating it is $300 added to my income and recalculate child support. No change to spousal. After recalculating, Ex’s child support obligation decreased by $5 per month and he owed the $295 he shorted support that month.

Both our joint children graduated high school that summer. Son repeated 4th grade so daughter and son were in the same grade from 5th grade on and for the first time in their school career they attended the same school together 9th-12th grade. The graduation ceremony was a ticketed event. Ex wanted tickets for himself and his girlfriend. Daughter was angry he would bring the woman to her graduation and decided on her own to text Ex and tell him she did not want the woman at her graduation. Ex responded essentially stating Im bringing her and if you cant accept her don’t contact me again. After the ceremony, Ex and GF came to the graduation staging area. Ex and GF congratulated son and the GF took pictures of son and Ex together, but they kept their backs to daughter and said nothing to her. Daughter pushed herself so hard during high school. She was a straight A student and graduated on the honor society role and with her national dual language endorsement. Although she didnt say much about Ex’s behavior, I have no doubts this hurt daughter a great deal. To me watching first hand the man Im ‘dating’ treat his own daughter like Ex treated daughter that day at her own graduation would have been eye opening. Yet this woman was participating in Ex’s petulance.

Part of the state laws governing divorce pendency is no liquidating assets, no canceling insurance, etc. It’s status quo until the end. Ex had an HRA card through his work. His employer loaded $700 per year per spouse onto the HRA card. So $1400 per year. The money is for any out of pocket for any person insured on Ex’s insurance. So it covered the kids too. The unused money rolls every year. We hadn’t used any of the money in that acct since 2019 I believe. I had used $800 to cover the out of pocket for a dental crown I had to have placed. Ex blew a gasket when he was notified. He sent me an email telling me to never use the card again because it’s his. We argued over email, then Ex had his attorney send my attorney a cease and desist on the HRA card. I forward my attorney that email argument in which Ex admitted what the intended use of that card was for. Never heard anything back from Ex’s attorney concerning this subject, but…..

Shortly after that, my attorney received notification that Ex’s attorney was officially withdrawing over irreconcilable differences between her and Ex. I believe I remember laughing out loud. His down and dirty attorney met the real behind closed doors Ex and it didn’t go well. I told my attorney I bet Ex leaves her scathing reviews online and files a formal complaint with the state bar against her. He filed complaints against 2 attorneys representing him when it was him and ex-wife. And I started looking for reviews online.

Ex started requesting discovery all over again. Apparently lawyers won’t release client files to clients who owe them thousands, so Ex thought he would just request it all over again from me. My attorney told him I had already submitted the requested documents and would not be resubmitting.

I took Son to the orthodontist to get badly needed braces. Son was insured by both Ex’s insurance as well as my insurance. I had planned to use the HRA card for left over out of pocket. The office ran the card and it declined. I knew there were thousands of dollars in that acct. Ex had removed me from the HRA acct. I asked why it declined. He said he removed me to prevent me from using any more of his money. My attorney contacted Ex to let him know he had violated state law by removing me from that acct and we were giving him the chance to reinstate me otherwise we were filing contempt of court. Ex responded that he was filing a formal complaint with the state bar for my attorney’s ‘threats’.

We are getting close to our September trial date. My attorney filed contempt of court and requested the contempt run concurrent with the divorce trial.

Ex represented himself at our mid September 2022 divorce trial. Just prior to the trial date, Ex filed a 135 page court memorandum, complete with photos, charts, spreadsheets and a detailed rundown of what a piece of crap human I am. Ex’s memorandum headliner stated that statistically I would be remarried within 5 years so there was no reason to award support, which would save him from having to file to end support in the future.

I told my attorney the Honda Civic our daughter had been driving since June 2020 was a hill I was willing to die on. Ex once again was demanding the sale of that car and he wanted the cash, otherwise he wanted the entire value of the car imputed to my ‘column’ of assets. With absolutely no proof, Ex declared our house value at over $500,000. I think he just pulled that number out of his ass and ran with it. Ex itemized everything he could think of in the house and imputed an arbitrary dollar value to everything and it was under my column for a grand total of $10k. Under his column he listed his guns, accessories and weight equipment but under the dollar value it said ‘personal’ under the value column.

7 ladies from my disability mom’s group and my oldest daughter attended the trial with me. I believe whole heartedly in the power of prayer. Those sweet ladies were praying fervently for me that day. The only other people in the courtroom that day was Ex, my attorney, the judge and of course me.

Ex did bring his angry black eyes and smirk with him that day. He appeared to be willing me with his eyes to drop dead right there in the courtroom.

There’s lots more of the trial to come….

After our final divorce trial mid September 2022 I thought things were finally done. I could see the light at the end of the tunnel. I thought we would be officially divorced by the end of September 2022. But alas no. Ex just couldn’t accept what he considered defeat. He couldn’t or wouldn’t just move on. My attorney wrote our final divorce decree and submitted it to both Ex and I for review. It appeared to very accurately reflect the judge’s trial decisions. Ex filed a formal objection to the entire decree. A hearing was set for the Monday after Thanksgiving to hear Ex’s objections. The very end of November. So we wait. Again. 

A friend and I attended that November objection hearing. When my attorney saw me walk in for the hearing he said you know this is just a procedural hearing, you didn’t have to attend. I said verbatim- I wouldn’t miss this shit show for the world. 

Even my vivid imagination hadn’t envisioned the scope of the shit show that ultimately ensued. 

The biggest difference at the objection hearing from other hearings we had gone to-a bailiff was stationed in the courtroom in front of the judge’s bench between the judge and Ex. My friend who attended with me was the first to notice and point it out. This was the very first time I had seen a bailiff in the courtroom at any of our hearings. I asked my atty what’s up with the bailiff? My attorney said that usually indicates the court anticipates potential trouble…..

The first thing the judge did was lean way over the bench, glasses pulled down to the end of his nose so he could look over them at Ex and in a really harsh tone, said why are we here Mr. Ex? Ex had written his own divorce decree and gave a copy to my attorney and a copy to the judge. Ex’s decree was a far cry from what the judge had ordered in September. Next Ex went straight into why spousal support is unwarranted. Judge- (harsh tone interrupting Ex) What in Attorney’s judgement does not reflect what I ordered at trial? Ex- (whinny) said ‘nothing’. Judge- I repeat, why are we here Mr Ex? Ex (in a now angry tone) said you ruled incorrectly and I want you to correct your ruling. 

Honestly- my memory of that moment is all the air was sucked out of the room because every single one of us besides Ex took in a sharp deep breath at the exact same time. I looked over at my friend wondering if she had heard what I just heard? We just looked at each other with our mouths agape. 

Judge said objection denied and dismissed. This hearing is adjourned. Ex started screaming. I mean this booming hysterical screaming. He said things like: Who do you think you are? And how dare you sit up there making arbitrary decisions ruining peoples lives. He screamed in his loudest voice you have made me an indentured servant to her (pointing his entire arm straight at me) The judge said leave. NOW! 

By then the bailiff was directly in front of Ex, arms outstretched telling him to leave. Bailiff kept walking forward, Ex backing up……Ex backed to the courtroom door with those evil solid black eyes drilling the judge, opens the door, and standing just inside the doorway, screams ‘you’ve ruined my life’ to the judge. After opening the courtroom door, he walked half way through the doorway and using his whole body tried to slam the courtroom door. The big heavy wood door was on one of those slow close hinges. He couldn’t slam it even with his best efforts, so he just screamed this guttural scream and walked out. We thought it was all over and Ex was gone. Nope. Ex came back into the courtroom a couple minutes later and screamed again ‘you ruined my life’. He turned back around and out the door and then he was gone. This time for good.

You have to imagine the loudest scream humanly possible. That is what Ex was doing. And for the first time ever knowing Ex, the outside world got to experience the true blue died in the wool Ex the kids and I knew exclusively behind closed doors. An angry, bitter, crazed, out of control man attempting to control every aspect of his surrounding through rage. I thought back to one of Ex’s mantras towards both myself and the kids throughout our marriage: if you want to show me how mad you are over something, I will show you I will be more mad, more angry. Ex was showing the judge just how angry the judge had made him. Did Ex expect the judge to cave and cater to Ex’s angry tirade? And change the orders? Ex’s behavior that day was embarrassing. So embarrassing, I was almost embarrassed for him. Almost, but not quite. Any normal sane person would have been embarrassed and ashamed of their own behavior. Not Ex, he was enraged and indignant that no one was showing him they felt as sorry for him as he felt for himself.

My atty said Ex is lucky, most judges would have had the bailiff arrest him. I said gee arent we lucky he’s a ‘nice’ judge. I told my atty- you didnt believe me way back in the beginning when I said Ex would probably be the worst you’ve ever dealt with. He laughed and said well you have to take what people say with a grain of salt, but now that we are at the end I admit in my 35 yrs as an attorney Ex is officially the 2nd worst. 

It was shortly after that objection hearing I went to the courthouse to look through the court computer for a copy of legal documents I was unable to locate at home. What I found instead was a letter Ex had written to the judge. A letter Ex filed with the court a couple weeks prior to the objection hearing and had not served the letter on my attorney or I. consequently my attorney and I knew nothing about it. Standing there in front of that court computer reading Ex’s letter, the bailiff’s presence in the courtroom as well as the judge’s tense and harsh demeanor suddenly made sense. They were preparing for an unstable self-righteous lunatic. 

Ex’s next move was to file a formal objection to the contempt charge he had been found guilty of. That generated yet another hearing for late December 2022. I attended that procedural hearing with my attorney. Ex was a no-show. The objection was denied.

I received the latest updated bill from my attorney after the final hearing. $24,850. A shocking amount of money. I had already charged $12,000 of that amount on credit cards up to that point. I had been looking to the mortgage refi to roll that initial $12,000 debt into the house because I honestly didn’t know how else to pay it off. Now there was a bill for an additional $13,000. I felt sick looking at the bill. I emailed my attorney and asked him to please be patient with me. I was expecting an extra few thousand from the house refi I had designated to replace the downstairs carpet, so I would pay on his bill as soon as I received that money. It was a few days later I received a call from my attorney telling me an anonymous benefactor had come into his office and paid $10,000 of the remaining bill. I now had a balance owing of $2800. I was floored. I doubt I will ever know who that anonymous benefactor is, but they are literally a life saver. It could have been the attorney himself. I know by the end he expressed frequently how sorry was for the direction Ex had taken things. My friends who attended the trial with me joke it was the judge himself. Or it was maybe a kindhearted person from my community. Whoever it was I am grateful.

It appeared Ex and his GF broke up around December 2022/January 2023, because Ex was back living at his older daughter’s house.