I could scream.

Let me say before I rant that I came from a rough household. So I know things happen, I know a lot of us in the world had it rough, but I made a promise to myself that I would never let my kids struggle the way I struggled as a kid. I want them to know that it's not okay to struggle, not okay to live in filth and be rude, inconsiderate, never on time, overall slobs. 

If you didn't read my previous rant I may have to recap a few things: There is a 7 year old and a 9 year old, the 7 year old has been diagnosed with autism and so we have made our best attempt to be sure that we are consistent and firm with our rules and schedules. In the beginning their divorce arrangements were a 50/50 custody where my partner (their father) had to pay child support and have them a week, then their mother has them a week. I changed my schedule at work so that when their father's mother could not watch them, I would be there for them. The bio mother cut the BF's family out on her weeks for vindictive reasons, insisting that her family would be there for her and the boys. Lo and behold, a few months after, the BM almost lost her job because her family ducked out since the boys were "too much" for them and she could not find a steady babysitter. She dropped child support on the terms that I quit my job and watched the boys in her absence, which I agreed to. So every day, no matter what week, I will always get them off the bus, and if they have no school I'm here for them in the morning too. She works til 4 but sometimes won't pick them up til 5 or 6 (she works 15 minutes away) which is fine if it wasn't every single day and always a new excuse. Even on her days off, when she has a whole day of free time to herself, she has neglected to come and get them off the bus, she still shows up between 4:30 and 5. I don't know if she does this intentionally to irritate me or if being punctual is just super difficult for her. She pawns them off on us constantly when she "has plans" and has had multiple chances to spend extra time with them since she doesn't have them as much anymore but chooses to have more "plans" that she can't spend that time with them. 

Back in July or August the BF was driving past the BM's house and noticed she had a guy over that he (the BF) knew. The guy is alright, albeit a lot of people said he was a little "grungy", but my partner says he's got a good heart. That's all that matters, right? That's all we cared about was that he was good to the kids if she was dating them. So we left it alone. We joked that since the guy had a paid off house and car, that the BM would see him as an "opportunity" and move in ASAP. Well, that's when we got the first phone call. She called the BF at midnight, saying that they got picked up by the state police almost an hour away and needed a ride home because her new boyfriend got busted with his DUI. No problem, my partner went out and picked her up. No reason to complain about how awful he is after that, right? A few weeks later she called him to vent about her boyfriend's court issues. That's when we found out this was the guy's second DUI in the span of A MONTH. Hello, red flags! The guy has three kids (11, 14? and 17, that he left frequently at home by themselves on school nights to go to the BM's house) and a CDL, and the first DUI wasn't a clue?

So, that opportunity we were talking about. A few months after all this she calls BF to let him know that she would be moving in with this guy by the end of the year. Called it. Whatever. Again, as long as the kids are happy that's all that matters. She ended up moving in with him by the end of the month, not the end of the year. All is fine and dandy, right? After a few weeks of this, the kids come over smelling like a cigarette. We asked if they like their new home, and we did the math in what the household is like. The house is a 3 bedroom, 1 bathroom holding two adults that don't know how to clean, five kids, EIGHT cats, and two dogs. They have the litter box in the kitchen that is rarely cleaned, and one of the dogs poops / pees on the living room and bathroom floors constantly. I want to mention that before the BM moved in with this guy, she had 4 cats and you could smell the urine from the driveway. So what does this place smell like now? On top of this, we brought up the cigarette smell to the kids and they said "yeah but they said we would be fine since the smoke goes up and we're down here." SCIENCE.

This has been going on for a good few months now and I've tried to keep calm. But today, she dropped off the boys with just the clothes on their backs and their two coats. Just from those two coats alone, their bedroom smells like a dive bar. I walked into their bedroom today and was struck by the stench as soon as I passed over the threshold, and all there was different was those two coats sitting on their bed. We already brought up the fact that the kids have the same smell you carry with you when you walk out of a packed smoker's bar, and her response was "oh that's probably because (her boyfriend) smokes in the house, I told him we need to get a smokeless candle." Meanwhile 1. we know she smokes in the house too, 2. what in the world is a smokeless candle going to do with two chronic smokers, 3. why not open the window or just entirely go outside? The weather isn't even that bad.

There are alarms going off in my head. I've started documenting what time she drops them off, what time she picks them up, and the detail of how badly they smell when they come here as well as their accounts of what goes on in that house. She refuses to let us pick them up or drop them off at her house, insisting she comes here even if it's inconvenient for her, so we don't even know first hand what situation they're in over there. When the boys put the phone in video-camera mode during a conversation we see glimpses of the inside of the house. Dirty kitchen walls, mattress with no sheets. She says they are absolutely horrible attitude-wise over there but they are fine at our house. We brought up the fact that she lets them get away with everything under the sun but she just clams up. She had the nerve to message BF and demand that he have a talk with the boys about their disrespect toward her, even though he does every day when they're over there. It's not our fault. We've even explained that they're good for us, she says she knows. And it's not a mother / woman thing, since they apparently don't listen to her boyfriend either but they listen to me.

Even the 7 year old's doctor discussed this with the BM and BF. After he had both accounts of her household he explained that the reason he acts up in the BM's house and not so much in ours is because her household is more chaotic where we have structure. No powwow or reasoning has gone anywhere with her. She will cry about how bad the boys are over there but when we point out the possible reasons (the only reasons) she acts like we are being unreasonable. I'm at wit's end.