that I still have a full head of hair, because if I pulled it out every time I was driven nuts by BM then I would practically be bald!

Well most of you know by now about our situation with transportation, money and so on. I look for the light at the end of the tunnel, but it feels like there are so many obstacles!! Not trying to make excuses or whine, we're taking care of business and trying to do what needs to be done....but am I wrong for needing to vent because of the sheer hypocrisy of BM? In this instance, if it weren't for what her and hubby did, then things WOULDN'T be so bad! There would still be problems, don't think I'm that naive, just not as many! I just hate dealing with the fall-out of this. It's not because I don't care about SS, or have his best interests in mind. How do you deal with things when his mother doesn't truly have his best interests in mind....when you KNOW she is just using her child as a pawn?

I really just need to vent unabashedly right now....I've kept things bottled up for awhile. Why does she have such a problem with us? I know she has her moments with everyone, that's why we have an idea what we're dealing with. She kicked her first husband out because she said she caught him abusing their daughter, he says he didn't, and the hospital found nothing to indicate abuse. But she got the PFA on him regardless. Then when she started sleeping with him again a couple years later (while being involved with both my husband AND her second husband all within a week of each other), she accused him of abusing HER, and again, the court dismissed it because there was no evidence. So I don't know how much truth to put into that. But then she also told me once that she pulled a Naomi Campbell and threw a phone at her second and current husband, and joked about it! She really seems like a man hater, which would also explain why she treats DH as she does. But then how is that going to be good for SS?

But the difference in how she is towards my husband and I is that she'll SOMETIMES be humane with them, but never us. She once told us she understood her first husband couldn't pay support at the time because his cat was having surgery. And as I've said, before her current husband went to jail over support, she dropped his case. Yet we mention when we come on hard times, her response to him (and me) is always "Your kids aren't my concern. I am here to see you provide for MY son and that's it, I don't have to care about your kids". Well, why have an affair with a man MARRIED WITH CHILDREN if you are going to hate his other kids?? I feel the sexism is such a loaded topic....we so often hear about guys taking the responsibility for their actions~ having sex. And it is a problem. But if the woman chooses to have sex however and as many times as she wants, well....she can do whatever she wants about it and somebody will support her choice. If she gives the child up for adoption, people will support that. If she aborts it, not everyone does, but some people support that. And you know what....the girl can do that why? Because she's a female. I'm not anti-feminism...I consider myself an equalist.

I realize things will never be exactly equal because men just can't have babies like we women can. But does that mean fathers shouldn't have rights? I say NO, they shouldn't be considered LESS than women. Yes, there are some deadbeat dads....there are deadbeat women too. Say a woman does have an abortion, not to use the term "deadbeat" to describe that, but she is essentially making the choice NOT to provide for the child, which is similar to a Dad not providing for the child. I think Nise said this in a recent post~ the system may have been set up with good intentions...ie, to prevent men from WANTING to be deadbeats and abandoning a child or children they helped create. But now I think it's gone too far...women like BM are hopping on the gravy train and using the system to their advantage.

Now I'm sure I may get flak for a lot of this, but you just don't deal with BM, not this particular one. I've been putting up with her crap for over 17 years. I KNOW she doesn't need the extra money from my husband. That's not to say he shouldn't provide for SS, because both he and I know he most certainly should. But that's why I'm sick of the deadbeat stereotype and the whole "just pay support" attitudes. Because you know what? That gives her EXACTLY what she wants...the satisfaction of knowing she hurt me by using my husband and getting money from our family. NOT for SS, for her. I don't see why DH can't take care of SS without her dictating it HAS to be what DRS says. Example~ she tried to bring up a guilt trip saying how she had her mom buy her daughter a winter coat, and her neighbor give SS one because she "couldn't afford it". Giving her the benefit of a doubt, we asked "Well why didn't you tell us he needed one, then we would have bought him one". She didn't answer. Her problem with that is, say we buy one. She will want that AND hubby to STILL pay all of monthly support and arrears...the coat would just be extra. Well with 6 other kids, she KNOWS we just can't afford extra expenses when we can't even afford the amount of support. Just what sense does it make for our family to be living off HALF of amount of money she makes, and then the state to say we should pay her over a quarter of our money? (that's now, originally it was more than HALF!)

I say this because I've heard about Standard of Living, which BM says is "bullshit". Here's another example of the laws being so "fair"....BM originally tried to justify support by saying it's less then half what my husband's part of her bills would be, if you look at the fact there's 6 people in her household. Now she's trying to deny that, but anyway....so she said before that she divides all bills by 6~ ie, water bill is $100, then my husband's part of that should be about $20. She said if we looked at it that way then we'd see support is "MORE than fair" to us.

Our problem with that viewpoint is that my husband never LIVED with her, so why should we follow the whole Standard of Living thing? She doesn't follow that principle with OUR children, and she already knew they needed taking care of by us when she wanted to sleep with my husband. But here's a big problem...we mentioned to her about how she increased her rent. She used to live in a $600 apartment, and we lived in a house with a similar mortgage. But it got foreclosed on, before she ever got pregnant with SS. So we moved to less expensive. Meanwhile, she gets married again and has another kid with her husband and has her SF move in with all of them. But then she tells us her rent "went up". It didn't happen by magic...it happened because she CHOSE to make her family bigger and needed more room. But even still, there are houses here in town that are bigger then where she's living now that are not much more than her old rent was. What does she do? Decides she wants to live an hour away for the first time, in a house that is $300 more a month!! And yes, our family also obviously grew too. But here's the kicker~ she says my husband needs to help pay HER new rent as it is and take it into account, but if our subsequent children that came after the affair need things then "too bad", we just shouldn't have had more kids. UGH!!!! She says our family "never mattered" and DOESN'T matter, but she wants my husband to provide for her family, not just SS. Is that not a PRIME example of hypocrisy? Paying her the whole support means that she gets spoiled even more and gets to live a better standard of life, while my husband helps foot the bills for it while making our family have even less!!

I'm just very upset right now, after dealing with more crap about how she's not going to give my husband copies of a test that was done on SS, because she's got "more important" things on her mind. Even though, once again, that is part of the legal custody drawn up in the order, and we want to know what's going on with SS. And, of course, more drama about the holidays, saying that if she were really doing things "her" way then SS wouldn't even come AT ALL...she only talks about him coming for a little because we said he "HAS" to be here for at least Christmas morning, if she won't let him be here for Xmas Eve. No, that's also what the courts felt was right and made the order for...shared parenting. There's a concept I don't feel she'll ever embrace. But she only agrees with the court when it's about the money she can get, nothing else. So frustrating.....

Okay, I got some venting off my chest....please realize it is just that