Why? When we have so little time?
There are things I don't understand about this world and I guess I never will. One of the big ones is how you can be betrayed by someone who professed their undying love and promised to love you until death. I went into my first marriage whole-heartedly, as much heart as I knew how to give. When you are on your own your entire life, that heart becomes a very protected place. When you are ignored when you excel and told you'll fail when you get older, you close up. You get by, you keep going. My ex-husband's family didn't like the fact he married somebody pregnant. I was called a "doper" (I wasn't) and told my step-grandmother said I "slept around" (I didn't). This coming from a woman married 5 times who was well known as a barhop and who called my grandfather at the time of my grandmother's funeral, a women who went from welfare to a free pocketbook by marrying him. Sure it was planned, I have no doubts. This woman talked about those around her like they were trash, why not me? She didn't want me around, I stood between my grandfather and her pocketbook. She made every effort to make sure that didn't happen, and all my grandmother's things and my home went to a son who didn't work, drank non stop and did drugs non stop. I had a beautiful home, HAD being the key word. He's come home coked up and torn down the fence and I can only imagine how bad the inside is now. She told her grandson I outed him as being gay, I didn't, I hadn't even talked to him in 20 years, his cousin did who lives in Ohio, his grandmother told me so. Yeah it's water under the bridge, but it was my bridge once.
My great grandfather-in-law stayed on my side. He was there when the women weren't. I eventually became close to his grandmother, we talked on the phone often, very often.
I'd heard rumors through the years that he was cheating, something he always denied. We'd never had an argument, could sit and talk for hours, enjoyed travelling, I couldn't imagine. When he did admit to one time he said it was HER fault, she started up on him when he was asleep. Kinda like the Clinton excuse. This woman continued to even visit our house and he did nothing. I wasn't sure what to think actually. I had 4 kids to raise. The oldest was sick and took up an extreme amount of time with him being totally indifferent to it. I had no support, nobody to share feelings with. The next one had some allergies and was sick as a baby then grew into hideous migraines. The third was lucky, he was healthy. Our youngest, a daughter, was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa when she was 4, something else to deal with alone and keep everything locked inside. I worked like a dog, not just with the kids but my whole life. I did any kind of work, started out in a store, then to the ambulance, then in Florida I cleaned the pool, did make-readies, delivered newspapers 9 months pregnant (and went back to work the day after delivery). I kept the kids clean and dressed neatly, did the housework, fixed dinner, took care of bruises and scrapes. My ex wouldn't hold a job, he'd get a job and if he didn't get promoted right away, it must be personal. He had delusions of grandiosity and felt he should be in charge from day 1, whether it be in law enforcement or in the prison system. He moved us around every year to two years. While I'm glad my kids got to experience different parts of this country, I do realize how hard it must have been on them and I do carry this guilt for not stopping it sooner. When I did put my foot down and move back to WV and went to work, he decided to quit and go back to college rather than work for the state police. He assured me he could move up quicker with a degree and also promised when he finished, he'd work and I could go. I started as well as working full time. When the oldest became sicker, my insurance wouldn't cover him, so a worker told us to get a divorce and then they would cover him, so we did. I fully expected it to be just for that. It wasn't. He hooked up with a married woman who made my life hell. She left nasty notes on my truck at college, called him at home while we were asleep (all the while him swearing she was just a friend). I finally found out the truth when the oldest caught them together and told me. When I asked, he put a hole in the wall and told me she had finally shown him the truth, it was me and his mother who had caused all of his life's problems. So I stepped back. He was supposed to watch the kids while I worked, frequently I would get calls my 4-year-old daughter was wandering the college grounds alone after dark, I'd have to leave work and go find out what was going on and frequently get jumped for daring to call him and find out where he was and what he was thinking.
After he graduated, he applied for and got disability on the basis of having a so-called mental disorder. All of his loans were paid off that way. Did he do as he promised and let me go to school? No, he took off to Florida with his mother and my kids, and planned to take his girlfriend but she didn't go. So I followed and went to work yet again in a new place. I remarried shortly before going. My new husband and I would constantly have to give him money. When we went to the store we took 2 buggies, one for us and one for him. Paid off his bad checks. When his girlfriend came to visit, robbed him blind and stole a rental car, guess who he called to take him to get it? You guessed it.
He met his current wife online there. I was again working 70-hour weeks. He told us she asked him to move in. I asked him if he loved her and he said "no, but she makes good money and I won't have to live with mom." We lived about a mile from each other. Chris was with me as I worked nights and we agreed the other 3 would stay in the house with them since she had 4 bedrooms and all days off would be with me. This was until Lindsay came and told me her new stepmother had slapped her off the chair for not wanting to eat brown lettuce. My son turned them in, the state said she had a previous history of abuse to her own children and said it was founded, and ordered no visitation until both of them went through anger management and parenting classes. Rather than do this, they skipped the state and went across the country. My youngest son cried when he said he was leaving and broke out in a full-body rash and was at the hospital. He showed himself so bad security had to remove him. The second oldest made him leave as well so he threw all of his belongings on my lawn. So we went many months with all 4 kids in one bedroom until we could find a house. It was crowded but happy. They hated him for this. As the years went on I would send them birthday cards and pretend it was from him so they would never have a father like mine who was indifferent. That was a mistake I shouldn't have made. I should have let them know the truth from the beginning. He came to Tony's graduation and talked him into going to college in Texas, somehow thinking he could get something out of it. He flat told me once he put him in school they were moving away and leaving him there and they did. Tony was strong and independent and did well, studied overseas, got his master's and has a good job. I furnished his apartment and even gave him a debit card in case he needed anything. As soon as he got the big time job, he quit talking. I found out the ex had told him the entire divorce was my fault, I cheated, did drugs, etc (all this while working in the medical field where you have to take random drug tests). He knew better, I never had, not since high school had so much as a drink. One thing about this man, he can talk. Regular blowhard actually. He could talk the president into claiming he was totally white, no kidding. Both he and his mom totally convinced him it was all me, all the while my ex would call nearly every other day just to talk, claiming he couldn't discuss anything *smart* with his wife. We even let him come to visit. When I had to have brain surgery both he and his mother came. I told them they didn't have to. They didn't come to the hospital though but once, and my kids told me both of them tried to talk them into leaving with them, told them how bad I was and they didn't know it, told my son's girlfriend and my daughter's boyfriend I hated them (they just damn-near lived with me). After my daughter graduated she went to try to live with him. That didn't last long, he took every dime she had and told her he wasn't sure he was even her father, talked to her about going to strip clubs, and other things that are absolutely sick. Chris had gone there from Oregon to get away from his wife and was dong so well, until after she went, then he made him move out. Try living in Arizona on 600 a month and being that sick. He wouldn't even take him to the hospital or go see him. A lot I didn't know about, I was just out of the hospital and paralyzed so my son didn't tell me. When I finally did find out, we were making arrangements to get him home when he died. His wife had been having an affair and got busted for taking pot across the border with her boyfriend, something my ex told my son he could never speak to HIM again for, yet after he died he and his lovely daughter in law had Wiccan ceremonies in the back yard (I'm not making this up folks). He told Tony I didn't go to the burial after he was cremated because there wasn't "anything in it for me." Me in a wheelchair and no car and he would say that. All the while still calling me. When my daughter finally told me all he and his mother were telling, I never accepted another call from him. Just a few months ago I told his mother she ceased to exist, that with all her letters and how much she loved me and the kids, she would do and say all she did behind my back. I also told her if either one of them had ever held a job they wouldn't have time for all of this. After Tony believed him about everything they told him about me being the one who cheated, he caught him on the phone with a woman he met at his high school reunion and had to ask him to leave his home, but still no apology. If I tried to take up for myself, I was only saying it to be "narcissistic." Lindsay came running home with her husband after he did them dirtier than a stranger would. I had to buy them bus tickets to get from Texas to WV. I put him in college, paid their rent, furnished their home, bought their groceries. Then I found out she had moved this unemployed Cuban guy into the home with her husband, and he was now in another room. When I told her I did not approve of this behavior and she wasn't raised that way, she stopped talking and started calling her dad again. She told her stepsister she had been thrown out of the house several times as a teen, I got nasty e-mails from her friends here on how they would have her for holidays since she didn't have a mother to speak of. Lord knows what all she told. I told her before she couldn't come home until she told her stepsister she lied about being thrown out and she swore she did, but I doubt it. She went to Florida to stay with his family, that didn't work, she tried staying with her grandmother, that didn't work, so she came back to stay with her best friend's mom (A woman I caught sending her dirty pictures over the cell phone back when she was 16 and told her to stop it right now). I don't know what's in her mind. She e-mailed several months until she came back, said she was engaged. She won't even talk to her brother now. They chat on the game system very little and she lies and says she doesn't have a phone. I don't know what happened to her furniture and all I bought them, but they only have a mattress in their apartment now. I spent just under 20,000 on them in 2 years and it's GONE. Not sure how I'm supposed to feel about this or how to get her help, help she desperately needs. She has no reason to lie about anything, she had a good, protected upbringing and never had to worry about anybody having her back, I was there, just like for the rest of them. It's not fair she does her brother this way. It's not fair Tony does his brother this way. I don't understand why a man would be so mean and cruel to his own family. A parent's job is to love their children, not brain f*** them and ruin any relationships they might ever have. I have tried to keep the youngest son shielded from so much of this but it has had an effect on him. He goes out of his way to be good to any girlfriend and NOT be like his dad, but so far hasn't found a girl who appreciates it, and with being dumped by his own father as a 7-year-old, how could he possibly have a normal mind? I have lain awake at night thinking about what he could possibly be thinking and the only thing I can think of is that he compensates for being such a failure by talking about me, his father as a husband, failure at work, failure at being a father. Easy to give blame than to face your demons. I got an email a few years ago from a woman he went to school with who found me online and told me he had told her he raised 4 children alone after I ran off, how 2 of them were sick, how he sacrificed so much. After I told her the truth boy did she chew him out!! Of course he got mad at me because she was so pissed. I have never hated anybody on this earth before, but I hate him. I have never wanted anyone to drop off the earth, but I wouldn't mind it if he does. As sick as I am, I live to read his obituary in the papers. I won't grieve over his mother either. I don't know how you call somebody and tell them you love them like a daughter and turn around and twist the knife. It's a shame that somebody with such mental problems can change a person so. These were people I've known since I was 18 and was gullible enough to believe. I should have known, should have known. What's impossible is to not let it bother you and to move on when your insides are screaming, knowing what they have told, knowing how they helped along the death of your oldest child and holding such hatred at times you can't breathe. It's there though and I don't think it will go away. Sometimes I wish I were a druggie or alcohol user to dull some of the hatred, but I have a household to run and a son to raise and try to give some normalcy too before he's married and gone.
My great grandfather-in-law stayed on my side. He was there when the women weren't. I eventually became close to his grandmother, we talked on the phone often, very often.
I'd heard rumors through the years that he was cheating, something he always denied. We'd never had an argument, could sit and talk for hours, enjoyed travelling, I couldn't imagine. When he did admit to one time he said it was HER fault, she started up on him when he was asleep. Kinda like the Clinton excuse. This woman continued to even visit our house and he did nothing. I wasn't sure what to think actually. I had 4 kids to raise. The oldest was sick and took up an extreme amount of time with him being totally indifferent to it. I had no support, nobody to share feelings with. The next one had some allergies and was sick as a baby then grew into hideous migraines. The third was lucky, he was healthy. Our youngest, a daughter, was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa when she was 4, something else to deal with alone and keep everything locked inside. I worked like a dog, not just with the kids but my whole life. I did any kind of work, started out in a store, then to the ambulance, then in Florida I cleaned the pool, did make-readies, delivered newspapers 9 months pregnant (and went back to work the day after delivery). I kept the kids clean and dressed neatly, did the housework, fixed dinner, took care of bruises and scrapes. My ex wouldn't hold a job, he'd get a job and if he didn't get promoted right away, it must be personal. He had delusions of grandiosity and felt he should be in charge from day 1, whether it be in law enforcement or in the prison system. He moved us around every year to two years. While I'm glad my kids got to experience different parts of this country, I do realize how hard it must have been on them and I do carry this guilt for not stopping it sooner. When I did put my foot down and move back to WV and went to work, he decided to quit and go back to college rather than work for the state police. He assured me he could move up quicker with a degree and also promised when he finished, he'd work and I could go. I started as well as working full time. When the oldest became sicker, my insurance wouldn't cover him, so a worker told us to get a divorce and then they would cover him, so we did. I fully expected it to be just for that. It wasn't. He hooked up with a married woman who made my life hell. She left nasty notes on my truck at college, called him at home while we were asleep (all the while him swearing she was just a friend). I finally found out the truth when the oldest caught them together and told me. When I asked, he put a hole in the wall and told me she had finally shown him the truth, it was me and his mother who had caused all of his life's problems. So I stepped back. He was supposed to watch the kids while I worked, frequently I would get calls my 4-year-old daughter was wandering the college grounds alone after dark, I'd have to leave work and go find out what was going on and frequently get jumped for daring to call him and find out where he was and what he was thinking.
After he graduated, he applied for and got disability on the basis of having a so-called mental disorder. All of his loans were paid off that way. Did he do as he promised and let me go to school? No, he took off to Florida with his mother and my kids, and planned to take his girlfriend but she didn't go. So I followed and went to work yet again in a new place. I remarried shortly before going. My new husband and I would constantly have to give him money. When we went to the store we took 2 buggies, one for us and one for him. Paid off his bad checks. When his girlfriend came to visit, robbed him blind and stole a rental car, guess who he called to take him to get it? You guessed it.
He met his current wife online there. I was again working 70-hour weeks. He told us she asked him to move in. I asked him if he loved her and he said "no, but she makes good money and I won't have to live with mom." We lived about a mile from each other. Chris was with me as I worked nights and we agreed the other 3 would stay in the house with them since she had 4 bedrooms and all days off would be with me. This was until Lindsay came and told me her new stepmother had slapped her off the chair for not wanting to eat brown lettuce. My son turned them in, the state said she had a previous history of abuse to her own children and said it was founded, and ordered no visitation until both of them went through anger management and parenting classes. Rather than do this, they skipped the state and went across the country. My youngest son cried when he said he was leaving and broke out in a full-body rash and was at the hospital. He showed himself so bad security had to remove him. The second oldest made him leave as well so he threw all of his belongings on my lawn. So we went many months with all 4 kids in one bedroom until we could find a house. It was crowded but happy. They hated him for this. As the years went on I would send them birthday cards and pretend it was from him so they would never have a father like mine who was indifferent. That was a mistake I shouldn't have made. I should have let them know the truth from the beginning. He came to Tony's graduation and talked him into going to college in Texas, somehow thinking he could get something out of it. He flat told me once he put him in school they were moving away and leaving him there and they did. Tony was strong and independent and did well, studied overseas, got his master's and has a good job. I furnished his apartment and even gave him a debit card in case he needed anything. As soon as he got the big time job, he quit talking. I found out the ex had told him the entire divorce was my fault, I cheated, did drugs, etc (all this while working in the medical field where you have to take random drug tests). He knew better, I never had, not since high school had so much as a drink. One thing about this man, he can talk. Regular blowhard actually. He could talk the president into claiming he was totally white, no kidding. Both he and his mom totally convinced him it was all me, all the while my ex would call nearly every other day just to talk, claiming he couldn't discuss anything *smart* with his wife. We even let him come to visit. When I had to have brain surgery both he and his mother came. I told them they didn't have to. They didn't come to the hospital though but once, and my kids told me both of them tried to talk them into leaving with them, told them how bad I was and they didn't know it, told my son's girlfriend and my daughter's boyfriend I hated them (they just damn-near lived with me). After my daughter graduated she went to try to live with him. That didn't last long, he took every dime she had and told her he wasn't sure he was even her father, talked to her about going to strip clubs, and other things that are absolutely sick. Chris had gone there from Oregon to get away from his wife and was dong so well, until after she went, then he made him move out. Try living in Arizona on 600 a month and being that sick. He wouldn't even take him to the hospital or go see him. A lot I didn't know about, I was just out of the hospital and paralyzed so my son didn't tell me. When I finally did find out, we were making arrangements to get him home when he died. His wife had been having an affair and got busted for taking pot across the border with her boyfriend, something my ex told my son he could never speak to HIM again for, yet after he died he and his lovely daughter in law had Wiccan ceremonies in the back yard (I'm not making this up folks). He told Tony I didn't go to the burial after he was cremated because there wasn't "anything in it for me." Me in a wheelchair and no car and he would say that. All the while still calling me. When my daughter finally told me all he and his mother were telling, I never accepted another call from him. Just a few months ago I told his mother she ceased to exist, that with all her letters and how much she loved me and the kids, she would do and say all she did behind my back. I also told her if either one of them had ever held a job they wouldn't have time for all of this. After Tony believed him about everything they told him about me being the one who cheated, he caught him on the phone with a woman he met at his high school reunion and had to ask him to leave his home, but still no apology. If I tried to take up for myself, I was only saying it to be "narcissistic." Lindsay came running home with her husband after he did them dirtier than a stranger would. I had to buy them bus tickets to get from Texas to WV. I put him in college, paid their rent, furnished their home, bought their groceries. Then I found out she had moved this unemployed Cuban guy into the home with her husband, and he was now in another room. When I told her I did not approve of this behavior and she wasn't raised that way, she stopped talking and started calling her dad again. She told her stepsister she had been thrown out of the house several times as a teen, I got nasty e-mails from her friends here on how they would have her for holidays since she didn't have a mother to speak of. Lord knows what all she told. I told her before she couldn't come home until she told her stepsister she lied about being thrown out and she swore she did, but I doubt it. She went to Florida to stay with his family, that didn't work, she tried staying with her grandmother, that didn't work, so she came back to stay with her best friend's mom (A woman I caught sending her dirty pictures over the cell phone back when she was 16 and told her to stop it right now). I don't know what's in her mind. She e-mailed several months until she came back, said she was engaged. She won't even talk to her brother now. They chat on the game system very little and she lies and says she doesn't have a phone. I don't know what happened to her furniture and all I bought them, but they only have a mattress in their apartment now. I spent just under 20,000 on them in 2 years and it's GONE. Not sure how I'm supposed to feel about this or how to get her help, help she desperately needs. She has no reason to lie about anything, she had a good, protected upbringing and never had to worry about anybody having her back, I was there, just like for the rest of them. It's not fair she does her brother this way. It's not fair Tony does his brother this way. I don't understand why a man would be so mean and cruel to his own family. A parent's job is to love their children, not brain f*** them and ruin any relationships they might ever have. I have tried to keep the youngest son shielded from so much of this but it has had an effect on him. He goes out of his way to be good to any girlfriend and NOT be like his dad, but so far hasn't found a girl who appreciates it, and with being dumped by his own father as a 7-year-old, how could he possibly have a normal mind? I have lain awake at night thinking about what he could possibly be thinking and the only thing I can think of is that he compensates for being such a failure by talking about me, his father as a husband, failure at work, failure at being a father. Easy to give blame than to face your demons. I got an email a few years ago from a woman he went to school with who found me online and told me he had told her he raised 4 children alone after I ran off, how 2 of them were sick, how he sacrificed so much. After I told her the truth boy did she chew him out!! Of course he got mad at me because she was so pissed. I have never hated anybody on this earth before, but I hate him. I have never wanted anyone to drop off the earth, but I wouldn't mind it if he does. As sick as I am, I live to read his obituary in the papers. I won't grieve over his mother either. I don't know how you call somebody and tell them you love them like a daughter and turn around and twist the knife. It's a shame that somebody with such mental problems can change a person so. These were people I've known since I was 18 and was gullible enough to believe. I should have known, should have known. What's impossible is to not let it bother you and to move on when your insides are screaming, knowing what they have told, knowing how they helped along the death of your oldest child and holding such hatred at times you can't breathe. It's there though and I don't think it will go away. Sometimes I wish I were a druggie or alcohol user to dull some of the hatred, but I have a household to run and a son to raise and try to give some normalcy too before he's married and gone.
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