Gerda Rises Up to Go On

[Gerda]

Gerda, you and I look at the world very differently, but I see your pain tonight and I want you to know, from someone who has been there, that there is a place beyond the pain.

OwnIt, it is precisely because of our different world views that I really found your message so touching. I guess my pain must be really palpable right now and it made a bridge between our visions. Your compassion really touched me and was so loving, thank you so much.

Everyone complains about the erosion of values, but if you want your children to have a sense of yours, you have to take a stand against the things that threaten them.

This gave me a lot of courage to continue to stand up for those values. D10 said something else about that woman tonight, and because of what I said, I was able to say a few clear-headed things.

Thank you, OwnIt!

[Gerda]

Gerda, it's not you...it's him. Work through the pain and then release it. You have to continue moving forward and not look in the rear view mirror for what once was is now in the past. Focus on you and your children and getting through the next few months.

Job, as usual your post had so many tidbits for me to stick into my brain. Thank you! This one above most of all. It's amazing how often we LBS's need to re-hear that it's them and not us. Though I guess I mostly do know it's him, I just get confused about what choice I should make as a result!

I am trying to work through the pain, and to not look too far ahead, as you say. I am really really suffering but trying to just let myself sit with it. Tonight I was the reader at Mass and after I sat back down I was thinking, "OK, I am really suffering but I just stood up and gave my reading to all these people, I am still able to give something even though I can barely function." The rest of the Mass I let myself go and just cried in my little corner but I think I need to do that for a few days. Sometimes I think of this whole thing as a first earthquake at BD1 and then all these aftershocks, sometimes almost as big as the first BD and sometimes just little violent tremors.

[Gerda]

DnJ, I read this already a few times but I need to read it at least a few more. Rescuing sounds great right about now but I am sure you are right that it's better to teach me to fish than to fish for me, teach me to ride a bicycle, teach me to install a base board heater, etc.

Still when we are in free fall, it is very helpful to get someone else's goggles on til we can find where the heck we put our own glasses. I am going to wear yours for a couple of days. I don't even feel like looking for mine. Glad yours are so clean and clear.

Well, okay, maybe I am not going to wear yours. I am still in the pit. But I am going to keep trying yours on.

More later, but please know that I am taking each line to heart and that I am extremely grateful and more. Also you know how I always say that when God wants to tell me something, he tells me twice? Well, it must be about hope this time. See below, a note from my spiritual father that came today.

I know that this causes you a great pain, a lot of guilt, a sense of failure, a sense of being abused... Accept this as a temporary trial.
Hopefully you will get 0ut of the slavery of Egypt and toward the promise land; but before reaching the promise land there is the desert. In the desert there is not goal, no direction, no joy, only hope.
As you go through this desert, don't make any plan, not even think about your future. Rely completely on the Lord; He knows and He will show you His mighty power. Believe that He has your life in His hand.
Keep on suffering for your children and put all your hope in the Lord. In the future He will show the way.
Keep your faith and Hope, because the Lord never abandons those who love Him.

[Gerda]

Gerda - just want to say I am sorry. Wish we could take the pain away. It’s awful, it really is.

Feel it and process it but know that you are strong. You deserve happiness and peace. You will build it over time, brink by brick.

Take it moment by moment. Be gentle on yourself. Believe better days are coming your way.

HaWho, getting a post from you is always very special. I was always told to read your posts because we had a similar situation in many ways. Thank you for reaching out and for this leg up. Knowing that you understand the painI I am in is very comforting, as is knowing you are on the other side of that mountain. I will try to keep having hope.

[Gerda]

Not even sure where to begin -- but yesterday, Oct 1, I had to pay H $2500, order of the judge. For a couple of days, he kept writing to me that I should pay it early because his landlord wanted the rent early. I ignored that.

On Oct 1, I opened up e-mail, and there was an endless vicious diatribe from M about my "late" payment and the announcement that he would be moving back in that afternoon.

I ignored that. I didn't have the money at all, so I put it on a credit card on PayPal and took off $500 for the child support he was supposed to pay. I had rented a car to take D10 to the beach for the day and was trying to get out the door.

Within a few minutes, huge onslaught of texts that if I didn't give him the whole thing in an hour, he would be at the door and I should let him know which floor or rental unit he should move into and he was glad because he wanted to see his son and be in his home and gather his things. S14 wasn't coming to the beach, and I was terrified that H would show up. All my L could offer as advice was to change the locks and call the police. I was out walking the dog and beelined to the locksmith to come change the locks while I was at the beach. I had promised D10 all summer we could do this day trip and there was no way I was going to cancel but I didn't want problems with S14 seeing H or with our renters witnessing any drama.

And so I decided to put the other $500 on the card. I figured it was better that we report he didn't pay child support than that I risked not following the order -- but most of all it was worth $500 to avoid a scene in front of the kids and all the horror of trying to keep him out.

I didn't read the long note, sent it to my BF, but I saw a little of it. He is unraveling even more than usual. And kept talking about his home and how he needed his home and time at our rental upstate, his "lucrative and 'lovely homes". It's interesting -- When he was H, home was such a big deal to him because his parents were never really making him feel at home and he had left his country as a little boy and ended up as a latchkey kid, etc. When he started going crazy, he kept talking about the idea of home and how he would create his own home since I didn't make him welcome in ours. (This was total rewriting, home was total sanctuary and I loved making things homey for my family, we always loved being at home and working on things together.)

More notes followed but eventually he calmed down after my BF wrote him back with some details about our finances and why he had to find a cheaper place, and he was able to see that I was serious about sending his crazy notes to her and not reading them.

Today he wrote to me and my BF a very normal sounding note that I had to pay the back rent on his storage unit and also really nice paragraph about he fixed the car and I was welcome to use it any time!!! ?????

Lord it is tiring.

[Gerda]

By the way, BF meant Best Friend! I just realized it might sound like boyfriend!

[job]

Gerda,

Do not pay the back rent on his storage unit. You gave him ample notice where it was and what he had to pay. It was up to him to either pay the rent or get his belongings out of there. If he had money to have the car fixed, then he has money to take care of the back rent on that facility.

I would like to know how he's driving the vehicle without a driver's license. Is the car in your name and do you still carry the insurance on it? If you do, you need to notify your DMV that you no longer have the car and drop the insurance on it for now. Drop the insurance and advise your insurance company that he doesn't have a valid driver's license. This is not about revenge, this is about protecting yourself if he has an accident.

Notice how he changes up his demeanor when he gets messages from your BF? Now, he wants to look like a great guy in her eyes and is trying to make you look unreasonable and insane. Do not drink the kool aid that he is serving up and I am sure your BF knows what he's doing.

Do not be afraid of him. He is nothing more than a bully and knows that you will jump when he says how high. He sounds like he might fit in the disordered personality arena. So many of the things he says and does reminds me of that personality disordered...but that is my opinion from what I have read about him over the years.

[DnJ]

Hello Gerda

I agree with job, and had a similar post until I pressed the wrong button on this touch screen device. Lol. Argggg!

Good job ignoring H’s shenanigans, emails, and threats.

It’s pretty apparent that H can and will change his demeanour quickly making himself look like the good guy. My XW did the same kind of thing.

I would stay away from borrowing the car, or other helpful offers. It will backfire onto you, no matter how it goes down. The car is his, leave it at that. Pretty sure you are doing that - just assuring.

You got this well in hand. Pay the $2500 and let him be the person who is not fulfilling his obligations. Your side of the street will be nice and clean.

DnJ

[Gerda]

DnJ and Job -- Thank you so much for weighing in.

Don't worry, I was actually never on the title of the car and I cancelled the insurance and he did get his own license. So that's all his problem now. He even somehow managed to find the money to get the car fixed and pass the inspection! So I guess the car was worth more than I thought!

I've been trying to figure out why I feel so terrified all the time, unfocused, etc. The peace that came with his moving out was intense, but it is being eroded by dealing constantly with the divorce horrors.

I have been reflecting on my stance on this divorce and if I would do better to give in to all his demands and be done with the horrible interactions and his ability to keep harassing me. But what I always come to is that what I am asking for is more than reasonable, and that I have the right to try to keep a half-decent life for my kids if I can. I am not asking for alimony (not that he has any money for it), I gave him the car, I have rented out half my own apartment to be able to give him money every month until now. I am pretty much solely responsible for the kids in every single way and don't really even get any child support -- I just took a deduction off paying him, and when I tried to do that this month, I was forced to pay him the whole amount so I got no child support at all! And I am not disputing that he will get what he is due, only when. I am running the rentals entirely alone (as I have since before BD) -- and that means doing all the reservations, bookkeeping, greeting guests and dealing with issues, cleaning toilets and rooms when I can and managing cleaners when I can't, doing all the garbage and maintenance and what limited painting and other stuff I can manage -- all to keep his asset warm for him and pay all our joint (largely his) debt and get nothing for it except that I don't pay much rent. I am not even fighting for the right to stay in the marital home with the kids til D10 is 18, though I would like to. I am only fighting to stay here for sure until June so I don't have to move the kids during the school year -- esp my son, who has such severe school refusal problems already. And that I be given until then to repair my credit and get the refinance that I have been told by the bank I can get as soon as my credit reaches 650. I have implied that if I can't do that by June, I will sell.

I would really like to insist that we stay here til S14 graduates high school, since it's his school refusal issues that are the most severe and the reason that I have to be home every morning to work on getting him up and out, often for two hours.

I feel like what I am asking is more than reasonable and in fact it's not even fair that he would get so much when he does nothing in any way to support either the family or maintain the asset -- and that I have nothing to be ashamed of for holding my ground. But I am in a constant state of doubt. Everyone is always screaming at court that I am trying to hold on to what is his. The judge has told H to get a job and support himself but she keeps allowing him to demand more money out of me when he threatens to move home. Sometimes even my L pushes me to settle for these absurd timetables H keeps pushing. My L has no kids and does not seem to understand the impact this is having on the kids and my desire to limit further stress until the summer. There was never a GAL because we settled custody, so the extreme issues my kids have with learning disabilities and emotional disturbance of my son has never been openly discussed in court.

H does not want to wait until June. He does not accept any of the court-ordered appraisals and is insisting that everything get put on the market, despite all the appraisers being who HE chose -- because he thinks there will be some kind of bidding war to push the price up higher than the appraisal. Today his L made an "offer" that I sell everything but don't have to close until June.

Sometimes I think that as much as he wants money fast, what he wants most of all is to get control of everything and prevent me from having any agency over anything "left over" from our married life. He is so vengeful and vicious.

I think the biggest problem with MLC in divorce court is that the same rules are being applied here as to any other divorce, and the MLCer is taken seriously, as if all the demands make sense. So something that is totally way out there becomes the starting point for compromise, and thus compromises are not comprises at all, but more of the same insane demands watered down only very slightly. And whenever we do go to court and to my mind H is getting reamed and chastised all over, he thinks that he is succeeding! So we aren't even reading the reality there in the same way either!

I am not really even sure what I am asking here.

[DnJ]

Hello Gerda

Good post!

What is accurate?

That was from a few days ago.

I believe you accurately captured your situation. Nice job! Really sharp sword, and bright shield.

Now, do not give in to his crazy demands. This horrible proceeding will not last forever. I would not give to much credence to H or his lawyer’s screaming rants. Just because something is louder doesn’t make it more true.

However, when your L expresses concern over timetables and such, listen to him. Seek to understand why he is recommending what he is. Remember he is on your side.

You lawyer, from what you have said, sounds rather nice and levelheaded. With custody being already settled, further disruption to you and the kids isn’t a court priority. Sorry to be blunt here. The court is now only splitting assets and figuring out support and alimony. Lawyers have seen lots of this stuff and get a pretty good feel for when and how to go about reaching the best deal.

This part is definitely business. Stick to business. Get your best deal - and only you can define what is “best”.

I could be way off base here. I think trying to stave off disruption until summer, is going to be a problem.

All this being said, you are being reasonable and fair. And dealing with H, a man who has lost the plot, and doesn’t care or understand about reasonable and fair anymore.

I am not really even sure what I am asking here.

I don’t think you’re specifically asking for anything.

I think you are finding an accurate and accepting view. Pulling it all together.

I really liked your post. You stated lots of things, problems, and concerns. However, I didn’t see any fears. Just concerns. Was really wonderful to see. Did you notice that?

Gerda, you are one strong lady. You can handle concerns. And you know you don’t have to do it alone.

Sword and shield.

DnJ