Thanks everyone... I should have made it more clear. In the beginning, XW was very hateful towards me. She had a reputation for being that kind of a hateful woman, so it was par for course. This was a woman who when the garbage collectors came over, they put everyone's cans back on the sidewalk, but threw hers all over the street just because she was such a nasty woman... she was also young, very young, at the time. She and my husband were dating for just a few weeks when she became pregnant at 18, him at 23. I remember the first time I met the twins, they were 4, and DSD said "you're the whore" in just the cutest little tone of voice.
Fast forward 4 years, I had had enough of the hateful comments and spew coming from her and invited her and her new H, by whom she had also "gotten pregnant" and M just a few months into their R... who later called my H and swapped notes on how he felt he had been tricked into M. (I'm starting to remember all of this and perhaps my H was not entirely dishonest with me... feeling better) In any case, I invited her and her H out to breakfast to discuss the children and calling a truce. I still remember the adversarial R we had at that point and I was sick of it. XW and her H and my H all were just going along, but I was having none of it any more. XW's H put a tape recorder on the table before we began... and I just said, look, we all love the children and this has got to stop. They are half of you and half of H and by telling them that H is bad, you are telling them that half of them is bad. It was like a light went on in all of them. Since then, well, I wouldn't say I would have sought her out to be friends, she was not a nice person, but we have all been friends.
A few years later when her H called my H and asked if he had also been tricked into M her, they were having problems. I got her the DR book and 5LL and they reconciled. She then called my H and apologized to both of us for being so hateful and the role she had played in the breakup of their M. It was like she finally got that she wasn't perfect and admitted her mistakes and I think she was OK with things then. It was at that point that we went from being cordial to her calling me for all sorts of things. I taught her to can food, gardening, we swapped notes on the kids, and finally her H, who was physically abusive, did it one too many times and the kids all came to live with us.
More recently I've forgiven XW's H for the abuse of the children because he went to anger management and became a Christian. She is also trying to build a Christian M now, and I think they're trying very hard... I guess they're moving so far away was an attempt to start over, but the kids are so hurt by it. They will be going down there this summer and I'm so afraid that she will try to keep them. I'm not convinced her H would be able to control his temper if DSD lived with them, as she loves to push his buttons.
So, that's my story... typing it out may have helped me a bit. I guess it may make me feel better by apologizing, but it may make her feel like crap and rip open old wounds.
I think instead of contacting her to apologize, I'll just check in to see how she's doing and trust that God has forgiven me for anything.
