Hi mighty! Well, I guess you can say that I'm OK. Still feeling anger but not as intense. I had my D14 with me until Sunday and I always feel better when she is here is with me. Today on my way home from work I got a call from D14. She had locked herself out of her mom's house and asked if I could come and get her. I was going to be passing by so, of course, I wasn't about to let her stay locked out of the house. So, I asked her if she had called her mother to let her know and what she had said. So, D14 says that her mother told her to call ME! Umm....ok, as far as she knew I was already past her home as I worked a little late today. I get to my D14 and I ask her what she wants to do. She said that her mom told her to just take her to her work and she can wait there until my W was done. BUT my D begged me to let her just get the key and take her back because "I don't want to wait for mom to get done. I'll have to wait there until 8:00!". So, I ask her if her mother leaves her alone until that late every night. Her answer was "Yes, but I don't mind. In fact I like it. I get the house to myself.".
So, just like I thought, my W is acting the same as she has for the last few years. She is putting her work ahead of her D14! Look, I know that the worst time for a teenager, the time when they get into trouble is the period from after school is out until a parent gets home. With no supervision teens are going to get into trouble. When her new friends at her new school find out that they can go to my W's house after school and no adults are going to be there, they will start pressuring my D14 to come over there. All it takes is one bad kid with the wrong things on their mind and trouble follows! I knew this was going to happen!
What I don't get is why my W even cares to have D14 living with her if she is going to do this! My W doesn't HAVE to work late every day. It's her choice to do that. It's her choice to be the one that they always ask to work extra because she will never say no! My W is so afraid of being seen as not part of the team, she gets stepped on at her work all the time! This is what she did when she and I lived together and when I asked her to please try and say no she told me she wanted to work late because "It's so unhappy here at home". Of course, she wanted to stay at work because being with me was making her unhappy! Now I'm not there and she is still doing the same thing! She wants so badly to have split custody and when she gets it, this is what she does?
So, I took D14 to W's work. She picked up the key, I took her to get ice cream and took her back to mothers house. So, my W didn't have to be put out once again. It took an extra 2 hours out of my day and about 20 miles but W didn't have to do a thing! So, did my W text me a thank you? Did she at least acknowledge my effort? Nope. Nothing. Zip, nada, not a word. Once again, I ride to the rescue so W doesn't have to miss a second of work and she doesn't even have the decency to say "thanks" or even acknowledge the effort. Same thing she did the last couple years when I would get a call at the last min. asking me to pick up both our kids from school (they went on opposite sides of town) and that took me an extra 1.5 hours and I wasn't able to do anything like meet with friends or go to the gym! Then on B-day my W tells me one of the things she wanted me to do was go out and do things on my own without her. How was I supposed to do that when I had to always be the one who took care of things at home?
Even now that my W and I don't live together, even though she has taken my D14 away from me and the only home she has ever known, my W is still using me to get out of having to be a decent, caring mother. Worse is that even if I brought this up in court, my lawyer says that in my state I will not get custody unless my w is smoking crack WITH my D14. It just is how it is where I live. He says I'm "lucky" to get 50/50 being a father since here mothers are always awarded custody. If my D14 would tell the court she wants to live with me that would change things but just the way she defended her mother saying she "liked" that she worked late, I know that won't happen. Of course she 'likes" it when she doesn't need her mom (like when she gets locked out of the house, say) but because she knows I will always be there for her she doesn't have to hurt her mom's feelings AND she knows I will still be there for her like I always have.
For my W to be leaving my D14 home alone every night is bad enough. telling her to call me is bad enough. But for me to ride to her rescue and her to not even have the decency to text a "Thanks for doing this so I didn't have to leave work early" just is so RUDE! God, I really hate how selfish these WAS's become. If I was a "friend who did the same thing, my W would be so thanking them and saying how much she appreciated the effort, etc. For the person whose life she has turned upside down? Well, it seems I'm not even worthy of a simple text message "thank you"!
