Rebuilding my life (ILYBNILWY? IDGAF 2)

[MoveFrwd]

Amoafwl (really curious about the name change btw)

I like switching it up every now and again. This one stands for "A Man Only A Fool Would Leave".

If I'm overemphasizing it IS because it happens so damn much.

I think maybe I used the wrong words. To me, her original request wasnt particularly offensive. But you came in here really upset by even the wording of her original question. To me, it is as though you are so put off by everything else shes doing/saying that even reasonable requests seem outlandish and rude. I certainly can understand where you are coming from, and I know that it must be testing every bit of patience that you have. Im just pointing out that it seems very easy for her to rile you up right now - if I were GF, it would be signal to me that you are still attached emotionally somehow.

I'm exhausted by it. My phone is basically PERMANENTLY on vibrate because just hearing the DING of a text message stresses me out sometimes.

Maybe it's time to stop responding to text and only communicate through the calendar software or email or something?

As far as the weekday time, she hasn't gotten D in the evenings for months. She's been snarky about it and made a comment to D once about taking her to girl scouts, and I just let it go and don't say anything. I WANT to reiterate: "YOU CAN GET HER ANYTIME DURING THE WEEK!" but I realize that's not going to help, and may make things worse.

Well no - that will clearly not help. Maybe it's less of an issue now, but I know if I were only having overnights with my kids 2 or 3 out of 14 days, it would be very difficult and I can see how she would feel isolated from D's life. Yes, this is based on her choices. No, Im not saying you should be pushing D back to her more. My point is that to me, her erratic behavior doesnt seem so crazy with that limited time. Thats on her to correct, but I wonder if we are too quick to judge and shame her in here.

You say that "She can get her any time during the week" but in the next breath, youre talking becoming less responsive to texts, putting your phone on silent, etc. How about the times when she asked to take D on snow days (during the week), but you already 'claimed' them?

I dont mean to sound like Im on her side or that Im saying youre doing anything 'wrong'. My point is more that we should stop and think about what she might be feeling to understand the situation. We talk about empathy and validation a lot on this site, but Im not really seeing it through this thread.

GF really isn't happy about XW's seemingly constant presence in my life. It's caused problems. I can't blame her. I read something about people in her position (women who are with men who have a toxic ex) and I see "us" in there, and I feel ashamed for having put her through all of this (especially the crap from last June when I could have gone back to XW). I actually sent the article to my C so we could talk about it and I could better understand and to support GF through having to deal with "her part" (not that she has a part, but she takes enough) of it.

I'm trying to own all of it. I don't know that I'm doing a great job of it, but I try. She hasn't done a thing to deserve any of this except care.

I mean, whats the long term plan here? How are you going to better disentangle from XW so that you can have a proper R with GF?

[Ginger1]

^^^^^^^That^^^^^^^

Anything she says now is completely unreasonable sounding to you. I can easily see how that can happen, given about 95% of the stuff she does say is wacky. But you are so tangled up in it, you are hearing some stuff that could be heard a different way.

You did go ahead and take those snow days off without talking to her? Why is that?

Here is the Parrot again: Get a more reasonable parenting plan solidified. Not a "you can take her anytime you want during the week" More like give her one or two nights a week, solid. more consistency for D, more consistency for her, and maybe she will calm the heck down. Nothing wishy washy, nothing questionable. It will cut down on need for communication. Get something very very formal.

[EastTN]

I think maybe I used the wrong words. To me, her original request wasnt particularly offensive. But you came in here really upset by even the wording of her original question. To me, it is as though you are so put off by everything else shes doing/saying that even reasonable requests seem outlandish and rude

No, she was absolutely reasonable in her request to take D to the Disney thing and I totally was on board with swapping weekends. But then I get yelled at for not responding immediately (unless it's urgent and/or important I respond to her on MY time, not her time), then called high and mighty because I said our plans weren't fixed? THAT is the part that upset me, and that's what puts me off. She still wants to control me, and I resent the hell out of it. If it sounds like I'm upset in these messages, I often am, and this is my outlet. I treat this place like my journal (and hey, like Tom Riddle's diary, it talks back). I express that resentment here, but NOT to her (she doesn't EVER get to know that she can make me feel hurt or anger or anything else) and NEVER to/in front of D. I save it for here.

I dont mean to sound like Im on her side or that Im saying youre doing anything 'wrong'. My point is more that we should stop and think about what she might be feeling to understand the situation. We talk about empathy and validation a lot on this site, but Im not really seeing it through this thread.

It'd probably be helpful to hear from someone on "her side" TBH. I don't get anything well reasoned, I just get spew. It's rare that there's anything approaching a "normal" conversation (and that BUGS me--I know this is my D's mom, and I STILL feel after all of this that there needs to be SOMETHING here for D's benefit, but all I get is hate and I just want to run the hell away from it. I don't think I can overstate just HOW MESSED UP I feel from the constant anger, and accusations, and little things like I feel are done JUST to get at me (again, who the heck thinks that sending pictures of the affair partner home with your kid is "OK" in any way?)) I know for a fact that she's lied to me about D, so I'm not just carrying over the lack of trust from the constant lies and gaslighting at the end of the M. How can I try to practice empathy and validate ANYTHING she says when I'm practically being abused, treated like a monster and can't trust that ANYTHING that she says is true?

How about the times when she asked to take D on snow days (during the week), but you already 'claimed' them?

You did go ahead and take those snow days off without talking to her? Why is that?

The advice I got was "stop trying to coparent, and start parallel parenting" and "stick to the schedule, it will help" and that's what I've been trying. I took off of work when school closed because I was supposed to care for D on those days (and I got to spend A TON of time with her that wasn't all work! I see D like three hours a day, and almost all of it is "work parent" time--homework, and cooking, etc. Very little of it is fun time. D and I never get to go to the park. D and I never get to watch a movie. I rarely get to see her run around and just be a kid! I LIVE for my weekends with her (four every three months), when we get to DO things just to do them. Snow days are like those weekend days). And what the hell does it say if I tell XW "yeah, I gotta work, so sure, take the time with D?" She's her mom, not a babysitter, and no matter how I feel I ain't going to treat her that way.

Or hell, maybe I'm just screwing up more and just don't see it because I'm too close to it.

Tangent: D actually WANTED to call her mom on Sunday night, which was great to see. They talked for a quite a bit, D ended up going to sleep an hour passed her bedtime. I wasn't really happy about that, but it was ok. I also got D to talk to her mom last night (XW sent me a text asking if D wanted to talk. D had told me she didn't, but I told XW that she was in the bath, wait a minute to call me, I'd try to get her talking, and I'd leave the room. It worked, both of them seemed happy as hell, XW sent a text thanking me).

So this morning, I get a text from XW why D didn't call on her way to school. Then something snarky about how I shouldn't say she didn't want to, because D "didn't understand." I told myself no way was I talking to XW on today of all days, especially not in response to that. And then, of course, something caused me to respond, as XW texted that she was having her bariatric surgery in two weeks, and she asked me to either bring D to the hospital before hand so she could see her, or let her have her the night before and her mom would bring her to school.

So yeah, I responded that she could have her, and I'd write her teacher a note explaining that she might be late that day, and why.

Here is the Parrot again: Get a more reasonable parenting plan solidified. Not a "you can take her anytime you want during the week" More like give her one or two nights a week, solid. more consistency for D, more consistency for her, and maybe she will calm the heck down.

I tried to give her that kind of time at the start of all of this (a friend suggested that I needed weekend time too, and that the way to handle this was to give XW two sunday nights a month to make up for the weekend). XW said it was ridiculous to have to drive D to school early on a Monday morning (it's +/- 40 minutes each way, so I can kinda see her point) and wanted no part of it. As far as moving forward, my L has tried to contact her L twice now to schedule, and he hasn't responded.

I mean, whats the long term plan here? How are you going to better disentangle from XW so that you can have a proper R with GF?

Truthfully? I don't even know HOW to plan something like this. My C suggested that GF and I have "XW free days" where we simply do not allow her to be a presence in our lives, discuss her at all, etc. It's worked well, for the most part. Beyond that? I continue to hope that she'll just plain get tired of me at some point and leave me the hell alone.

[MoveFrwd]

No, she was absolutely reasonable in her request to take D to the Disney thing and I totally was on board with swapping weekends.

But you came on here and said that you thought she should have approached you differently. Or that you would have just informed vs trying to switch.

What are your thoughts on swapping weekends as a general practice? In my opinion, that means youll have D 2 weekends in a row, which would put her at what, 18 days in a row without seeing her mom? That seems crazy to me. I dont know enough details, but I imagine that XW or D wouldnt be super excited about that.

But then I get yelled at for not responding immediately (unless it's urgent and/or important I respond to her on MY time, not her time), then called high and mighty because I said our plans weren't fixed? THAT is the part that upset me, and that's what puts me off. She still wants to control me, and I resent the hell out of it.

Youre allowed to be pissed with the way she is reacting. If someone spoke to me like that regularly, Id be pissed too. Im just suggesting you see it the other way. If you asked for time to take D to XYZ and it was a limited time offer to get tickets, and XW said 'maybe' and then took a couple days to confirm, and by then the tix were gone....Im sure you would be upset about it too. "How hard can this be?" "Why cant she just answer the question?" etc etc. Look through the actual words and try to empathize.

It's rare that there's anything approaching a "normal" conversation (and that BUGS me--I know this is my D's mom, and I STILL feel after all of this that there needs to be SOMETHING here for D's benefit, but all I get is hate and I just want to run the hell away from it.

I understand. Im in the same boat. The frequency is way lower than what youre seeing, so the resulting impact seems a lot less, but the sentiments are pretty similar. I can do 10 things right and one thing wrong and instead of "thanks for doing all of those things", I get spew about the one thing. What kind of relationship do you foresee with XW? What kind of relationship do you actually want?

I don't think I can overstate just HOW MESSED UP I feel from the constant anger, and accusations, and little things like I feel are done JUST to get at me

Thats your choice. When my ex will say similar things to me, my GF gets very upset saying "you dont deserve that" and "shes such a b$%@#" and the like. To me, I know that she is just projecting her anger on to me. It isnt about me...its about her. Same as your XW. Like Vapo has said to you many times "water off a ducks back"...thats because it isnt about you...at all. She is doing it to get at you, and because its working, shes going to KEEP doing it.

(again, who the heck thinks that sending pictures of the affair partner home with your kid is "OK" in any way?)

At this point, does it matter that its an AP? I mean, youre in another relationship for a while now. Whether or not he was around at the time of your breakup doesnt really matter anymore. Im not suggesting you need to like this guy or hang out with him. But I worry on some level, your resentment towards him reflects your feelings towards XW.

How can I try to practice empathy and validate ANYTHING she says when I'm practically being abused, treated like a monster and can't trust that ANYTHING that she says is true?

I believe that there is no excuse for the way she is treating you. I dont think that the situation she placed herself into is any reason to treat you as she is. That said, I do think her actions are based on the feelings that she has around the situation.

As Ginger has said repeatedly, having a loosey-goosey parenting plan where you sit as the primary caretaker and appear to 'dole out' parenting time to XW as you see fit is a difficult way to sustain a friendly relationship. Any time XW feels slighted by the 'system' or the 'situation', its YOUR fault, not the lawyers or the courts or the government or whatever. YOU are the face of what is keeping D from her. You are so worried to 'rock the boat', but what you are doing now ISNT WORKING. So what choice is there?

The advice I got was "stop trying to coparent, and start parallel parenting" and "stick to the schedule, it will help" and that's what I've been trying. I took off of work when school closed because I was supposed to care for D on those days (and I got to spend A TON of time with her that wasn't all work! I see D like three hours a day, and almost all of it is "work parent" time--homework, and cooking, etc. Very little of it is fun time. D and I never get to go to the park. D and I never get to watch a movie. I rarely get to see her run around and just be a kid! I LIVE for my weekends with her (four every three months), when we get to DO things just to do them. Snow days are like those weekend days). And what the hell does it say if I tell XW "yeah, I gotta work, so sure, take the time with D?" She's her mom, not a babysitter, and no matter how I feel I ain't going to treat her that way.

My point is that your parenting plan says she can have D any time she wants on the weekdays. So, a snow day comes up (on a weekday), she asks for time, and you tell her no. As I wrote above, this puts YOU as the bad guy. I would be livid if I tried to exercise my right to 'weekday time' and was blocked 'just because'.

I also got D to talk to her mom last night (XW sent me a text asking if D wanted to talk. D had told me she didn't, but I told XW that she was in the bath, wait a minute to call me, I'd try to get her talking, and I'd leave the room. It worked, both of them seemed happy as hell, XW sent a text thanking me).

It's still ludicrous to me that you and XW are texting basically daily to arrange these phone calls for a 7 year old. My kids are around the same age - theres no way I would be engaging in texts wth their mom EVERY DAY, and I guess, often twice a day. I cant help but think that a part of you wants or needs this contact for something.

Truthfully? I don't even know HOW to plan something like this. My C suggested that GF and I have "XW free days" where we simply do not allow her to be a presence in our lives, discuss her at all, etc. It's worked well, for the most part. Beyond that? I continue to hope that she'll just plain get tired of me at some point and leave me the hell alone.

That sounds so incredibly passive. Where are YOUR boundaries? It feels like anytime XW wants, she can suck you back in. Having "XW-free days" feels like just ignoring the issues until the next day. Frankly, I dont see her going away until you have a very clear and defined parenting agreement in place.

[EastTN]

But you came on here and said that you thought she should have approached you differently. Or that you would have just informed vs trying to switch.

I did do that, didn't I? Hell, I don't know, I probably AM being a bit oversensitive. Or at least idealistic. I really didn't have a problem with what she said or how she said it (to start), there wasn't anything wrong with it. I DID mean what I said: if there was something cool for D to do on a weekend that I wasn't going to have her, I'd chalk it up to "well, crap, I don't get to do that with her" and maybe mention it to XW so she could. I guess I'm just frustrated with the fact that sometimes it seems like XW really doesn't get this whole "divorce" thing.

What are your thoughts on swapping weekends as a general practice? In my opinion, that means youll have D 2 weekends in a row, which would put her at what, 18 days in a row without seeing her mom? That seems crazy to me. I dont know enough details, but I imagine that XW or D wouldnt be super excited about that.

If we were EOW, I'd agree, but I get 3rd and 5th weekends. Swapping weekends doesn't seem like it has any real consequences. And yeah, 18 days is crazy, and *I* am not down for that. I gave (not traded) XW one of my days between end of school and Christmas to keep that from happening (would have been 15 days). The idea of D losing touch with XW isn't a happy one for me. I might want her out of MY life, but I'd never want her out of D's.

If you asked for time to take D to XYZ and it was a limited time offer to get tickets, and XW said 'maybe' and then took a couple days to confirm, and by then the tix were gone....Im sure you would be upset about it too. "How hard can this be?" "Why cant she just answer the question?" etc etc. Look through the actual words and try to empathize.

Fair enough. I really don't think you go from "front row center" to "only crap seats" available in a few days for an event where tickets have been on sale for weeks, but I get your point. I'd be upset, too.

I understand. Im in the same boat. The frequency is way lower than what youre seeing, so the resulting impact seems a lot less, but the sentiments are pretty similar. I can do 10 things right and one thing wrong and instead of "thanks for doing all of those things", I get spew about the one thing.

Thats your choice. When my ex will say similar things to me, my GF gets very upset saying "you dont deserve that" and "shes such a b$%@#" and the like. To me, I know that she is just projecting her anger on to me. It isnt about me...its about her. Same as your XW. Like Vapo has said to you many times "water off a ducks back"...thats because it isnt about you...at all. She is doing it to get at you, and because its working, shes going to KEEP doing it.

I appreciate that insight. So how do you keep it from getting to you? How do you keep it from working its way into your new relationship (you're talking to your GF about it since she's commenting, right?) I get that it's about her and not me, but damn, everytime I find a center and just start ignoring a particular line of BS and think she's out of buttons she finds a new one to push.

When we go back to court, I'm going to ask my L to ask the judge for OFW or something similar with direct communications reserved for emergencies.

At this point, does it matter that its an AP? I mean, youre in another relationship for a while now. Whether or not he was around at the time of your breakup doesnt really matter anymore. Im not suggesting you need to like this guy or hang out with him. But I worry on some level, your resentment towards him reflects your feelings towards XW.

I don't think about him much, honestly. I did in the past. I had all sorts of fantasies about him getting what he "deserved." Once he was in D's life, that mostly went away, since whatever happens to him affects D at this point. I even encourage D's relationship with him.I see him at pickup sometimes, I hear him on the phone sometimes when D talks to her mom (D actually wanted to call HIM one day, and I just handed her my phone), and I really don't care. It's just "meh" at this point. That doesn't mean I want a picture of him in my house playing happy family with what used to be my family.

You know, the funny thing is I largely feel sorry for him. Everything I see (which TBH isn't much) about him and XW looks A LOT like what XW and I had at the start. I figure he's on track to have all of what came later for me, too. IF I wanted something bad to happen to him, I can't imagine much worse than that--karma will likely be a real thing for him. And that's the part that's funny--I don't WANT him to go through that, because it means D goes through it again, too.

As Ginger has said repeatedly, having a loosey-goosey parenting plan where you sit as the primary caretaker and appear to 'dole out' parenting time to XW as you see fit is a difficult way to sustain a friendly relationship. Any time XW feels slighted by the 'system' or the 'situation', its YOUR fault, not the lawyers or the courts or the government or whatever. YOU are the face of what is keeping D from her. You are so worried to 'rock the boat', but what you are doing now ISNT WORKING. So what choice is there?

My point is that your parenting plan says she can have D any time she wants on the weekdays. So, a snow day comes up (on a weekday), she asks for time, and you tell her no. As I wrote above, this puts YOU as the bad guy. I would be livid if I tried to exercise my right to 'weekday time' and was blocked 'just because'.

L is working on that now, we'll see what happens. I agree that what we originally came up with plain doesn't work and is just adding to the misery. Changing that is a priority. It will still be months before anything happens, though.

As for the "any time on the weekdays" it's actually "after school." Subtle difference, I guess, but I think important. And yeah, I agree this "doling out" is stupid and [censored]. I was hoping it wouldn't be that way, the plan isn't written passively, it's XW SAYS "I'm getting D tomorrow after school" and as long as there are no conflicts (she can't take her out of school events or extra curriculars) it's her time.

Next week was supposed to be winter break. It got cancelled (too many snow days). XW texted me and asked if she got D on Sunday. I told her what happened (I updated our calendar, but I guess she didn't look) and to my surprise, no drama, she just asked if she could take her to Girl Scouts on Monday. Said Yes (wanted to say "of course" but I think I add to the drama when I talk like that). I LIKE when XW takes her to Scouts after "my" weekends, it means she doesn't have to go so long between seeing her.

It's still ludicrous to me that you and XW are texting basically daily to arrange these phone calls for a 7 year old. My kids are around the same age - theres no way I would be engaging in texts wth their mom EVERY DAY, and I guess, often twice a day. I cant help but think that a part of you wants or needs this contact for something.

This is all her, not me. Yeah, I can "not respond" but I feel like not responding to a polite "hey, can D call?" as opposed to an angry accusation is just being an ahole. Otherwise? Do not want.

That sounds so incredibly passive. Where are YOUR boundaries? It feels like anytime XW wants, she can suck you back in. Having "XW-free days" feels like just ignoring the issues until the next day. Frankly, I dont see her going away until you have a very clear and defined parenting agreement in place.

I think my boundaries are still ill defined, but I think I'm getting better. To be honest, I'm still learning (maybe relearning? I remember being different a long time ago) how to be a healthy human being. I can keep XW out of my personal space, I can NOT respond to most of what she throws at me, I don't feel compelled to answer whatever she asks, or tell her about my life, or ask her about hers, or any of that crap.

The point of the "XW free days" isn't to kick the can, it's to make them last longer and longer. GF and I have had XW intruding into our lives for most of our relationship, and she ends up being the elephant in the room too often. So this is us getting the elephant out. GF still has questions, and she still worries sometimes. The amount of contact XW still have isn't lost on her. So there HAS to be an outlet here where she can feel safe and talk about that, which means NON-XW free days still have to be around for a while. It made sense when my C and I talked about it, anyway, and GF seems enthusiastic about the idea, so we'll try it.

And yeah, I think she's not going to go away any time soon (regardless of parenting agreement). TBH I think at some point, she'll get bored (I'm trying really hard to be boring) and start making OM's life hell instead... and at THAT point, I think she'll be gone. Still passive, I know, but I don't really have any strategies to deal with this. Even my 1st XW wasn't anything like this (though I was able to go full NC with her with no issues, since no kids). I asked C to think about this one, and maybe give me a referral to someone who might be better equipped to help.

What kind of relationship do you foresee with XW? What kind of relationship do you actually want?

You know, what I WANTED was one of those "easy coparenting" relationships that some people seem to have. Easy back and forth. No drama. No issue with one or the other entering the house (invited). Just something that a child could look at and feel secure, and I could look at and think "yeah, you screwed me over, but this is about D and not me."

After a year of this s---? The kind of relationship I want is "none." Her as far out of my life as she can get while still being in D's the maximum amount. Sit on opposite sides of the auditorium at the school play kind of relationship. Don't call me, send me a message on the website kind of relationship. And THEN, maybe once that settles down and I don't feel AFRAID of what she's going to do next? Then we can go back and try the first one again, and see if that can happen.

[Vanilla]

My view is that your R with your crazy ex is none of gf business.

It is YOURS to manage.

How many times do the posters here have to say start a schedule?

V

[marina7]

EastTN,
Hey buddy, I see your W has a pattern like my W, before she took s9 when I finally put my foot down saying I don't have to jump everytime you wanna talk to them W didn't care if a child was showering she would say oh well not my problem. When I finally said enough then she took s9 then she used him as her pawn but when she seen I wasn't budging she then didn't let me talk to him. I was like you financially I couldn't but I knew I had to put things in writing by court and bring s9 back home. I wish you the best of luck. And keep protecting D.

[EastTN]

V,

I agree with you 100%. My circus, my monkeys, GF shouldn't and doesn't need to be in that. We had a long talk, she agreed with that (actually, she used the same words you did: none of my business and I have to let you deal with that).

For the schedule, don't know that it's going to be necessary. D calls her mom when she wants to and has more positive conversations now. Doesn't pretend to be tired or sassy, and I have to chase her off the phone when she has to go to bed. Makes me happy to see that. Maybe this works as a new normal everyone can live with.

Trying not to engage with XW, mostly successful. She still baits me, she got me to respond on Monday (D had a school project which was a timeline of her life. I had asked XW if she had any ideas for her milestones, she gave me a couple ideas and a couple of pictures).

Monday, XW was supposed to take D to Girl Scouts. Our troop leader decided we weren't going to have a full meeting because it was cookie delivery day. I found out Monday afternoon. The troop leader actually talked to XW before me, since I had already told her XW would have D for scouts that night. Get text from XW saying she had dinner and was going home with D, and I knew that, and I could have told her, and that this was getting old. I told her I had JUST found out.

I'm a bit irritated, since XW had her for hours, made me drive to her house to get her (instead of driving to school which is 4 miles from home, I had to drive 25 miles from work, then 30 miles home), and didn't do homework with D (apparently, D was too busy playing Rock Band with OM. Which XW sent me a video of. Who does that?)

So anyway, I get a text while shes with D saying, "D said there wasn't anything about me on her project. It's ok EastTN. Doesn't matter how much you try to keep me out of her life I'll always be there!" Should have ignored but responded, "Not about me either. About her. And yes there is something very much involving you on there." that's about the maximum she gets me engaged these days, so I guess that's good.

And then WTF moment this morning. I get a text that asks me if I still have a Sam's Club membership, because she needs to buy protein shakes and they're cheaper there. Why the heck does she do stuff like that? Is she honestly expecting a "hey, sure, use my sam's club membership anytime you want?" or "I'll pick some up for you tomorrow and drop them off?" What the heck?

[Vanilla]

Sensible gf.

Keep the schedule idea in the back pocket for the next great manipulation, rage round.

Buttons always out of reach, ok.

V

[EastTN]

I don't know if this is manipulation/rage, but damn if it isn't ridiculous to be told that something someone else did is absolutely your fault.

Background: XW had her bariatric surgery today. A couple of weeks ago she sent me a text:

XW: My surgery is scheduled. Will you please bring D to the hospital to see me before I go in? Or let me have her the night before and Mom can take her to school once they take me back? Please, I'm begging you it's important.

Me: Let me know when. I agree it's important.

XW: The 28th this month. In two weeks exactly.

Me: I put it on the calendar. Get her after school on the 27th and your mom can drop her at school. I'll write Ms. Teacher a note and say she may be late that day.

XW: Thank you EastTN! Means a lot

Me: Don't need to thank

So... they get D last night. This afternoon, I show up at after school to get D, and no one is there--after school is empty. I call XMIL. No answer. I text XMIL I'm at school to pick up D, she's not here. Did she not come to school today? No answer. I text XW. No answer. I start to panic. One of the admin staff is working late, and asks me if I need anything. I explain that I'm there for D, and she's not here. I think she is probably with her mother and grandmother, but I DON'T KNOW. She unlocks the school, we go in, and she starts checking. Computer says D was not absent today. We check after school's records and D did not show up for after school. She calls the teacher on duty for car riders today, and D absolutely did not go home in a car. I start to panic (more). I call XFIL, asks him what he knows, and he says D is with XW and XMIL, and he thought I knew. School lady calls two other people while I'm on the phone with XFIL and we both hang up and say "She wasn't in school today." So, mystery solved, panic abated. About ten minutes later XMIL texts back "I thought they knew sorry r I would have called and told u as soon as she wakes up we will start back."

XW wakes up and texts me. Says there was a late start to surgery.

XW: And I'd like to point out that when we talked about me getting her on Tuesday the night before surgery you said it was OK that if she didn't end up going to school if that was the case and I'm sorry my surgery was behind.

Me: By the way, here's what we said (sends screenshots of conversation from two weeks ago)

Me: You had me show up at school knowing she wasn't going to be there. I got to panic. Because they said she WAS there. But didn't go to after school. And didn't get picked up from car riders.

XW: What You could've called or text but no you didn't and you waited to you got there and I can't believe the school had her down when she wasn't there that's something wrong with that

XW: And I didn't have you show up for nothing I was OU least you could've done was called I couldn't do anything while I was in the back

Me: I did call. And text. Your phone and your mother's phone. She got back to me half an hour later.

XW: They probably with the doctor?! I don't know I wasn't there this is not my fault so you can stop acting the way you are the least I need is for you to be showing your ass right now. Just another struck towards me because I know how you are and your damn lawyer anything and everything to try to make me look bad. well that isn't going to work this time I had surgery she's here it's not my fault the school had her down for coming in when she was definitely not there maybe they need to get their [censored] together

Me: XW, you had D. I was supposed to pick her up at school. If you weren't bringing her to school you need to TELL ME. Don't try to make this out a my fault. You absolutely knew she was not going to be there when I went to pick her up. You CAN'T make this one come out any other way. No misunderstanding.

XW: You're an ass EastTN. Plain and simple I went back to the waiting room is are you driving getting hooked up at 10 o'clock, I didn't have my surgery until afternoon I didn't have my phone the entire I was waiting to get out and see her then Mom bringing her to school Bc that's what I told Mom. After I get to see her you can bring her to school. She probably didn't think anything since it was late when they got to me. Sorry things didn't go as planned not my fault. Not please stop with your blaming me for something out of my control