Brave Little Gerda, So Chilled She Could Not Speak

[Gerda]

I am numb. It wasn't as bad as what happened to Marina but it was horrifying. It seems that he is going to fight for custody. I can't tell if all he wants is money, in which case I feel I should just give up everything in order to avoid putting my children through a custody battle.

It was so so so so horrible. A Catholic friend was with me and that was very helpful, H was horrified when he saw her. His lawyer kept lying about what is happening, said that he doesn't see the children because he can't make a schedule until he moves out, says he has no access to bank accounts which is a lie, said my father pays for everything for me, which is a lie. But in order to prove these things are a lie,I will have to go to trial, thereby dragging this out for a year or two. No one seemed to care that he doesn't work or help me, none of that seems to matter unless you go to trial, it's all about trying to work out a settlement to avoid trial, and no one cares that seeing him is harmful for the kids or that they don't want to sleep over at his place, if he gets one, and that he can't afford one until our house is sold.

But all of it ends up being made to look like I am trying to control everything. The court attorney, a young woman who has never had children I am sure, kept looking at the papers and saying, There is no money here, I don't understand how they are living, and his lawyer kept shouting about "the asset," our house, and she kept saying, but it's not liquid. And yet allowed him to suggest he would pay for the children's attorney by using the house as collateral!

So I don't know what to do. I don't want my kids to go through that. And we'll have to get a guardian for them and they'll have to go through that too.

Thank God he hasn't come home yet.

I realize I am still in disbelief. I still can't believe he is not going to wake up and be H again. I admit this. I realized in court that I keep thinking I won't have to go through the whole thing, that he will wake up first.