Light at the end of the tunnel.
You guys. Daughter is turning 18 tomorrow. I have been waiting for this moment for years and it's almost hard to process that we literally will never have to speak to The Ex again unless we want to do so. No more sharing schedules, no more delayed or cancelled plans because she can't make up her mind, no more arguing. It is going to be absolutely glorious. With all of that being said, The Ex is still up to her typical BS with everything and throwing Daughter smack dab in the middle of it.
We're planning a graduation party for Daughter in August. Trying to be civil, I told Daughter that she could invite her mom's side of the family if she wanted them to come. Daughter took it one step further and invited not only The Ex's family, but also The Ex and Ned. (I cringed when I saw The Ex's name on the guest list because quite frankly, I don't want that evil spawn anywhere near my house. But I suppose that if it's for Daughter and it's only one single afternoon, I can tolerate it.)
We ended up postponing our trip to see Husband's family. There was a very slight chance that we had fourth-hand exposure to coronavirus but with the way that isolation requirements and testing would have worked, we wouldn't even know if we needed to be tested until after we were back in our state. Husband's parents are pretty old and his mom still isn't always doing the best healthwise, so we decided it was better to wait to visit than risk the small chance that one of us had it and took it to either of them. Fortunately, there ended up being no concern and we could have taken the trip but oh well; better safe than sorry.
Since the schools closed, they had voted to postpone the graduation ceremony. I bought the plane tickets to visit Husband's family and shortly after making the purchase, the school announced they were planning on holding the graduation ceremony tonight. When we found out, we asked Daughter if she wanted to reschedule the trip so we could attend the ceremony but she said no; she'd rather spend her birthday with family in Husband's home state. Now that we've postponed the trip, we'll be home for the ceremony so we're going to attend.
Husband sent The Ex an email using the email address she has linked to her Netflix account so we know it's active and she has access to it. This is important because The Ex told Daughter that she didn't log into 2houses anymore because she "doesn't use" the email address that she used to sign up for the site. Husband told The Ex that we were attending the ceremony, Daughter was given 4 tickets for guests to attend the graduation, we needed to know if she was coming and if so, what names to put on her tickets; Husband said that if she didn't respond to him, then he was going to tell the school that she wasn't coming. Husband also asked her to make sure that she had her copies of all the receipts that he'd sent to her on 2houses because he wasn't going to renew the subscription after it expired since the kids would both be over 18. Unsurprisingly, The Ex has not opened the email and has not responded.
The same day that Husband sent this email, I mentioned to Daughter that we'd be attending the ceremony; she said she needed to call The Ex. I said that Husband already emailed her about graduation. Daughter said she was going to call anyway because she'd told The Ex that she'd call her the previous night but got out of work late so she never called. Daughter called The Ex, tells her that we're going to the ceremony, says she's inviting The Ex and Ned to the ceremony. The Ex says, "So wait...you're not going?" (I assume The Ex was asking if we were not going on our trip.) Daughter said no, we weren't going. The Ex said, "Okay. Love you," and hung up on Daughter.
Last Friday night, Daughter texted me asking if I had her "senior pics and stuff." (I don't know what "and stuff" means... LOL) Before I could answer, she texted a second time saying, "Mom wants them." I will admit: I was feeling extremely petty about this. I was PMSing, I was tired from a long work-week, and I was straight up not in the mood to share "my moments" with The Ex. I took Daughter shopping for clothes for her pictures; I did Daughter's make up for the pictures; I arranged for the pictures to be taken; I arranged the location; I helped with poses and expressions and whatever else. Every single thing about Daughter's senior pictures was 100% me without any involvement whatsoever from The Ex...but suddenly, she "wants" them? Hell to the no.
I was struggling with my own feelings over this and talked to a few of my friends about it. I pointed out that The Ex had never once asked for any of Son's senior pictures (Which were also my doing), so why was it suddenly soooo important that she have Daughter's pictures? One friend suggested printing off a wallet-size photo of each kid and to consider it a "goodbye" gift. I said that I knew the "right" thing to do was to give The Ex the pictures, considering that it is her child...but I just wasn't in the mood to be the "bigger" person for the billionth time this year. Another friend made an extremely valid point:
"I just asked [friend's husband] what he thought and he agreed with not giving [The Ex] anything. [The Ex] had the opportunity to get pics taken but because she has chosen not to and has made her choice to not be civil with you guys, that's on her, not you guys. Unfortunately [Daughter] is in the middle of it. You might have to tell [Daughter] that just because [The Ex] wants something, doesn't mean she gets it. Those pictures were your doing and [The Ex] should have been a mother and set that up for her too but she didn't. And like I said, if she had ever been a decent person to you guys, we wouldn't even be having this conversation..."
That paragraph opened my eyes to something I hadn't even considered. The Ex literally had NO involvement with either Son or Daughter's senior pictures...but why hadn't she? The Ex had physical custody of the kids during the summer when most senior pictures are taken; she had ample time and opportunity to do this with both of the kids but she chose not to. She was completely uninvolved, left the responsibility entirely to us, and now wants to act as if we owe her something. And my friend is completely right - if The Ex hadn't tried alienating the kids from us, lied to us, lied about us, and tried to be a respectful co-parenting adult in any way, shape, or form, then I wouldn't even have a problem sharing anything with her.
On Sunday, we were sitting at the neighbor's and Daughter brought up that The Ex wanted the senior pictures. Daughter seemed irritated with The Ex and read off the text messages that they'd sent back and forth.
Edit: I was able to actually see the text messages so I erased what I had previously written so that you can read the conversation word-for-word.
Still Friday but two hours later
The Ex: Can you please send me all of your senior pictures
Daughter got pretty irritated with The Ex while she was telling us about all of this. Daughter said, "Oh, if I go to [Husband's home state], she says I'm 'gonna get corona.' But we just went to [neighboring state] a few weeks ago, and that was fine. If I have a graduation party here, I'm 'gonna get corona.' But she can take me to [state capital] to buy fireworks and that's fine. It makes no sense; everything just has to be on her terms."
The Ex keeps telling everyone who will listen how "scared" she is of herself or someone in her family contracting coronavirus...except when it's something that she wants, then it's completely safe for them to go wherever her plans may lead. Girlfriend said that as far as The Ex is concerned, it's as if coronavirus "doesn't exist" when it comes to what she wants. They can go wherever, do whatever, see whoever...it's "safe" because The Ex is doing it.
Now since I've started this post, Daughter spilled more tea about The Ex, graduation tonight, and why she's pissed at Daughter/me/Husband/the world. I'll update you guys later!
We ended up postponing our trip to see Husband's family. There was a very slight chance that we had fourth-hand exposure to coronavirus but with the way that isolation requirements and testing would have worked, we wouldn't even know if we needed to be tested until after we were back in our state. Husband's parents are pretty old and his mom still isn't always doing the best healthwise, so we decided it was better to wait to visit than risk the small chance that one of us had it and took it to either of them. Fortunately, there ended up being no concern and we could have taken the trip but oh well; better safe than sorry.
Since the schools closed, they had voted to postpone the graduation ceremony. I bought the plane tickets to visit Husband's family and shortly after making the purchase, the school announced they were planning on holding the graduation ceremony tonight. When we found out, we asked Daughter if she wanted to reschedule the trip so we could attend the ceremony but she said no; she'd rather spend her birthday with family in Husband's home state. Now that we've postponed the trip, we'll be home for the ceremony so we're going to attend.
Husband sent The Ex an email using the email address she has linked to her Netflix account so we know it's active and she has access to it. This is important because The Ex told Daughter that she didn't log into 2houses anymore because she "doesn't use" the email address that she used to sign up for the site. Husband told The Ex that we were attending the ceremony, Daughter was given 4 tickets for guests to attend the graduation, we needed to know if she was coming and if so, what names to put on her tickets; Husband said that if she didn't respond to him, then he was going to tell the school that she wasn't coming. Husband also asked her to make sure that she had her copies of all the receipts that he'd sent to her on 2houses because he wasn't going to renew the subscription after it expired since the kids would both be over 18. Unsurprisingly, The Ex has not opened the email and has not responded.
The same day that Husband sent this email, I mentioned to Daughter that we'd be attending the ceremony; she said she needed to call The Ex. I said that Husband already emailed her about graduation. Daughter said she was going to call anyway because she'd told The Ex that she'd call her the previous night but got out of work late so she never called. Daughter called The Ex, tells her that we're going to the ceremony, says she's inviting The Ex and Ned to the ceremony. The Ex says, "So wait...you're not going?" (I assume The Ex was asking if we were not going on our trip.) Daughter said no, we weren't going. The Ex said, "Okay. Love you," and hung up on Daughter.
Last Friday night, Daughter texted me asking if I had her "senior pics and stuff." (I don't know what "and stuff" means... LOL) Before I could answer, she texted a second time saying, "Mom wants them." I will admit: I was feeling extremely petty about this. I was PMSing, I was tired from a long work-week, and I was straight up not in the mood to share "my moments" with The Ex. I took Daughter shopping for clothes for her pictures; I did Daughter's make up for the pictures; I arranged for the pictures to be taken; I arranged the location; I helped with poses and expressions and whatever else. Every single thing about Daughter's senior pictures was 100% me without any involvement whatsoever from The Ex...but suddenly, she "wants" them? Hell to the no.
I was struggling with my own feelings over this and talked to a few of my friends about it. I pointed out that The Ex had never once asked for any of Son's senior pictures (Which were also my doing), so why was it suddenly soooo important that she have Daughter's pictures? One friend suggested printing off a wallet-size photo of each kid and to consider it a "goodbye" gift. I said that I knew the "right" thing to do was to give The Ex the pictures, considering that it is her child...but I just wasn't in the mood to be the "bigger" person for the billionth time this year. Another friend made an extremely valid point:
"I just asked [friend's husband] what he thought and he agreed with not giving [The Ex] anything. [The Ex] had the opportunity to get pics taken but because she has chosen not to and has made her choice to not be civil with you guys, that's on her, not you guys. Unfortunately [Daughter] is in the middle of it. You might have to tell [Daughter] that just because [The Ex] wants something, doesn't mean she gets it. Those pictures were your doing and [The Ex] should have been a mother and set that up for her too but she didn't. And like I said, if she had ever been a decent person to you guys, we wouldn't even be having this conversation..."
That paragraph opened my eyes to something I hadn't even considered. The Ex literally had NO involvement with either Son or Daughter's senior pictures...but why hadn't she? The Ex had physical custody of the kids during the summer when most senior pictures are taken; she had ample time and opportunity to do this with both of the kids but she chose not to. She was completely uninvolved, left the responsibility entirely to us, and now wants to act as if we owe her something. And my friend is completely right - if The Ex hadn't tried alienating the kids from us, lied to us, lied about us, and tried to be a respectful co-parenting adult in any way, shape, or form, then I wouldn't even have a problem sharing anything with her.
On Sunday, we were sitting at the neighbor's and Daughter brought up that The Ex wanted the senior pictures. Daughter seemed irritated with The Ex and read off the text messages that they'd sent back and forth.
Edit: I was able to actually see the text messages so I erased what I had previously written so that you can read the conversation word-for-word.
Wednesday
The Ex: [Ned] and I will be there.
The Ex: For your graduation (Husband emailed her about this a week and a half before graduation; he told her that he needed to know whose names to put on the tickets. The Ex still hasn't opened his email.)
The Ex: I'm done working at 4PM (That's completely irrelevant, but sure...whatever.)
Thursday
Thursday
The Ex: So, when are you planning on seeing us...
Daughter: Idk I work thro the 28th.
The Ex: NICE...
The Ex: The only weekend I can get off is August 7th. We are going WHITE WATER RAFTING (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.....I'm so sorry for my outburst, but I cannot erase from my mind a vision of The Ex with her pear-shaped obesity hurtling down a river in an inflatable raft.)
The Ex: Wanna invite [Daughter's friend]
Daughter: Ma my grad party is the 8th
The Ex: Too bad
Daughter: What's that supposed to mean
Friday
Daughter: Too bad? Mom I've had my grad party planned for a while.
The Ex: With soooooo many people going. And not us... (Wait a minute...if The Ex wasn't invited, how would she know that there were "soooooo many people" coming to Daughter's party?)
Daughter: I invited you guys. It just up to you if you want to go or not?
The Ex: Tooo many people going (She just got caught in her narcissistic bait-and-switch. She tried to make Daughter upset/jealous that they were doing something fun during the weekend of her party when she knew Daughter wouldn't be able to come; then she tried to make Daughter feel bad that she and Ned weren't coming as if they hadn't been invited; now she's switched it to a claim that she's not comfortable with the amount of people invited so that is why she's not attending Daughter's party.)
The Ex: Your (*you're) going to end up SICK (Here we go again...I'll elaborate below after I'm done typing all of the texts.)
Daughter: There is literally 17 people that said they're going. And half of them will prolly not even come.
Still Friday but two hours later
The Ex: Can you please send me all of your senior pictures
Daughter: I can
The Ex: And if you have really nice pictures of your hair and makeup done
The Ex: I need quite a few
Daughter: Okay. I'll find a few
The Ex: ASAP if you can
Daughter: And what's this for?
The Ex: ME
The Ex: You don't have to
Daughter: No I will.
The Ex: [Son] never gave me any pictures... it's ok... I guess I'm not important... didn't think I would have to ask...(Okay, for starters you probably never asked Son for his senior pictures. Second of all, if you did, he never once mentioned it to me or to Husband. Third, even if you did ask and Son didn't give you any of his senior pictures, your attempt to guilt Daughter into sharing her life with you is complete bullshit; maybe if you tried to be a loving mother who actually cares what happens to her kids in their lives, they'd be more inclined to make your dumb ass feel "important.")
Daughter: Oh my god mom. You're important. I'll find some. (I can practically feel Daughter rolling her eyes while she typed this.)
Still Friday and another two hours later
The Ex: When r u sending then
Daughter: I'm going to yes
So over the course of this conversation, The Ex managed to: complain about Son, try to make Daughter feel bad for her, got mad at Daughter for not coming home with her after graduation, announced she wasn't coming to Daughter's graduation party because she already made vacation plans, accused Daughter of not telling her about said party, and then told Daughter she's going to catch coronavirus from her party. Now mind you, exactly one week before we're having Daughter's graduation party, The Ex is throwing a party of her own - it's a joint birthday party for Son, Daughter, and The Ex's daughter AND it's also going to be Daughter's graduation party. The Ex thinks her party is "safe" because she's inviting "only family and there significant others." (Not my typo.) The Ex has invited at least 30 people, the majority of which have said they're attending, and the guests live in a combined total of five different cities spread out across our state...but somehow, this is "safer" than us having a graduation party with people who all live in the same community and have seen each other on a near-daily basis.
Daughter got pretty irritated with The Ex while she was telling us about all of this. Daughter said, "Oh, if I go to [Husband's home state], she says I'm 'gonna get corona.' But we just went to [neighboring state] a few weeks ago, and that was fine. If I have a graduation party here, I'm 'gonna get corona.' But she can take me to [state capital] to buy fireworks and that's fine. It makes no sense; everything just has to be on her terms."
The Ex keeps telling everyone who will listen how "scared" she is of herself or someone in her family contracting coronavirus...except when it's something that she wants, then it's completely safe for them to go wherever her plans may lead. Girlfriend said that as far as The Ex is concerned, it's as if coronavirus "doesn't exist" when it comes to what she wants. They can go wherever, do whatever, see whoever...it's "safe" because The Ex is doing it.
Now since I've started this post, Daughter spilled more tea about The Ex, graduation tonight, and why she's pissed at Daughter/me/Husband/the world. I'll update you guys later!
A Jabba the Hut buoy, Halloween has come early. Too vicious to hope for an iceberg?
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