It's All My Husband's Fault

  Sometimes, life involving The Ex is like a circus.  Case in point:   To the best of our knowledge, New Guy is no longer in the picture and The Ex is now officially dating this new guy who we'll call Ned. ( The previous blog post he was referred to as The Ex's new-new boyfriend.  We now have a nickname for him :D )  From what we've learned so far, Ned seems like an okay guy.  From what we can find, he doesn't seem to be a criminal like Boyfriend is/was, but Ned has his own baggage.   Ned was in the middle of a divorce while The Ex was having an affair with New Guy ( Who still happens to be with his wife. )  Ned and his ex-wife have one child together.  Ned somehow works with The Ex, at least from comments that Son and Daughter made in the past; according to his information online he's a manager. ( So if/when their relationship doesn't work out, it's going to be a giant mess.  I'm pretty sure that The Ex would quit or Ned would have ...

  I don't think that Husband has needed to have any contact with The Ex since the stipulation ordeal, when she mailed it back late then tried to get out of following the terms by saying she hadn't received a signed copy yet.  Other than that, no fighting or arguing - no contact at all.   This week is Husband's second summer week and Son's school year schedule starts next week, so Son is going to be here full-time from this week forward.  Son called me at almost 10pm on Saturday and asked to talk to Husband.  I said I wasn't sure where he was.  Son asked what we were doing this week; I told him we had some plans.  Son asked if he could stay with The Ex; I told him no.  He asked why; I asked if there was something going on.  He said yes.  I told him that if there was something going on that The Ex wanted to keep him for, then she needed to be the one talking to Husband about it.  Son said okay, we hung up.   Shortly after, Husb...

  Husband got the stipulation filed, the judge signed it the following day, and we got our copy in the mail that week.  After a few days, the child support website wasn't reflecting that support was suspended as of July 1st, so I called to ask about this.   Our state has redone how they handle child support questions.  You can no longer call and speak directly to your case worker.  Instead, you call and speak to a representative who tries to answer your questions to the best of their ability; if they can't, then they send a message to the case worker asking them to call you.  This could be a really good system they have in place, except for one simple fact:  the representatives are idiots who don't know anything.   A week after Husband filed the stipulation, I called to ask if the court had sent a copy to the child support agency.  "I don't know if I can discuss the case with you."  I explain that Husband has already sent over his wr...

  Eighteen days after Husband first sent the stipulation to The Ex, she finally responded: "In the event that child support is resumed the petitioner asks that the respondent resumes his half of the transportation in placement exchanges. ( She definitely did not write this.  I am assuming that she finally coughed up the money to pay her lawyer to read it and give her a valid opinion rather than relying on her friends and family to tell her what to do.  And really, why couldn't she just have said, "Can you write in there that if I start paying child support again, you'll start doing half the driving?" ) The petitioner will not be held responsible for all past debts of the variable expenses. ( Could have just said that too.  This response didn't need to take almost three weeks. ) All other terms as listed are accepted by the petitioner, please add these stipulations and reply for a final agreement. ( Again, "she" is referring to herself in the third ...

  About two weeks ago, I had what I like to refer to as my best idea in the history of ever.  I don't even remember what brought it about but I was thinking about child support, how The Ex always blames her child support obligation for the reason she's broke, how Son is convinced we're just taking all of her money, blah blah blah.  I wondered if there was a way that we could get by without child support - after all, we had already gone a month and a half without a payment.   Then, all at once, every single gear in my brain started spinning.   I told Husband about my idea.  He said it seemed pretty good.  I called Our Attorney; she said it sounded good and if we got The Ex to agree to it, then even better.   I typed up a stipulation and Husband sent it to The Ex via 2houses.  To summarize, we'd change the order to say that beginning on July 1st:      •  The Ex will not have to pay any child support     ...

  Be forewarned, this is a rambling post because it's been really quiet lately.   The Ex was almost half an hour late dropping off the kids last Friday; Husband texted her about it so there's documentation.  I thought about being half an hour late to take the kids back on Monday, but we have a stipulation we want her to sign so we're kind of letting things slide.  If it happens again, then they're definitely getting taken back late.   That aside, The Ex hasn't said much of anything.  The kids said something about her "friend" bringing his jet ski to Tiny City.  I honestly almost asked, "You guys do know that [New Guy] is married, right?" just to see the look on their faces because a)they've never told us New Guy's name and b)I'm sure that while The Ex is acting lovey-dovey with this dude, her teen children have no idea that he's married to another woman.   A friend of mine says she wishes she could just understand what exact...

  I may have already mentioned them, but I'd like to take a moment to quote two specific phrases from the court order between Husband and The Ex:      •  The party receiving the children shall pick them up during the school year.  This shall be reversed during the summer.      •  The summer is defined as the Monday after school ends until one week before school starts in the fall.   That's easy enough to understand, isn't it?  After all, it's been the court order for nearly five years.  There has never before been an issue on our end over who was supposed to pick up or drop off Son and/or Daughter.  There was an issue in November 2013 when The Ex "didn't know" they had switched weekends, failed to pick up either of the kids, and then tried demanding that Husband give her a "make-up" weekend for her screw up.  There was another issue in December 2014 when The Ex left Husband a rambling voice mail and stated ...