Dinner and a rant.

Last night we went out for dinner. Just the two of us, Jr is at the biothing's house. Before you wonder about the title "biothing", let me explain.

WARNING! BITTER STEP-PARENT RANT AHEAD!

First of all, the female in question is a miracle of "oops" pregnancies, reason enough to loathe her. 4 husbands, 4 kids. Two of which were taken away and custody given to the fathers, not an easy task in the state of Maryland. One of those kids is Jr.

She pays us next to nothing in child support. I'm serious. For nearly 16 years, she's paid the absolute minimum Maryland requires and each time John has spoken to her about raising it a bit, she quits whatever pathetic job she has. She raises huge stinks about contributing to buying him luxuries like ... glasses and clothing. And thinks nothing of buying him. I mean that, that's no typo, she'll buy him a flat screen TV for his bedroom, a new Playstation, an mp3 player. But glasses? She's supposed to pay 50% of all medical expenses. The last time we bought him glasses and rec specs, it was more than 400 bucks (he has a special Rx). We're still waiting for her half and that was nearly 3 years ago.

Let me just add (since I'm on the topic and feeling particularly bitter this morning for some reason) that John took custody when Jr was around two and a half. She had been catting about while John worked 2 full time jobs because she wanted to be a "stay at home mom" and she had 2 other kids - well, one really, because one was with the father. She filled that time screwing other men and in general neglecting Jr. John didn't know - at first - about the former.

And I say she neglected Jr because when John,who had no experience raising children or any idea of what was developmentally "on target" and who was working constantly, took Jr to daycare at close to 3 years old, he realized that Jr had almost no vocabulary, in comparison to other kids his age. Sure, he had realized that the baby was constantly dirty, as he was doing almost all the childcare when he was home and rumours from neighbours about the older daughter being left alone with Jr circulated, but my husband is a good man and loathe to think poorly of others.

But when he found out about the infidelities, he took Jr and sued for custody. By that point, Jr had been tested and found to need speech therapy (big shock!!) and a therapist was coming 2-3 times a week to John's mom's house, where they were staying. John worked heavily with Jr, leaving work early, working on speech therapy every day, making sure Jr was getting what he needed.
The biothing showed up for one session. One. And that was right before the custody hearing. She lived 5 minutes away.
She showed up to the custody hearing sans lawyer and 7 months pregnant with another man's baby. John and her were still married at the time.

Yes, I say that judgementally. I am biased, certainly, but John is a good and kind man. He is devoted to his son - and to me. He has become extraordinarily gentle around me since this alleged pregnancy, pretty much doting on me. I know that he must have been much the same way with the biobitch, who screwed him over.
I don't forgive crap like that, not even slightly.

Needless to say, that amongst other things made the judge give John full custody. Not joint, not shared. FULL custody. Which he still has. Yet my husband bends over backwards to insure that Jr has time with the biothing. When we lived closer to her, John would drive Jr to her house and back (!!!) so Jr could spend time with her. Not that she would lift a finger, of course. Now that we live farther away, he still drives halfway, a good 45 minutes in either direction. And she bitches about that. I don't know any other custodial parent who does what John does.

She does absolutely no parenting of Jr. Nothing. Which shows in the way he talks about her and treats her, she complains about his tone with her. When he spent most of 7th grade at her house because of poor school districts (PG county, for those that know) where we were living, she never made sure his homework was done, never ever went to parent-teachers, never ever made sure he was staying on track with his schooling.
As a result, Jr entered the 8th grade missing the all-important basics in math/algebra and English and he struggled mightily. We disconnected the Playstation and made him sit and do work. I bought him workbooks. By the end of 8th grade, we had made up a lot of the missing links but decided to put him in pre-algebra in 9th grade and made him do extra work in the summer. He was bitter, oh yes he was.
Smartest thing we could have done, the kid is acing algebra and geometry now. Yeah, his English leaves a lot to be desired but he really is a typical boy. Just not interested, would rather be outside playing sports. Despite that, his grades are excellent after much hard work from John, Jr and me.

Not to mention her treatment of me. I've been in the picture 5 years and she has gone to great effort to badmouth me to Jr. Calling me names, badmouthing me. When she found out I was Jewish, she hurried out and bought Jr a crucifix and made him go to church the weekends he was there. That lasted all of 3 weeks, because she didn't go to church before. When we made wedding plans, she decided that her and husband number 4 needed to have a "renewal of vows". Right before our wedding. It was pretty funny, actually. She has consistently tried to poison Jr's mind against us and even told him that John had "girlfriends" while they were married. It goes on and on. Whenever Jr comes home from a weekend there, we hear the not-so-subtly planted vitriol that she's shared with him. Because to her, it's not about the kid. It's about her.

Oh, and I've only shared the tip of the iceberg, honestly. I could go on, but there's no need. I feel much better now. On to what I was actually going to talk about.
{/end rant}

Anyway, so Jr is over there this weekend and we have a kid-free weekend. We went out to a Mediterranean restaurant, as I was craving some home-style food ( I grew up in Israel) and it was pretty decent. Tabouleh, hummus, kibbeh, dolmades, fool medames. And shwarma, which was so-so. The salads made up for it. It's a strange place - looks like a full service restaurant, but you order and pay at the counter and then sit down and wait for someone to bring you your food. Kind of odd. But tasty and it satisfied my craving to the point that I over-ate. It just tasted so good!

And the main reason I mention all this? I wore jeans.

Maternity jeans.

Nothing else fits.

Ack.