Open Mouth... Insert Foot

My last post on Thursday was certainly a less than classy rant. My feelings were hurt, I was frustrated, and I just kinda laid it all out there. I really meant to do my I'm So Unreasonable Friday post, but I got a little surprise last night when I got home from work. We had no kids...

My mom had taken Lena home with her Thursday night after she picked her up from her student council meeting. Since my parents moved away over the summer, Lena has really been missing them so I allowed her to skip school Friday and spend an extra day with them. We were both so used to having them down the street from us, but its been really tough on Lena to not be able to just ride her bike down to Gramma and Papa's house whenever she wants. I figure since she's tested into advanced in almost every single subject so far this year (completely voluntary on her part I might add) that one free day wasn't going to doom her entire education.

The surprise however was no Anne and Paige. If you read my previous semi psychotic meltdown post, you'll know that we weren't originally supposed to have the girls this weekend, but that the schedule had gotten changed last minute. After James had called me at work to tell me about the change, I guess he talked to their mom to see if he could pick them up Saturday morning instead because I was so disappointed about our cancelled date. When he told her why, she asked if she could just keep them for an extra weekend.

I suppose I need to give a little back story here on why she'd want an extra weekend. See, she only gets them one weekend a month. The rest of the them, they're with us. Shortly before we had gotten together James had started the attempt to get custody of the girls. Anne's well being had come into question and he pursued trying to get the girls. Long story short, the court did not find sufficient evidence to remove the girls from their mother's home. Personally speaking, I think he just had a terrible lawyer and I still hope for the day when we can pursue it again. It was nothing their mother did, however the boyfriend of hers and his four children that live there are, shall we say, less than kind to Anne. He's made the comment more than once that he has to deal with our girls and based on what Paige has told us, he's a monster and treats her mother horribly. However, she simply won't say so in front of a judge. That's part of the reason James lost. He had the opportunity to appeal the decision, but was informed that should he lose again, he will not have the right to pursue it again for a minimum of 3 years. Given the fact that Paige will not publicly share her story, he worked out a deal with their mom. He would not appeal the decision, provided that he gets extra time with the girls. Not wanting to take the chance at losing her kids (can't blame her there) she agreed to the additional visitation.

For the last year, she's been getting them the one weekend a month. When she saw the opportunity to get extra non-school time with them, she jumped at the chance. Personally speaking, I like their mom. I don't think she's a bad person and we get along fine. I'm all to aware that most mom/girlfriend relationships can be overrun with nastiness. My mom and my step-mom never liked each other and my mom was always trying to make me feel bad about loving my step-mom as much as I do. She was filled with insane jealousy and was constantly putting down the things my step-mom did. I'm incredibly grateful that our girls don't have to go through that. Their mom and I work together as a team and we're usually texting back and forth about stuff for the girls: sports schedules, girls scout fundraisers, school, etc. She's simply gotten herself into a situation that its really hard to get out of and I feel for her, because once I was in her shoes. The difference between us though, was that I am lucky enough to have an entire network of people behind me that helped me get out of a very bad situation immediately. The moment things went south I had the ability to walk out the door and never look back and know I'd be just fine no matter what happened. Not everyone is so lucky.

I'm getting off on a tangent though. When I got home, I was told that we had dinner reservations at 7, so I needed to change so we could get going. He took me to one of my favorite places, BC Osaka, which is an absolutely delicious Japanese Steakhouse. I enjoyed the food, but mostly I enjoyed having his company all to myself for a change. We talked and laughed through dinner and stopped off and rented movies on our way home. He gave me an amazing back massage as we watched World War Z and I fell asleep full and content. I feel sorta guilty about skipping a weekend with the kids, but at the same time I know that their mom really wanted the time and will appreciate it just as much as I appreciated being able to go out last night just the two of us.