I went to see my IC yesterday and she told me after all of this work, I am not making any headway so we need to take a different approach to recovery.

I had to do something I NEVER wanted to do. I had to call my H and ask him "are you absolutely sure that you don't want to work on a relationship with me now or in the future?" He said "No way is THAT going to happen!" I said "Please, just answer the question." And he said "I am absolutely positive I want nothing to do with you."

I had yet to actually hear those words come out of his mouth and it was devistating. The worst part of it is now what I MUST do. I MUST get over him. So, to do that, even though our child is stuck in the middle, I must have no more contact with him unless absolutely necessary.

That means my daughter will have to wait by the door, when he pulls up for visitation, and be dropped off outside when he gets home with her. No more e-mail, no more phone calls, no more anything. My IC thinks that if I am actually separated from him, I will finally begin to get through the grieving process. I have to give up hope for the future on "us" being together.

So, last night my daughter comes and sits down with me while I'm crying and tells me "Momma, I love you. Don't be sad. You're sad cause Daddy doesn't want you anymore aren't you?" I just nodded my head and hugged onto her.

Then she proceeds to tell me that over the last weekend while she was with him, she had told him that she wanted to live with me and just visit him like we have been doing now. (Going through custody battle currently). He told her "Your mother wants you to live with her because she doesn't want you to see Daddy anymore." She said "I know that isn't true Momma, cause you told me I can see Daddy whenever I want to."

I said "Baby, of course Momma wants you to live with her, but if you want to live with Daddy, that's ok too." She said "No, I don't want to live in a small 1 bedroom appartment. There aren't any kids there and there's nothing to do! It's so boring!"

Then she said "If we have to move Momma, I still wanna live with you." I just cried and cried and cried. I told her that I was doing everything I could to keep her in her home, and to keep our home. Expenses are out of control now that I have to handle everything, and I'm getting no support from him at all or have I for the 10 weeks that he's been gone.

I'm so miserable I can't stand it. I need money more than anything right now I can't seem to get my butt to work. I'm hardly able to get my butt out of bed to experience life. I have to MAKE myself.

On top of all this, the custody battle, getting over my H, my job that's sucking, my financial hardship, I now have to start the D proceedings, the interrogatories. I only have 2 days left to get them done. I keep finding more and more information on the 86 questions that I have to answer.

I never really kept any records. I never thought about doing any of that being married. Now I have to figure out how to get them from here and there. It's horrible. I have no room to breathe and I can't stand this.

I don't know what I'm going to do if I lose my baby. I will probably end up being committed.

I just need some hope, somewhere, for something. I have lost it all for everything.

double <img border="0" title="" alt="[Embarrassed]" src="images/icons/blush.gif" />

<small>[ August 04, 2004, 10:46 AM: Message edited by: Belonging to Nowhere ]</small>

You should be happy having your sweet little daughter with such a mommyloving reasoning! And that should be quite enough for the time being.
Calm down and prepare yourself for custody battle.

Plan B is good – it helped me a lot!!!
Once you get a distance from him and neglect his existence at all, you’ll feel much better – you’ll see life IS going on, your child is your biggest and purest source of strength (use that energy coming from your love for her!!!), and – you are!, you are capable of living without him, trust me, nobody is irreplaceable!

Btw, what does he want? 50/50? Or sole custody? Reasons he can use against you?

He's fighting for full custody but told me he'd settle for joint. Of course, he's lied to me so many times I can't believe anything coming out of his mouth. Currently, he's fighting for full.

What can he use against me? I really don't know. I have done everything I can to keep communication and a loving relationship going between him and his daughter.

I have taken on all the bills and the home, keeping up on her school clothes, practices, classes, ect. All of her playdates with her friends and even her birthday party, I have done it all.

He says he has information about me not wanting to have her a long time ago when I was doubting my trust in being a good enough mother. I am very young. I was pregnant at 18 and had her at 19. I was very scared and never had any experience with babies.

Now I'm doing it all and I have been since she's been born. I have been taking care of her, nurturing her and it shows when she looks at me, loves me, even when she gets in trouble, she still loves me and doesn't get mad at me for it.

The only thing I can think of that he'll try to use against me other than that is the fact that I changed the arrangements on parenting time after the first month so that she wouldn't be spending the night over there anymore. He still got to see her during the day several days a week.

I had reasons for doing that, which I can back up and prove through the legal system. If he wants to bring it up, that will be his loss. After all, he was only watching her 8 hours a night while she was sleeping during the week and not taking her at all on the weekends or any other time that she was actually awake.

I only have a few more days until the evaluation. I hate having to do the interrogatories during all this, but according to my "sources", this is a strategic move by his lawyer to dump so much on me at one time I will slack in one area or the other so he'll come out on top.

Unfortunately for him and his lawyer, I'm not slacking. I have been working on this custody case for 2 months. It's pretty much taken care of on my end.

The interrogatories Im going through right now. I have a meeting tomarrow with someone that's going to help me fill them out correctly. Then I have another meeting with my paralegal and then a meeting with my lawyer all this week to prepare for the evaluation for custody next week and to get the interrogatories sent out correctly.

Yes, it's a lot to handle. I've had to take off work to do it, which is pulling down my financial aspects, but I have to do it. It's not going to last forever and it's most important right now that I prepare for the future.

Money will always come later. Right now my family is coming first and that's one little girl, one little spitting image of me, my daughter.

Well, I have to go get her ready for her soccer practice. Wish me luck! The STBX will be there. I doubt he will say anything to me, but who knows. He is being a real jerk about everything right now.

Thanks for your support. I really need it. There's only so much support a 6 year old can give, but she's my reason all of this is happening. I want my baby happy.

You are very welcome! And, yes, I wish you luck! With all my heart!!

You sound you know what you are doing and it seems to me you shouldn't have any problem of having at least 50/50 if not full custody yourself.
Yes, you were&are a young mom, but you seem to me so a good one, responsible, loving, caring.
I cannot believe any judge would take your daughter away from such a good mom!

Keep posting (and asking, some of us might know to help you too.)

Sending kisses to your little child and my prayers to both of you! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Smile]" src="images/icons/smile.gif" />