Once I returned to my regular schedule at work things, were beginning to look up. I no longer needed to report to my supervisor or submit the times that I worked. While work was going well, in the back of my mind, I often thought about the child support order. Although there was a judgment in place for me to pay child support- which was equal to half of my monthly salary- the deductions were not happening at that time.
I remember one night, while I was working overtime, I checked my pay stub. There it was. The child support deductions were in full effect. I wasn’t shocked because I knew it was going to happen sooner or later. I was more upset that we had come to this. There was no reason for me to be placed on child support especially since my children were a priority, in spite of how my ex felt about me. My decision to leave was a decision I made for me. It was no longer about making him happy nor the people who were around me. It was time for me to be happy so I did what I had to do for me and he couldn’t understand that. He took my leaving him and looked at as in I was leaving my children. That was never the case. As a matter of fact, I had the opportunity to move to London and start a new life, and although I did consider it, I could not leave my children behind. I could have ran away because I knew that my life was not about to get any easier but I stayed and I decided I was going to fight back in spite of how I feel.
With the child support payments being deducted from me, my ex felt as though he had sole custody of the children and with the injunction in place he felt like he had all the power. The injunction stated that I had to stay away from him but it did not say that I could not have any contact with my children. Once I was released from jail, he also went to court and tried to file a restraining order on me and made some bogus allegations. One of the allegations were, that he was in fear for his life and he felt as though I would kidnap MY children. The court date arrived and he did not show up causing the judge to throw the case out. After that, most times when I went to pick up my children or when they wanted to spend the night with me, he would tell them things like, “If you go with your mom she will go back to jail”. My children would come and say things like they don’t want to get in trouble with their dad or they didn’t want me to go to jail so they wouldn’t come. I tried to pick my kids up with the police and I was told that as long as my kids are with their father, they couldn’t make him release theme to me. I was taking hit after hit. The thing that hurt me the most was looking at my children knowing there wasn’t a thing that I could do. I honestly felt like I had failed as a mother and for a brief moment I almost regretted leaving. Not because I wanted to be with my ex but because I wanted to be with my children. Those moments of doubts showed me that I could not give in but I had to fight even harder. I knew God was a fair God and it was only a matter of time before the sun would shine on me again. I knew that it was a process that I was going through and I knew that I would make it. I knew that my children and I would be together. It was at that moment that I decided to push forward with the divorce.
Divorced. Now What? 