For those who still remember me (very long)....

[lucky]

I wanted to update everyone on my situation & our kids....

Osd -- not good.  She'll be 19 in May and will turn 19 in jail apparently.  I don't remember if I posted this but in late February she was busted for trafficking marijuana -- 25 pounds of it, along with 4-5 others involved.  She was lucky and got out on her own recognizance but had many restrictions on her activities and the people she could be around.  She's violated them all -- she's using again and her roommate is a meth dealer and osd is her transportation to sales and collections, etc.  We also believe that they may have been prostituting themselves.  The car we gave her for Christmas has not had insurance on it since the beginning of March.  

Her arraignment hearing was last Monday and she blew it off so there was a warrant for her arrest.  All of us (mom, dad, stepmom, aunts, grandparents) told her to get her butt into the police station and turn herself in Tuesday -- and to CALL the courthouse on Monday afternoon.  She refused and said that she'd do it NEXT Monday because she didn't want to sit in jail over the weekend.  On Thursday morning she was driving the roommate around and our local police department pulled her over and cuffed her, brought her to jail where she was booked on $5,000 bail.  Her roommate has no DL so the car was impounded.  Her roommate & friends came up with the $500 needed to post bond, but by the time the bailbondsman got over to the jail, they'd transported her to the other county (2 hrs away) and increased her bail to $50,000.

A hearing was held yesterday and her current bail is now $10,000 and her roommate was bitching at mom because osd's family won't help come up with bail money.  She's lucky she didn't bitch at me or her aunt, mom doesn't want to alienate the roommate because then she won't tell mom what's going on, I have no such concerns since this info is all public record, I'll just go look.  Plus osd's family won't help because we're all concerned that osd is going to take off for Texas and/or Mexico -- the people she's living with and "friends" with are from there and many are Mexican born so they're here with green cards.  In addition, we believe that if she was that damn stupid to get herself into this stuff, then stupid enough to blow off her arraignment hearing, she DESERVES to sit in jail till court.

She's looking at $10,000 fine and/or 20 years in prison max.  She probably could have gotten off with a year in jail with probation for several years, but I highly doubt the county attorney is going to make her a deal anymore like they were talking about.  Plus, she's going to lose her car because as soon as the roommate found out that they couldn't afford to get osd out on bail, they suddenly "couldn't" get the car out of impound.  Probably because it's worthless to them without osd to DRIVE it.

DD -- pretty well.  She turned 18 on the 13th and will be graduating in June.  We still don't get along very well and she still lives in the foster home -- that's part of the problem yet.  She is still planning on going to school for law enforcement, but she's also considering EMT training.  At this point, she hasn't been accepted to the law enforcement program, hopefully they'll let her know soon! and the EMT training program she wants to attend has a waiting list so she won't be admitted to that (if she even qualifies with her history) for another year at minimum.

OSS -- he's 16 & he lives with mom and has gotten her to the point that he does pretty much as he wants.  He was caught shoplifting and has to go to court for that.  He was offered diversion which is actually more punishment than what a judge will hand out but mom decided to "punish" him for pissing her off and didn't go to the diversion intake meeting.  When she called to tell me that, I managed to make her understand that she blew a beautiful opportunity to lock down the expectations and requirements (that, if not met could be brought up in the resulting court hearing to show his lack of compliance, etc.) in favor of a judge slapping his hand for a first offense.  I think she felt rather stupid, but it's too late now, they don't allow you to reschedule that, you get one shot at it.  He's also failing school.  And not just failing, he won't do ANY work at all.  He thinks that if he fails at school, mom will let him attend the regular public high school instead of the charter school.  She won't because 1) she needs dh to agree and 2) since oss wants it, she told him that he needs to straighten his act out and prove that he can do the work, etc. before she'll consider it.

YSD -- is 14 & is being confirmed on May 1 and, while mom's family complained, they have all RSVP'd.  It was almost funny, they all called mom and told her how many and she told all of them that if they didn't call me, I would NOT be making a reservation for them.  They were mad, oh were they mad, but they called me and one of them even tried very, very hard to make ME mad, but I just laughed it off.  Because of all the crap(and before anyone called me to RSVP -- all they'd done was bitch, literally) I called mom and told her that for ANY event that comes up with the kids in the future that dh and I plan, ONLY SHE would be invited from her family because this was the second time they've pulled this crap and that I do not feel comfortable just inviting SOME of them so it would be none.  She passed the message along and told the two biggest problems that it was their fault and now everyone was going to pay for it so they'd better get their act together.  I think mom's parents called the two problems and they got their butts chewed for it by them too.  Other than that, ysd is doing VERY VERY well.

YSS -- is 12 and I don't know how he's doing really.  I disengaged from that whole situation because I can't deal with the way yss treats us and how he complains the entire time he's with us.  I can't deal with the way pbfh#2 (different mom) allows him to go to a friend's house to spend the night/weekend immediately after school on dh's weekends, then calls the following week to ask what time we're picking him up and goes "Oh, well then you won't be getting him this weekend since it mine." when we remind her.  He hasn't been here in a couple of months I think -- but dh needs to deal with it.  Everytime we pushed something, she'd call the cops on dh so I think he's afraid of that.  He'd already been accused of rape and we had to hire an attorney to defend against the OFP she filed with that accusation.  No arrest or charges were filed, but if the OFP had been granted....

DS -- is 11 and in the residential treatment facility.  He's doing well, except he still is pushing his limits way too far at home.  So much so that the last two weekends he was brought back to the facility early.  He has a home visit contract that he's to follow and if he doesn't, we have agreed to bring him back.  He won't follow it.  Although, to be fair, it isn't just him, we're still working on making changes ourselves.  This weekend he doesn't get a home visit.

He's been on a homeopathic remedy for three months and we're not sure if it's helping or not.  Our biggest concern was the ADHD and the remedy hasn't even touched that.  He isn't violent anymore, but he's been in treatment since Oct. 21.  One would hope that the treatment for that long would have taken care of the violence anyway, you know?  On Thursday, we had a new psychiatrist evaluate him, this one is supposed to be very conservative with prescription medications.  His last one was medication-happy, for every side effect, he prescribed another med rather than changing the initial medication to something else.  We'll discuss the evaluation/recommendation with the therapist on Tuesday in our family meeting and decide then.  Also, ds's hayfever is acting up and I asked the homeopath about it and he said don't worry about it.  WHAT!!  The poor kid has all the classic symptoms and while not as bad as it could be, it's still early in the season.

As for me:  I love my job, I've been there for 10 months already and it's flown by.  Me and dh are getting along with his ex-wife ("mom") and she seems to be getting more normal now, she isn't being a pbfh anymore and tells people that it's easier to just get along.

And me and dh are doing very well.  We don't fight much anymore, although that probably has to do with many things.  No stress with his ex (mom) to speak of, no stress with the kids really, finances are ok.  That's not to say that he doesn't tick me off on a regular basis, but we don't get into huge fights about little things anymore.

Life is ok right now.  It could be much better, but we're doing all right.

I hope everyone else is doing at least as well as we are.  Everyone take care!

[em]Lucky

Lead your life so you wouldn't be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.
- Will Rogers[em]

[dipper]

Wow Lucky!!  I remember reading about your osd, but I had no idea of all the other.  

Please do not be offended, but the name lucky reminds me of the story of the dog with three legs and all sorts of ailments..named lucky.  I thought of this as I read all that is going on in your life. But, yes, you are lucky - you have the strength to deal with all that is going on in your life.  

Sounds as if only your ysd is a peaceful situation.   Being a parent is hard, being a stepparent is sometimes a nightmare...the entire situation with so many personalities involved.  And some people try to make it hard when all we want to do is be a family.....

I hope things continue to improve though for you and dh!!!

[MixedBag]

Well, I remember.....and thanks a ton for the updates.

The kids are just gonna have to learn about the consequences of their decisions.....and sometimes you just gotta back off and let it go.

I'm glad to read that you and DH are still together -- I remember the rough days....and the good days.....