I was on the phone with the high-priced lawyer I sometimes consult the other day to ask if I could move 15 miles from here so that our daughter could attend the public schools in the next county.
Because this would be good for our daughter for a number of reasons, the lawyer told me that I had a decent case but that the modification would cost $35,000. He also mentioned that, because the standards for a relocation modification are pretty subjective, I might lose.
What the fuck.
We’re talking about a move that would have no impact on my ex’s visitation time or ability to attend school functions. The school in question is a 20 minute drive from his house. The school he is counting on her getting into is actually a longer drive for him.
I don’t mind her going to that school, actually. That’s not the problem. The problem is it’s a competitive magnate program, and I just found out there’s a good chance she won’t get in.
Hence, my scramble to find an alternative.
Meanwhile, I haven’t discussed this with my ex except through an unproductive email exchange. We are supposed to sit down and talk Friday.
I am dreading it. I called the lawyer just to find out what the worst case scenario is so that I could gird my loins in preparation for this confab.
It is really hard to talk to Duane. He’s not flexible. He denies any reality he doesn’t like.
When I was going through the divorce, both my lawyer and the parent coordinator I consulted with told me not to give him the right to make educational and medical decisions for this very reason.
This was a tough one for me. First of all, I think both parents should have these rights. I think that divorced parents should work together. It would have gone against my values not to give him these rights.
On the other hand, I knew what the outcome would be if he shared these rights with me, that he would stonewall and obfuscate and leave me to find a solution that worked for him. I knew that I would be triggered by the same sense of isolation and uncertainty I felt throughout the marriage. I don’t want that feeling in my life anymore. It is not fair to have that feeling now that I don’t even have the legal or cultural protections that come with marriage.
After agonizing over this for months, I let the attorney leave these rights off when he drafted the decree. He assured me this was the right way to go because I would negotiate a better financial settlement if I asked for as much as possible up front.
He was right; I did get a lot more money.
The downside is Duane found a way to get me back for attempting to restrict his rights. He hired an attorney who slapped on the geographical restriction as part of the negotiation process.
Here’s why I say this was a punishment.
The agreement we had when we initially moved to this city was that living in Texas would be temporary. That was a non-negotiable part of the deal for me.
My ex lied to me repeatedly.
And when I finally called him on the lies, he left.
Now I am stuck here.
Understand that my ex could move to accommodate me if he wanted to. He has made a great career, but career is not important to him. He has an in-demand set of skills and could find a job with a comparable salary in just about any high-tech sector.
When I find out that I can’t move 15 miles without his permission, ultimately it makes me wonder why his life is so much more important than mine. That s the 35 thousand dollar question.
This is not just a personal question. Ultimately, divorce is a political question. It is a feminist question.
For just a second, I am asking you to think outside the box. Forget about the “best interests of the child.” Why are “father’s rights” more important than mother’s? Why are men more important than women?
These are questions no one seems to be asking. Maybe I am missing something.
Where is the national conversation about these issues?
I’m not a big fan of the magnate programs if you are not already zoned for that school. In my school district, a single C or discipline issue gets you kicked out.
You have a blog where you make no bones about your desire to move away with your daughter. I’d bet that your ex will resist a 15 mile move to the next county because it would make a bigger move easier to get approved. Is there any reasson that you couldn’t move into the magnate school’s district? That would take the pressure off of your daughter and I doubt your ex could fight it.
I’m not a big fan of the magnate programs if you are not already zoned for that school. In my school district, a single C or discipline issue gets you kicked out.
You have a blog where you make no bones about your desire to move away with your daughter. I’d bet that your ex will resist a 15 mile move to the next county because it would make a bigger move easier to get approved. Is there any reasson that you couldn’t move into the magnate school’s district? That would take the pressure off of your daughter and I doubt your ex could fight it.
Hi, Jenny.
No, I have a blog where I make no bones about the fact that I am miserable living here in Texas. I would never “move away with my daughter” because it would make her miserable to be separated from my ex, and I care about my child too much to hurt her anymore than she has already been hurt by this process.
That said, I am also a human being and have feelings, desires, and needs that are independent of hers. That is what I am blogging about — anonymously.
Dame Yankee
Hi, Jenny.
No, I have a blog where I make no bones about the fact that I am miserable living here in Texas. I would never “move away with my daughter” because it would make her miserable to be separated from my ex, and I care about my child too much to hurt her anymore than she has already been hurt by this process.
That said, I am also a human being and have feelings, desires, and needs that are independent of hers. That is what I am blogging about — anonymously.
Dame Yankee
Hi, Jenny.
No, I have a blog where I make no bones about the fact that I am miserable living here in Texas. I would never “move away with my daughter” because it would make her miserable to be separated from my ex, and I care about my child too much to hurt her anymore than she has already been hurt by this process.
That said, I am also a human being and have feelings, desires, and needs that are independent of hers. That is what I am blogging about — anonymously.
Dame Yankee
If your ex put a geographical restriction on your divorce, he’s probably pretty aware you’re not happy in Texas and is concerned that you might move away, anonymous blog or not. Does he know that you would “never “move away with my daughter” because it would make her miserable to be separated from my ex, and I care about my child too much to hurt her anymore than she has already been hurt by this process.”? You might lead with that when talking about the new school.
My husband and his exwife have a zero cooperation divorce. They literally follow the agreement literally. No exceptions because neither trusts the other and there is still so much anger between them. She’s the “primary residential custodian”, which breaks all ties that he is not willing to spend a huge amount of money on. It’s exasperating to me considering the co-parenting relationship I have with my exhusband, but ever situation is different. At this point my husband has resigned himself to living that way until his son is an adult. It’s giving up a lot. This sounds like your situation. Hopefully you can find peace and a way to live your life in Travis county. I’ve been to Texas a few times and have never seen the charm (or at least any more so than any other place). I have a close friend that grew up in Austin and loves the place and she would love to go back there.
Dear Yankee,
Hang in there. I know that it sucks and is totally unfair. You describe a situation that is classic emotional and legal abuse. Sounds like your ex is using a tool he has discovered to control and feel pwoerful. There is no reasoning with men like this. If you haven’t already, please read about narcissism and personality disorders. It will explain a lot and remind you that you are not crazy. You are a victim and so is your daughter. It is traumatic to have to co-parent with someone who doesn’t care about you and likely not his daughter. If you are waking up in the middle of the night thinking about this injustice, or in your head a lot about the conversations you have had with him, feeling anxious or hypervigulant, snapping at people, you might be actually suffering from PTSD. I’ve been there. I got really good trauma therapy. You right its time for more conversation about the crap that ex’s can cause and the tool of co-parenting and parenting plans give to abusers and narcissist to cause havoc in other’s lives. The divorce playbook is different. Don’t try to solve this problem, you can’t, because the problem isn’t the details of the agreement or even your attitude and behavior. The problem is that you have an ex who is going to find a way to control you and feel powerful over you anyway you can and it won’t make sense no matter how many ways you look at it. It’s abuse. And you are the unfortunate victim who happened into his path. I wish you prayers and the right help to get through this. If I can, so can you. Take care!
Thanks, Julie.
I write a lot about narcissism and sociopathy here. I’ve had a lot of therapy as well. Unfortunately I was also raised by someone with a personality disorder (not narcissism or ASPD, but one of the cluster Bs), I was already susceptible to this kind of psychological abuse. I don’t have PTSD or CPTSD, though, at least not according to the psychologists I’ve seen. I am, however, anxious and depressed.
The divorce was a pretty traumatic experience. No one, not even his former girlfriends, “sees” my ex. I didn’t see him either. Of course I felt something on an intuitive level, but there was a lot of cognitive dissonance. Our daughter might be starting to figure it out a bit, which will make it easier to parent her. She blamed me absolutely for the fact that her dad walked out.
I have my issues — a lack of time to post here this fall among them — but what you say about co-parenting and shared custody and personality disorder is real, and it’s a problem, and women like us need to be able to talk about it without the shame and blame of a society that condemns divorced couples that can’t be friends for the sake of the kids.
Thanks for posting. I’m glad you’re doing better. I’m getting there!
Dame Yankee
It sounds like you did what I did. I traded peace and parenting time for mobilty. My normally mild manered ex made it perfectly clear that he would conduct a full out war if I tried to move away with the kids. I mentioned the possiblity of moving in an email and got slapped with a restraining order like I was going to steal the kids in the night. My lawyers estimate of what an all out fight would cost were huge and their evaluation of my position said that I would probably lose the right to move and he stood a good chance of getting primary custody. Also, because I made more than he did, there was a chance that I would end up paying him to fight me. Better to negotiate a plan that I could live with than to risk losing and getting a situation that I couldn’t live with. I did work. Things settled down, we share custody and we work together well. It’s just that I’m stagnating.
I will say that I’m glad that I didn’t move, I just resent being stuck. I know, divorce sux. My BFF’s ex moved away last year. He was out of work for almost two years and he had no choice. They both work hard to keep him involved with the kids, but the kids are devistated and acting out. There really is no substiture for being there.
I have a healthy commute to work and a job that a possible promotion path would take me out of the country. When my ex and I were separating, he misinterpreted a comment I made to mean that I planned on moving with our kids. I went away on a business trip, hoping that a little time away would let us cool down and find a way to work things out. I came back to an emergency court order keeping me from relocating. I was furious, but at least I understood his fear of me moving away with the kids, something I would never had done over his objections. So much for cooling down and working things out! When we were in mediation, he was adamant about equal parenting time, right of 1st refusal, and an anti-relocation clause (either of us were free to move, but if we move too far for alternating week, it dropped to every other weekend, farther and it defaulted to a long distance visitation plan). He wouldn’t agree to one day less than 50/50 and I think that was 100% due to his fears of me relocating. With relocation off the table, the rest went very smoothly.
” I mentioned the possiblity of moving in an email and got slapped with a restraining order like I was going to steal the kids in the night.”
Me too, even though I would never move away over his objections. His fears came from watching it happen to friends of his. The ex wife remarried and moved to follow her new husband’s job and the dad was left to visit a couple times a year.