Mr. Uranus has done it this time. My ex-husband, said Uranus, is the biggest moron ever. See, when we were dating, I kind of suspected he was a little, shall we say, na�ve. However, I thought this was due to his religion, Mormonism, and he would eventually grow out of it. I thought, maybe he doesn�t know about the world we live in because he was raised in an apple orchard and he spent a lot of time chasing his tail; I mean, running in circles because he was an undiagnosed ADD patient.
Um, no. He hasn�t ever come to, really. He still lives in fantasyland. I�m sure he has lots of dreamy images of his rather boringly plain and �Little House on the Prairie�-like wife riding up naked on a unicorn wearing nothing but her hair. I mean, I was surrounded by wheat fields, so I know she gets the flying horses. He thinks life should be perfect. Picket fences, etc. And kids will magically know the facts of life.
Mr. Uranus has done a lot of things that are despicable and show that he lacks morals. This has never changed, even though I was fooled for a short time recently. Mr. Uranus cheated on me no less than 5 times in our marriage. The last hag, he got pregnant.
While he was doing all this fooling around, our daughter took a back seat to his wants and needs. So, I told him to get the hell out and grow up. I warned him that if he didn�t clean up his ways that one day he�d dip his wick in the wrong place and his pee-pee would shrivel up and fall off and he�d have no one to blame but himself, but he never really got the responsible sex thing.
Hedonist that he is, he drank, he womanized, and if it felt good, he did it. Meanwhile, he did pay his child support, but I believe it had a lot to do with my statement that if he couldn�t be a man and be a father, he�d better be a benefactor. Or else. Or else I�d string him up by his coconuts. So, he paid his support. And in turn, I did my very best to make sure he knew what was going on in our daughter�s life. Pictures, letters and emails; he never wanted for them. Phone calls too.
Coming back from his side? Radio silence. Nada. Not unless I begged him, which I did regularly.
Finally, he found a woman who�d put up with and idolize him. Now, he believes that he has gotten the parenting thing down cold, since he�s raised her child for the past year and a half. Oh, and he�s finding he doesn�t know Jack.
I know a few of you know of him, and none of you have ever met him. So I feel free to write about our issues. Now, we have been okay with each other for the last three years. Well, he just stomped on it. And all the hard work I did with our daughter, he refuses to recognize it.
This last Saturday, I called him to talk to Jackie, and he blurted out, �She�s spoiled, she�s selfish, she sneaks, she lies, and she enjoys hurting other people.� I�m aghast. He�s finally talking about himself.
Now I�m offended that he has labeled our daughter. That is a big no-no.
Maybe also he was talking about the change in her environment where she gets unlimited love and affection to one where she has to share her father with two people she�s never met. So he�s expecting her to adapt right away, and demanding her respect right away. And while Jackie is most respectful, according to her godmother, her teachers, her peers and myself, she is punishing her dad for not being there for her. I told him that respect is earned with kids. I also told him he should want her to obey because she respects him, not because she�s afraid, because eventually she will do it behind his back.
I told him to explain explicitly what was inappropriate, define the consequences, enforce them and make them fit the crime. I did feel that Jackie was being made out to be a monster. She�s no angel but she�s not the little Linda Blair he described.
He didn�t like it that she knows where babies come from.
He doesn�t like it that she knows that she can�t wander away from adults because people abduct children.
He doesn�t like that she has a very vivid imagination and that she follows him all over the house.
I could go on and on. But he never earned the right to criticize me because while he was finding himself, I raised Jackie alone.
I believe he thought he had it all figured out. He definitely had something to prove. And he proved badly that he doesn�t have all the answers. That his own daughter is something he can�t ignore anymore and that there are consequences for his selfishness. Waaah. It�s hard raising kids, but he has a wife who doesn�t work. I mean, how hard can it be?
So, I wrote Jackie a letter this morning.
Jackie,
Hi boo. I miss you. I can�t wait to see you again. You are so very precious to me and I love you just the way you are.
I cleaned all that junk out of your closet that you�d wanted to donate before you left. A lot of kids who have less will now have more toys because of you. I�m proud of you.
When you come home, Pappa wants us to come to Kansas to visit. He wanted you to write him but it seems like you can hardly write anyone because you are so busy with that schedule of yours.
Aunt Renee and Kayla and Leah are coming at the end of June, I think to visit. They won�t be able to visit again until after Aunt Renee�s baby is born.
There�s a lot that I want to tell you. I will probably call you one night this week.
Love always,
Mommy
And after I called in the middle of the night last night to give him a piece of my mind, I calmly wrote him, the jerk, this letter this morning:
Mr. Uranus,
I don�t know why we are fighting right now. I�m also puzzled as to why I�ve been the subject of your criticism. Maybe you should look at yourself. I would really like you to take this to your �counsel� and show them what a bad mom I am. You will be laughed out of the office. You forget that Victims Advocacy and Children�s Advocacy are my causes and I�m educated in it. There are ways to protect yourself. I mean, kidnappers don�t� just take 12 year-olds five minutes after they develop boobies.
It is not right, nor appropriate for you to make me the target of your problems. I am not the cause. It is not right for you to slander me when you are around my child anyway. She�s got ears like radar, and you are undermining my relationship with her. That is detrimental to her mental health.
I know you never really cared about school, but education is the key to making decisions. An uneducated decision is a bad one, while an educated one is desirable. While you never wanted to learn about parenting and never read the books I gave you about it; I did. Jackie is a sharp kid and she�s never satisfied with vague answers. However, I can tailor them to what she�s asking. Seeing my 7-year-old niece try to dress like Brittany Spears because she�s �pretty� will do that to you. Seeing other kids at school in the first grade cursing, hitting, fighting and engaging in adult behaviors is another motivator. I�m sorry.
We can�t expect our kids to grow up as warped as we did.
*I cannot believe that you would think that educating a child will make them do �bad� things. How out-dated! Talking to Jackie about drugs will not make her do them. We got 8-year-olds sniffing glue and paint. Should I wait till she�s 10 to talk to her about it?
She�s developing crushes and already has had one little boyfriend. Jackie will start developing in a few short years. You do not wait until a child is inundated with an influx of hormones and feelings and then talk to them.
The onset of puberty is starting around the age of 9 now, sometimes earlier.
Education begins before that happens. It takes a long time to establish that trust and communication between our kids and us.
I sent you a few links where professionals, with PH D�s, people who are in the know, who recommend you start at an early age educating children about their bodies, it�s capabilities and respect and modesty in an open and honest way. It creates an open dialogue. I will not leave my daughter to drift alone in this world, where she doesn�t understand her own feelings and body. That only encourages the teenage notions that your parents never felt like you did and don�t know what you�re going through.
If you want to pretend that she�s six months old forever, that�s your
hang-up. It is my belief, and the sincere and educated belief of professionals that arming your children with information in regards to their rights as far as their body, strangers and �good touch, bad touch� prevents child abuse, stranger abduction, incest and other forms of abuse. You can take that to your lawyer. They are not going to take your stance either.
You can say that I�m a moron for being celibate. No, I�m protecting my child. There are many so called normal people out there who turn out to be raging, drug-using, drinking, cheating, child-molesting, wife-abusing, womanizing, lying weirdo�s. I�m picky about who comes around my daughter because it�s my job to protect her. What I find funny is that while you slept with anything that had a hole, I�ve chosen to surround myself and my daughter with family, close friends, and very few men. These men are either related or they are Rene�. So what if I�m alone longer. I also think that if I had moved on with my life you would�ve used that against me also. And if something would�ve happened to Jackie then you would�ve felt validated.
You can hold my being victimized by adults against me, which is wrong. You should never blame the victim. You delude yourself and believe in your heart that I am taking my daughter�s innocence away because it makes you feel justified about not ever having a serious talk with her. You should know however that she doesn�t know the intricacies of human sexuality. She doesn�t know I was molested. She doesn�t know about the majority of things. She just knows she has boundaries that they shouldn�t cross. She doesn�t know about the details of child sexual abuse or anything of that nature.
You should also know that family members commit a majority of child molestation. I�ve never told her that. I just told her that no one, except her mother or father or a doctor should be touching her. That the touch should be loving, soothing, healing and should not make her uncomfortable.
She is not afraid of people. She is street smart, that is different, and even John Walsh, of America�s Most Wanted fame, says you should educate your kids, as young as five years old.
Jackie knows why she should not wander away and what to do if someone tries to take her. All the children in her school have been educated about this. All her peers have been educated. I don�t see any of these kids hiding in their houses. Jackie�s not hiding in hers either.
You let her watch scary movies, but are horrified she knows what childbirth consists of. What is it about it that scares you? Blood, gore, and screaming? Gee, she gets that in one of your movies. She doesn�t get terrified watching surgeries, she loves it. She actually wants to be a doctor. She is fascinated with the way our bodies work. She thinks our bodies are neat and that it is cool that doctors can help heal us.
She�s never actually seen a baby come out, but you know what? Kids are present many times at the birth of their siblings and they are young. It�s a beautiful thing.
I�ve told her childbirth is painful and that it is a lot of work to take care of a child. You want me to tell her a fairy-tale? Why, so she can have a baby at fifteen to fill up that lonely place? No thanks.
Her overt sexuality? Well, that�s actually on you, according to her doctor and again, the pediatric specialists. It�s called, �lack of paternal influence� and here are the symptoms:
Has no stranger anxiety, latches onto any men and expresses love and affection for them, asks them to marry her mother and compliments them on their appearance. This can cause problems later when the daughter seeks the unconditional love from a boyfriend. She will do anything to keep that love.
And: according to the National Fatherhood Initiative, children with absent fathers are more likely to fail or drop out of school, engage in early and overt sexual activity, develop drug and alcohol problems, and experience or perpetrate violence. I�ve got the responsibility of heading it off by communicating with her, bro.
Children whose parents separate are significantly more likely to engage in early sexual activity, abuse drugs, and experience conduct and mood disorders. This effect is especially strong for children whose parents separated when they were five years old or younger and the father is absent.
What�s Jackie up against because you were gone?
� Absentee fathers can have a tremendous negative impact upon children
� kids are twice as likely to drop out of school
� kids are apt to spend more time in juvenile corrections
� kids are more likely to suffer health problems
� are more likely to experience negative dating and marriage situations
Promiscuity and pregnancy are classic outcomes of fatherless daughters. They're looking to define a male image for themselves through love and attention from the only available outlet - a man. She thinks he will love her if she 'gives' him what he most desires. It's as simple as that. Jackie�s not stupid. She�s probably seen a million times the subtle ways women use their wiles to get attention from men. She will do whatever she can to get love from a man.
I could play the �blame� game with you day and night. But that�s not in Jackie�s best interest. Are we done yet? We can work together, or since you are unwilling to see you�re role in her behavior, we can totally let the relationship we�ve built disintegrate. I wouldn�t be surprised because you are hell-bent on making yourself look good.
You always have been.
You disregard Jackie�s education and have the nerve to criticize me educating her. That�s pretty rich, even for you.
You give her a gun, that looks remarkably like a real gun and don�t educate her about the difference between a real gun and a fake, and about respecting guns.
You want to be Mr. Fun-Dad but seems like Jackie�s not going along with your fantasy.
People who live in glass houses shouldn�t throw stones meaning: lots of folks advised me against sending her there because you�d turn on me, drag my name through the mud, and act like you need to prove you�re better than me. Plus, you�ve never really illustrated that she was important to you. I had faith though that you would do a stellar job. I said, he�s not a jerk anymore. He has remembered her this past year at Christmas and on her birthday.
But it�s not really a competition because you cannot dispute your whereabouts and I cannot dispute that I sent her up there of my own accord.
I take pride in having educated my daughter about the world she lives in today and it�s history. I take pride in having done my very best, and I never gave up on her. I�m proud that she loves you. Why?
Most women would�ve told the truth about you, and she�d probably hate your guts. You can�t argue with what you did. However, you can forge a positive future with her.
I grew up without my dad and I know how it feels. I wanted her to get her own experiences with you and hoped that you and her could have a relationship despite your demonstrated indifference for most of the past four years. I did you a service. I did the right thing.
The insult about being spoiled and the world revolving around her: first, she is an only child. Two: Love is not spoiling. Yes, my daughter knows I�m her number one fan. But if she�s in the wrong, we think of a solution together. Three: You�ve never seen her interact with other kids here. She shares and I treat all kids equally.
I guess you think I should have another so she won�t be an only child. Sorry. I don�t want more kids right now. There are worse things than being an only child, such as being an �unwanted child.�
And the best thing about only children, despite your beliefs is that:
ONLY KIDS:
� 20 percent of children today are �onlies�
� Studies have found that onlies:
� are the same as kids who grow up with siblings
� are often more successful in school and tend to have more self-confidence because they get more one on one from their parents.
� may have more opportunities due to more finances being spent on them.
In short, I have done my very best for her. You should appreciate that I didn�t ruin her for you. But you�ve always been one to feel sorry for yourself instead of accepting responsibility for what has occurred. You blame others.
I might�ve blamed you somewhat but I kept it to myself. You couldn�t even exercise restraint in that area either.
I�ll be calling you to let you know when the flight is reserved for. I�m thinking June 21st.
I�ll let you know. Hopefully the baby will be here so she will have at least one family moment with you that she can hold on to.
Missy
1:35 p.m. - 2003-05-27
Recent entries:
What you missed - January 16, 2012
%%older_entries%%From hell - October 19, 2010
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%%older_entries%%Tired - June 20, 2010
%%older_entries%%A beautiful lie - March 11, 2010
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