Everything

Everything falls apart.
Cars.
Houses.
Bodies.
Families.

We can't hold any of it together in our own power.
I can't hold any of it together.

For many years, I mourned the loss of the vision I had of a "whole family."  Without my Bible study ladies, I doubt I'd have made it through those years.  But I did.

And just when I started to accept that my little, imperfect family was just right...BAM.  Gone.  G.o.n.e.

We can see him now.  For 4 hours a week.  With supervision.  IF his mother lets him come.

Even when he is here, it's abnormal.  Nothing fits.  We're all nervous.  She knows she can do as she pleases, and he...my little boy...he has changed.  He's not really a part of us anymore, even though he always will be.

Somehow, the six of us have got to get our feet under us again.  We've got to learn to live without him.  The Nick-sized hole in our lives is tearing us all to pieces.

We are not okay.
And I can't hold any of it together...

Supervision

I know I should have updated on this last week, but I am still so mad about it that I could spit nails.  Whatever that means.  Sounds painful.

So.  What happened is...Nick's mother doesn't have to answer for keeping him from us all those days, for keeping Nick out of school to keep us away from him, or for filling his head with lies.  But we have to have supervised visitation, all based on HER word that he was in danger with us.  Pardon my French, but that is about the biggest pile of bullshit I have experienced in life.

We've had two visits with him now.  Four hours each.  Supervised.  And her lying self gets him the rest of the time, and now tells people "well, his dad did get visits, but at least they're supervised", as if WE were the ones who did something wrong and not her.

Life lesson for all boys and men...keep your thingamajig put away.  It'll cause a whole heap of trouble if you let it run around all willy nilly.  18 years of trouble, to be exact.  Only 7.5 left for us...joy.

The count

The official count is...

18 weekends.
30 Wednesday overnights.
4 holidays.
16 days of school vacation.

69 days of missed visits with Nick.
Over a time of 8 months 14 days.



We have family court today, scheduled for all day.  It could go either way.  We could lose him completely.  Or we could be given custody.  Or anything in between, I suppose.

I had a dream night before last that we were suiting up to enter the warzone.  Only we were already severely wounded, bleeding everywhere, a real mess.  Feels pretty accurate today.

Oh, Nicolas...

It's been over 7 months.  Will be 8 months on the 23rd.
Eight months since you've been in our house.
Eight months since you've slept in your bed.
Worn your clothes.  I bet your shoes won't even fit anymore.
Hugged your baby Essie, making her laugh as only you can (oh, how she's grown, big brother).
Fought with Hannah over something ridiculous, and then declared her "your favorite".
Climbed a tree with Noah.  Had a sleepover in his room.
Helped Levi with a computer game.  Been adored by him.

Oh, Nick.  You've missed so much.  My heart can try to absorb the pain quietly, but when I see your siblings in pain, it floods and overflows.  I'm sorry, Nick.

There's a stack of Christmas and birthday presents in the closet.  Don't be mad, but I opened one.  It was the next book in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series and it was supposed to be yours and Noah's.  It's still yours, kiddo.  I'm sorry, Nick.

We never even bought your birthday present from us.  You were supposed to get a new bike this year.  A big 10 year old kid bike.  But you weren't here to pick it out or ride it.  So it stayed in the store.  I'm sorry, Nick.

You're graduating from 4th grade, finishing life at your elementary school.  I'm sorry we can't all be there.  I hope you will know we love you and miss you soooooo much.  I hope you can feel us loving you from far away.  I'm so sorry, Nick.

We weren't in your life for the first 17 months, but for 12 months, we didn't even know about you.  And then we spent the next 5 fighting to see you, son.  This is 100x worse pain than that.  We know you.  We love you.  You belong to our family.  Yes, you belong to Mommy's family too, but that shouldn't remove you from ours.  Lots of kids have two families.  And so many of them seem to do it better than this.  I'm so so so so sorry, Nick.

I'm sorry for your broken home, that you didn't choose.  I'm sorry for all the tears you've cried and will cry.  I'm sorry for all the days you missed here, and even the days you missed there.  No kid should have to go through this.  I'm sorry, Nick.

I'll never stop loving you, bud.  Never.  I might push the hurt down, so that I can get out of bed and be a mom for the other kids.  But there is a Nick-size hole in my heart, and only you can fill it.  I miss you and I love you.  God knows...

Some of my favorite things...

Watching my kids' eyes light up when they realize I remembered the dollar store glow sticks that are Kamping tradition.

Splashing in the rain with my babies.  And then coming inside, getting all cozy in jammies, and watching Bugs Bunny all together in my bed.

Belting out Veggie Tales, sound effects, funny voices and all.

S'mores for breakfast.

Knowing how blessed these little people make me...

I hope they always remember the little things. 

And I hope Nick remembers the little, random things.  This was our first family vacation without the whole family. 

We have to continue on...with all of our favorite things.

Not a day

"Momma, when can he come home?"

"Oooh, Nick would love this book!"

"How come his mom gets to decide he can't see us?"

"Does this mean he's not our brother now?"

"Why doesn't he tell his mom he wants to come here?"

"Does he miss us?"

"Does he care that we miss him?"

"I'm gonna pray and God will send him home."

Oh, my Nicolas...not a day goes by that we are not missing you, grieving your loss, and yet trying to live still.  You're not even gone, just gone for us.  And yet only over a couple hills, around a few bends, just a handful of miles away. 

Not a single day.  We have not forgotten you.  We will not forget you.  We love you, kiddo.

Missing my boy

I haven't cried too much lately, but it seems to be coming due.

Part of my heart is missing, though it lives just over a couple of hills, in another town, with another family.  I keep hoping maybe his mother will relent and if we keep trying, maybe she'll just let him be with us again.  Maybe this weekend.  Maybe this Wednesday...maybe...or maybe not.

And then he doesn't come, isn't even in school on Wednesdays.  He's been stolen from us, and it is so unfair.  To him, to us, to the other kids.  They deserve to know their brother as a real brother, here in their life regularly, to play with, to fight with, as all siblings should.  I hate that he's already become "the brother we never see" to Levi and Esther.  I don't think they even realize he's as much of a brother as Noah is.  It's just not fair.

People ask me how many kids I have, and if I think I won't have to explain anything, I still say 5.  But if it's someone who sees me with my kids, sooner or later, they're going to wonder where this 5th imaginary child is.  A couple times lately, I have said I have 4 kids.  Even as I type that, the guilt is overwhelming.  How can I disown my boy?  Oh, Nick, please don't ever think I've disowned you, that I still don't think of you as mine.  It just hurts so much to explain to someone who doesn't really need to know and probably won't understand why an "evil stepmother" would be anything but relieved over not having to deal with another woman's child. 

Please forgive me, Nick.  If I don't cry, it's not because my heart isn't breaking into a million pieces.  I just can't cry because if I start, I might never stop.  I have to be able to live life, to love and care for what is left of our family, even if it means I must lock the sadness into a room no one lives in any more.  Your room.

I love you, Nicolas.  More than you will ever know.  I pray you are missing me.  I hold onto a thin thread of hope that you'll come back to us.  It's been over 1/3 of a year.  I miss you so much...

A very special day

Today is a very special day.  Probably not for the reason you are thinking, as you read this.  Yes, it is Hannah's 6th birthday today, and that post will come later.  But since this other special day came first, it deserves to come first.

It was 9 years ago, February 21st, 2002.  It was a warmish day in Pine Grove, PA, with spring in the air.  While Noah napped in his room, I walked up to the mailbox, hoping for something other than a handful of bills.

What I found that day changed the rest of my life in ways I never could have comprehended that afternoon.

But first, a little of the back story that brought us to live in Pine Grove, PA at that time...

It is no secret that Brian and I had a rough few years at the beginning of our marriage.  We were both so young (18) and really had no business getting married with the baggage we were both carrying.  But we did get married, and while I tried to set up a happy little home (snort), Brian was out...pretending he wasn't married.  Sorry, there is no delicate way to say that.  He was staying out late, partying, and sleeping with other women.  I don't say that to make you all think horrible things about my husband, for he is not that person at ALL anymore, but to understand how we got to this day walking to the mailbox, you have to know what came before.  And it was ugly.

So.  We ended up separated in the spring of 2001, and back together at the end of the summer, when Noah was 18 months old.  At that point, everything was out on the table, Brian admitted he had been a complete _______________ (fill in the blank with whatever nasty word you'd like...but remember, this is not the Brian of today).  I had some requirements to us getting back together: 1) We had to move away.  The influences here in NY were out of control and I wanted to remove them from his life.  2) We had to attend church as a family.  And 3) He had to work.  Full-time.  No excuses.  He agreed, went to school for a few months to learn to drive a tractor trailer, got a job driving out of Carlisle, PA, and we moved to Pine Grove on our 3rd anniversary...January 1, 2002.

Life had been rocky, but it was going to be good now.  We began to heal, to learn to work together, learned to be parents as a team, and having only each other to rely on was a big part in that.  Then something incredible happened.  I found a church for us to attend (remember, requirement 2), and on Brian's second time there, February 3rd, he was moved by the Spirit of the Living God, and accepted Christ as his Savior!

WOOHOO!!!  Now life would be really good!  The past was behind us, and the future was bright.

Back to the mailbox...

There was an envelope from County Family Court.  Weird.  Not even the county we had lived in.  And it was thick.  As I opened it, my heart beat faster until I felt nauseous.  Blah, blah, blah, appear on this date, to answer these charges...you are the putative father of Nicolas S. C------, date of birth 2-7-01, whose mother is J----- C-------.  Putative?  I didn't even know what that word meant, but the rest of it was pretty clear.  Brian had another son.  Maybe.  Noah had a brother.  Maybe.  I had a stepson.  Maybe.

I walked in the house, shaking, glad Noah was still sleeping.  Quickly, I called Brian's sister.  Yes, she was the first one to know.  I asked her if she knew this woman, and she didn't.  I asked her to please not say anything to anyone, and she agreed.

Ironically, it was the day Brian was coming in from the road for a few days, and Noah and I went to pick him up at the truck terminal an hour away.  I probably wasn't fit to drive, alternating between crying and shaking.  My nice, neat world was falling apart before my eyes.

I meant to wait to say anything until we were all in the car.  But I couldn't, and my tear-stained face gave me away anyway.  The first words out of my mouth were, "Do you know J---- C-----?"  He didn't deny it.  But it's not like I hadn't known.  I knew there were other women.  The past was behind, forgiven, gone.  Until all of a sudden, it wasn't gone, and turns out, never really would be.

What followed was a lot of pain, a lot of tears, a lot of what ifs, and five months later, when we got to meet Nick, a lot of love.  And a lot of healing.  And learning what real forgiveness is.  It was not easy, and sometimes still is not easy. 

Truth be known, had I known then the agony of today, of being kept from MY son, Nicolas, of seeing my other kids miss him desperately, I might have demanded we not have anything to do with him.  But there is a reason we don't know what lies ahead for us in life...probably many reasons, most of which we may never know.  But I know that the decisions we made then to be in his life as fully as we could be, which led us to move back to NY only 8 months after we had left "for good", were and are the right decisions. 

I can't imagine my life without that little boy.  My little boy.  I never went through labor with him, but the anguish of the heart was more than enough to count him as my own.

Nick

Today is my Nick's birthday. As happens every year, Noah and Nick will be the same age for 9 days. I have two 10 year olds!

You are so loved, Nick. I only wish you knew...

Our family is never complete without you. We love you and miss you very, very, very much. I do hope that while we are missing you, you have a wonderful birthday.

Love you, kiddo.

Christmas is done

The tree is down.  The decorations are put away.  The stocking candy has all been eaten.  I threw out the last crumbs of cookies the other day.

And Nick missed it all. 

Actually, he missed everything from carving our Halloween pumpkins on.  We had found beautiful pumpkins this year, and were going to carve them the afternoon that my boy's mother came and stole him from our house on our weekend.  We never did carve them, and the pumpkins rotted on the steps.

Thanksgiving wasn't too bad, since Nick would have been with his mom this year anyway.

The first week in December, Brian and I realized that it was not likely Nick would be here at all for Christmas.  Instead of hoping for a change of her miserable heart each time he was supposed to be here, and then dealing with the cries and wails of siblings missing their brother, we sat the kids down and told them that Nick would not be here for Christmas.  Yes, it would suck, and no, it was not fair, but there was nothing we could do about it.  We determined to enjoy Christmas and the family we could see and love in person.

I think we did a decent job of it.  But I have to admit, now that everything is put away, I feel a little more dead inside.  I would say peaceful, but it is not a peaceful peace, but more of a resignation to what is and an exhaustion with fighting against what it seems we will never win.

The reality is, Nick is almost 10 years old.  We have been in his life, constantly, consistently, never missed a visit, never had unpaid child support.  And yet, if the judge decides he is old enough to decide for himself, I am pretty sure she's got him brainwashed enough that he'll say he doesn't ever want to come here again.

Our only hope is the judge seeing through her lies.  So...our only hope is God revealing it to the judge, because she was born to lie, that one.  And unfortunately, she's taught Nick well.

I think we're over 30 days of missed visitation now.  I don't have the heart to count, but it's got to be close.  A whole month...

Ten reasons I hate football

10.  It's a stupid game.  Helmets crashing into each other...nuff said.

9.  They move in spurts, a play, then a huge pause, then another play, then another huge pause.

8.  Practice is too early to eat dinner...

7.  but way too late to eat dinner.  Hello, dinner at 9:00??  Nice.

6.  Looks like all the games are going to be at 8:30 Sunday mornings.  Super lame.

5.  My kid is on the third string, meaning that we will sit through all of these practices and games all to see him play 5 minutes.

4.  It's a stupid game.  I know, second time on the list, but it bears repeating.

3.  It totally disrupts our entire family.  Seven days a week.  Hate it.

2.  It's always cold and/or raining when I'm sitting there.

1.  What a stupid game...

BUT

The reason I will endure, that reason is aboslutely singular and alone.  Nicolas.  I love that kid.

I can still pray that he'll decide to love soccer like the other kids, right?