Fungal developments
BM was blasting Dh's phone and email all week with "poor me" crap which DH left completely unanswered. The silence must have been driving her crazy. Finally, after a fresh crop of texts, DH answered, "all I care about is ss13 right now, that he get his proper medication." That was perfect.
So after all this frippery dh called the school nurse. She did not kick the boy out of school. She said the school could, indeed, put the medicine on. So dh ended up telling me, "I regret not calling them sooner. You were right."
It's sad to see this intense desire in him to defend BM, not because he cares about her per se, but because she is the mother of his children and it's a horrible vision to realize your kids' mother is useless and horrible. So for awhile he was trying to tell me that the child was not contagious once the medicine had been applied and even that though we could easily see the red infection it was "just the part that needs to heal up -- the infection is already gone." And this man is a scientist! The psychological forces are so powerful they overpowered his logic, his education, his very IQ.
So after talking to the school nurse he also told me, "Yes, he's still contagious and those lesions are active."
After much angst, he decided we will not pick up ss13 from school today like we usually do and neither will we take him this weekend. He actually really wanted to back out of his threat to BM not to take the child until he was healed (this was the only way to force her to put medicine on at her house) saying things like, "Well, I've made my point." I told him his point will be his threats don't matter if he doesn't follow through on them.
Teen Girl is also texting him rabid messages in defense of her mother. Wow. Your father is trying to save your brother from rotting away and save you from getting it, too, but you need to defend your mother's right to let you both rot. Words fail me.
I feel bad for DH like he's the hero in the movie trying to save the little boy and everyone who could be saved as well is pouring hot buckets of oil down the wall and raining arrows down trying to fell the rescuer! I never could have imagined a person would have to go through so much just to get ringworm on their child.
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Yikes! Supposed to say in the
Yikes! Supposed to say in the last line "...just to get ringworm MEDICATION on their child." Eek!
Yes, ma'am. Yes, maaaa'aaaam.
Yes, ma'am. Yes, maaaa'aaaam.
Dumbfuckery is the exact right word for it. Gonna print the label and paste it on her door.
Our bms are doppelgangers for
Our bms are doppelgangers for sure because everything you wrote about your sd could also be written about my sd15. Instead of being top of her class where she could easily reside, she's swimming around at the bottom having just earned 2 Fs and a D on her report card just this week. All courtesy of BM's cray cray parenting.
I've been thinking the same thing, about the crossed wires. This med thing is so far gone that she must have a personality disorder or something. Helps to know we're not alone.
SD has lost the desire to be
SD has lost the desire to be something, too. She says things now like, "Mom didn't go to college!!!" Just great. Her dad has a degree in Physics. The girl could go just as far. But it's so much more comfortable to wallow in the failure at mom's house.
"Both so happy and so sad,"
"Both so happy and so sad," boy, you said a mouthful there. Yep, BM is NOT fine. She's a leech on society, on your dad, on her own dad, and on me. Do not aspire to that, little girl! It's so heartbreaking.
"Poor me" crap smells of BPD,
"Poor me" crap smells of BPD, and her daughter jumping to mommy's defense is indicative of the same. Your SD's mission in life will be to cater to her mom's needs, not the other way around - until one fine day she finds herself an epiphany... or a therapist.
Don't take it the wrong way ... I do not think that your DH's way of not picking up your SS in order to make his threats a reality is very productive. No judgment; i have been tempted many times to use my kids to make a point... punish my ex... drive it home to him. Drop them off on his door step like he does it to me, without coordinating plans, and run off. But why do it to them? It is hardly the best way to proceed: if BM was in coma (she is to a degree, in an oblivion all her own) the other parent still needs to act responsibly. It can also backfire in that she now has grounds for shared victimization claims: see, my darlings? Your evil father is punishing us all.
It is mind-blowing how a decent, smart guy, who towers above the crazy bitch as a human being, can be so nonplussed by her low tactics.
I found it also very touching that he tries to defend against the very notion that the mother of his children is so useless.
Denial helps deal with truths that are too awful to acknowledge. Sounds very familiar.
No offense taken. I am loyal
No offense taken. I am loyal to my husband so I support his decision and, in fact, I am the one who suggested it. However, that was only after he shot down every single other thing I suggested, a list about a mile long. Very close to the top of the list was have him live at our house for 2 weeks -- we'll medicate him.
I was rather shocked when he jumped on the "don't pick him up" suggestion as a good idea, especially after so many "no's." But I believe his reasoning is that if we take the child for the 2 weeks then it is actually a reward to the bm so next time he needs medicine she will neglect him again. Leading to more and more neglect, leaving her in charge of her custody time (no actual change in custody) but able to pawn it off on us at a whim. So ss13 suffers both more neglect and more instability.
Honestly, I wish we could just take both kids and cut her influence to a few hours on the weekends and maybe once or twice during the week but DH fears, and probably rightly so, that the courts will never take them from her and it will be a huge expense for nothing. Yeah, ask tog about that.
The sad thing is that we and the kids both are in an impossible situation. There are no good choices for us. The only one who wins is BM with her twisted psychological needs and terminal laziness.
I don't doubt for a second
I don't doubt for a second that the kids would be better off with you. But I also have very little doubt that you will not be able to shape BM's parenting skills, or any other behaviors - that is an exercise in futility. Your behavioral techniques are no match for the depth of her psychopathology.
ChiefGrownup, you are so good at putting your SS's maladaptive behaviors on extinction while reinforcing the ones you want to promote, it's truly impressive! But BM is a berry off a very different field, as my grandmother used to say. Your frustration is going to grow exponentially the more effort you put into shaping her in your own image. You cannot change the kind of parent she is. My advice is to give it up. Just be the parents your skids need and do not worry about rewarding or punishing BM.
You are the CHIEF grown up, after all
Ah, you made me giggle! yes,
Ah, you made me giggle! yes, I am the chief grownup!
Your assessment here is food for thought. I may share it with dh. He's the one always trying to get her to do this or that. I just want to have boundaries. There's a difference. But dang your assessment is extremely interesting, thank you.
You know, at 15 and a half
You know, at 15 and a half she is far old enough to be asked to help. But she's never asked to help with anything. She's never trusted with anything because she's not trustworthy. And most of all she's not to be trusted with her little brother. She can be really great to him WHEN SHE FEELS LIKE IT. But most of the time she feels like being mean to him. We don't allow her to be mean to him at our house but that's when we're looking over her shoulder. I suspect at BM's house she's her normal raging bully self.
Stupid, right? I was a very experienced babysitter at her age and I bet most of the ladies here were, too. Ugh.
Love the rest of your rage. Thank you. She needs a dtzy whoopass session. I would pay to see that. Oh, moses on the mountainm, that would solve so many things.
You know, in the beginning,
You know, in the beginning, inhabiting that pink cloud of fluffy love vapor, I thought DH had some grand plan for why he allowed that bullying behavior. After marriage it finally sank in that he really couldn't see her behavior. That was near the end of Year One of Marriage. With the dawning of this new light, I yanked her by the horns, hog-tied her, and let her know it was between her and me now. Life has been soooo much better since then.