I had a long talk with a friend this morning. One that made me feel slightly less alone with my ‘single divorced mom’ situation. She is a single mom with kid…like me. And she was lamenting about her X. And the incredible struggle she was having making her summer plans. Because of…you know…the ‘visitation schedule.’
“You won’t believe the text I got from my X last night,” she sighs as she scrolls through her phone.
“What about?” I ask with concern. I know from experience it could be anything.
“Summer.” she replies.
“Ahh.” I understand immediately. Enough said. The fucking visitation schedule.
The visitation schedule is always a pain in the ass. To say I hate it doesn’t do my feelings justice. It is literally the number one reason that I have to look at my calendar daily. Not to keep track of meetings at work. Not to keep from missing my dentists appointments. Not to make sure I don’t forget anyone’s birthday. But the number one reason I look at my calendar every single day is to figure out where the hell my kids are going to be from day to day, week to week, and month to month. When someone asks me a simple question like ‘hey do you want to get tickets to take the kids to a baseball game May 11th’ I can’t say ‘sure that sounds fun!’ Instead I have to reply with ‘let me check my calendar and see if I will have the kids.’ The visitation schedule is like an unwanted member of the family. It is what my oldest son would call an ‘attention whore.’ And we all know how I feel about whores…
But summer adds a whole new level of fun to the deal! It’s why when people ask me the innocent question ‘What are your plans for the summer’ I get a lump in my throat. My naive and innocent love of summer evaporated with my marriage. My X gets 2 weeks’ vacation with the kids every summer. Seems reasonable right? Totally reasonable! And in theory it is… But my X does something extra special fun with his 14 days. His 336 hours. He breaks them up into tiny pieces and then strategically places them in between his normal visitation days. This allows him to do fun things like take all of the weekends. Or keep them 5-6 days in a row. It lets him disrupt the kids schedule in the absolutely most intrusive way possible. I don’t think he could make it more inconvenient for his children if he tried. But I think he is trying. Maybe he just sees it as an inconvenience to me. But if he thinks that, he couldn’t be more wrong. It’s fucking awful.
I know the intention of the 2 weeks’ vacation that my X received after our divorce. I was there. In all those meetings. With all those lawyers. I was part of the discussion. And I remember it clearly. The intention of those 2 weeks was so the X could take them on trips. Fabulous uninterrupted vacations. So they could do something great together. For 2 weeks in a row… But that is not how my X works. He has calculated to the exact hour what time he is ‘owed’ and he plans to use it in a way that maximizes the time his children are spent away from me. They are without the comfort of their normal schedules. They never understand it and they refuse to try. It’s their way of protesting the whole damn thing. And who can blame them. They didn’t ask to be slaves to a calendar!
So yay! It’s summer! Isn’t this fun…☀️
***And I have to be honest about something. The other reason I hate summer. Or how about the real reason I hate summer. I’m alone. My kids are gone and I miss them. I hate summer…and divorce.
Divorce Shoes 