One Year Later, Continued (Ex Shenanigans)

Okay, so I missed something very important out of my last post.  My ex-wife came to stay with me temporarily when Jik left last summer.  (I know what you're thinking, but the magic was gone.  I felt nothing but pity for my ex anymore.  If there were such a thing as a negative arousal state, my ex put me there.  Plus, my mom was there to referee.)

Before my ex came (my son came with her, by the way), Jik and I had talked about helping her--not because she deserved our help, but because we felt it was what was best for the kids.  We paid for her ticket, as well as tickets and enclosures for her pets.  Again, we felt this was the right thing to do.

My ex wasted no time trying to assert herself as maven in my household.  She regularly countermanded my mother--whom I'd left in charge in my absence during work hours, disregarded the way I had been providing structure for my children, and generally just acted entitled to our help.  She would initiate hostile conversations where she would talk to me as though I was not there.  She would allow our daughters to sleep in her bed at night (a habit I had worked hard to break them of).  I became the "bad guy" in my own house! 

A little back story: my ex-wife was the proverbial absentee parent.  She allowed our children to do whatever they wanted, provided they remained in the house.  She sat out back, drank $15 per bottle wine (on my dime), smoked cigarettes (also on my dime), and read low-rent romance novels.  She was my wife, and I was supportive as I could be, but I was frustrated by her apathetic approach to parenting.  She "checked out" of parenting a long time ago.  Parenting made her so stressed out she was suicidal at one point, so it was easier for her to just babysit our kids.  Of course, my house turned into a bit of a dump too, but that's another story. 

Back to the main story.  I had told my ex that she needed to find a job and her own place, and then get her head straight (she has a history of severe depression) if she wanted to be of any use to the children.  My mother and I helped her to get a job; I wrote her resume, and mom cashed in a favor. 

Jik came back two months later, and my ex moved out.  She (my ex) got an apartment and worked two jobs.  She did nothing, however, to try to deal with the issues that had plagued our marriage. 

The kids would spend time with my ex periodically, but they would invariably come back with stories of how their mother had slept during her time with them, and how she had left them to their own devices (much like she did at our old home).  They would also come back a bit reverted to their undisciplined selves of yore.  It was as though my ex was actively trying to undermine me every time the kids went to stay with her. 

Every thing I did or said that might possibly affect the kids was subject to her examination.  It was somewhat ironic that she who found so little time to parent during the twilight years of our marriage, now found the time to criticize my wife (then fiancée) and me for every detail, no matter how minute, inconsequential, or irrelevant.  My daughters saw fit to give their mother a tour of our home, after which, my ex greatly insulted our sons (my wife's from her first marriage).  "Those boys will not be sharing a room with my daughters." she demanded, knowing only what she had gleaned from talking to my 9 year-old daughter.  Of course, such a statement implies that there is something wrong with my stepsons, and Jik reacted accordingly.  It was all I could do to keep my wife from bitch-slapping my ex-wife!  Of course, I was not happy either, but I did not want my wife to have any issues, and I figured a criminal record would delay our immigration process!

In truth, losing my job as an air traffic controller was probably one of the best things that could happen to my children, since I could get them away from their mother for a while.  It should, in theory, also be good for her, so she can use the time to get the help she so desperately needs (as of the time of this writing, she has done nothing of the sort, however; she has, in fact, used the time to do everything but seek professional help).  Of course, this is no longer my fight, but she's mistaken if she thinks she'll play a big part in the kids' lives while her head is still screwed up.  Children need stability, love, and structure, not randomness and apathy. 

One Year Later

Well here we are, one year later, and Jikky and I are still going quite strong.  I can't say it's been all roses and puppies, but we can definitely say we've put our relationship through the ringer!

When last I wrote, Jik and I were in the lovely (ahem) little hamlet of Bethel, Alaska.  I was working as an air traffic controller.  Jik was taking care of three of our five kids (the other two were still in Bangkok with Jik's mom).

In September of 2015, I had a bit of a "deal" at work.  According to my coworkers, I put two planes too close together.  Given the environment I'd come from before, I was comfortable with the distance between my planes, but I guess that's neither here nor there; in short, by my coworkers' perception, I screwed up.  I was suspended from work pending an internal investigation.  It came out that I had been stressed to the max because of the fallout from my first marriage--I had lost my house, my car, and almost all of my belongings.  The stress of the divorce and dissolution of my old life had changed me.  I had lost my confidence, and my work had suffered accordingly.  Couple that with a rather toxic environment (and one in which I never fit), and it was a recipe for disaster for me.  I digress.  I went into counseling, and Jik and I started to guard our money resources carefully.  Jik helped me to plan our finances and manage our household.  We stretched the money out as long as we could, but eventually, we had to leave Bethel and relocate to California to stay with my family.

The move was hard on the kids, but Jikky took it in stride--even though she was sad to leave Bethel.  If there were ever a good reason to end our relationship (from her perspective), it was this.  My life had fallen apart: I had no home, no job, no car, and no prospects.  I had hit near rock bottom.  Through it all though, Jik buoyed me up; she helped me to regain my confidence, and loved me and our three kids (mine from my first marriage) with reckless abandon.  Thanks to my father, with whom I'd had a rocky relationship for much of my adult life, we at least had a place to stay.  Thanks to my mother, we had a car to use.

We got our daughters enrolled in school at the local elementary (which had improved markedly since my childhood), our teenager enrolled in online school, and daddy (that'd be me) on the job hunt.

Since I'd received a letter from the FAA indicating that I could no longer attain a fight physical based upon the perception of fraud (um...I hadn't talked to my physician about my anxiety and depression when I renewed my flight physical), I could no longer perform ATC services.  This meant I had to go back into IT -- a job field I'd had mixed success in several years prior (in addition to being the field in which I hold both B.S. and M.S. degrees).  I knew it would be a tough sell, but Jikky was in my corner from the outset.  She encouraged me, helped me to prepare for interviews, and reassured me after my numerous interview failures.  "You'll get it when it's the right job, hon." she'd say, "If you didn't get the job, it was probably not a good fit anyway."

In January of this year, my divorce from my first wife was finally completed.  I had primary physical custody and decision-making authority of our three kids, and my first wife was now, thankfully, my ex-wife.  We could finally make official the relationship that we'd lived for most of the last year.  We began to make plans to wed in February, so that we could adjust her status and begin to petition for our boys to come home too.

Then disaster struck.  Jikky found out that her ex-husband had been coaching her sons to go to court and testify that they wanted to live with him and his bimbo girlfriend instead of with us and their siblings.  He had been preparing to go to court and sue Jik for full custody of the boys while she was in the USA with me.  I immediately knew this meant she'd be leaving before we could adjust status.  We talked about it, but ultimately we decided she needed to go back.  It ended up being good anyway, since Jik had not seen her sons in six months; she needed to hug them, kiss them, and smell their scents.  We did, however, accelerate our wedding plans.  On 6 February of this year, the most beautiful woman I've ever known said "yes" to me in front of a minister, in the pretty little park off of the highway in Hercules, California, and made me the happiest man in the world again.