I can’t remember how much time had passed before the letter in the mail came. I opened the letter and read it… the court ordered him to pay me half of the hospital bills, and half of the daycare i had paid. On top of that they ordered that he pay me $50 a month. Fifty fucking dollars? Am i being punked right now? Of course it didn’t come without any ridicule from R. He would text me laughing, and telling me how stupid i was for coming after him in the first place. He told me he’d never give me any money anyway, because i was keeping his son from him. He gave his other child’s mother money because he knew that child was his and she at least lets him speak to his other child. It was whatever at this point. I was hurt, and it is just his character to kick someone while they’re down.
There was a note at the bottom saying that if i’d like to have my case reviewed that would be an option. I took that option. After going through the whole review process they ordered that R pay me $75 a month. At this point it wasn’t worth it to continue. Our child support worker told me that he wrote on his paperwork that he was unemployed – so going after more was going to be nearly impossible. Funny how he can say he’s unemployed but yet they’re garnishing his wages in order to give me the child support… thank you, government. So intelligent.
I had to make something work, the $75 dollars (which, i never even got) was nothing compared to what i spent on diapers, formula, daycare… but at this point it didn’t matter. I went to school for one semester, because i couldn’t afford to keep going after that. I was bummed, but knew this wasn’t my last go at college. I just had to rearrange some things in my own life.
This was the point in time when myspace was really cool, and facebook wasn’t really even a thing yet. One day out of the blue i got a message from a guy, we’ll call him E. We became “friends” online, and we chatted every day. He was from the east coast… Maryland. Somewhere that i had never been. We chatted about meeting in person someday a couple times. I blew it off a little bit only because i knew i’d never have the money to go there. I didn’t even have the money to survive at this point. But, it was fun to entertain the thought. Daydream about being close enough to the ocean to put my feet in it every day. I love the ocean. It’s quite possibly my favorite place in the world to be.
I was still sort of seeing the guy mentioned in earlier posts. But we lived pretty far away and didn’t see each other much. I was still too young to get into bars, and he wasn’t. He went out a lot and seemed to have a lot of friends. My intuition was that i wasn’t the only girl he was seeing… and i was super right. Imagine that. One morning i woke up and decided i was done with that whole thing. I remember i told myself when i went to bed that night if i didn’t hear from him in the morning, I was done. He had ignored me all day – so this was it for me. It was unbeknownst to him, his last chance. I didn’t have time for this crap in my life. I woke up around 8:00 the next morning – to no message from him. I text him and i said, “I think i’m done now. We need to just break up.” There was a little back and forth between the two of us that morning via text as i fed Jackson, but I just couldn’t do it anymore. As if having a child with a cheater wasn’t enough, i dated one right after the fact. I was in a sad, lonely place. I was better off alone at this point. Just me and my little boy, and my mess of a life that i somehow needed to find a way out of..
I was still job hopping a lot – as i was always looking for an opportunity to make more money than what i currently was. Trying to find a job that would allow for me to still go to school was nearly impossible. I put college even further on the back burner. I was constantly fighting with my parents and spending most of my time in my bedroom. I didn’t want to be there. I wanted to be out on my own. Free to make my own decisions. I wanted nothing more than to be independent. To have my own place, my own rules, my own decisions. I couldn’t do that right now and it was slowly eating away at me.
One day I was online, chatting with E. I had taken a liking to him as i could tell him everything i was going through and i didn’t care what he thought. He was so far away and i’d never have to actually interact with him. I could spill my guts and it wouldn’t even matter. After a particularly hard day… He told me to come there…and he’d buy my ticket. I could almost smell the ocean at this point.
I can’t… i couldn’t actually do that… could I?
jess restructured 