The Story So Far…

The good news? The judge in Washington threw a curveball, that caught us all off guard, but did what we needed to. Gwen will be spending most, if not all of her Spring Break (aka – THIS WEEK) with us, visiting Cora's family and Gwen's old school friends out in Washington. There's a court hearing on Good Friday, where we will know more.

Backing it on up, since I don't know who knows what. While this isn't going to be a blow-by-blow, I hope that it gets you all up to speed on what's going on.

History: Gwen's never had the best relationship with her father, Aaron. He doesn't get her, but she's had his number since she was 3. There was a long cycle of her going over to his house every other weekend, putting up with life over there, by doing whatever it took to not piss him off. He was never violent or anything, but when she came over, she was the babysitter for the other kids and when not babysitting, he would tell her things like, "if you get straight A's, that must mean that your classes are too easy, and that the teachers are all stupid."

(Here's a picture Gwen made of her dad BEFORE things went bad.)

And things have been going downhill between them since the move. We'd hoped that he would view me as competition, and up his game, and that their relationship would get better. No. And because of couple of factors are involved: She's getting older. A 14 year old girl will start to question a lot more behavior from adults than a 10 year old will. Also, Cora and I have shown her a "new normal" in how a father fits into her life.

Well, about a month ago, Gwen had her last straw. While on a video-chat with Gwen over the computer, he left her in charge of babysitting her 4 younger siblings (6,4,2,& 3/4) while he left the house, got in his van, and drove off to go get his wife from the bus or train station. Gwen is 2,000 miles away. Feeling responsible for those 4 kids. As the video link keeps cutting in and out. And the 6 year old is freaking out running around, some times in the camera range, sometimes not. Gwen came out to get us in a genuine panic. She felt so responsible and so powerless. (He was gone about 25 minutes.)

Since then, all 3 of us have tried to make him see that it was a big deal, but he's denied that it was an issue, blamed everything on Gwen, and said everything except, "I'm sorry." Not that that would fix it, but it would be a start.

With Gwen's pending Spring Break visit out there for 9 days, we had to act. With her old lawyer in Washington, and a new lawyer in Chicago, Cora has been working up a way to give Gwen a voice in her relationship with her dad. The plan was:

1) File a motion to get the case moved from Washington to Illinois. (If Gwen is to have a voice, she will need to have a counselor. Well, that person will need to be in Illinois to meet with her.)

2) Once the case was in Illinois, put in an emergency stay on the spring break visit with Gwen and her dad.

3) File a change in the parenting plan to give Gwen a voice in her relationship with her dad.

That’s not what happened.

After reading everything written and submitted, the judge in Washington decided to suspend all the phone calls and the visit, and there would be a hearing to decide what’s what on April 22 (Good Friday).

Today – We are out in Seattle, visiting everybody, having a good time. Heading to the Space Needle tonight to celebrate the 2 year anniversary of the day Cora and I met.

Hope you all are having a good week.  We will keep you up to date when we know more.