Living Happily Ever After
test123

Blog Articles

Another Stranger

Date: March 26, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

Day two or three after the nightmare began, my college friend called.  She told me she was having trouble dealing with the whole situation. (They were our friends.  Her parents were some of His victims.)

“Do you realize,” she asked, “That we have been so upset that we can’t do anything?  We literally can’t function.  We can’t even feed our children!  We’re devastated.  We’ve been so betrayed.”

I could relate.

She told me she had learned things about Him she needed to share, to make sure I understood all that had been going on under my nose for 16 years.  Those clueless years. I listened.  I learned things I’d never known.

Then she said, “Andrea, do you realize if you walk away with anything, ANYTHING, from this you will be stealing like He did?  If you walk away with anything other than the clothes on your back, and your children, you’ll be stealing! Don’t you agree?”

Unfortunately I didn’t.

“Actually, no,” I replied. It was one of the few times, maybe the only time, in the history of our 22-year friendship I could remember disagreeing. “I will take anything the authorities allow me to have, and I will use it to rebuild a life for my children.  I guess until you have been left as I have, utterly destitute–with no home, no job, no money and four children to provide for–you can’t understand.  But I WILL take anything the government gives me and be grateful for it.”

We finished the conversation (I don’t remember the rest of what was said), said goodbye, and hung up.  I didn’t know that would be the last time we talked to each other.

Suddenly, another stranger in my life.

Sudden Strangers

Date: March 26, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

March 18, 2009.  The first of many nights I allowed a stranger to sleep in my home.

That is exactly the way it felt.

I heard Him sleeping that night, probably the best sleep He’d had since 1994 when His crimes began.  He had lost everything, including His family, He was headed to prison, but He could finally sleep.

Ironic that I couldn’t sleep anymore, isn’t it?

I lay awake all night, crying, in shock, filled with dread and terrified at what lay ahead for my children and I.  And even more frightening than all of that was having Him in the house.  I felt like I didn’t know Him anymore.  At all. It was exactly like opening my home to a stranger off the street and fearing what He might do to my children and I in the middle of the night.

Sudden strangers.

I couldn’t believe how quickly a man I’d known for 21 years, and had been married to for nearly 20 years, suddenly became a stranger to me.

Day three after the nightmare began we were walking up the wooden steps to His shop behind our house.  I stepped on a broken board, my foot slipped through, I caught myself but not before He reached out to steady me.  As He did, His hand accidentally grazed my backside.

I didn’t anticipate how strange His touch had instantly become.  I was amazed at how wrong it seemed and how uncomfortable it made me.  But I didn’t say anything. He apologized for touching me; said He was just trying to steady me.

How strange this man who was once my husband (I thought) apologizes for touching me.

How strange that his touch made ME feel uncomfortable.

Sudden strangers.

The Felony Diet

Date: March 25, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

There’s another bonus of the unexpected life I can’t forget to mention.

I call it “The Felony Diet.”

It’s simple, really.  No special workout regimen, no special meals, nothing to prepare.  Just live a day like March 18, 2009, and you won’t believe the results!

I lost SEVEN POUNDS the first day, Wednesday, March 18, 2009.

I lost two pounds the second day.

Without even trying.

Beat that, Weight Watchers.

But I have just one question:  what kind of shock and stress results in weight loss like that?

More than any words I can conjure up to attempt to express how I felt and what I lived through, to me, “The Felony Diet” says it all.

The Price

Date: March 23, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

That decision, to allow my spouse to stay in our home, had a price.

It gave me time to ask Him questions.  It gave me time to bring closure to the life I thought I’d had but never really had, knowing what I know now:  the truth.

It gave my children time to be with their father.

It gave us all time to “process” the situation. (Or begin to attempt to.  How do you REALLY ever understand something like that?)

The emotional processing of our situation and beginning to deal with our circumstances for my children and I, meant we allowed ourselves to joke about it or look for the positive, in addition to expressing our grief.  You’ll read jokes we made about our situation and the criminal who put us there in future blogs, I’m sure.  To some, it may seem inappropriate.  But I heard a very wise and inspiring woman named Marjorie Hinckley once say something like, “In life, you can choose to laugh or cry.  I choose to laugh.”  I agree.  It’s how I was raised–it’s what my mom taught me as she lived her unexpected life.  So I choose to laugh as often as I can muster the jokes, and my children do too.

For example, that first night, after telling our children of the situation, my oldest went into his basement bathroom to brush his teeth before bed and saw a mouse.  He grabbed some toilet paper, picked the mouse up, threw it in the toilet and flushed, and came right upstairs and told me of his experience.  He couldn’t believe it!  YUCK.  I joked, “Well, that is one thing I won’t miss about this house and living in the country when we move–the mice!” He agreed with me, we laughed together, and found a way to look on the bright side.

But at the same time, it was a tough time for us in every way.  Not everyone outside our family understood my decision to let Him stay…or any other decision I made. And I paid a price for that.

For example, some of my oldest and closest friends (from college, who had become like family to me, the friends I vacationed with, the friends I called right after He told me the news) called throughout the first day, March 18, for updates, to check on me, and also with one burning question:  Where is He staying?  I could tell my answer wasn’t what they wanted to hear, so I offered as much explanation and rationale as I could.

When I shared this with another friend (a friend who stood by me through it all, who still stands by me, the friend who gave input as to what should be written into my divorce), seeking her counsel, she said, “Andrea, it’s not anyone’s business but yours.  You don’t have to tell anyone anything.  You don’t have to explain yourself to anyone.” (I quickly learned this friend was right.  But at this point, I hadn’t learned that lesson yet.)

It turns out, the information I offered wasn’t enough.   The college friends then wanted to know WHERE He was sleeping in the house. And when I evaded that question, they had their children text my children and ask the same question!  My daughter innocently offered the private details of our family life to them–which they passed along to one of His victims, which that victim then shared with EVERY victim, and suddenly very private things I had shared with only those closest to me, in strictest confidence, were publicized.

It’s amazing who your true friends are.  And in the worst moments, the largest betrayals, and due to the criminal actions of one, they aren’t always who you think they are.  But those who are your friends are truly golden.  You realize that’s one bonus of the unexpected life.

Do You Have Any Idea What You’re Going To Do?

Date: March 22, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

Thankfully, the attorney told me he’d inform the government about my visit to my bank–explain why I had gone there, how much cash for groceries I had withdrawn, etc…  And then he asked, “Do you have any idea what you’re going to do?”

That was to become the most-asked question of the day:  March 18, 2009.

I thought everyone was asking that in regards to the rest of my life.  But I soon learned it wasn’t a question about me, it was about Him. Was I going to kick Him out of the house that day?  Did they need to find Him a place to stay?

I didn’t know what I was going to do.  Having been married for nearly 20 years, and thinking we were happily married for those 20 years, and thinking I was married to an honest and good man for all those years, not to mention the many shocking revelations I’d received that day, I hadn’t thought that far ahead.  I was just trying to get through one minute at a time.

It hadn’t dawned on me to kick him out.  I didn’t know what my plan was.  My world had crumbled in a moment; I had a million things to confront and face and handle instantly.  I didn’t know anything at that point.  I only knew I needed to do what was best for my children.

That my answer.  ”I don’t know.  I need to figure out what is best for my children.  I will do what is best for my children.”

What WAS best for my children?

Isn’t that the million dollar question of parenting?  And in the end, we just have to do what we feel is right, what we believe is best for them, pray (and then go to work)  to ensure that our efforts in their behalf help them grow up to be good, responsible, functioning adults–without baggage from their childhood to overcome.

Good luck with that one, Andrea.

And in my case, in this situation anyway, sometimes you are hated for the parenting decisions you make.    Not by your children, necessarily, but by outsiders looking in.

No Parachute

Date: March 18, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

Last night, as I picked my 10 year old up from swim team practice, I was stunned to hear sniffling coming from the backseat as I drove down State Street.  I looked in my rear-view mirror and thought I saw him crying.  When I asked if he was ok, he told me yes but life is just hard sometimes.  ”Tomorrow it will be one year, mom.  Last year at this time I was making an art project of a ship.  Do you remember how well it turned out?  And that night  is when I found out about everything.” How can a little boy who was only in third grade remember so much about one particular day?  Probably for the same reason we all seem to.  It was the day our family ended.  And I hope soon and someday he gets what I’ve been trying to teach him, and demonstrate to him, for the past 365 days:  this latest “project” is going to turn out well, too.

When I woke up this morning, my hand brushed something as I shut off my alarm.  It was a note from my two teenagers:  ”Here’s a little something to brighten your day.  We know it has been hard, but we all love you!  We are so proud of you for rising to the challenge and living what you have taught us!” I think March 18 is on everyone’s minds.  (And I promise, I don’t walk around talking about it with my kids.  Hmm…I wonder if they have discovered this blog?:)

Anyway, life didn’t turn out QUITE as I expected it to.  Here’s why.

Last March 18 I dropped my three-year-old off at preschool.  I had a plan for the 2-3 hours he was going to be gone.  And then my spouse called me on my cell phone.  ”What are you doing this morning?” he asked.

I told him my plan and he told me he had hoped to spend time with me.  I invited him to join me doing what I had planned.  He told me he didn’t have that much time.  I asked him how much time he needed, he told me (it was the same amount of time it would have taken to do my activity, and when I pointed that out he told me he wasn’t going to do that activity with me.)  So like the flexible, kind wife that supported all of his dreams that I’d always tried to be, I turned the car around and headed home to spend time with him.  I had no idea I was turning around so he could destroy all of my dreams.

Before I reached home, he called my cell phone again and asked me to meet him in the motor home.  He loved that thing.  (I hated it, had never wanted it, but had supported him in that dream as well.) Looking back, it was probably a bit odd for him to request I meet him there.  But then again, I had no idea what was about to go down.

Everything.

I walked in and he was talking on the phone to someone.  (Not unusual.  He had spent his days and nights calling clients and putting business deals together our entire marriage.) I sat at the table, waited for him to finish his phone call, and happened to glance to the left where I saw a yellow legal pad with names written on it:  Market Street Advisors, C.G.Boerner, Majestic Mountain Construction and Impressions Everlasting.  The only thing I knew about anything on that list was that they were my spouse’s business ventures.  I didn’t have anything to do with them.  I figured he’d been doodling or making one of the endless lists he was famous for writing down on yellow legal pads.  I was wrong.

He hung up the phone, sat across the table from me, folded his hands together on the tabletop and paused.  I looked at the legal pad, slid it across the table to him, and asked, “What’s this?”

He replied, “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”  In a voice as calm and unemotional as I’d ever witnessed.  Nothing about his performance tipped me off as to what was about to happen.

Turns out, that yellow legal pad was a list, but only the beginning, of the lies I didn’t know he had been telling me and everyone else…for over 16 years.

It’s still not quite real.  The fall out is, of course.  But everything else STILL doesn’t seem real. And without warning, I found out everything I thought was real, actually wasn’t.

“My company, Market Street Advisors, is a sham.”

One simple sentence, and the complicated web of choices, actions and decisions of ONE person, the man I’d known since 1988 but apparently hadn’t known at all, shattered my world.

March 18, 2009.

But I didn’t get it.  Yet.

I know it showed in my face.  I didn’t have a clue what he was telling me.  My first thought (always a party or holiday thought at that stage of my life!) was, “Is this an early April Fool’s joke?  Doesn’t he remember yesterday was St. Patrick’s Day? Boy, does he have his dates wrong!  What kind of joke is he trying to play?” All I could do was look at him with a puzzled expression on my face.

Suddenly,  in spite of my education and my knowledge of English and vocabulary, I didn’t understand the word “sham.”

He explained, “My company isn’t real.  It’s a sham, and has been from the very beginning. I’ve been running a ponzi scheme for the past 16 years.”

I didn’t know what a ponzi scheme was.

I’d heard mention of  a ponzi scheme on the news, I’d heard the name Bernie Madoff, I knew he had done something illegal, I knew a lot of people were mad at him and what he had done, but I didn’t understand what it was he, or my spouse, had done.

I got the condensed version.  What I was told left me in complete and utter shock.  But it didn’t stop there.

My spouse told me he had hired an attorney (that was the day he got dressed up and “went to meet a prospective client” downtown, came home, had dinner with the family, had family home evening with the family, and had family scripture study and family prayer with the family.)  He told me he had already turned himself in to the government authorities and to our church leaders (that was the night he missed dinner to meet with a church leader and then came home and watched American Idol with us, as usual.)  He told me  he would be going to prison and getting excommunicated from our church.  He also told me everything had been seized (I didn’t know what that meant but was too shocked to ask–he was still talking.) He told me I would be left alone to raise our children.  And he told me I needed to hire an attorney right away but he’d maxed out all of our credit cards paying for his.

I was shocked.  I was stunned.   I was confused.  I was scared.  I was devastated.  And at the same time, I didn’t know what I thought or felt.

All I knew was that I had been thrown out of an airplane…without a parachute.

What was I going to do?

The Last Day of My Old Life

Date: March 17, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

March 17, 2010.  Today.

Today I can’t help but remember the last day of my old life.  March 17, 2009.  What a difference one year, even ONE DAY, makes.

Last year at this time my biggest concern was making sure everyone wore green!  I remember sending my middle son off to school, at his insistence, in a glittery green leprechaun-looking top hat, shamrock sunglasses, green beads, a green shirt, and sparkly green boxers over his clothes; shaking my head at his appearance as he climbed the steps of the school bus.  I remember making sure my three-year-old wore a green “cowboy” shirt to his riding lesson.  I made sure I served green food at dinner.  Oh, and I took pictures.  Unknowingly, I documented much of the last day of my family’s life.

However, we didn’t eat dinner as a family that night; it was just the kids and I.  Unusual, now that I think about it.  My spouse had a meeting with a church leader, at the church leader’s request (he told me), during dinnertime. When he got home from his meeting, it was a low key family night the rest of the evening.  Everything was normal.  We even watched American Idol, family-style, that night–as usual.  We all went to bed and slept.

It was the last night I slept.

I wonder, now, how one member of our family lived that day like everything was normal, posed for a photo, and watched tv with us like nothing unusual was about to happen?  Like he wasn’t about to deal our family the biggest destructive blow anyone had ever not imagined?  And how he dealt us a hand of cards he had stacked and shuffled without ever informing us of the game he was playing.

I’d never been much of a card player.  But thank goodness my mom was.  She wasn’t around March 17, 2009, but she had taught me to play any hand I was dealt.  She had prepared me.

A terrible hand was looming, and I didn’t even know it.  I think life has, perhaps, the best “poker face” of all.  According to Voltaire, “Each player must accept the cards life deals him or her; but once they are in hand, he or she alone must decide how to play the cards in order to win the game.”  It was up to me to play the game and win.

Get ready for March 18, Andrea.

The game of your life, for your life and the lives of your children, is about to begin.

Thoughts From THE Drive

Date: March 10, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

As the miles ticked past, thoughts continued to flood my mind.

In between offering cheerful comments to my children about, “Isn’t it going to be GREAT to live in Utah?  Are you guys as excited as I am to live in Utah?  Think how LUCKY we are to get to move and make new friends!  We are going to have a fabulous new life!” and silently wondering how, beginning the next day, I was ever going to leave my children all day and work full time in another city, and how I was ever going to live through the next 50-60 years, much less ever smile for real again, I marveled at my ability to say one thing and think another!  Must be my public relations expertise and crisis training.  Lol.  (Just kidding, my fellow PR professionals out there!)

As if my heart weren’t broken enough by all that I’d already lived through and had to endure, the giant cherry on the largest ice cream sundae of the grief and devastation that had become my lot in life was knowing I was spending the last day of my life as a “homemaker” (totally ironic–didn’t I just break my home up when I got divorced earlier that day?) and stay-at-home mom driving.  Not the memory I wanted to make the last day before I’d have to leave my two youngest children, for the rest of their lives, to go to work to support my family.  THAT had certainly never been my plan.  I never dreamed I’d be anything but a stay-at-home mom.  But again, I tried not to think about that as I continued to head west.

As a younger woman and younger mother, I’d made this same drive to Utah 6-8 times each year to stay in touch with family.  As my children had gotten older and their schedules had gotten busier, I’d driven it less.  And suddenly, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d made the drive alone.  And then it hit me.

It was the day my mom died.

In that moment I decided I HATED the drive from Denver, Colorado, to anywhere in Utah.

That day had started out like any other.  Get up early, exercise, nurse the baby, get the other kids off to school, straighten the house, return phone calls, take care of the business of the day, etc…Oh yes, and that day I was supposed to host a church function for 20-30 girls and their mothers for Mother’s Day (totally ironic, now that I think about it) so I was gathering decorations and items needed for that night, and making desserts.

And then my brother called.  Totally unexpectedly.  His words changed the course of that day.  The ensuing events changed the rest of my life.

“They found mom this morning, unresponsive.  They think she’s had a massive stroke,” he said.

“What?  I should come right away!  Let me gather my stuff, I’ll jump in the car and come there,” I offered.

“Lets not jump to any conclusions.  Why don’t we wait and see what the MRI shows,” he said.

Relief flooded my soul.  That didn’t sound as serious.  Thank goodness, because my baby had the stomach flu.  It would take me HOURS to make the drive to Utah, by myself, with a sick baby.  So like an idiot, I continued to complete my tasks for that night and actually took the time to finish baking the desserts and called a good friend to substitute for me and take over the hostessing duties of the evening. (And in my defense, it is how my parents raised me to be.  Serve others, go the extra mile, NEVER drop the ball on anything you have committed to do.)

A few hours later, the baby was still throwing up and the phone was ringing.  It was my brother calling again.  He was crying.

“The MRI shows a massive stroke.  They’ve given mom 24-48 hours to live.  How fast can you got here?”

Eight hours to drive.

More proof I really must be the Queen of Denial:  I didn’t even pack a dress for a funeral.  What was I thinking?  That’s right, I wasn’t thinking.  I threw some stuff in a suitcase, pulled my 5th grade daughter out of school to tend the baby as he threw up so I could keep driving, and headed to Utah.

It was an eight hour drive.

Plenty of time to think.

And my brother called every hour or so to ask if I was almost there.  My mom was fading fast.  All of my siblings were together, holding her hand and saying goodbye.  I was alone.  Driving to Utah.

About three hours into the trip I had an experience that was unusual enough I noted what I felt and the time I felt it.  I didn’t have cell service at that moment, but as soon as I did, I got another phone call from my brother.  He managed to choke out, “She died.”  And somehow I managed to not crash but to keep driving through my grief.  (Little did I know how expert I was to become in that over time.)  And sure enough, I  knew the moment in time my mom had died.  I had felt it.

She hadn’t made it eight hours.  So I cried and I drove.  I drove and I cried.  Maybe I should have appreciated it more. Because the next time I made the drive, in 2009, I wouldn’t have the luxury of tears.

Keep driving, Andrea.

Eight Hours To Think

Date: March 10, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

Like I said, I drove off in my trusty Subaru without a backward glance to the life I had lived for nearly 20 years in Denver, Colorado.  It had been a good life, with many great experiences and good memories, which made it all the more difficult,and poignant, for me.  I had eight hours to think.

I couldn’t help but reflect on who I’d been when I arrived there–a college graduate as of the day before I arrived; a newlywed with hopes and dreams and my whole life ahead of me; I had had a mom visiting me there through the years.  I realized how much I had learned and grown in Denver.  I realized I had, really, grown up in Denver.

I had entered the workforce and learned valuable lessons; I had learned to be a wife; I had learned to work to have what I thought was a real and great marriage; I had become a mother; I had served in the community; I had served in my church and had learned what it meant to be a Christian and to live a Christian life; I had made friends; I had traveled the world and had life-enriching cultural experiences; I had informally continued my education; participated in book clubs and learned about new things.  And I knew all of that was ending.  Actually, it was already over.

I had discovered my marriage had been built on lies and a sham of epic proportions (in my little world) with its tentacles reaching into every aspect of my personal, public, religious, and family life; I was re-entering the workforce; and my mom was dead.  Everything I’d ever known or had, it seemed, was gone.

I had been unrighteously judged and accused of things I had never known about much less participated in by literally hundreds of people who knew me (and who should have known better) and by countless other hundreds of strangers (that is all I can admit to myself, who knows? It could be in the thousands, really.)  Except for the support of a very small network of friends and family who had not betrayed me and abandoned me in my hour of need, I was alone.  And I felt more alone than I knew one person could feel.

I don’t know how I would have done it, how I could have driven off to face my new opportunities, had I not had a very important epiphany.  You see, I had my two youngest children with me in the backseat.  So I couldn’t cry, wail, or do anything else that felt natural and right, to me, in that moment.  I couldn’t upset them like that.  Their life seemed like it was going to have enough challenges ahead without me adding to them.  All I could do was think.  Eight hours to think.

Thoughts ran through my mind at warp speed, so many, so quickly I don’t know that I processed them all.  But I do remember wondering to myself, “How can I do this?  How can this be happening?  How can I be leaving my LIFE?  How can I be abandoning all I have become and built over the past almost 20 years?  How can this be real?”  And then it hit me like a bolt of lightening. I won’t have a scar from it like Harry Potter, but it has been forever seared in my mind.

I realized I could do it, and had done it with as much grace and dignity as I could muster, I could drive off without a backward glance, I could be an example to my children and show them how you carry on and do what you have to do (even do what you don’t want to do) with your head held high, even when the direction seems impossible because…I had been blessed (yes, I realize now, BLESSED) with my neighbors.

My neighbors were good people.  But some had been affected by my former spouse’s choices (and those that hadn’t, for some reason, jumped on the bandwagon anyway) and had gone from being like family to me to turning in to absolutely the most hateful and hostile people I have personally ever had the opportunity to know!

I reflected on my neighbors and realized they had a purpose in my life.  I saw them for what they were to me–a blessing, in their own way.  Corrie Ten Boom, author of “The Hiding Place,” was sent to a German concentration camp.  Her story taught me about gratitude and choosing to give thanks in all things for SOME thing.  And to look for the tender mercies that come to each of us in our lives.

In her trying and miserable existence, one day the only thing Corrie and her sister could find to be grateful for was fleas!  It seemed a little ridiculous but they chose to be thankful for the fleas they lived with.  (After all, gratitude is always a choice, isn’t it?)  They even prayed to God and expressed their gratitude for the fleas.  And do you know what? Those fleas ended up saving Corrie’s life when Nazi soldiers wouldn’t enter their barracks for inspections–because of the fleas!

I haven’t had the chance to thank those neighbors for being true fleas to me until now.  But thank you.  I mean that, sincerely, from the bottom of my heart.

Each of you made it easier for me to do what I had to do, and to do it with gratitude, and I will always be grateful.

Onward I drove.  Eight hours to think.

Divorced–And $1 More!

Date: March 8, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

July 13, 2009, was a day I never expected to live.  Here’s what happened.

I got up in the morning, got ready (I remember I wore a skirt), drove to a courthouse in Arapahoe County, Colorado, with my then-spouse, chatting and making small talk as we drove. And then we got divorced.  An alien experience in the great expectations I’d always had for my life.

Getting divorced itself, in my opinion, was not like it’s depicted in the movies.  I expected a huge, empty court room, with just a judge, myself, and my spouse, but that isn’t what I got.  I got a tiny courtroom (seems like it was the size of a large master bedroom), 8-10 strangers observing my proceeding and hearing my private business, and a magistrate signing the paperwork.  And where were the attorneys that were always present in divorce?  Oh. That’s right.  I didn’t have a dime and neither did my former spouse.  We couldn’t afford attorneys.  (I had paid a family lawyer for unbundled services and basically wrote my divorce myself, with her help, input from my friend Holly, and the aid of life experience from what I’d observed my divorcing friends go through.  All 2 of my friends who’d divorced.  Obviously, my experience with divorce was pretty limited!)

I had the opportunity to hear the private business of the parties who went before my turn came.  If I could have been ANYWHERE else, I would have been.  But since I had to be there, I tried to not hear what was going on.  I tried not to think.

When my turn came, I stepped to the table and spoke into the microphone.  While I had done everything required, my former spouse had not taken care of details he was supposed to have and the magistrate did not look kindly upon him.  I was granted everything I asked for…and $1 more!

You see, due to the choices of my former spouse, there was no way I would get any financial support of any kind.  I wouldn’t even have asked for any, but legally he has to pay something, so the court assigned him minimum wage (even though he was not employed and didn’t anticipate that he would be for quite some time) and stipulated he should pay me $563 each month to support our four children.  (HA!  Not that he’d be able to pay me, but my health insurance is $400/month!  My daycare and preschool is close to $600/month!  My car insurance, for a teenage driver, is $300! $563 doesn’t even cover our food! But whatever makes everyone else feel better about the situation…I’ve know I’ve gotten shafted financially, and every other possible way, but who’s complaining:)

Back to the divorce proceeding.  The magistrate noted I had been a stay-at-home mom and homemaker for almost our entire 20 year marriage and asked if I was requesting maintenance from my former spouse.  When I wasn’t, she added $1 to the amount of child support for MY maintenance, signed the papers, and I was divorced.  As quickly as that.

Divorced and $1 more!

We walked to the car, got in, and drove “home.” I don’t know about him, but I was trying not to think about what had just happened and the reasons for it.  I had other events to get through that day.

When we arrived home, we hauled my suitcases out and loaded them in my new (to me) 2005 Subaru Outback station wagon.  We loaded our two dogs (Joe, a 100 pound yellow lab and Ella, a 25 pound cocker spaniel) into their crates and into the Subaru.  I put my two youngest children, my 9 year old and my 3 year old in the car, ignored the staring neighbors, and drove off without a backward glance.

I wish I could say I drove off into the sunset.  But that isn’t what happened.  That isn’t where I was headed.  Call me the Queen of Denial, but at that moment, I couldn’t look back on any part of my previous life or I’d never be able to move forward.  I drove out of my Colorado neighborhood for the last time, heading to Utah, acting like I was going on a quick roadtrip–NOT starting an entirely new life in a new state as a single mother who works full time, the sole emotional/physical/financial support of 4 children!

I didn’t take one last walk through the home that had been mine for 16 years.  I didn’t walk my yard, look at my flowers, or “say goodbye” to any part of my home, property or old life.  I knew I would never be able to move on if I allowed myself to look back, even one little moment or at one tiny little thing.

Because I had never felt more inadequate for any task in my life.  I knew I had an emotional marathon ahead of me of unimagineable proportions.  Had I really been trained for it?  Was I really prepared?  It certainly wasn’t an exercise I’d ever planned on or expected.  I hoped I was up to the race of my life.  My childrens’ futures, and mine, hung in the balance.