My daughter

My daughter is a bright, beautiful, smart-ass, child. I love her more than she will ever realize, well at least until she has a child of her own. She is quick witted, loves her friends and family, loves to play soccer and her violin, loves animals, tolerates school, she does have a couple classes she really enjoys. All and all she is growing to be a mature, kind young lady who isn't afraid to burp better than most people we know. For the most part I believe she handling the divorce, new relationships her father and I have started, and everything else fairly well for a 12 year old. When her father and I divorced we both agreed to put our daughter 1st and let her have a sense of control in her life. Her father, the man that he is, has not really done this well. He has no problem letting her make decisions, but the decisions he expects her to make are not really ones she should have to make. Recently there has been some schedule conflicts, which happens, not really a big deal on the surface. The real issue is it appears her father is choosing his new girlfriend's daughter over his own daughter. Now the girlfriend has been in the picture for about a year and 1/2. My daughter generally gets along with her and her daughter. A little back story...
The girlfriend and my ex talked about the girlfriend moving from upstate New York to Texas, were we live. Fine, great, wonderful.. except after the divorce and because of the financial situation I was in, the ex stayed in the house. I have been awarded the house, but I was not capable of affording it just yet. I was going to have my mom move in to help, it was going to be tough, but I figured I would work it out. That is until the ex decided he didn't want my mom living with our daughter in the house. (A whole neither story on that..) Any way, after many discussions and fights about it, it was decided I would move into an apartment for about a year so I could improve my financial situation. And it was ok for my mom to live in the apartment with me and my daughter. Granted, my daughter technically still lived at the house, but she is at my apartment just as much as she is at the house. So basically it was ok for my mom to live with my daughter in the apartment, but not in the house.. never understood that logic, unless there was another completely different reason for it, which I wouldn't doubt considering who my ex is.. So it was decided that I would move out in February and she girlfriend and her kid would move to Texas during spring break in March. The main reason I agreed with the situation was because I was afraid the ex would cause issues when Blue got out of prison. Plus I was weak and still intimidated by the ex, by the way he could manipulate any and every situation to fit him best. It has been so hard to stand up to him and demand what is due to me legally.
So the plan is for me to move to an apartment, let our daughter get used to the situation, then have the girlfriend move down in March. Yeah, that didn't happen. I moved out at the beginning of February and the girlfriend moved down mid February. No adjustment period what so ever, plus our daughter missed about a week of school so the girlfriend could move down to Texas. Again I was not happy about it, but too weak to take a stand out of fear he would do something to stop our daughter living with me and Blue when he came home from prison.
The girlfriend is here, her daughter is here and they are all living in my house. It is all kinds of fucked up, but moving on. The plan was for the girlfriend to find a job when she got to Texas. The economy being the way it has been for the last few years, it wasn't easy for her to find a job and get settled in my house. That I understand, it is difficult to find a job. Here is the kicker, they decided she couldn't find a job in her field of home mortgage underwriting, something a long those lines anyway (yet if you look there are lots of opening for that type of job), she would go back to school and the ex would support her and her kid. The worse part is I was never "allowed" to go to school because we couldn't afford for me not to work and the ex wasn't willing to make it work so I could go back to school. In fact the 2 times I tried to go to school did not turn out so well. The 1st time was right after high school, I enrolled in a community college to start taking the required classes so I could transfer them to ASU or something. Anyway, right after I enrolled, the ex convinced me to un-enroll so we could get a bigger apartment so a friend of ours could move in with us. OK, I am all for helping someone out. Needless to say the friend moving in didn't work out so well and we ended up being stuck in a bigger apartment without a roommate. We made it work, somehow. So no school. A few years later, we had our 1st house together, things were going fairly well financially so I looked into going to a broadcasting school. I went down did all the stuff I needed to do until it came time for financial aid. Being married, I had to get information from the ex and he had to agree to it.. I don't really remember but I had to call him for something. I had talked to him about me going and as far as I knew he was in agreement. I didn't just go down and it do without talking to him, I didn't surprise him with this. So I call him from the financial aid office for whatever reason. He started asking me what I was doing, etc. I told him and he told me "no". I was on the phone, balling my eyes out, begging him to let me do this. His excuse was there was no way I would be able to get a job after school because he knew a couple of guys from work who had been through school for communications and they couldn't find a job and it was hard to get a job. Well duh, I knew that. But because of these guys, I was not able to school because he believed them more than he believed in me. Over the years, I knew I should have left him then..
Back to present day. The girlfriend is enrolled in school and not working any where. The ex is supporting her and her kid, paying me child support and paying all the bills. I have no idea how he is managing it because I know what he makes and I know what the bills are for the house. When I found out she was going back to school (yes she as a degree in something), I was completely torn apart and hurt beyond words. My poor daughter was the one who told me, it was more of us discussing how things were at the house and she mentioned it. She didn't know what to do when I got mad. I explained it wasn't her fault and I am glad she told me, but I had to figure out how to deal with it. So I did, sort of. Which brings us up to last Tuesday. The girlfriend's kid is sick with some sort of abscessed tooth, or something. Can't go to school because of fever and pain, don't blame her one bit, I wouldn't go to school either or have my daughter go to school. Anyway, the girlfriend had my ex come home from work to "work from home" so she could go to school and he could take care of her kid. Now understand, he rarely did this when our daughter was sick, I was always the one to miss work to stay home with her. Honestly I never minded anyway. So it is 8:15 AM, I am taking my daughter to school (just left the house so I knew the situation with the girlfriend's daughter). I see the ex driving back to the house and I ask my daughter, "What's your dad doing?" She replied "He is going home so Anne can go to school". I was pissed, but I didn't really want to show it to my daughter. She knew I was upset, but I try very hard not to say negative things about her dad. It isn't the right thing to do. I am also talking to Blue on the phone. Basically I hold it all together, drop her off at school, and say good-bye to Blue. I start to drive to work and everything comes out. On top of all of this, it has been almost a year since our divorce and the ex still has not fix the paperwork for the 401k. He has some typos in the original he needed to correct. So I let him have it, in as calm of way as I could through texts. I told him I was hurt and angry that he is being supportive of his girlfriend but never was of me and hurt that he still hadn't taken care of the 401k issue. He apologized, which really meant nothing to me and we agreed to go to court Friday, which turned into Monday because the judge was not available Friday. It has finally been taken care of..
Back to the original point.. my daughter plays soccer and the girlfriend's daughter plays soccer, different age groups. Some of their games conflict a little bit. My daughter had a bye week on the 12th. So they made plans for the girlfriend's kid birthday party. Well my daughter had a rain out game and the scheduled the make up game on the 12th, which now conflicts with the birthday party. I asked the ex about it and he said something about having to ask one of the other parents to take our daughter to the game (I originally planned to be out of town visiting Blue). I said something about I will rearrange my schedule.. Later during my daughters game (that we were currently at when I asked him about the make up game) I got to thinking about what the ex said. So I sent him a text asking if he planned to be at our daughters game on the 12th at all, he replied with "probably not". That is my issue with the whole thing. He is choosing to be with "the kid" rather than figure out how he could be, at the very least, at part of his own daughter's game. Now he is making my daughter choose between spending time with him and going to her soccer game. It is bullshit choice she should not have to make and that is why I am so angry. I even told him that these are the type of things our daughter was going to remember and he still doesn't get what he is doing. Or maybe he does and doesn't really care. He has always done what he wanted regardless of how it effects those around him.

The Visit

A couple weekends ago I went to visit Blue in his new home. All things considered it was a good visit. We talked about somethings that have been bothering me. He takes things so much better than I do. He has the ability to move past things a lot better than me.  I hold onto a lot emotionally. Though it did help me and our relationship talking to him. I have been putting forth the effort to let go of my relationship with my ex-husband. Working on letting go of some of the anger and hurt I have felt for so many years. I am also working past the reason he is in prison. There are questions I would like answered and slowly I am getting those answers. It isn't that he doesn't want to talk about it, but because of the nature of the offense it isn't something we can openly discuss on the phone, in letters, or during visits. Most of what needs to be said and explained will have to wait until he is released. For the most part I understand what happened and why, but at the same time I want to hear it from him.
I know he lives with the regret and shame. It kills him just as much as it kills me that we are separated. Especially when I am the one who will meet his little niece before he will get a chance to. He knows what he is missing. He knows that he made the biggest mistake all in an effort to comfort himself and hurt me. I told him I can forgive almost anything, once. At the end of the day, he realized what I have been telling him from the beginning, I am in for the long haul with him. When everyone is ready to walk away from him, as they have most of his life, I will be the one standing beside him, always.

April is upon us and it is the time of year I find myself extremely busy. I am going to see Blue for the 1st time at his new "home". It will be a new adventure. It will be a couple hours closer than his last place, but it is still a 10 hour drive. It will still cost about $300 to go see him. I am feeling a little trepidation about going to the new prison. Each one seems to have their own rules, which I guess could be a good thing or a bad thing.

The Assistant Warden called me late last week to discuss my request for extended visitation time and my 1st trip to the prison. He was kind and willing to answer and explain all my questions. I have found when you speak to the prison officials in the prison, they tend be very helpful, or at least as helpful as they can be. I have always received answers to my questions and they are grateful that I am so patient and respectful to them. I have casually joked with many of them while being processed for a visit. It that regard, it has been a good experience. I have witness power ego trips from some guards, but it has only been a couple of times. I do appreciate the professionalism I have experienced while visiting Blue. It makes a scary, anxiety filled experience manageable.

I have been lucky from what I have read by other experiencing similar situation. Some of them I have spoken to personally and I get the impression if you are rude, unreasonable, and not willing to understand the situation, you will get it back from the prison. If you go in with the attitude of "ok, this is your game and I will play by your rules", it is generally a better visit. Granted I am only telling a small part of what prison existence is like day in and day out.

Recently there have been some concerns about the medical care provided to the inmates from the media and families of the incarcerated. I have my own concerns because it reminds me of what "social medical system" is really like. You only get the care that is absolutely necessary and or least expensive to administer. I don't expect much from the prison system in way of medical care again because it is ran by the government, which in of itself is inefficient and wasteful.

None of us individually have all the answers or all the information. From someone just now entering the prison system, it seems there is no easy way of changing anything. The prison system is controlled by laws which is set by legislation. The way the legislation is working as a whole doesn't work for the country as a whole. There are so many different view, needs, and cultural differences that it makes it hard to find a consistent way of running things. Or even making a decision. I personally don't see anything positive coming out of how things are done currently. Too many self interest groups controlling how and which laws are passed. Also there seems to be a lot of reactionary legistration. Compared to comprehensive proactive legislation. We are a huge country that genuinely cares about the community we live in, but not necessary the country has a whole. Based on my education and experiences that is why we created each state to govern themselves. I am could be wrong and I am willing to admit I have miss understood the idea of separate states.

Is it simply a case of not enough voices telling the government what we actually want and need? I don't know. That is for smarter people than me to decide. Or is it? The quiet voice never gets heard even if what they are saying could make the most sense or direct law makers in the correct general direction.

Here I am a year later, another adjustment and another upheaval. There has been a lot going on over the last year with the IDOC. They closed a couple prisons and shuffled a lot of inmates around. Blue was supposed to be transferred back in August, but the day he was supposed to be transferred there was an injunction filed from the Correctional Officers' union to stop transfers until there were some meditation between them and the state government. That took a few months to hash out and the union is still not happy, but the state was able to move forward with the closings and transfers.

Blue was finally transferred late last week. I haven't been able to talk to him since Thursday, but I was able to talk to him for a few minutes on Monday. It is now Wednesday and I don't know when I will talk to him again. That builds my anxiety and my stress. Today I am not doing well. I know he is under a lot of stress adjusting to the new prison. He wants to talk to me, but I am sure there are various reasons he isn't able to. I am trying to be patient and wait. We will get back on a calling schedule at some point soon. You get used to talking at certain times every day and now I don't know when I will talk to him.

Having a loved one in prison is so stressful on those who care about them. It is one thing to know about it, but it is something completely different to deal with it. I don't know how families deal with loved ones being locked up for the rest of their lives. Somehow there has to be acceptance, but acceptance is hard to find. Blue has less than 4 yrs (hopefully a lot less once they start sentence crediting) and that is hard to accept. I want to get more involved with those groups that are tied to the prison system in IL, but finding the time is hard. I work 2 jobs and have a daughter to raise. Supporting a loved one in prison is expensive. The state charges so much for so many different things. But I did learn that the extra "profit" from commissary goes into a fund for the inmates to be able to have cable, weight equipment, and other "extra" things for them. So in the grand scheme of things, the extra money I spend does help with a lot of other things for my loved one.

Most of the time I try to figure out how to simplify my life to let some of my other stress out of my life. Most of the time I feel like I am on the verge of an epiphany but can't quite get it. I have been trying to take one day at a time, deal with what I can today. That is a lot harder to do then say. I was texting my best friend about it and she said that I just have a lot to deal with and it is overwhelming. I told her that it seems I should be handling this better than I am, but I am probably expecting too much out of myself. It doesn't help that I am scattered brain to begin with...

Hopefully later today I will be able to talk to Blue and hopefully the calling schedule will be consistent soon. It is amazing how much a simple phone call can make things better.

Six months ago I found an old boyfriend on Facebook. I wanted to see how he was doing. I had not talked to him in 21 yrs. I always missed him, worried about him, and wanted to know what he was up to. Blue was my first love, first one to ask me to spend the rest of our lives together, I was 14 when we started dating, he just turned 17.
I found him in September, 2011 and by January, 2012 he was back in prison. I fell hard for him by the beginning of October. I am divorcing my husband of 18 yrs to be with someone who is going to be locked away for 5yrs. We barely got our relationship started, fell in love, and wanted to marry each other within a month of reconnecting. The old feeling came rushing back for both of us. We both have trust issues and that lead to him to make some really bad decisions that landed him in prison for 5 yrs. He was already on parole for a previous conviction, so he was given 5 yrs.
While he was in county waiting out court dates we talked and wrote each other a lot. It made it so much easier to deal with him being in jail. Oh, I forgot to mention he is in Joliet, IL and I am Justin, TX. There is about 1000 miles away. So regular visits are hard.
For the last couple of weeks he has been in receiving in Statesville waiting to be transferred to the prison he will spend his time. I have not talked to him in over 2 weeks, I haven't received a letter from him if over a week. He was able to send a couple of letters right before we was transferred from county to Statesville.
Every day I come home to check the mail hoping to get a letter from him. Every night about 7 PM I wait to see if he calls me. He typically would call me around 7 PM when he was in county.
All of this is completely new to me. Working my way through the prison system and trying to understand the rules. The emotions are completely new to me.. well sort of. I have been depressed, but this feels different. I have never been through anything like this before. I had a safe and secure life, now I worry about Blue's well being all the time. I know prison isn't exactly safe and his emotions are very negative and low. He wasn't in the best emotional state when he went in, nor for most of his life. So between missing him, wanting him close to me and everything else that goes with being in love, I worry about him being in prison.