Divorce Court - Part 3 Of A Gazillion

As I explained everything to IM, we headed up to the courtroom. As we entered the courtroom, we saw IBM and her lawyer up in the front row whispering to one another. My stomach knotted up and head started to spin, thinking of all of the things that I wanted to say/do.

I walked up to the clerk to check in while IM found us some seats a few rows behind IBM and her trusty attorney. I then joined IM and took a sip of water, since my mouth had suddenly been stripped of every drop of fluid. While listening to the first few cases, I rummaged through my files, pulling out what I thought I might need.

All of the sudden, I got a poke in the ribs from IM who, pointing at IBM, said , “look.” I peered past the heads of a few people fidgeting in their seats awaiting their turns to be in the “hot seat” and saw what IM was referring to…a printout of my blog. I almost burst into laughter as I knew she would try to use it against me. She (IBM) whispered a few things to her attorney while smugly smiling and chuckling under her breath. Then…up it came…a print out of IM’s blog. We looked at one another and just smiled. I was smiling and thinking that IBM was just digging and trying to use anything she could to hurt me and my chances of seeing my boys….but at the same time my brain was franticly trying to think of anything that I may have said that COULD be used against me. (yeah, I have some mal feelings about her and have stated that in my blog. Yeah I do think that she is just being malicious and vengeful, but I don’t recall EVER making any accusations about her or attacking her in any way. In my head, at least, my blog was just a digital, out there for people to read, diary.

Anyway, as we waited, I wrote down all of the things that I wanted to make sure got addressed;

Finalize divorce (order for final judgment)

Inform the judge that IBM has not adhered to the same order that she is saying that I did not adhere to

Reinstate my visitation request

Offer the court my reasoning for not going to the drug test

As I was listening to the judge, making rulings and discussing cases with the people ahead of us, I noticed that he did not seem to be in any mood for any crap that day. I hesitantly pushed everything out of my head and thought it best just to go up there with nothing prepared and just answer his questions the best way that I could. (MISTAKE)

Finally, we were called. IM squeezed my arm and wished me luck. I made my way to the front table throwing up, crying and wetting myself all at the same time (on the inside.) After being sworn in, I realized that I had no clue what the best way for me to explain my side of things was. I suppose that is one of the major obstacles in a divorce when the other side has a Nasty-Ass attorney and you have none. I could tell that things were about to go wrong when I had the out-of-body experience where I floated up and over to the judge’s chair and looked at me sitting at the table with the look of a retarded, uneducated, vagabond who had no business speaking to a judge, let alone representing himself in a bitter divorce. As I floated back into myself, and wiped the vomit from my lower lip, I tried to shake off the feeling that I was beaten before things even got started.

After reading the OSC request, the judge asked IBM and her attorney for confirmation and reasoning for their request for supervised visitation. Among the things that her attorney rambled on about, the one thing that caught the judge’s attention was that I failed to show up for a drug test. The look in the judge’s eyes told me that he was not pleased. I decided to not try to make excuses for it and reiterate to him that “I DID miss it but that I did appeal to IBM and her sidekick right after we all got back from our Christmas vacations, that I would be happy to go in for the hair follicle testing” (it goes back 3 months – I had not and have not been doing anything that I needed to hide.) They refused saying that I violated the order and that we’d have to go back to court.

As IBM’s attorney was throwing out accusations, legal jargon and snide remarks, my brain …got a flat. At that point, all that I could do was to sit there and take the beating. I felt like a piñata being pounded on by a horde of teenaged boys.

…More to come…