Christopher in Denver as June ends!

Christopher got here at about 9:30pm last Wednesday.  It has been just wonderful.  I'll come back and add more of what fun times we've had.  Right now it's hard to type at all.  He's sleeping and our last hours together of this visit are slipping by.

Tomorrow he must go back to NM with Bevin and I feel nauseous about it.  How is this really our life?  No one who knows me or begins with any objectivity understands this.  Every day Christopher is away is harder than the last.  I can only recommit daily to never giving up this battle to bring my son home.  I will go down any road that presents itself as hopeful in this dark night.  I am a mother with nothing to lose and only my child to gain.

Not really bad or ugly but DIFFICULT

Had to make some hard decisions this week.  One of the big ones was about how much I've been trying to get done each week.  Getting up at 5:30am and to bed at 11pm and still not getting the minimums done each day has been taking its toll.  The Colorado Bar Exam.  I need to be able to give the preparation more actual time and more mental energy than I simply can right now. Therefore, I am deferring until February.  Will life be easy then?  Likely not.  But it will surely be better than right now.  So, in February, I will have a laptop to take the exam and I will be fully prepared.  Then I can move forward with my legal career and making a better life for my son, Christopher.

The last difficulty is really just a laughable one.  I ran up Mt. Evans yesterday.  Yup.  It was absolutely grueling.  I felt like quitting in the first quarter mile.  It began at 10,000 feet and ended at 14,000 feet.  It was 14.5 miles long.  At the start is was in the 50s, but by then end it was 20 degrees, 20 mph winds, snow and visibility of about 5-10 feet.  The bits of me that hurt the most were my hands.  I thought I just might lose use of some fingers.  And the altitude was nauseating, disorienting, painful.  

All in all it was entirely insane to have done, but there are some interesting aspects to it.  It was allegorical.  A lot of people quit.  500 started and less than 300 finished.  I could have quit. That would have been logical.  I wasn't really in shape for it (whatever that might entail and mean!)  I wasn't doing well.  I was hurting a lot.  I was having altitude issues.  I was miserably cold.  I questioned my own sanity.  But quit?  I was alone most of the ascent.  I did a lot of talking to myself.  I created a mental and physical system to get through.  I also simply decided that I would not quit.  Why quit?  Defeat and failure on Mt. Evans would have meant little, but allegorically it meant a lot.  It meant more than a lot.  It was good to push my own sense of capability.  Physically, it made no sense.  Mentally, this was something I needed.  Something a lot of people need.  I hope others can achieve it more painlessly, though!

The Good

So the hope and the inspiration to take control of my life and turn things around for Christopher are the beginning of the good. And I'm willing to commit to trying to post more here to keep everyone updated on what is happening with Christopher and the custody battle developments.

Some short other fun news: The Summer garden is going well this year. We have tomatoes, basil, peppers, potatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, spaghetti squash, musk melon and butternut squash. Christopher is especially excited about the tiny, yellow pear tomatoes. There has been a ton of rain and the poppies were gorgeous and the roses are making a super recovery from the dry Winter!

The biggest recent good news is that there was a really fabulous fundraiser in New York! I sooo wish I could have been there. Not only was money raised to help in my fight to keep Christopher, but it sounds like it was a lot of fun too! I cannot thank and applaud Sabrina enough for her work on it. WOW is the best word to describe it.

So THANK YOUs are in order:
Sabrina
Annette
Morgan
Raven

Roze

Margaret

Amanda

Olivia

Coko

Ronda

Precious

Veve & Twiggy

M

Charles

Rita

TES

Deb

N

Velvet

Kim

And perhaps others whose names I don't yet have!

As I have said many times before... This is a dark time, but it is not without its bright, silver lining. I have been blessed with a lot of love and wonderful friendships in my life. And I have been astounded how many have written, have called, have donated money, have prayed, lit candles, and more!

Good; Bad; Ugly

Well let's get some of the bad and ugly out of the way. First, my apologies for the tardiness of my posting efforts. I am overwhelmed and more than a little hermit-like right now. In truth, I have not been doing well. I was just denied visitation last weekend with Christopher and it was really rough. It wasn't a full denial in that I could have had a few hours--two meals and about two hours--if I'd driven down to Santa Fe. But with so much to be done in Denver, I had to weigh it out and the joy of the brief time just couldn't completely justify the twelve hour drive and travel costs. Very, very hard choice. I've had a lot of those recently.

And I've been burning the candle a bit too brightly at both ends. I have been working full-time during the days and taking bar review classes for the Colorado Bar exam evenings. And I've been trying to keep up with the custody battle and visitation skirmishes as well. I've stayed so tired that I've not been doing much working-out even. My poor triathlon team. I'm going to have to make it up to them somehow...

Bevin is again not paying the mortgage and the fear of losing my home and substantial investment in it is very stressful. I truly do not understand his financial negligence when financial planning is now his career and I especially don't understand how he is in such a financial mess when he is earning more than four times what I earn. I pay the mortgage amount to him each month as per our lease, but he then squanders the money and leaves the mortgage unpaid. It is incomprehensible. Unless, of course, it is purposeful. For a long time, I have avoided such "assumptions," but I am in a more realistic place now. Oddly, it is not depressing. It feels like this willingness to accept the bad and ugly is a first step to making beneficial change.

Bevin is also being incredibly draconian about scheduling for the Summer. Christopher doesn't have ordinary school, so one might think Bevin would ease up and give me more time with him. No. Instead, Bevin is working to pack Christopher's schedule with camp and soccer and such so that Bevin can tell me that Christopher is too busy for visits with me. Lately, Bevin says he is irritated by my "many" 5-10 minute phone and Skype calls with Christopher (which I try to get in most days). It is nothing short of insane. I want Christopher to have fun activities and to develop friendships. All of that is great. Certainly. But our having time together and maintaining our relationship is fundamental to Christopher's psychological and emotional well-being. I stay so very upset that Bevin does not care about what he is doing to Christopher. Christopher is just some collateral damage to him. It's disgusting that the Court and so many others are unable to see Bevin's actions for what they are and Bevin for who he is. What can I say, though? He has a lot of superficial charm and I fell for it too. I fell hard. It has taken me 6 years and more pain than I want to admit to see through that pretty facade of his.

Bevin has begun dating one of Christopher's teachers. I quite liked this teacher when I met her so that much is positive. I'm only upset with Christopher's discussion about how she is to be his "Mom." Christopher says that Bevin and the teacher are getting married and are going to have a lot of babies. Truly, I think that's great if that's what they both want. I don't wish Bevin ill. I really just want nothing from or to do with Bevin. I want all our financial and other entanglements dissolved. And I must have my son back. I will not be written out of my baby boy's life. Quite the opposite. I will never rest until Christopher is back home. Once that happens, I will somehow support a continued relationship between Christopher and Bevin. I want as much stability and love as I can get for Christopher--from wherever I can get it. He is being horribly damaged by all of this. He is showing a lot of signs of "wear" from this battle. It is so wrong. I stay so hurt and frustrated that I cannot protect him from it. I will forever blame myself for ever trusting Bevin and believing his lies so that he could hurt my baby like this.

Hope. I have moved to a place of starting to admit and accept how emotionally abusive Bevin was to me. Many friends were concerned for me and made comments at the time, but I was blinded by the naive love and false hope I had then. Now, I am beginning to see more clearly. I see the lies. I see the scheming. I see the vicious circles I dutifully ran. I see the cyclical drama I so easily got drawin into. But, because I'm finally starting to see clearly, I see real hope for today too. I know my chances with this court aren't positive, so I'm looking ahead into appeal. And I know this Court is unlikely to enforce on the lease/mortgage or credit card fraud issues so I'm looking into criminal and civil charges there. I realize that it's solely up to me to seek out justice and I think I'm ready to do the work to make it happen. It's bootstrap time. And I have to do this work for Christopher. One day soon, we will have a normal and stabile life again; the life we are meant to have.

2nd Half of Christopher's May/June Denver Visit

During this week with Christopher I took the week off from Bar review classes so that I could have every evening with him. I had some of the day too as I headed in to work super early so I could leave early.

Check out Mt. Everest in his sandbox!

Here's some of what happened during the week:

We babysat Saffron and had a half sleep-over. The next morning Christopher was really sad that she wasn't here, though! Christopher had a fun play date with Keller and just missed seeing Fiona too. He had some rainy day time for playing board games with G'Mo and also got to take a field trip with her to an art project store. He made frisbees for

himself and Saffron and some cool sand creatures. Christopher got to see some totem poles and dinosaurs at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and also built a bat house with Gwen. And, on his last full day here, we had dinner and a big play date with Saffron and Shannon.

Christopher and Saffron talked about getting

married--what they'd wear and the baby they'd have!

Saturday morning Christopher wanted to just stay home for a quiet morning together before heading to the airport. Heading to the airport was, indeed, uncomfortable. Bevin had come in earlier and been downtown and missed the shuttle back to the airport so I drove him to the airport. Christoph fell asleep so we drove in silence. It seemed pointless to say, "No," but was surreal. How did we get to where we are? Who is Bevin anyway? Did he ever only have a relationship with me to steal my child? Why is the Court letting him do it? All of that plus the fact that I imminently had to let him take my baby away once again rolled around in my head and I cried some on the way and all the way home.