Everything Can Change In A Minute

Today is the day that gets me one step closer to finally ending one horrible chapter in my life and hopefully starting a great new one!  At least I hope so anyway.  I filed a motion to have my default set aside in hopes that I can file my response to my husband's divorce papers.  I have a feeling that I have not written about this so I will give a bit of a back story and try to make it short mainly for the fact that just thinking about it all and how I have gotten to where I am today just makes me so mad!

I was served with divorce papers by a sheriff towards the end of April.  I had no idea what I had to do and what any of the papers meant let alone what form(s) I would need if I wanted to respond.  It was not until the week before my papers were due that I was informed and found out about free legal council here in my small butthole town (which I secretly love in all honesty).

The legal office has funky hours.  Seriously.  I am talking Monday thru Thursday and only from like 1pm to 4pm.  Seriously funky right!  Good thing I do not have a real job to get in the way right!  So anyway I get there as the door is opened and have to fill out some paperwork and had to cross my fingers and hope that my ex had not seen them to help him with the papers because then it would be a conflict of interest and they would have to turn me away.

Getting off the subject.  They are able to see me and get me all the papers I was going to need to try and get any and all fees waived, something called like a CIF or something that contains all the personal information so it does not have to go into the divorce papers (since those are public record) and then my papers for my response.  I spent about two hours the next day filling out form after form and review his giant packet of stuff to try and wrap my head around everything.

When I was finished I went back to the law center to have them check over everything to make sure I had it all filled out and done.  On my way to the office though my ex called me.  He asked if I was planning to respond to anything and I told him yes and he asked me if it was okay that he ask what I was wanting to change.  I told him that the only thing I really wanted to change was the spousal support and that I did not want to increase the amount that he is already giving me but I just wanted to keep it going until I get moved up to my mom's house and get a job that I can financially support myself with.  The only other thing that I was adding was just the stuff that we had already discussed and I just wanted it written down on paper.

See at that point I told him that it was not that I did not trust him but I just wanted it all to be legal.  Now (two months later) I cannot trust a single word that comes out of his mouth.  Anyway, he said that he agreed to what I had said so when I talked to the lawyer he told me of some form called a stipulated judgement or general judgement.  All that form does is take what changes we want to make to the divorce papers and then we sign them, get them notarized and then they get filed...and all that time I spent on the papers I filled out was for nothing.

On the lawyer's advice, he told me to email my ex and let him know that I intend to respond to the papers and give me ten days written notice before filing a default.  A default pretty much means that I would be agreeing to everything that he put in the original papers.  Even though he had agreed to my ideas I still emailed him along with physically mailing him a copy of the email and a hand-written statement saying the exact same thing just to cover my ass.

Good thing I did not toss the papers I had filled out because it was the Thursday before my papers were officially supposed to be filed and I taught my Zumba class that morning and then pretty much diddled around the afternoon before heading over to the house to grab some stuff.  My ex had told me that he had to go into work that morning and was not sure when he would be getting off.  I texted him and told him that I was heading over to the house and packing some stuff.  I did not get a response from him.  I had already told him that I was taking off that weekend to take stuff up to my mom's house and was leaving really early the next morning.

I spent close to an hour and half at the house just filling my car up with bags of stuff (because that is what he did when "packing" my stuff...just tossed everything into plastic grocery bags and I will get to that later) and could not get him to respond to me by text or phone call so finally I just left.  I went to grab some dinner and when my food was about to show up he finally texted me back.  Told me that it was now or never to fill out this paper and I told him that I could do it in an hour and he called me and started yelling at me.  Yelling that he does not agree to anything I had originally said and that he was not going to do that paper I had and that if my papers were not in by that Monday then he was going to default me.  I tried to stay calm and told him that as per my email, he had to give me ten days notice before he could do that and that I would be back in town on Monday.

Needless to say I went to my mom's house for the weekend where all the stuff I had brought with me also included a 55 gallon trash bag FULL of garbage.  I swear he took the empty shampoo bottle out of the trash and put it with all my stuff!  Asshole!!!  So I get back into town and work all week to make sure that I have everything in my response perfect.  I added some other things to my response that my ex and I had verbally agreed on and since I could no longer trust his word I wanted it written down.  I took my papers in the day after Memorial Day and was told that he filed a default on me the Monday before and I could not file.  I wrote a letter to a judge asking me to let me file and telling him what had happened and why my paperwork was not filed on time.

I finally heard back and was told that I had to file a motion to have my default set aside.  That is where I am right now.  I have taken my time to write this not-so-short description to try and pass the time and it has helped.  I now have less than 22 minutes until 3pm when I was told to call.  I filed my motion and waited and waited and had not heard anything so I called a couple weeks ago and they told me that a judge was having a hearing today (that no one had to attend) and was going to make his decision and was told to call after 3pm and if they did not have an answer yet then to call back tomorrow morning.  I am just crossing my fingers that I have an answer today so I can just know what is going to happen.

I know that the judge is either going to look at the case and see it as I cannot file because I had ample time to do so and I did not and since I did not get my paperwork in on time that I am just stuck and he/she'll say no.  Or it can go the other direction and he/she could see that I tried to get my paperwork done and my ex had changed his mind on what we were going to file and then after reading the enclosed copy of the email (with the date on it) asking him to give me notice before a default which he did not and the print out of when things were filed shows that not only did my ex not give me notice but he filed the Monday my papers were due like the minute the court was open.  Hopefully the judge will see how big of a douche bag he was and will grant my motion and allow me to file.

I am so damn nervous I feel like I am going to throw up and I cannot even text my boyfriend for comfort because he left his phone at home.  If I do not find out anything this afternoon I think I might ask one of the other instructors to cover my class in the morning so that way I can keep calling tomorrow if I need to so that way as soon as there is an answer I can be there to file my papers and put myself into even more debt than I have already acquired over the last couple of months.  I am just making that credit card balance higher and higher every day and mostly for gas and food.  Stuff I actually need to survive and live and unfortunately I only make about $150 a MONTH at the gym.  Gosh I cannot wait to move home and get a job and actually make some money and then start school again.  Oh crap I have to call the VA and my school to change my info again.  I might as well just wait until I get to my mom's house next month so that way it won't be a huge mess.  Although I really need to get my bank info set with the VA.

Okay I have about ten minutes and I really feel like I am going to vomit everywhere.  I am starting to shake and I can feel my heart starting to race.  Oh my gosh I just hope that the motion is granted in my favor.  I really need this!  I really, really need this!  I am freaking out.  I just have my fingers crossed that I can file and if that becomes a reality then I am going to keep my fingers crossed that maybe the judge will tell him to pay me more in spousal support.  Oh man I am freaking out.  I think I am just going to call now and see if there is an answer.  If there is then I might just see if someone else can cover my class for me today so I can go file this paperwork!  Wish me luck!