Friday 20 July 2007

Reconcilliation

After discovering the ex wife's intention of moving with no obvious plan to inform my husband, I called him at work to notify him of my revelation.
He was, quite obviously, annoyed, upset, I'm not really sure. A mixture of feelings I suppose. She was intending to move, and not tell him, so the next time he wrote to his daughter, the letter would never be delivered.

According to the Estate agent, the house was under offer with the proposed completion of sale, happening within a matter of weeks. My husband decided to call his ex wife.
She was clever as always, asking if he had spoken to the school. He asked if she ever intended informing him of her plans or was she simply going to disappear and take his daughter with him? She fobbed him off telling him nothing was final and she would ask their daughter if she wanted daddy to continue writing. My husband's response? I would have hoped as a decent human being you would automatically let me know.
But of course, his daughter was over him wasn't she? And his ex wife has never shown an indication of decency.

This was serious. I encouraged my husband to call the school and ask to see his daughter in person. He needed to hear it from her if he was never to see his child again. The head mistress behaved in a very noble manner when his ex had notified her of the move. She told his ex that as a representative of the school, she was duty bound to inform the father, my husband, of the potential school move of his daughter. His ex wife wasn't too happy about this, but she wouldn't be would she? She thought she could paint my husband out to be a terrible father, but once my husband had contact with the school, and they could see for themselves what a nice guy he is, they came to their own conclusions. His ex wife was/is a clever woman who puts words into her daughter's mouth. Duly pointed out by the headmistress!

This may seem harsh for me to say such things, but even after the way I have been treated I do not want my husband to remain sad without his child. If I didn't care about his feelings, I wouldn't have told my husband of my discovery, I could have withheld the information and never spoke of it, but I'm not like that. My husband is too important to me. I encourage him to speak to his daughters teacher this morning.

My husband was nervous but made the call to be told yes his daughter wanted to see him even though she did have to think about it for a few moments.
I watched him in the shower as he prepared himself for his reconcilliation. He was shaking, nervous to see his own child. I was anxious myself but encouraged him and things would be fine. He was worried about what they would talk about even though they only had 10 minutes or so during her lunch hour.

I told him she would probably whisk him around her classroom excited to show him all her work. I suggested he ask her teacher to stay in the classroom with them, to be on the safe side. He felt ashamed and doubted his parenting skills. He seemed to shower for ages and I wondered if he would end up looking like a prune but understood the water seemed to calm him.

As he left I hugged him but he was still shaking. I could not go with him to support him, he had to do this alone, it was between father and daughter. So once again I feel slightly excluded as I am unable to support the man I love.
He hadn’t told his ex wife of his intentions, he knew what would happen and I waited in anticipation for him to return home.

Hearing his key in the door I waited for him to find me in the kitchen. As I looked at him there was something different. He walked taller as if he were walking on air and the grin was so big it distorted his face. He gabbled and I had trouble catching what he was saying.
‘It was wonderful,’ he exclaimed. ‘Like we’ve never been apart. You were right but I knew all along things would be fine, she’s my daughter and I’m her daddy. Hannah showed me all the things she has been doing at school and I could see it in her face she was pleased to see me too. I knew my bitch of an ex wife was lying when she said Hannah didn’t want to see me again, she was over me; she looked pretty over me today. Look at this photo I have taken. She held on to me the entire time I was with her, she didn’t want me to go when it was time’

He was completely euphoric and I instantly noticed a change in my husband. The man I had fallen in love with five years ago was standing before me. I hadn’t noticed the mental torture that had weighted him down over the last year and he appeared to be standing taller too like a weight had been lifted. But in the same instant, the weight seemed to place itself back on to my own shoulders. I had been blind. Even though I had been aware of his sadness and despair I had overlooked something else. Along with the loss of his daughter something inside of him had died but as I looked at him now I immediately saw an instant re-birth.

He asked his daughter if she would like to come visit us again and she said she would love to show us the Brownie badges she had earned. I felt uneasy and cautious yet positive things would be different. We decided we would not let things affect us. We knew what the problem was and we could deal with it now. His ex wife could not stop him from seeing his daughter. Her insistence that his daughter didn’t want to see him was an obvious lie, her actions proved that so the only card she could play was to say his daughter didn’t want to see me. We were prepared.

My husband called his ex and told her he had been to see his daughter. She was not happy but had to accept father and child wanted to see each other again. The planning began.
Within an hour my husband received a call from his daughter. She was faltering, embarrassed on the telephone. ‘Sorry daddy, I want to see you but not her. I don’t want to see her.’
So there it was, her mother was working her from the back and his daughter was pressured into saying an awful thing. How can someone do that to a child? Once again his ex wife wins!

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