Our Story...Part 1

I am going to explode if I don't find an outlet for all this frustration! I have always been better at writing out, or in this case typing, than I have been vocally. So, this is how I am going to record my frustration. Then I am going to start walking. I can at least get healthy while I am angry!
So the past 12 years of my life have been great, and bad, and better, and worse. about this time 13 years ago, I met the love of my life, Craig. We met through a telephone dating service. Really, we did!! We played phone tag for a couple of weeks and then finally connected. And connect we did! We spend hours on the phone the first night! We talked every night just about all night. Then we decided to meet. I wanted it to be a public place although I wasn't scared at all! We met at a gas station. I was in the store when he pulled up and he saw me through the window. He later told me that he thought I looked like an angel. He was and still is so sweet! We talked for a while there and then I had him follow me home. We watched a movie and stayed up all night. He left at 4:30 in the morning to go to work. I didn't have cell service where I lived and when I went out later that morning I got a voicemail from him. I still remember what it said. "Hi Beautiful. I wanted to tell you that I had a wonderful night and I hope you have a great day. Get some sleep and I will talk to you tonight." I melted! I knew that I had found someone special. We were together every night after that.

We moved in together after 2 months. Everyone said we were rushing things but we knew that we would be together for the rest of our lives. We went and picked out rings. Craig proposed to me on my birthday March 15, 2001. We married on April 26, 2001. It was a small ceremony officiated by Craig's uncle at a church that I never even knew existed until about a week before the wedding. We got married on a Thursday night because April 26 is Craig's father's birthday and we wanted to make the day even more special. Gordon Carden went to be with Jesus when Craig was 8.

So fast forward almost a year and we are in the month of April 2002. My dad lives with us, W and M live with us,  I am pregnant with A, we are working on getting our new home on wheels set up and a letter arrives in the mail from DHR addressed to Craig. I go ahead and open it because I have a suspicion to what it is. My heart leaps and drops at the same time as my suspicions are confirmed. A woman is seeking child support from Craig. Now to back track a little, he was upfront with me that there was a possibility that this woman was carrying his child. They were together several months before we met and she told him she was pregnant. He found out that the entire time they had been together she had been cheating on him. He broke up with her. She called in January 2001 to as she put it "Let you know your son was born" but wouldn't let us see the child. She said she didn't want him having anything to do with her son. Ummm...then why did you call??
We called DHR trying to get a paternity test done and they wouldn't even dream of it! Told us that the mother has to initiate that. What a crock! You have a man that wants to take responsibility and pay child support and be in his child's life and you want the mother's consent for that. CRAZY!!
So we didn't have the money to go through a lawyer and private DNA firm and we dropped it. Fast forward back to April 2002.

I called Craig at work and let him know. He took the next day off work and we went to an attorney's office and had him write up a letter that states we want a DNA test before any support. We got a court date in the mail for May 30 2002. We show up and see C for the first time. He is almost 18 months old. He looks just like Craig. We didn't even have to have the DNA test. We already knew. We still had to go through the formality. Family court is really messed up. This woman had Craig and 2 other men listed as possible fathers. The judge worded the petition as if the men were the ones not sure who the father was. Whoever turned out to be the father is the one that had to pay for the DNA test..so you guessed it! We had to pay for the test although she is the one who was cheating and didn't really know who the father was!! RIDICULOUS!!!

So I guess this post is long enough...I will finish up the story next time...It only gets crazier as we go!!