How a careless teenager turned into a (step)mom - Part 18 - Stricken by fate

'HOW A CARELESS TEENAGER TURNED INTO A (STEP)MOM'

(life of a girl who survived domestic violence and stalking, fighting for a better life)

Welcome to the Eighteenth day I'm participating in the #monthlyauthorchallenge!
I'm really excited to join the challenge! Why? Because I would love to share some bits of my life with you.
I think it might surprise you and even shock you 😉

DAY 18 Stricken by fate

The relationship between @fitzgibbon's ex-wife and the two of us has always been complicated.
I got the feeling that she regretted her decision. I think she miscalculated the time she would have with her kids.
She lived (and still lives) nearby Belgium. A two and a half hour drive from her house to ours. So she saw the kids one weekend every two weeks. Visits in between those weekends were not possible because of the distance.

She said she didn't believe in solid relationships, and that she wanted to take a look at the situation again, when @fitzgibbon and I would split up.
But that never happened..
The relationship between her and @fitzgibbon and I got much worse as soon as @fitzgibbon and I got engaged 5 years ago.
She got really defensive. She didn't want anything to do with me anymore.
Was she jealous? Was she still hoping for the two of us to split up, so the kids could come live with her again?
I tried to communicate with her, but she hated my guts.

No matter what we tried, everything was interpreted in a bad way.
She fought about a lot of things and even took us to court a lot of times.
That didn't make things better..

3 years ago we were stricken by fate..
On a sunny sundaymorning in march, the morning after celebrating my birthday, we were called by @fitzgibbons mom.
She told us @fitzgibbons younger brother Gido died in a tragic accident. He fell of a mountain while walking with his girlfriend in Switzerland.

TOTAL SHOCK!

We went to be with the rest of the family. We grieved. We cried. Besides that we faced a lot of challenges.. Like we had to figure out how to get his body to the Netherlands.
A couple of days later Seth and Lily had to go to their mother according to the schedule.
We asked @fitzgibbon's ex-wife if it was possible to switch weekends because of everything that was going on. We were with the family all the time.
AND besides the grieving of the loss of Gido, my sister in law (wife of another brother) could give birth to our little niece every minute.
So Crazy!
But she didn't want to switch weekends. It was HER weekend, so we had to bring the kids over that weekend.
We did.

She was supposed to bring them back two days later on sundayevening.
She didn't.
She sent us a message sunday in the afternoon, telling us she wasn't gonna bring them back home.

WHAT?!

We tried to call her but she didn't answer..
HOW COULD SHE DO THIS TO US AT THIS MOMENT?

The kids didn't come home that sundaynight.
The next morning we went to their school to talk about this situation. The principal called her. She answered. She told the principal she wasn't going to bring the kids back home.
After that phonecall we could't reach her anymore. Not by phone, not by mail, not via her family. We went to her home. Nobody was there.

That week @fitzgibbon was busy organizing the funeral of his little brother. His body could come to the Netherlands any time. In the meantime we drove to the south of the Netherlands serveral times to talk to the police about what to do.
The police tried to get in touch with her. They even went to her house and her parents house.
No succes..
After a couple of days a police officer declared a search warrant notice.

Seth and Lily were still missing during the funeral of Gido.
That was so hard.. We were all so sad because of the loss.
Seth and Lily not being there, and not knowing where they were, made it even harder for the whole family.

A couple of days later the police informed us that they'd found the kids. The police brought them with an undercover car
to a location where @fitzgibbon could pick them up.

We were so RELIEVED!

After that we talked to a lot of people and decided to stop the arrangement concerning parental access. We lost trust in her. We had to talk about this and build trust again..
She wasn't planning on talking to us. She contacted her lawyer again.
The judge had this great idea..

'CPS SHOULD INTERFERE!'

Stay tuned!

-Thank you for your interest! I would love to hear something from you! Please leave a comment and I'll get back to you 😊 Hope to see you back tomorrow! Love you 😘!-

This story is part of a series I'm writing this month in the #monthlyauthorchallenge, here below are the previous parts:

PART 17: Nothing is impossible!
PART 16: We doubled!
PART 15: The stalking continues
PART 14: A Life-changing experience on Valentine's day
PART 13: Getting to know myself again
PART 12: CPS-Mill
PART 11: The Attack
PART 10: CPS
PART 9: Stalking
PART 8: The divorce
PART 7: Running away
PART 6: Domestic violence
PART 5: Now what?
PART 4: Becoming a young mom
PART 3: Kissing and making out
PART 2: The first guy I'll kiss
PART 1: This is me