1: Tough Love
Originally emailed on Sept. 13, 1997
I just came from meeting with my advisor at school. It looks like I can finish up in the spring if I can manage 9 credits a semester, but that's a little iffy because I can only make my budget balance if I work 25 hours a week. Well, I'll either manage or I'll take six credits a semester and finish up next December. It doesn't make much difference. He says I shouldn't worry about my grades this past year. They're good enough to keep me in good academic standing, and he says packaging is the kind of field where you don't have to be at the top of your class to get a decent job.
That would be more of a comfort to me if I wanted a decent job. I like what I'm studying and I think I'll like the work, but I don't want to be a single working mother for the next fifteen years. I still miss what I had with Sam. I'd like to find it with someone else but neither the men nor the women I date seem eager to take on a whole family, let alone to expand one. I still think about that baby I aborted last fall; I know the abortion had everything to do with getting so depressed because I wanted that baby so much and it's hard not to get depressed when you cannot have the one thing you want most. I'll be getting the boys ready for school in the morning, or cleaning up the supper dishes and watching through the window as they play with Hot Rod, and I think, what if that baby was a little girl? And what if I never get to have a little girl? And then I stop thinking about it because it just makes me sad again. If I don't manage to stop thinking about it I end up spending a day in bed with the curtains drawn, and I hate that.
So, speaking of Sam, listen to this juicy gossip: you know that Sam's dad has been paying Sam's child support for, oh, the last year or more. I like it because I can count on the checks coming on time, and because Sam's mom is just as likely as not to send some little thing for the boys along with it: a toy or a video or some school supplies or a gift certificate for Toys R Us. And sometimes she sends a little something for me, too, a bottle of perfume (she can never remember I'm allergic) or a sweatshirt that says "world's greatest mom" or something. She's very thoughtful, very mom-like, you know. She's pretty much let Mr. Reissinger make the decisions; she nurtures and makes a home and defers to him and, old-fashioned as they are in that way, they are good respectable people and I think they're happy together.
Well, this sweet passive quiet thoughtful little mouse of a woman has been worried about Sam. His irresponsibility concerns her; she confided to me in one of our rare phone conversations that she fears he's run wild since our divorce, that I was a steadying influence on him and he has no self-control now. His financial fiasco last year was especially troubling; apparently it was worse than I knew, and Mr. Reissinger paid out a lot of money to keep Sam out of bankruptcy court. Sam blamed it all on that lover he was swindled by, but Mrs. Reissinger hinted that he is in trouble again, all on his own.
She decided to go to a therapist to get some advice: how could she help her son, now thirty-three years old, become a responsible person who can take care of himself? The therapist listened to the whole story: Sam's money troubles; Mr. Reissinger paying his debts and bringing his mortgage up to date; Mr. Reissinger writing a check to me for child support every month and leaving it on the dining room table for Mrs. Reissinger to mail; Mr. Reissinger giving Sam a little here and there when he thinks Mrs. Reissinger doesn't know about it. The therapist said, "Mrs. Reissinger, you and your husband are trying to be good parents, generous parents, but if Sam is going to learn to handle money he needs to know there are consequences to his actions. As long as his father keeps cleaning up his messes he has no incentive not to get into them." One session and Mrs. Reissinger is cured of her difficulty. I should have such problems; I'm twice a week at Student Mental Health with some grad student psychologist younger than me, more about which later.
Anyway, Mrs. Reissinger goes home that evening and fixes Mr. Reissinger a special dinner. They eat by candlelight, she serves coffee and brandy afterward from the good silver coffee service she usually only uses with company, and she lets him have a cigar in the house. Mr. Reissinger puffs away and says, "Elinor, did I forget our anniversary?" He is joking; he never forgets their anniversary. Mrs. Reissinger says, "No, I have to tell you something."
"It must be bad news," he says, "or you wouldn't go to so much trouble about it."
"It's not good or bad news. But we need to make a change, and I want to be very clear about it." And she tells him about the therapist, says, "You are not to give Sam one penny more. When he calls and hints that he needs money, you will not send him a check. You will not pay off any further debts he incurs. You will not give him cash gifts for his birthday; we'll send him a nice sweater set instead. And you will not pay his child support to Louella."
"But he won't pay it," says Mr. Reissinger "Why should Louella and our only grandchildren suffer because of him?"
"It's his responsibility, George. I'm sorry for Louella; maybe she can take him to court and get his wages garnished. But we can't take care of it for him. Dr. Kasmir was very clear about that, and I agree. You must see it."
Mr. Reissinger grudgingly agreed, and my call from Mrs. Reissinger was to tell me, not only the whole story in Technicolor wide-screen Dolby SurroundSound detail, but that they are very sorry they can no longer pay Sam's child support payments. I said, "You were generous to do it for so long; you are right to stop. I'll take him to court if I have to. I'll threaten to end visitation. I'll work it out the way other divorced women work it out, one way or another."
Mrs. Reissinger said, "Well, I wanted to talk about that, too. Mr. Reissinger and I agreed that there is some small help we can give as grandparents, without crossing the line into fatherly responsibilities; we'd like to pitch in for school clothes and supplies this fall. In fact, I'd love to come up for a visit and help shop, if you wouldn't feel intruded upon. I'd stay at a hotel, of course. I'll get one with a pool, the boys can come swim. And Mr. Reissinger insists on paying your legal fees if you pursue any action regarding the child support. Both of us would testify in court on your behalf. And we think you should know that we have changed our will and all our assets will go directly to the boys when we die; our lawyer will be trustee until they're twenty-five. We'll change that, of course, if Sam straightens out and we decide we can trust him not to fritter away everything Mr. Reissinger has worked so hard for. But in the meantime, as Mr. Reissinger told Sam on the phone last night, he has our love always but no money from now on."
I said, "Mrs. Reissinger, this is not like you. You've always been so supportive of Sam."
She said, "We are being supportive of Sam right now. We are supporting his development into a man who fulfills his responsibilities. I am confident he will be grateful someday."
Well, I decided that if they wanted to play Tough Love with Sam, I'd be happy to go along. I went to see my lawyer and said, "I need to get child support out of my deadbeat ex-husband and I'll do whatever it takes." And then I called Sam to say I expected child support checks to continue uninterrupted for the full court-ordered amount and if I didn't get one--if it was so much as a day late--my lawyer was prepared to file a motion in court denying Sam's visitation rights on the grounds that he had abdicated his parental responsibilities (there's no such legal grounds but my lawyer says in family law the courts are pretty much making it up as they go along and it's worth trying anything once). This was followed about a day later by a very dense letter from my lawyer in scary legalese; Sam is too smart to be easily intimidated but it can't hurt to try.
We'll see what happens. But this is part of why I need to work 25 hours a week; because then I'll be covered—almost—if Sam misses a payment, or if it takes me months in court to squeeze the money out of him. Sam's past behavior means I've got to figure I'm on my own from now on. Mr. and Mrs. Reissinger are right in what they're doing, and I take a grim satisfaction in knowing that, even if I've got to tighten my belt to get by, this is likely to hurt Sam much more than it will hurt me.
So Mrs. Reissinger came up over Labor Day to spend a long weekend and go school shopping. I have most of the clothes the boys need; I've been garage-saling all summer long. I let her get school supplies, book bags and lunch boxes, shoes and boots, and some big-ticket items like new winter coats, but only because I wanted to make her happy <g>.
© Copyright 1997-2001 Su Penn. Design by David Dierauer.
Previous issue | Next issue 