I am so glad I have found this site. I need to vent so badly.

Background: I am a recently married woman to my husband, who I do love, who happens to have three children, aged 10, 7, and 4, two girls and a boy, respectively. They live with their biological mother most of the time and my husband (excitedly) takes them every other weekend and holiday, as well as any other time their lazy assed mother decides to ditch them so she can spend our money on spa days with her fat friends.

Did that sound angry? That's because it is. This woman is a freaking piece of work. I'm a full time student (paying my own way) and my husband (although recently unemployed) had a half decent career. He pays her child support to the tune of what works out to 55% of his take home pay. He's unemployed as he was forced to quit earlier this year, but he still pays and she still keeps demanding more and more. She recently tried to put in an application to go after 100% of his income basing it on the fact that I work and support him. Again, I don't make good money, and I'm a full time student. She's very aware of all of this, but I know that she sees this as "revenge" for my "stealing" her husband. She attempted to trap him (and did a darn good job of it, too) with not one, not two, but THREE "accidental" pregnancies. He finally left her, and we were close friends, then dating. Granted, his divorce was only final a few short weeks before our wedding, but this was solely because she drug it out and refused to sign papers in the hopes that she could prevent us being together. She also constantly causes drama, refuses to pick up her children, demands more money, lies pathologically, and overall creates a shitstorm to deal with in terms of the kids, including, but not limited to bad behaviour, rude habit, disrespect, and a lack of appropriate responses to an adult. She has serious entitlement issues, and refuses to generally take responsibility for her actions. She is also very uneducated and will bicker about anything or everything, make up lies, etc. The most recent one has been a threat to CPS that I have been "hitting" her son - who I intentionally avoid because he is such a terror, let alone get within arms' reach of. Additionally, she always wants more money. My husband and I live on less that a thousand dollars a month for our rent, bills, food, etc, while she takes more than that from us, in addition to income from an under-the-table beauty business, two cash renters, and welfare dollars.

Now, the kids. I get that they are children of a divorce. It's hard. I know. I've read about it on the internet for months, and months, and months. Generally speaking, they're not really terrors except for the little one. The girls are old enough to know how to play their parents, and they do quite well (so much that I'm almost impressed some days). They're generally okay to deal with, other than the odd rounds of "13-going-on-30" type defiance, which I can tolerate. The four year old is a nightmare. He has been coddled to a ridiculous extent by his mother (probably because my husband chose to leave her shortly after the child turned 1, because that was the last straw - he stayed to support her so she wouldn't have to care for an infant alone, but then realized he couldn't handle the deceit). This child is always told what a "special boy" he is, and that he can do no wrong by his mother. He has temper tantrums, hissy fits, refuses to use the toilet, screams, swears, bites, hits, lies, refuses to listen, is violent with my pets, and a general terror to have in my house. He absolutely will not stay in his room at night, waking the girls up by going into their room multiple times each night, or screaming at the top of his lungs and breaking things now, as we've recently started locking him in his room. Additionally, he throws food, will force himself to throw up for attention (literally - shoves his hand down his throat and vomits everywhere), pees anywhere and everywhere when we go out in public, and more.

Normally, I just disengage and stay in my room when they visit, because it's not worth the drama-with-the-baby-mama when I try to interact with them. I also like to avoid the 4 year old. However, having the children at my house has become extremely disruptive in my health and my life. Before, I felt like a prisoner in my own home. Now, I feel like a prisoner in my own body. I have an autoimmune disorder that is exacerbated by stress and lack of sleep. Usually, since I work and go to school long hours, I catch up on my sleep on the weekends to stay sane and feeling less like I'm about to drop dead. Since my husband has had his children more weekends than usual throughout the summer (due to baby-momma refusing to keep them....yet still wanting all of "her" money) this has all gone to hell. Starting in about April, the 4 year old started with the nighttime antics after his biological mother told him it was okay for him to "go to his sisters' bed for cuddles, because that's what special boys get to do." Since then, we've had the night time drama every single time the kids have been here. We're generally up at 11:00 pm, 1:00 am, 2:00 or 2:30 ish, 4:00 am, and 6:00 am with his antics.

It's gotten to the point where I am in so much pain and I am so tired all the time I can barely function. I fall asleep at work, and if I manage to stay awake at all, I'm in bed by 7:30 or 8:00 at night when I get home. My husband doesn't "get it," because he can stay home and nap all day during the week because he STILL hasn't found a job (that's his own fault, and has nothing to do with anything else, or any of my anger or upset about the kids). I feel so frustrated because I am the one working and paying for the privilege of being ill all the time. I pay for everything in our house so that he can still pay his child support out of his savings, including things like underwear, antibiotics, etc. that the biological mother of these children refuses to buy because she "can't afford it" (but she can afford gel nails you get changed weekly and Justin Bieber concert tickets?!).

Basically, I'm overtired, run down, sick, and fed up. Since April, I've had the flu and a new cold monthly, I've been to the hospital once for exhaustion, and I literally have a prescription in my name to get some sleep. My doctor gave me sleeping pills, but those don't exactly help keep a 4 year old from screaming me awake in the middle of the night. Quitting my job (which is a FT Monday-Friday with regular hours for the summer) to catch up on sleep and get healthy while the kids aren't here isn't really an option. It's gotten so bad that I walk around with permanently black eyes - when I forgot the concealer last Monday, a coworker asked me if I had injured myself on the weekend. It just feels really hopeless. Today I was in tears after yet another sleepless night.

I've tried to broach this with my husband many ways, but his response is always, "I can punish and discipline him, but it's not his fault." Granted, he does usually follow through and issue some discipline, but he still believes it's "not the kids' fault their mother is a bad parent." I get that, but it's ruling my life. I suggested that I would maybe save up so I could stay at a hotel on the weekends, and he balked at that, saying locking in his room would do the trick, I just need to give it time. Overall, I am just frustrated at the entire situation.

I'm so tired. I'm tired of being sick, and I'm sick of being tired.

- FedUpFemal