Such a rhetoric question I know. But when custody is truly 50/50 and BM makes almost 25% more than BD and BD still pays CS, what is it for? Would it be reasonable to expect it to pay BD's 50/50 share of a cell phone plan, car insurance, school lunches? I thought the CS concept was to equalize the household but when the payee makes more than the payer and still gets child support, it can't be that. . .

Disclaimer: I don’t for one minute think this is the norm. I realize there are many awful skids out there, who deserve all the vents and rants about them.

I saw my ex MSS last weekend. He just graduated from high school. SS brought Mr Toddler to the airport for me since exH couldn’t be bothered to keep our son for 4 nights in a row. It’s tough, you know. . .

Anyway, he and I chatted for about 30 minutes. SS is polite and well-mannered. It was evident in the way he talked to me.  And I knew what I had been keeping buried all these years.

So this one guy I’ve been seeing, has me on alert now. Friday night we went out. It took an hour to get to where we were going. During the ride, he had a nonstop texting session with his older son. That’s not what bothered me. It’s the content of it:

His kids were at the grandparents farm for the weekend. The BGM (BM grandma) was lecturing and threatening punishment to the kids because they got into some serious trouble this week at school.

So SS was complaining about BGM to his dad and his dad was responding with things like: 

grandma is wrong

Today I filled a bucket in the sink and walked away for a minute. When I remembered it was running, I rushed back in a panic. It overflowed harmlessly into the sink. In our old house, I flooded the kitchen twice last year doing something similar. I was so freaked out, I had a panick attack trying to clean it up before ExH came home and would scream at me.

He did notice the damp spots so I lied to him and said I spilled a bucket so I wouldn’t hear his abuse.