First off I have to say thank God for this website. It is at times the only thing keeping me grounded. DH and I have been married for 1 year and 3 months (but who's counting!) He came into the marriage with 2 kids (SD 11, SS 9) and an egomaniac ex wife. I came into the marriage with a nice savings, a good job, and a thorough lack of understanding about the stress that was to come! Together we also have BD 9mo. We have the skids 50% of the time on a whacked out placement schedule (which is completely based around BM's work schedule so she can always have the skids on her days off). She's an EMT and as such we have a "rotating" schedule where we have the kids 5 days, then she takes them for 4 days, then back to us for 5. It took me a year and a half to figure this schedule out because it revolves and never involves the same days of the week. BM will "tell" DH which days she's taking the kids in addition to try to even out the days each month. The poor skids can't even figure out where they're going. Well, we're in the midst of a major court battle to try and get a set schedule. She is fighting this one to the death, especially since she has now been ordered to pay us child support and to reimburse us for the $1000 of medical bills that she owed us from 6 months ago.

I'm hoping this blog provides me an outlet for all this chaos! I look forward to your comments too!