Well...

I've made mention in the past of all these problems I've had with my exwife.  I wish I could say they were exaggerated or even improving, but after 12 years its like it all happened 12 minutes ago...and she's the one who left me for someone else.

So today at 3 the buzzer to my apartment rings.  I look out the door and its her.  She's not supposed to pick up our son til 4 during the school year (5 during the summer), so I open the main door a bit and tell her she's an hour early, she's going to have to wait.

As usual (she's pulled this nonsense with times before) she insists its THREE, not FOUR, and she's picking up HER son and I can't stop her.  So I tell her to leave, and she forces her way into the apartment, pushing me back in the process.  So I tell her she's tresspassing  and she needs to go.  Now.  She heads for my apartment, I beat her to it, and try to shut the door.  She pushes it in and is trying to force her way into the apartment, all the time she's screaming like a lunatic.  I reiterate that the pickup time is 4 and she needs to leave.  She's screaming for Billy to come on, lets go.  He comes to the door and tells her forget it...its 4, and he's not going til 4.  Then he asks her why she always pulls this. 

So she becomes more irate and shoves the door hard, hitting the instep of my foot and knocking me back a bit.  Now as many of you know I have a herniated disc in my back.  This shoving me back produced a sharp pain in my lower back (as I type this 2 hours after the fact, my calf is killing me which means more nerve pressure).  Now when she sees me fall back, she tries even harder to get in and attempts to stab with her keys in the chest.  She's a lunatic.

Now I want to mention that over the last 12 years she has repeatedly hit, kicked, punched, slapped, thrown things at me, and tried to break out the windows in my car.  I've kept my calm for 2 reasons: 1, because my son is there and 2), because I'm not stupid: you guys know how big I am, and she's like 5'4.  No matter what she did, if I retaliated then I'm the one going to the can.  Thats an automatic.

So this whole pushing and shoving thing is going on, and at one point she tells me she's calling the police.  I tell her by all means, call them...please.  Then I tell her I'm going to my neighbor's to have him call the cops, so move.  She refuses to budge and blocks the doorway so the only way I can get past her is forcibly.  And again, like every time for the last 12 years, I do not take the bait.  Now at this point another neighbor is coming in the front door and I ask her to call the police (I should mention I don't have a phone), and at this point my ex just goes running out of the building.

Now, at this point my back is killing me, I'm all upset, but my main concern is Billy.  So I go to him and give him a hug, tell him I'm sorry but I'm calling the police this time...it has to stop.  He tells me its ok, he understands.  So I find a neighbor thats home (and that has a phone) and I call Woodridge non-emergency.  Within a few minutes a couple squads show up and I tell my side to the cop.  The cop asks me what I want to do.

Now at this point I was getting soft and thinking "maybe this scare will calm her down" when another cop comes in and mentions that her story is about the same as mine, but her's is pretty believable.  WTF???  I had mentioned to the first cop that my son (who's almost 14) saw the whole thing and could verify everything I said.  The first cop tells the second cop that there's an unbiased witness, the son, and he can verify my story.  That changed the second cop's tone a bit and then he walked outside.  So the first cop asked me again what I wanted to do.

I want to press charges, officer.

So the cop gives me directions to the station but tells me to follow him...the directions were in case he got another call in the meantime.  So I got Billy and told him he was going to need to come with and talk to the police.   So we drove down, and I made sure he was ok (he said he was ok, but how could he be?).  Before we left though, I saw the cops putting my ex in a squad car in cuffs.  Now I'd be lying if I said that after all these years and all this bullshit it didn't make me feel a little warm and fuzzy inside, but the last thing I wanted was my son to see his mom being taken away in cuffs.  So I stalled for a minute, and then when we went outside I told him to just keep looking at our car as he was walking towards it and not to focus on anything else.

So anyway, we get to the car and drive to the station.  I realized we were headed towards the back of the station, where we might get another glimpse of her being led into the cell in cuffs so I cut us off and took us around the other side of the building so Billy wouldn't see any of that.  Again, all things aside...my son is stuck in the middle here, I know this is painful for him and he doesn't need anything added that doesn't need to be added.

So we go in the report room and the cop gives us pens and paper and has us write our statements out.  The first cop was really cool.  Then the second cop from the building (who was acting like a douche to me for whatever reason) came in and gave me some attitude about figuring out how to get Billy back home for school.  Now, the first cop and I had already talked about this (I asked that Billy sit outside while we talked about the more sensitive stuff) and so I called her parents.  Now, I cannot drive him back down there...not with the way my back is feeling at this point.  So I called and of course her parents were assholes to me.  Seems she had already called them.  Then I talk to her dad and he's saying I should be the one to drive him down.  I mentioned that its really not possible with the condition of my back.  He tells me that it wouldn't be happening if I had just turned Billy over to my ex.  I told him its a bit more complicated than that, my friend.  His response..."Oh, is it?".  Um...obviously yeah, if thats your assessment of the situation.  So at this point I ask the cop in the room if I can put the call on speaker.  He tells me yes.  I tell my ex's dad that I want to put him on speaker in the presence of this officer, is he ok with that?  He tells me yes.

So anyway, we arrange for him to come up tomorrow and get Billy around 3-ish.  He's going to call me about 20 minutes out since I live 10-15 minutes away and I will turn Billy over to them.  Fortunately Billy doesn';t have school tomorrow.  And in all honesty, and the cop there can vouch for this, my concern throughout all of this was not only Billy's general well-being but the fact that he didn't miss any school.  I should also mention that when we were back at the building I was trying to avoid bringing Billy into it, and he advised me he understood and it was completely up to me, but without a witness it would be basically "he said, she said".  So I had no choice.

And the words the officers used to describe were "aggressive" and "unstable".  That was from the moment they interviewed her at the building through the time they processed her.

I also need to go Tuesday morning to the Wheaton courthouse to file an order of protection against my ex.  Paper trail and what-not.

So anyway, how was your day?