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What a dramatic week I'm having -__-
Nov. 6th, 2025 12:53 amI try to avoid connecting too many details of my personal life to this username, but I am having a doozy of a week.
The cozy local game store my friends and I have regularly patronized for the past couple years is having a social tailspin as several unsavory details have come out about the owner's business practices. It's unclear (to me, at least) whether what he's doing is illegal or simply unethical, but either way our crowd is migrating to a new game store for future Magic events. The upside of this has been the chance to solidify my friendships with several of the store's now-former regulars.
A dozen of us are going to someone's house for a potluck and informal Magic tournament on Friday. I'm planning to bring oranges and a big batch of my blackberry pineapple lemonade, but I'm also trying to think of some more tangible food item I can buy or make without breaking the bank. We have some nut allergies and a gluten intolerance in the group, which rules out several of my usual potluck staples. If anyone sees this and thinks of the perfect thing, I'd love suggestions!
As my casual cardplaying hobby melts down, my fiance's having some significant family problems. His mother's working on getting her divorce finalized. She still owns a business with his soon-to-be-ex stepparent, and Stepparent continues to take home a co-owner's salary while ignoring deadlines and fobbing off responsibilities on my fiance, who has worked there for over a decade but is not trained or qualified to do Stepparent's job.
Meanwhile, my fiance's youngest brother is stuck in the shared custody whirlpool. Stepparent has become convinced that Brother should not attend public school anymore and wants to pull him out of school while she looks for options. She sent my fiance's mother a many-page document about this, which included a section in which she clarified that she is unwilling to contribute to any homeschooling efforts or fill out any school-related paperwork. Brother has a cluster of developmental and communication disabilities and has been treated terribly by public school officials, but keeping him out of any school altogether for a nebulous period of time sits poorly with the rest of us. At this point he only attends school or does homework on the days he's with my fiance's mother. Stepparent also insists that she is the only person who understands Brother's feelings or makes an effort to communicate with him.
My fiance and I had a long talk with his mother over pork and apple soup earlier this week in which we said things like "That document is a strong example of her parenting style and the way she communicates with you, so save it in case things continue like this and you have to sue for full custody" and "You're right. This is emotional abuse." The past two years have been a minefield of gaslighting and financial abuse, and it can be painful to watch. The worst part is when Stepparent sends me one of her long, rambling text messages and I have to figure out a diplomatic response so she won't take it out on my fiance's mother.
While we were there, Stepparent came by to drop Brother off. She poked her head in and apologized, saying she'd rear-ended my fiance's car. (No major damage. We checked later.) Brother then started hitting her with some force, eventually pushing her out the door, which he locked. Obviously I, my fiance, and his mother verbally objected to this. My fiance's mother crossed the room, told Brother that we don't hit people, and unlocked the door to let Stepparent back in. Stepparent immediately chastised my fiance's mother for intervening, saying that it was a disruption of Brother's freedom to communicate. The next day my fiance and I woke up to a long text from Stepparent. Evidently us crying out when we saw Brother hit someone kept her from "decoding [his] behaviors as communication."
This is an almost thirteen year old boy who does not ordinarily hit people. He has significant communication difficulties, yes, but he uses a mixture of ASL, verbal speech, writing, and gestures to communicate with reasonable fluency. To say that it's alarming that one of his households encourages hitting as a viable communication strategy for a preteen is an understatement.
Since this whole mess began, I've told my fiance that I'm in his first ring of support so he can be in his mother's. Luckily both of them have good therapists as well. At the same time, the situation begins to frighten me. I've been part of Brother's life since he was five. I love the kid like crazy. Stepparent loves him too, without question, but she's not treating him right and it doesn't feel like there's anything I can do about that. I hate feeling so powerless. Right now, the best thing I can do is just keep being there for my fiance, his mother, and their family. I've been making her a lot of soup.
The cozy local game store my friends and I have regularly patronized for the past couple years is having a social tailspin as several unsavory details have come out about the owner's business practices. It's unclear (to me, at least) whether what he's doing is illegal or simply unethical, but either way our crowd is migrating to a new game store for future Magic events. The upside of this has been the chance to solidify my friendships with several of the store's now-former regulars.
A dozen of us are going to someone's house for a potluck and informal Magic tournament on Friday. I'm planning to bring oranges and a big batch of my blackberry pineapple lemonade, but I'm also trying to think of some more tangible food item I can buy or make without breaking the bank. We have some nut allergies and a gluten intolerance in the group, which rules out several of my usual potluck staples. If anyone sees this and thinks of the perfect thing, I'd love suggestions!
As my casual cardplaying hobby melts down, my fiance's having some significant family problems. His mother's working on getting her divorce finalized. She still owns a business with his soon-to-be-ex stepparent, and Stepparent continues to take home a co-owner's salary while ignoring deadlines and fobbing off responsibilities on my fiance, who has worked there for over a decade but is not trained or qualified to do Stepparent's job.
Meanwhile, my fiance's youngest brother is stuck in the shared custody whirlpool. Stepparent has become convinced that Brother should not attend public school anymore and wants to pull him out of school while she looks for options. She sent my fiance's mother a many-page document about this, which included a section in which she clarified that she is unwilling to contribute to any homeschooling efforts or fill out any school-related paperwork. Brother has a cluster of developmental and communication disabilities and has been treated terribly by public school officials, but keeping him out of any school altogether for a nebulous period of time sits poorly with the rest of us. At this point he only attends school or does homework on the days he's with my fiance's mother. Stepparent also insists that she is the only person who understands Brother's feelings or makes an effort to communicate with him.
My fiance and I had a long talk with his mother over pork and apple soup earlier this week in which we said things like "That document is a strong example of her parenting style and the way she communicates with you, so save it in case things continue like this and you have to sue for full custody" and "You're right. This is emotional abuse." The past two years have been a minefield of gaslighting and financial abuse, and it can be painful to watch. The worst part is when Stepparent sends me one of her long, rambling text messages and I have to figure out a diplomatic response so she won't take it out on my fiance's mother.
While we were there, Stepparent came by to drop Brother off. She poked her head in and apologized, saying she'd rear-ended my fiance's car. (No major damage. We checked later.) Brother then started hitting her with some force, eventually pushing her out the door, which he locked. Obviously I, my fiance, and his mother verbally objected to this. My fiance's mother crossed the room, told Brother that we don't hit people, and unlocked the door to let Stepparent back in. Stepparent immediately chastised my fiance's mother for intervening, saying that it was a disruption of Brother's freedom to communicate. The next day my fiance and I woke up to a long text from Stepparent. Evidently us crying out when we saw Brother hit someone kept her from "decoding [his] behaviors as communication."
This is an almost thirteen year old boy who does not ordinarily hit people. He has significant communication difficulties, yes, but he uses a mixture of ASL, verbal speech, writing, and gestures to communicate with reasonable fluency. To say that it's alarming that one of his households encourages hitting as a viable communication strategy for a preteen is an understatement.
Since this whole mess began, I've told my fiance that I'm in his first ring of support so he can be in his mother's. Luckily both of them have good therapists as well. At the same time, the situation begins to frighten me. I've been part of Brother's life since he was five. I love the kid like crazy. Stepparent loves him too, without question, but she's not treating him right and it doesn't feel like there's anything I can do about that. I hate feeling so powerless. Right now, the best thing I can do is just keep being there for my fiance, his mother, and their family. I've been making her a lot of soup.
