I can't sleep... or I've had enough sleep I guess. I put in about 6 hours. It's 4:30am. I'm just struggling with this whole thing. I was starting to accept the inevitable. Last Thursday at therapy, I found out that George had called up Penelope's therapists earlier last week wanting to know when he can see his daughter. He had left a message on that Monday, and she waited until Thursday, before our session, to call him back. During her conversation, she agreed to allow him to see Penelope this Wednesday. She said "I have to talk to your sister and your dad, but I think it can be Wednesday." I explained to her, it didn't matter what we had to say.. even if one of us was having brain surgery, he was going to insist on seeing her Wednesday because SHE okay'd it. She should never should had talked out of turn. If our say really mattered to the outcome that is. It just really pisses me off. Plus, George had told our dad that Monday that his therapist was going to be calling Penelope's therapist. To find out more information about why he can't see Penelope yet. But he was the one who called her. He doesn't really want anyone to know why he can't, he just wants to see her. I know he misses her, but he is really pushing this, not for Penelope's sake, for his own. I told her, if she thinks Penelope is ready, then I will deal with it. But if she is doing this because George is putting the pressure on, then I don't want it to happen. I know that is the case, because the prior two sessions she said it was good that my dad was able to hold him off. But she denies it. I don't trust her anymore.
It's been a rough few days trying to keep myself together. Thursday after therapy and the big news, I ordered Penelope a pizza for dinner so I wouldn't have to cook (Thursdays are late nights anyway because of the far drive to and from therapy) and I went to bed with a throbbing migraine. Friday should be better since I had scheduled Penelope to go to the pool with her good friend Jackie and my mom for the day. My mom was picking her up at 11am. But my mom needed me to relieve her at 4:00 because she had an appointment at 5:00. That gave me a few hours of doing chores around the house. At 2:00 she calls me and tells me "Don't be late!" I said "Great mom, you've had her for 3 hours and want to be relieved while I've been with her for 2 weeks straight... thanks" She just laughed and said "I can't help it, she is driving me crazy" and went on to tell me all the annoying things she had been doing at the pool. But she handles the situations all wrong. She yells, and warns, and promotes the behavior by doing so. I knew by the conversation that Penelope being around my mom wasn't healthy so I hurried up and went to relieve her. By the time I got there, everyone seemed ready to leave, which was fine. Before my mom left, she invited us to come for dinner after we were done driving Jackie home. I told her I would think about it and call her... I wasn't happy with her renewed oblivion to my need for a break and Penelope's needs when it came to healthy parenting. But I told Penelope about it, and she always jumps at the chance at seeing he Papaw. So I tried to call her but was only able to leave messages. We went to their house about an hour later. No one was home. Shortly later, she called back and said that my dad was going to be home soon but she had dinner plans (not with us anymore) and we should stick around for dad. I felt bad just being there without him even knowing that she was planning us to have dinner with him. I'm sure he wouldn't mind but at the same time, she just ditched us. Ugh, she is such a pain! So we went and waited on the back porch for him to get home. (Okay, just got about a 10 min. snuggle time break with one of the cats while I'm blogging..) When my dad got home, I told him what happened. He said "We can go to dinner too!" Penelope wanted to go to the restaurant about a mile away. It's the only decent sit down restaurant within 10 miles. So we go over there. While we were at the hostess' stand, Penelope spots Grandma. At the same time, my dad spots George sitting near her and immediately grabs Penelope and says "Let's go eat somewhere else." I saw it around that time too and we hurried to leave. Penelope bucked and was very upset about leaving. My dad, not knowing what else to say "We don't want to eat were Grandma's eating. We are mad at Grandma..." Penelope likes the idea of being mad at Grandma so she let up a little bit. But she really had her heart set on eating there. Something about corndogs. My dad started throwing out names of places that we typically would never go but Penelope would like. I think if she would like eating at a 5 star restaurant, he was ready to take her there. So we drove into town and went to some buffet restaurant that serves mediocre food but it made Penelope happy. Of course, when we got back to the house, when Penelope was not in the room, my dad and I asked her why she didn't tell us or at least go eat somewhere not so nearby. She got defensive and claimed she tried to call.. But she could have told me when I was talking to her but that would have been to easy I guess. Okay.. went on too long about my mom again. But I guess I'm just trying to point out how she just doesn't see, or is refusing to see how hard this all is for me, and making my life more difficult. She knows that this all is going down with George seeing Penelope and how I'm not okay with it. But she is so happy for her son...
Monday, she calls me about something.. I can't remember. She is telling me about her dinner that Friday with George and his friend. The dinner was work related. George had met a guy who works in the same industry as my mom and was needing leads and wanted to partner up with her. Of course, it was work related. Anyway, she tells me how when Penelope used my phone to call her when we got to her house, that George started to tear up. To explain it to his friend, he told him that his daughter lives with me and he hasn't seen her in a long time. My mom says "You'd be surprised how he was though. He was honest with his friend about why!" I was immediately suspicious. "Really.." She tells me that he told his friend that Penelope has this problem where she treats him like a boyfriend than a dad and he has to act a certain way around her. I said "That's it? That's not it. That's the problem. He sees it as Penelope's problem. Something she has to deal with that he has to put up with. He won't admit that he has caused it through the way he has parented her.. that he promotes this mentality and behavior for his own selfish needs." I explained to her, again, that he has fed on her insecurities from her mother's abuse and abandonment, by putting her in the role of his psuedo wife through their "snuggle time" that consisted of them sleeping in the same bed together for 6 years until she was 8, telling her his adult life problems, telling her how she is the only thing that can make him happy, making her cook and clean for him - the best a toddler can do, but when it wasn't good enough or she didn't follow directions well enough, he yelled and screamed at her and spank her when he felt the need to. But then when something better came along, friends, a social life.. she was left with whomever was willing to take care of her. She was left with other people more than she was at home. One of those environments led to her sexual abuse. He also left her with her mother, even though he wasn't suppose to via the visitation rights (supervised) in the unhealthy environment where she was taken by her mother and secret boyfriend to a waffle house where her husband showed up and had an altercation with her. But since her mother wasn't suppose to leave and take her anywhere, it wasn't his fault. But Penelope was so scared of him leaving her that it killed her self-esteem. When it was the two of them - it was the two of them, but as soon as anyone else, or something else came up, his attention totally disappeared. He would wait until she would go to sleep and then he would leave to go out "nearby" he claimed. But when a 4 year old with PTSD because of abuse and her mother's abandonment, wakes up from one her regular nightmares and goes looking for you and the house is empty, what do you expect? No wonder she insisted on sleeping in his bed, to keep an eye on him. So no, he didn't not tell the truth, or the whole truth at least. He wouldn't."
After my rant, she was apalled and said "Have you ever told George this?" I said, "Yes!....Yes! Of course I have. But I'm just some stupid female that is trying to steal his daughter from him.. that is brainwashing her. He doesn't care. He doesn't see his actions being harmful. He feels as her father he can't do anything wrong. She is his and all she needs is him. Anything he may have done wrong was because someone else wronged him or whatever." She tells me that I should have a meeting with him and my dad so that he hears this. I told her that he has heard it, from me, from Penelope's therapists. That was why he was suppose to meet with them a few weeks ago.. But then he did try to preoccupy the meeting by talking about how I wronged him by going through his old cell phone he gave Molly and reading his one email. My mom then started to tell me how I was wrong in doing that.. that it was violating his privacy. That really pissed me off. When did that come about? I said "When did you change your mind about that? I thought you understood why I did it? (prior post) She said "You should have just deleted the pictures and not opened the messages." I said "How am I suppose to know what he really thinks or does if I don't investigate? He lies so much, I never know what is true.. I have to protect Penelope..." She says "You can't protect Penelope from everything.. you can't protect her from her father. It's not your place. You are too obsessed with this." What? WHAT??? This woman is crazy! I was so mad. She is in such denial herself. She just can't handle it. I can't stand it. I told her "I can't talk to you about this anymore. You don't understand and I don't have the strength to explain it to you. I have to go." I swear, I'm so sick of her defending him.
She called back later and tried to smooth things over. But I've made a point to not talk to her about George. No more. It only makes me more depressed. Severely.
I went over my parent's this past evening, to go over "the rules" for the visit with my dad. The therapist had told my dad that she would write down the rules for him and send them with me but she didn't. So I wrote down what I remembered her saying, and some things that were important to me. My dad wanted me to stick around until after his Tuesday night golf thing because he wanted to talk about George's workers' comp claim. I've been helping him manage it since February - which for the things mentioned above, have been growing more and more difficult. George has a doctor's appointment on Thursday and a hearing coming up. He wants me to go to the doctor's appointment, because George keeps "forgetting" to discuss certain important things for his up coming hearing with him. I said I'd go, not that I want to see him. I'm only helping him for my dad's sake, because he is supporting George and if George get's cut off of his comp, it's going to get really bad financially. My mom had shown up while he was gone and we ate dinner.
A little later, my other brother showed up to pick up something he left there earlier. Penelope was outside with my dad and my brother told my mom and I how George had called him about an hour earlier. He wanted a favor from him.. but during the conversation he started trying to get him to "side with him" about how unfair it is that he can't see his daughter and he wants to know why he is being punished when he didn't do anything. George told him that I turned Penelope's therapists againt him and that I'm brainwashing Penelope into hating him. I said "When did you talk to him? He knows he is going to see her tomorrow." He said "Just a little bit ago, he knows that I know, but it's not enough. He doesn't understand why it has to be for such a short time and why there has to be all these rules etc." I was amazed. Instead of being happy about seeing her, he is still on his manipulative rampage of trying to convert anyone he can talk to into being his follower. I said "Yes, I'm brainwashing Penelope. I'm trying to plant bad memories into her brain so she hates herself and is sad and in pain, just to hurt him... yes, that's what I want." And I'm suppose to help him? I had to leave at that point, I was starting to feel sick again, getting a migraine. When I left, my dad was on his lawn mower. I told him what happened. I said "It makes it really hard to want to help him. I will of course, but ..." He understood. It will take all my strength to see him on Thursday if I still end up going to his doctor's. I'm sure my dad is going to tear him a new hole about it. Sabatoging his only free help to keep his income right now. Good.
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