Authored by Zahira Valdez

She was so cruel to me.

The way she would put me down and judge me. Every little thing I did was “bad,” and she loved spotlighting it and amplifying it in court.

She loved having her children come into my home and poke me with her words, judgments, lies, and put-downs.

For eight years of my life, I was told by this woman that I was a bad mom and unfit to be around. I was told by her kids that my newborn baby wasn’t their real sister and that my daughter from a previous marriage was a bad kid. I was told, under my own roof, that I was an embarrassment, weird, and hated.

Eight years.

In my own home. In court documents. With children involved.

I wasn’t perfect, but did I deserve that treatment? I’ll never know.

Did I deserve to be shoved by her when her child approached me first and started talking to me? She pushed me and said never to speak to her kids. She told the court I made her kids uncomfortable and that I couldn’t be around them.

How did she get away with involving the kids for eight years?

And why? Because I was dating her ex-husband? Because I married him and formed a family?

After eight years, I stopped being so kind and accommodating. Through all eight years, she was unwilling to co-parent with my husband or allow her children to be a part of a blended family under the guise of protecting her children. Yet after ten years, my biological daughters have been doing well all along, so was I really that bad of a mom?

Sometimes I wonder, though, what her kids are going through now. We don’t see them anymore. My kids and I were forced out of her daughters’ lives while, at the same time, their relationship with their father was disrupted.

I’ve moved on, and honestly, I am in an amazing place with my husband, my children, and in my home. Which leaves me with one question: Who was the problem all along?

Maybe I should have just sided with her and said, “You’re right. We shouldn’t be around your daughters.”

I’m genuinely happier than I have ever been, and I hope she is too.

I hope they know we miss them…But we’ll never miss her.