So Michelle, of course you know I'm so excited to have
you on the Harvey Law Speaks Podcast.
And this is my first live interview.
So, I've done interviews with people over the phone.
And we've done like conference calls. But when you
said you wanted to come to the studio...
"Studio"
*both laugh*
I was so excited, because anyway, you know of course you're my friend.
So, there was just... I know we have a natural chemistry
So I'm really excited about what's going to come out of this interview.
So before I even get ahead. Tell me and my listeners a little more about yourself.
Okay. So my name is Michelle Chime.
And I am a fourth grade teacher.
I've lived in Chicago for... fourteen years now? I think.
I am originally from Fort Wayne, Indiana.
I love to cook and make jewelry and have people over.
I'm really social in general.
But, that's when I'm not teaching; which takes up a lot of my time.
You are seriously one of the best cooks I know.
Which, after this interview, I have to tell you some of the stuff that I've been working on.
So, I wanted to have you on the podcast, because, we met...
You said you've been in Chicago for fourteen years.
I've been in Chicago, I guess twelve years. I was just doing the math the other day.
And I realize that I probably met you a year or two of me being here.
But one of the things I've always known about you, not that you kept it a secret,
Was just the fact that your parents divorced.
And I-I've never met your mom but I feel like I've met her.
And the same thing with your dad because they are so much a part of your life.
Um, just like you said, you like having people over.
And I see all this work of stuff that your dad does.
But I knew two things: one, that your parents divorced,
but I also knew that you have a great relationship with both of them.
Right.
So, I thought that I wanted to hear more about that.
And I thought that just in the stories and the things that you've described,
It would be helpful for people who are going through a divorce
or who are contemplating a divorce to hear from the child of a divorce
but from an adult who experienced it as a child.
So, you know what I mean?
Yeah.
So I really just want to talk about like your thought process at that time
versus now and your effect or whatever.
So, we talked about it off camera, but tell me about how your parents feel about you having this conversation.
They are totally okay with it.
I called both of them after we talked because
I felt like I owed them that. Since it's their story and their history.
So I asked them if it was cool and both of them wrote: Yeah! No problem.
Then I asked them both if there was anything I shouldn't say and they were both like
No! Say whatever.
Oh, awesome.
So, full permission to do whatever.
Okay, full conversation.
*Michelle laughs*
So tell me, how old were you when your parents got divorced?
So, I was uh six when they actually got divorced.
Mhm.
Um, I think there was some conversation about that before hand.
I think I was six when they finalized it or when they told us, I'm not sure.
I don't remember.
Ok.
I don't have any real memories before I was eight.
Wow.
Which, I don't know, I'm sure a therapist would say there was some trauma.
*Andrea laughs*
Right.
I don't feel traumatized.
But I don't... I don't have any real--
I don't remember my parents being married.
I don't remember them living together.
Mhm.
Um... at all.
So, I, my sister would've been--
If I was six, she would've been nine.
And my dad thinks it was on my sixth birthday.
Really? When it was finalized, or that they told you--
That they told you that: we're getting divorced,
or they told you--
That they were getting divorced.
Um, I asked them if they had been like--
How long the conversation had been before that point
and neither one of them could really pinpoint, um a time.
And I also asked like, how I reacted.
'Cuz I don't remember. And my mom thought that I got sick.
She was like, I'm pretty sure you got sick. Which is really what I always do when things get stressful.
Mhm.
Umm, and she remembered that there were some like
behavior issues at school and some little, like, things
even though they tried to be as transparent and open
and have as many conversations as possible.
Okay.
And I asked my sister what she remembered and she said,
Just that she remembered sitting down on a couch somewhere
and them talking to us both about how, uh, they loved us both.
And, la-dee-da.
But I guess there was a lot of like ground work before that point.
That I wasn't really aware of.
Right, because you were so young, so, it was--
the level of conversation could only be what a six year old could really understand.
So, okay, your parents are divorced. You don't have
memories before you're eight.
No.
Do you kind of recall maybe the difference between your parents
who are divorced versus like your friends' parents or your classmates whose parents were married,
and kind of, married and living together, I'll say.
And you really noticing that.
Yeah.
So I think that when you're a kid, you see everything through your own perspective, right?
Mhm.
And you just assume that everyone around you is exactly like that.
I see that in my classroom, even. Where the kids like, they think that because they understand something
in a specific way mean that every kid in the classroom has that same experience.
Right.
And so, I remember-- I remember always being aware of it
because my parents' custody arrangement was unique.
Which I'll come right back to that.
Okay.
But I remember becoming more aware of it. Uhhh, when I was
I was would like between eight and ten because my dad got remarried.
Uhh, somewhere around there.
I think I was maybe nine when he got remarried.
Uhhhm--
You had memories then.
Yeah, so I remember all of like, becoming more aware of like
how other peoples' families dealt with that.
So, uhhhm,
I feel like you can't really understand my story without understanding my parents' custody arrangement.
Right, okay so tell me about that.
Okay. Go there?
So, I-I asked both my parents how they arrived at it. And they told me the exact same story
My dad said they thought they started with--
Or my mom said she'd thought they started with traditional custody arrangement.
Mhm.
When I asked my dad about it he laughed and he was like: Oh, she remembers that?
*both laugh*
He says that he asked her how she saw a custody arrangement working and she said uh,
You know well I would have custody of the kids and you could see them, you know, on the weekends
Right.
And my dad was like: Oh, that's funny.
Because I think I could have custody of the kids and you could see them on the weekends.
Mmm, and they had the same exact story.
And I, and I want to point out.
I will let you get to you story, but
you know, when we hear the "traditional" that's what you hear.
You know, mom has the children and then on the weekends
it's Friday to Sunday, or Friday to Monday drop-off.
And there may be a night for dinner after school.
So that is, for our purposes we'll call it traditional.
But I know exactly what you mean, yeah.
And so my dad said that, he says to my mom's credit
she saw that as a starting place he knows that at that point in time
it would've been 1988?
Mhm.
Basically she could've had whatever she wanted.
Oh yeah.
The courts would have ruled in her favor, like... You know whatever.
But, to her credit she didn't do that.
And mom says, she remembers my dad saying: I'm not losing custody of my children.
I want my children.
Mhm.
And then they both agreed that they weren't gonna mess us up.
And that was our starting point.
So I guess they went to some counselors, uh, I guess two different counselors.
And then, they read some books.
They had different names of books.
I wrote them down, but one was uh Mom's House, Dad's House.
That's what my dad thought it was called.
But they don't agree on what the book was called, but they read some books.
*both laugh*
I'll look-- I'll look it up and see if I can put it in the show notes.
It'll be interesting to see like a 1980's 90's book like
translate to 2019
Yeah, yeah.
But, okay.
So they ended up with this like, joint custody arrangement.
Where uh, we spent a week at one house, a week at the other.
Mhm.
And we always switched houses on Tuesday's, which was really intentional. .
They didn't want there to be a big show of transferring parents.
They didn't want to like drop us off or make a big deal out of switching houses.
So, one parent would drop us off at school in the morning and a different parent would pick us up in the evening.
Mmmm.
School was the buffer in between.
Which is a natural thing to do anyway.
Exactly.
Okay.
And they stayed-- they, my parents, my whole life even now have come to the same church.
Mhm.
So we would see both parents on Sunday's.
Wow.
And then on Tuesday's we would always switch.
And in the beginning, they were super strict.
They had this whole schedule about holidays. They would alternate important holidays.
Right.
They would count the days.
Right. People do that!
It was very strict. Like, I remember they had um,
Brown paper bags. All of our clothing was labeled. It had an "M" or a "D" on the tag.
We had to of everything important. Two bikes, two rollerblades.
Two-- anything that could be seen as having more at one house than the other,
they made sure we had two of.
Okay.
We'd always have one at each house.
But the clothing and stuff always got labeled "M" and "D".
So when they dropped us off, we had a daycare we went to in the morning.
And the other parent picked us up in the afternoon. 'Cuz my parents are both teachers.
Mhm.
They were busy as well.
Um, they would leave a brown paper bag. And you know, it had the clothes that had come from the other house
Wow.
And always had um, my dad said he got them at Sam's Club, like a--
A tricolor, like those carbon copy things?
Mhm.
They would write down any expenses that were mutual expenses.
Doctor's offices, field trips, whatever it was.
And they would just write down what they paid, so what the other parent owed.
And they think they would even--
I don't know how frequently they evened it out.
But they were very like, organized and methodical about it.
Mhm.
At the beginning.
Right, right.
So everything was counted and everybody got exactly the same number of days.
I didn't know that at the time.
Right, of course.
All I knew was a brown paper bag was always there.
*Andrea laughs*
And the same would happen at church sometimes.
They would leave a bag for the other one.
Right.
So it doesn't sound like they really communicated.
They were more like, exchanging information.
Yeah, I think they communicated like on the side.
Mhm.
Between themselves.
But I think, at the beginning especially,
You know, there were all these hurt feelings and--
Right
Every-- I think they were trying the best they could to
Do right by us?
But of course, they had their own like adult feelings.
Yeah.
Now that I think about what that must've-- I mean they were married for
Almost twenty years?
Oh that's what--
Oh, that's what I was gonna ask you. How long first, before when you were six, so they had been married for like...
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