August 7, 2026 - Bringing It On Himself

On September 19, 2025,--while the divorce was still pending--Typhon was ordered to pay $3,198 per month (starting on October 1st) in interim child support. Unsurprisingly, Typhon didn't pay a cent of it.

I filed a Petition for a Rule to Show Cause, which is basically a motion asking the judge to find the other party in contempt of a judicial order, in December 2025, on the basis that Typhon hadn't been paying his child support. The scheduling hearing for the Rule to Show Cause was held in January but, because our final divorce hearing was already scheduled for March 31-April 1, the judge decided that the Petition for the Rule to Show Cause would be addressed at the divorce trial.

Typhon and I ended up entering into a divorce settlement agreement rather than having a full blown divorce trial. I received some favorable terms in the divorce, but there are other things I'm not so happy about. Nonetheless, I decided that, in the long run, giving up some of the money to which I was entitled was worth it if I didn't have to relive the decade plus of abuse that Typhon put me through, which I would have had to do to explain to the judge why I should be awarded what I was seeking.

As part of that Marital Settlement Agreement, Typhon admitted that he owed $16,332 in child support arrears as of the date of the agreement (Mrach 29, 2026). He agreed to pay me $10,000 of that arrears as a lump sum payment within 5 business days of when he recieved the back pay owed to him as a result of the furlough that was affecting DHS at that time. The remaining $6,332 would be paid at a rate of $250 a month until it was paid in full. We also agreed to lower Typhon's monthly support obligation to $2,722. The Marital Settlement Agreement was incorporated into our Final Divorce Order, and the Petition for the Rule to Show Cause was Dismissed.

The DHS furloughed employees, or at least the ones working in the department where Typhon works, returned to work on their next regularly scheduled work day after Friday, April 10. 2026. All DHS employees (except for TSA employees who recieved their back pay slightly earlier) had their back pay hit their bank accounts on either Friday, April 10 or Monday. April 13.

At the latest, therefore, Typhon should have paid me the $10,000 in child support arrears that he owed no layer than Monday, April 20, 2026. Needless to say, Typhon did not pay me $10,000 bu that date.

On April 26, 2026, Typhon made his last trip to our former marital residence to retrieve the remainder of his personal property that was left in my garage. Before he left, he dumped a bag of money in the middle of the garage, allegedly as fulfillment of his arrearages.

There were some bills, but the vast majority of what was in the bag was coins. Not only that, but they seemed to be soaked in something - gasoline, WD-40, PB B'laster Penetrant, or maybe something else. I have no idea what, but it smelled something like that. I wore gloves the entire time I rolled the coins, just in case.

Although Typhon claimed there was $3,369.13 in cash in the bag, there was actually only $2,081.81. Other than that, Typhon tried to fulfill his arrears obligation by unilaterally taking deductions for alleged damage to his personal property or alleged missing personal property. That's not only not allowed under the law, but I didn't cause the damage he claimed or withhold any of his property from him.

I repeatedly tried, through Atticus, to ask Typhon to pay both his monthly child support obligation and his arrearages. He steadfastly refused. Because my monthly budget is dependent on getting that money from him, I've been operating at a $2,700 loss every month. My paycheck is gone within a day or two of being paid, since I've got a stack of overdue bills waiting to be paid. I haven't been able to spend anything extra on the kids and, even when they really need something like new shoes, I find myself in a position of having to say "As soon as I get my next paycheck." Even if Typhon wanted to punish me, he shouldn't be putting his children in this situation.

I finally had enough, and I filed another Petition for a Rule to Show Cause on July 17, 2026. The hearing on the petition was finally held on August 7, 2026 before Judge F of the Loudoun County Circuit Court.

Before I get into the hearing itself, there are two things I want to note. First, Typhon subpoenaed our oldest daughter, Ursula, as a witness for this hearing. Why, you may ask? I have no clue. The issues were: (1) was he supposed to pay? and (2) did he pay? I don't know what he thought Ursula could add to that discussion. He didn't need to drag her to court. And, in fact, she didn't end up even entering the courtroom that day.

Second, Judge F is an excellent judge, but he is not someone I would want to get on the bad side of. He is fair and let's both sides say what they want to say to an extent, but he also tries to keep his hearings focused on the actual issue presented to him. And Judge F has a rather low tolerance for being disrespected. He will forgive it once, maybe twice, but he definitely will not let it continue.

With that background out of the way, let's return the story to the hearing itself. I showed up early with Ursula because, again, Typhon has (ridiculously) subpoenaed her for the hearing. Our courthouse changed its rules on July 1st, and now everyone can bring their cellphones inside the courthouse (but you still can't have them on inside the courtrooms themselves). I let Ursula bring her phone to entertain herself during the hearing, but I also made her bring her headphones so she didn't bother anyone with whatever she was listening to.

Typhon was already there when we arrived, so I encouraged Urusla to go say hello to her father. She sees me all the time; she may as well spend some time with him even of the circumstances are less than ideal. Plus Atticus showed up a few minutes later, and that gave us a chance to talk over last minute things outside of her presence.

When it was time to go inside the courtroom, we left Ursula sitting on the bench right outside the courtroom doors. Luckily the Circuit Court isn't busy, so I wasn't too worried about her being out there alone. Given our track record with Typhon at the courthouse, both Atticus and I had an additional courthouse deputy in the courtroom with us as our personal security detail. Adding the court bailiff, that means there were 3 Sheriff's deputies in the courtroom during our hearing.

Since it was my petition, I went first. Atticus started with a short opening statement. Typhon kept snorting during it, then trying to cover it up by pretending he had a cough or something stuck in his throat. But the case ahead of us went long and, by the time our case was called, we had been sitting in the gallery in front of Judge F for about 1.5 hours and Typhon hadn't made a sound before now. It was obvious to everyone what he was doing.

As of the date of the hearing, Typhon now owed something like $21,000. I don't remember the exact amounts, and I don't have the numbers in front of me. This amount does not include the $6,332 that would be spread over monthly payments. Rather, it only included that $10,000 lump sum he was supposed to pay me under the Marital Settlement Agreement and the child support payments he failed to make in April, May, June, and July of 2026.

The Marital Settlement Agreement also contains a provision that says if a party has to bring a motion to enforce any part of the agreement and wins, the other party has to pay the winning party's attorneys' fees. Thus, I also asked for approximately $6,000 in fees incurred by Atticus.

After Atticus' opening statement, I was time for my direct examination. Atticus basically went through all of the facts I described above with me, but smit was really quick. Typhon huffed through a lot of my answers because he never could contain himself.

Importantly, towards the end of my direct examination, Atticus asked me if I was aware that jail time could be a penalty for civil contempt. I said that yes, it had been explained to me that jail time was a possible penalty. Atticus then asked me if that was what I was asking the court for. I had been looking at Atticus or down at the podium (at the documents in front of me) for a lot of my answers, but for this one I turned and made direct eye contact with Judge F. Only then did I say, "No. I am asking that he be given 2 or 3 weeks first to pay. I don't want him to go to jail. I just want the money he owes me."

Atticus asked another question after that, but I honestly can't remember what it was. All I remember was that Typhon, who was representing himself, objected to it. Instead of saying why he objected, though, he started going off about how the documents show how Atticus was lying, etc. Judge F cut him off, telling Typhon that he would have a chance to testify but this wasn't it.

When my direct examination was over, Typhon had the opportunity to cross-examine me. As an attorney myself, I knew this would be the case ahead of time, and this was the part of the hearing I was the most anxious about. Typhon started by asking me if one of the documents --I don't remember which one, but most likely the Marital Settlement Agreement -- stated something in one of its provisions. I think it was the amount of his monthly support obligation. I read the document and said yes. He then asked me how much I had told the court my child care cost was during the hearing for interim child support. Atticus objected on the grounds of relevance, and Judge F asked Typhon to explain because he also didn't see how that was relevant to the issue of this hearing.

Typhon proceeded to make a long winded explanation about how he was going to try to show that both Atticus and I were liars, we lied about everything, that I haven't complied with a single provision of the Child Custody Agreement or the Marital Settlement Agreement, that I allegedly said something like "I didn't lie, I just onitted", and other such nonsense. Of course, none of that is true. On the contrary, it's pure projection of his own actions onto me.

Anyway, Judge F eventually cut Typhon off and sustained Atticus' objection. He tried to explain to Typhon that the Petition for the Rule to Show Cause sets the scope of the hearing and that he refused to relitigate issues that had previously been decided by the court. Typhon, though, refused to listen. He kept trying to ask me the same question, Atticus kept objecting, and Judge F kept sustaining the objection. Eventually, Judge F told me to sit down and asked Typhon if he had anything he wanted to testify about.

Typhon has never been one to pass up an opportunity to talk, so of course he testified. It was almost incomprehensible though. A lot of it was just the same rant about how both Atticus and I are liars, the judge shouldn't believe anything we say, I don't abide by any of the court orders, etc. There were a few actual defenses in there though. For example, Typhon claimed he sent checks totalling $10,000 to Atticus' law office over the summer. That was the first either Atticus or I had heard about anything like that though, and Typhon didn't present any evidence of written checks, proof of mailing or delivery, proof of checks being cashed, etc.

Judge F tried to interrupt Typhon a few times during his tirade, but Typhon didn't stop easily. Towards the end of Typhon's "testimony," Typhon finally said something about being prepared to write a check for $5,000 or something like that right then and there. He was still talking, but Judge F said over him that he should wait because he was going to owe $21,000 more than that. During this whole process, Typhon's voice also steadily started rising as his "testimony" continued. He wasn't a full fledge yell by the end, but he was close. With difficulty, the judge and the bailiff got Typhon to stop talking so that Judge F could issue his ruling.

Judge F determined that Atticus had presented a solid case on my behalf, and Typhon had failed to rebut the evidence of failure to pay with any concrete evidence of payment. Therefore, he was ordered to pay the whole approximately $27,000. Not only that, but I think Judge F was fed up with Typhon's attitude during the hearing because he immediately remanded him to jail until the full arrears amount had been paid.

Needless to say, Typhon did not take this well. I noticed that Judge F left the bench almost immediately after issuing his ruling. The bailiff approached Typhon to get him to collect his things, but Typhon started throwing a fit. The two deputies who had been sitting in the back of the room the entire hearing, ready to be my and Atticus' security escorts out of the courthouse once the hearing ended, moved forward to help the bailiff. As Atticus and I hurriedly gathered our things, I saw the bailiff call into his walkie talkie for additional backup. The bailiff then came over and asked Atticus and I to leave more quickly. Atticus left the proposed order for Judge F to sign on the plaintiff's table for the bailiff to deal with later, and we left the courtroom. The last thing I saw as I left was Typhon being all but drug to the chairs lining the wall where defendants wait for the officers who will take them into custody. I also heard him say something about his dog, who was in a crate at home.

I was already starting to be in tears as a result of Judge Foster ruling -- I honestly never wanted Typhon to end up in jail. He's still the father of my children, after all. But that last comment about his dog sent me over the edge. The poor dog was innocent after all. He didn't deserve to suffer because of Typhon's bad decisions. By the time I took the last few steps out to where Ursula was sitting, I was a wreck. Not bawling but the stray tear was definitely rolling down my cheek.

I told Ursula what happened, and her first instinct was to go to her father. I, of course, immediately stopped her. She didn't need to see him like that. Especially when he was resisting being remanded into custody. Plus, while we had been talking, 2 or 3 more deputies had entered the courtroom to help subdue Typhon, at least one of which was in the black uniform of a "regular" Sheriff's deputy rather than the brown uniform of the Sheriff's deputies assigned to the courts.

I asked Ursula if she had the contact information for J, the one friend of Typhon's down at his house that I know of (and who I'm about 75% sure he's sleeping with, but whatever). Ursula did, so I told Ursula that rather than going in and seeing her father in that state, she should contact J about going and getting Typhon's dog from Typhon's house. That would be a concrete way that she could help her father right now.

I think Ursula appreciated being given a task so she didn't feel as helpless in this situation. As the days have progressed, Ursula has stayed in contact with J (who did in fact get Typhon's dog and take him to her house), Typhon's father, and Typhon's twin brother (who I'm shocked is involved because the brothers hate each other so much they can't even stand to be on the same coast). Ursula was still understandably upset over the outcome of the hearing though. She wouldn't talk to me that night, but I managed to talk to her a little over the following weekend. She doesn't blame me at all for what happened, which actually shocks me a little. Rather, she told me that she recognizes that Typhon brought this on himself through his decision not to pay child supprt in the first place and then his attitude and behavior in the courtroom. She has a lot she needs to work through on this.

The other three children, on the other hand, were almost happy when they found out what happened. They found it hilarious, and have been cracking jokes about it. After some of the recent events, our oldest son in particular is still pretty bitter, and he's trying to figure out how to make fun of his father for this after Typhon is released. I just keep asking Peter if that's really such a good idea and telling him to really think through it before he does anything.

As of when I'm writing this, Typhon has been in jail for six days (not counting that first Friday night). His father supposedly wired the money right away, so I don't understand what's taking so long. But I'm terrified of what Typhon is going to do when he is finally released. He has been incarcerated for almost a week with nothing to do but to think about how he's going to get revenge on me since, obviously, this is all my fault (in his mind). I'm trying to hide this fear from the kids, and I think I've been doing an okay job so far. Atticus showed me this app (Vine Link) that let's you look up offenders anywhere in the country, and you can sign up to recieve notifications when their custody status changes. I don't know how quickly it updates, but I'm hoping it gives me some sort of heads up at least. I'm also hoping that, at this point, he isn't released until Monday so that the kids will be safely at school if he comes to the house to try coming after me after he's released.

I guess we'll just have to see how this all plays out...