I will not make any other comment to this. I hope Maxx will explain the other side and the discussion with Bodine. I feel all who have read his story and had doubts because of it deserves to know what is real.
If this is in error I apologize to Maxx. However at the moment I do not because he did not dispute it before.
I hope the truth is brought forward. I hope you will give the full story.
Back when you read my go around with Bodine a lot was said that I regret to have said to him. Perhaps he feels the same way. As things have cooled off between us we have patched up our quarrel. I know I have publically complimented him since then for being a good husband and that he has kept himself in shape for himself and for his wife. He's a good example of what a good husband should be. We have exchanged a number of friendly PMs since then. I just sent one out to him a day ago. I genuinely like this man. Good guy.
In regard to some of the things said and my giving the whole story. I have not made my whole story known for two reasons.
First reason was that I didn't want men who could learn lessons from my tragedy to dismiss it. I didn't want men to say "I would never do that" or "Those aren't my circumstances".
The second reason is with giving the details of my life there is the temptation by some knowingly or unknowingly to sum me up into a quick sound bite. Maybe make a joke about me or make me into a joke. So I have not given up as much detail on my life for that reason. I didn't want to become a stereotype that could be easily dismissed. The first and second reasons are essentially the same now that I think about it.
A friend of mine Howard, who is married to a Russian women said to me, "Why put yourself up on the operating table to be dissected?!"
Well Raven9273 I'll hop up on the table and give the details of my life for the last time.
I started the business I am at today, 20 years ago. It has earned me a good income over the years. In the mid nineties my ex-wife and I built a house on 1.89 acres of lakeshore property. We lived there with our two daughters.
About that time I had a "crisis of conscience"
http://www.freeminds.org/doctrine/publications/crisis-of-conscience-the-book-that-opened-the-window-on-the-watchtower-society.htmlAfter I left the Witnesses I was disfellowshipped by them for being an apostate. This put me at odds with my family and with my ex-wife
who wanted to stay with the Jehovah's Witnesses. The marriage fell apart. The rest of my family was divided about how to treat me. Some
of them like my brother and sister who were never Jehovah's Witnesses would associate with me. The rest would not speak with me. The
exception is my mother. She and I see each other often. She does feel a bit of conscience in doing so and has said to me "I will have to
answer to Jehovah for this". Again my fault as she and the Witnesses see it is that I no longer accept the teachings of Jehovah's Witnesses.
My father by the way passed away a few years before I was shunned by the "one true religion". Can anyone relate to this?
The divorce was long and expensive. It lasted almost 2 years. The settlement was that I was to pay child support for my daughter in high
school until she graduated, $1,636 a month. And $2200 a month in spousal support, for life. That is $3,836 a month total. In addition I was
to pay off all of my ex-wife's debts, lawyer costs and divide the lake home's equity after the sale after my daughter graduated from high school.
I had gotten behind in my taxes from this. Didn't make the quarterly estimates but the IRS didn't mind as I would send them a lump sum for
the whole year. Usually around $30K . I think I was called a tax cheat by someone on the boards but believe me I wrote those big checks.
Anyway on a trip to visit my sister I heard on talk radio about what great wives Russian women make. I was intrigued by this and did
a word search "Russian Women Marriage" when I got back to the office. This it lead me to an Angelika website. I fell for one picture of
a Russian woman age 39. I was 47. I started writing her. I visited her twice but to be frank she had severe mental issues. Reality to her
was what she imagined.
I decided to try again. This led me to my future ex-wife. I went to visit her. It was a WOVO all the way. I was much too monogamous to
consider writing to multiple women. I felt strongly about hurting their feelings if I did.
I am probably the only guy on these forums who has been proposed to by a Russian man. The agency owner Alex suggested at the airport
that I could marry Elena (nickname by me, Elvira) and do a direct consular filing at the American Embassy. All I had to do was get married
there. Elena gave me a big smile and said "I like!" A couple visits later we got married at ZAGs. About that time the US Moscow embassy did
away with direct consular filings.
Over the next year while the K-3 and K-4 visas (she had a son) were processing I visited her 3 more times. I must have spent about 3 months living in Russia.
I spent a lot of time explaining to Elena what life was like in America. I also explained in detail about my life financial and otherwise. I showed
her photos of the home I jointly owned with my ex-wife. I explained how it was going to be sold the next year. And how the equity I was going to
get was going to go to purchase a new home that we could choose together. She was an economist so she grasped the numbers easily.
During that time of the visa wait I was living at my office. I have about 250 square feet of office space, two rooms and I work alone so why waste money on renting an apartment? I used the money saved to purchase furniture, appliances etc for when Elena arrived. I had room in the back in the warehouse where I
stored the stuff. I was really looking forward to having family again that I could go home to after work. But in the meantime prepare.
The embassy interview finally came. The woman CO was impressed that I visited my wife 6 times. My wife turned in my tax returns plus the affidavit of support. It showed I had an income of about $110K minus the spousal support of $26K. Living in Minneapolis, Minnesota is rather low cost compared to California or New York.
When she arrived March 15th, 2003 she stayed the night in a Super 8 Motel. The next day after getting a good rest. I showed her some apartments we could rent. The one she liked had two bedrooms, two baths, a walk in closet and a living room with vaulted ceilings. What stunned her about the place was that it had an indoor pool and sauna down the hall and down a flight of steps. There were outdoor pools also but this was March in Minnesota.
She had been acting strange from the time she stepped off the plane. I felt she had been influenced by someone in Russia right before she left. Her being a GCG crossed my mind but it was too horrible to think about. So what I did was get everything she wanted. I was hoping she only felt insecure and that I could alleviate that getting her what she wanted. What was on her mind was to get all the documentation for her legal immigration. So I took her to the BCIS (As the USCIS was then called) and did all her AOS. We did her son's documents a few days later. Both of them got their work authorisation cards then. With that we were able to get her and her son their social security cards. So she had her I-130 relative petition filed and gotten her work authorisation card within a few weeks of her arrival. She got her SS card on May 13th (2 months after her arrival) and with that she was able to get her learners permit to drive that very same day. She had already taken the written test and had passed. She really hit the ground running getting all her documents so fast.
I hope that answers your questions.
I am editing additional information below now that I have had time to think over what I wrote above.I had no business going to the FSU looking for a wife. The reasons were that I little experience with women. I had only one all those 27 years of marriage, my first ex-wife. I had a strong "wife need" when my marriage ended. My thinking at the time was not about determining whether a woman was sincere or not but rather to show her what a good husband I could be. At the same time I was in internal anxiety as I still was paying child support of $1636 a month (that ended a few months after she arrived) that should go to my new family and I wasn't in position to purchase a house. My name was still on the title of the home I jointly owned with my first wife. I was unable to get the equity out until after she sold the house. That was supposed to be in June of 2003 when my daughter graduated which was a few months after my Russian wife arrived. My American ex-wife did not want me to move on with my life especially with another women. This is why the divorce lasted for two years and why my finances through the house were tied up with her until the house sold. Actually my American ex-wife stalled the house selling for two years from the time it was supposed to be sold. Now if I had one of those "stand by your man" Septembrist Russian wives like OlgaH or Doll 
it would have been easy. But I had a wife who had different plans from my own and they didn't include me. All this had me pretty shooken up. Afterwards I was always looking at what I did wrong. I voiced this subtly to a few people. I had come to the conclusion that few people reading what I wrote or if I posted the details would understand my situation. So I stayed silent on this. Maxx
