The last we heard about Melissa Etheridge’s split from her partner of nine years, Tammy Lynn Michaels, Micheals’ lawyer was shot down in court on a request for $25,000 to tide his client over until a monetary agreement was reached for their divorce/partnership dissolution. Michaels has taken to her blog on several occasions to creatively explain her side of the breakup. According to Michaels, Etheridge emotionally withdrew from the relationship while Michaels was busy caring for their three year-old twins and later broke up with her with little explanation or warning. Then Etheridge filed to make their split official after promising to delay the process, leaving her broke and struggling to pay daily expenses. Only Etheridge’s lawyer was able to prove that his client was providing for Michaels by paying all the bills and giving her an additional $2,000 a month. The judge was satisfied that Michaels had enough to get by and denied the request for additional money.
Now Michaels has blogged that she’s sick and needs expensive medical care that she can’t afford. She also is facing eviction from her rented home in 45 days. How is that the case if Etheridge is paying the rent as she claims? Here’s Michaels’ now-deleted blog entry, which explains her side of the story but frankly doesn’t do much for her case.
ulcers to gallbladder to pancreas to liver and then…?
a dillar
a dollar
a trick or treat
hollar
need some help
need some honesty
need some real
call ‘er
no answergallbladder
pancreas
liver
ulcers
MRIs
ultrasounds
gotta get it done
on pennies now?
somethings going ongotta get a job
with barf bag in hand?
and leave my twins with who?
and with what babysitting money?a dillar
a dollar
a trick or treat
hollarthis too shall pass
cuz i believe in miracles
and
miracles look like rainbows.oh. and we have to be out of our rental in 45 days.
man, i love a challenge.
[From Tammy Lynn Michaels’ blog via Huffington Post]
I get the gist of what Michaels is saying, but this writing style is so vague and hard to decipher that I’m not feeling as much sympathy for her as I used to. There’s something very whiny about it, which is completely understandable if she’s sick and scared. It’s just easier to relate to a situation when it’s explained in complete sentences.
Michaels seems to have realized that she’s not coming across well, or maybe her lawyer had a talk with her about sharing her personal business while a court case was pending. She’s since deleted the above blog entry as well as at least one earlier entry in which she described how she gave up her career to care for her children with Etheridge.
I’m not sure exactly whose side I’m on in this messy divorce, but it sounds awfully cheap to give the mother of your children a mere $24,000 a year to live on when you’re a multimillionaire rock star. I hope Michaels gets enough money to live on, and that she has decent health insurance. It’s the least that Etheridge can do.
Header image is from 4/17/08. Credit: PRPhotos
I wonder if Michaels is a little bit mental.
I suppose a bad breakup could push you to some strange behavior, but she’s coming off as a bit odd to me, you know?
🙁 I hope she gets taken care of, like any other wife of a star would.
Whenever a relationship ends, it is sad. I just hope that Melissa takes care of her child, and does right for the child. She is paying her ex’s bills (from what I read), so as long as the child is taken care of, that is all that should matter.
The more she blogs, the more unhinged she seems, to me at least.
not picking a side-
but it’s worth mentioning that the judge is satisfied all Tammy’s/twins bills were getting paid + cash. Judges like to make sure spouses are kept in accustomed style.
Maybe Tammy is very bad with money, so Melissa pays the expenses instead of Tammy.
I would hope her lawyer told her to stop blogging about it, it will only hurt her case.
If Melissa is paying her rent, there’s no reason she should be evicted, so now I’m starting to wonder. I still think after all that time and 2 kids, plus Tammy giving up her career, Melissa should pay support like anyone else would have to. But I don’t get Tammy saying she’s broke and soon to be homeless if her rent, utilities, car, etc are being paid for.
They sound like the ramblings of someone with their mental ability impaired.
There’s always two sides to the story and we haven’t heard Melissa’s side. I would venture a guess there is more to it then what Tammy is telling.
It would be nice to see her get a job like the rest of us. I’m sick at work today but I’m working because there’s not other way to pay the rent and bills. If she’s mentally ill, she can apply for assistance. All the rest of us have to do, so why is she exempt?
Oh crap another person who believes in the power of rainbows.
You know, I don’t know what to believe. A friend of mine pays thousands of pounds to his ex and she has a big house and he pays everything for her & his kids etc. and his ex still goes out and tells everyone how she is about to be thrown to the street (she was given the house), how her kids face the future with uncertainty and are alwys worried (they both go to private schools paid by the dad) etc. I doubt the judge would let a mother be thrown to the street. Maybe she is not getting as much as she wants but I don’t think she is not getting anything.
If my significant other was a millionaire AND never home and I was always home with the children, You can be sure I would have an account with more than $4 in it. That’s just common sense, even if you are not expecting any sort of split
She might actually have to get a job. Oh the humanity!
@ BB: is your friend’s ex Sarah Ferguson?
She has time to write lousy, whiny poetry on a blog but doesn’t have time to get a job and earn her own money? Cry me a river, honey, and get over it. Go find employment and start paying your own bills like the rest of us have to.
I agree that there seems to be something really off about this woman. I don’t think I believe what she is claiming at all. And I’m starting to see why the split happened. Sorry if that sounds mean but that’s my opinion.
@ Riley:
LMAOROLF
i agree that there is something really off about this story. i don’t think melissa would really want to leave her children starving and homeless, and the fact that she is choosing to stay mum despite the ‘poor tammy’ movement (at the potential risk of her career) is also somewhat telling.
if the judge doesn’t think that tammy is so hard done by, maybe everyone should hold back on the melissa bashing for awhile.
at any rate, Tammy whining about it on a blog isn’t proving to be overly effective.
It’s impossible to tell how “fair” divorce settlements really are. In my own family, we have me, who basically got nothing after an 18-year marriage; versus a slightly younger family member, who got a HUGE child support settlement, after just 5 years (I think she planned the whole thing, btw.) So yeah, very interesting to hear that Tammy considers herself one step from living on the strees. I think that might be an exaggeration, but I hope we get updates.
Hard to know what it’s really like on either side in this situation, but I’d say that all bills paid (presumably including groceries) with $2k left over should be enough. If she wants to live in a higher style, she should sell a book.
WWCD = What Would Celestia Do?
They’re poetic stanzas, people.
@hellen:
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA that was great
It may be easy to say “get a job”, but we have to remember, she didn’t sign up for the split. It was agreed that she would stay home and run the household. That was her job and she gave up her career to do it.
Some of us have been in her shoes, but we’re not in showbiz. Sometimes we’re forced to go back to work for various reasons, but it’s not that easy. When you’ve been out of the loop for a few years, you’re not as marketable. Plus you have to make arrangements for your children, who have been in your constant care since day one. It’s a huge adjustment.
I really feel for her. I don’t think she’s mental, I think she’s hurting. Melissa really fucked up, and could stop this from getting any worse by simply settling with Tammy and moving on. Why be a stubborn bitch.
The more this drags out, the worse both will look which can’t be good for their careers or more importantly the stability of their kids.
Good one, hellen. Heche has been called crazy on many an occasion, but after that Letterman appearance they started calling her something else.
You know, I respect that she is hurting deeply, but unfortunately, the financial responsibility fairy doesn’t care. I said it before, I hope she had a separate account, as all women in long-term relationships are encouraged to do so.
Lady needs a gag order because these back blog ramblings are not helping her case in the least. There’s no way that her lawyer would think that this is a good idea–people have lost their jobs by blogging about topics far more innocuous and less personal than this. I wouldn’t presume to know why she made the choice to talk so much about it in public fora, but I would imagine that the huge fame-money-power differential would cause her to feel that her voice and interests would be lost in the melee. At this point though, she has hoisted herself by her own petard and is losing sympathy for it.
My father left our family when my mother was pregnant with me and outright refused to pay any child support. The courts had to track him down on more than one occasion as he devoted a huge amount of time and energy towards not being found by my mother. And I was the third child, so you can imagine how WONDERFUL that made our lives. All I mean is that sometimes life just bashes your skull against the pointy rocks and if you don’t find a way to adapt, it’s not life of the rocks that suffer. I hope she has some kind of security system that can help her ease into regular life, because it’s an evolve or die world and the world, sadly, does not wait for you to feel better. And it is sad.
Funnily enough, that voice that so wants to be heard is bellowing so loudly that some are coming to the point where they want to shield their ears. I’m sure Etheridge has an army of consultants engineering her every moment of silence, and at this point she’s winning out for it. Not in the court of public appeal necessarily, but in the one that matters, definitely.
Snotty side note: stress doesn’t cause ulcers, bacteria is the most common cause by far.
Gee, when I separated from my spouse, I had to get a job. What was I thinking?
OK, first of all: Just because she has to be out of her house in 45 days doesn’t mean she’s being “evicted.” TL most likely gave notice (or was given notice) to vacate in order to relocate to a more affordable place. ME may be paying now, but that may not be true in the future.
If it’s TL’s gallbladder, I feel for her, because I was sick for years until we found out what it was. By that time, I had to have priority surgery to have it removed. The recovery time was significant, so she won’t be going to work – or even taking care of her kids – for awhile.
She needs to stop with the random blog posts and attempts at “creative writing” or poetry. It’s making her look a little un-hinged.
Lastly, when you have children, you must continue “living” because they need you. You don’t have the luxury of breaking down and staying in bed for however long you want. Focus on your children; cry at night when they’re asleep; rage at your friends about what a d!ck he/she is being; and before you realise it, you’ve put it behind you.
Oh my god, I fucking hate poety. This chick sounds weird, arrogant, and whiny. And she’s too old to be writing angsty, stupid blog entires. Leave it to the middle school girls, Michaels. No wonder Melissa ditched her.
Mama Besser hit the nail on the head with her post.
We live in a cruel world. People lie. Their intentions change. They break promises. It’s been that way since Adam blamed Eve for showing him the apple. Tammy needs to move on and adjust. That may sound cold, but it could be the best piece of advice she’s ever received. I wish someone had told me that during a recent hard time.
What would MaGuyver do?
@ GatsbyGal: Off topic, but thank you for having the cojones to say you hate poetry. I really do, too. Man, that feels good to get that off my chest! I have so many friends who LOVE it or even write it, I can’t say that to them, LOL!!
Anyway, I’m starting to get the gut feeling that Melissa’s ex is a few sandwiches shy of a full picnic basket. No doubt Melissa had her reasons for bailing. Sounds like she needs all sorts of professional help. She can start by going to Bad Poetry Writers Anonymous.
@Tia C: I’m so glad someone agrees with me. Sometimes it seems like everyone loves that shit, and I too have several friends who enjoy writing poems and posting them online. And it’s just like…uggggghhhh. Even good poetry, like the ones we had to read in english class, pissed me off and weren’t any good.
Then get a job tammy.
I really don’t like when spouses are all “but I’m broke – he/she needs to pay for my life” when they go through a divorce.
First of all, why is that their problem? No one owes anyone crap.
And second of all – ESPECIALLY tammy. She has had jobs in the past – she has her own money (and likely even a bit of royalty money). Stop hitting up Melissa and get’cher own job!
It isn’t $24,000.00 a year to live on if Etheridge is paying for all her bills on top of that.
She is NOT getting $24,000. a year. She is getting ALL of her expenses paid PLUS $24,000. for whatever she wants to spend it on. I wish my ex would have offered me such a deal prior to the divorce/legal separation/settlement.
I think that Tammy is a self-pitying, attention-seeking liar. I am so glad that I kept insisting on hearing Melissa’s POV. People were so quick to judge Melissa without all the facts. Egg meet face.
Melissa Etheridge is behaving like a real man: Cheap, cold, callous and detached. I feel sad for TM, she’s having an emotional breakdown, but maybe it’s a blessing in disguise for her that it happened now before she wasted more time with that person who has no problem making families and then just walking away from the family when it suits her.
isn’t tammy the partner who stood by melissa when she had cancer? seems like melissa could do the same if tammy is now ill; she is the mother of melissa’s children after all. having said that, if my ex paid all my bills, including child support and gave me $25,000/year on top of that i’d be pretty stoked.
Tammy has always been a terrible writer, using the wrong (but close) words, spelling, etc. Bad use of language does not make a poet. However, I agree the writing has gotten worse, perhaps becausewhile she’s hurting and attempting to rhyme she’s trying to equal Melissa in composition? Some of her old blogs use many of the words and concepts in Melissa’s songs. Who was first? But hurt she does and some of her phrases are quite applicable in her situation. I wonder how I would feel if my spouse had that look with someone like Alexandra Cousteau and was taking a week between concerts (other are almost daily or every other day) when the break was after the joint appearance with Cousteau? Tammy was in a similar position, young, blond and beautiful,and pictures of Melissa and Tammy show Melissa with those same eyes, hands, body language. Not only is she home with the kids, but the years and motherhood have taken some toll. Perhaps befote she has to get a job, Melissa could help with a spa period,an opportunityto lose some weight, and help get those agents back. ( PS, Usually, ulcers, gall bladder, pancreas problems lead to major weight loss).Tammy shouldn’t like off her kids forever, but there should be a time and help for her to get back to some independence. Melissa can help with that. Must be alot of hurt there, as there was never such a public display with Julie Cypher. Whatever they work out, however the lawyers manipulate the public appearances, claims and blogs, the internet preserves it forever and a 13 year old daughter has the savy to dig it all out. Perhaps for the kids sake, they can lay the public bitterness (and private bitterness) to rest.
I believe that both sides Melissa and Tammy has their own faults..so NO one will be blamed and lashed in public like this–Melissa delivered for us great lyrics and songs..from her heart–while Tammy had been a very sweet wife to Melissa while she had cancer..But all relationships has ups and downs and we don’t EXACTLY KNOW what happened that lead to split..so we dont have any rights to condemed both..They are sweet couple and I hope the public should respect these two –still..only RESPECT and they needed much privacy..and being lashed by the public to add to their burdens..
plsss..
salve