Hello All,
Okay - first off, our situation is not the norm and I do know that. So bare with me as I try to fill you in so you can hopefully help us out! 
We are engaged and my fiance is coming over to the US on a fiance visa. We have been in a long term relationship for a few years and doing so long distance. We cannot really plan much because we do not know exactly WHEN he will get his visa to come and then once he gets it we only have 90 days to get married (quick stuff!) {I posted my date as Nov 17th - but that's just an approximate, as we cannot know for sure until he gets his visa.}
My situation is a bit more difficult in the fact that I have an ex-husband, who's a bit clingy and stalkerish (another long story). I have a child together with my ex, so I cannot completely cut ties, he's not interested in participating in the child's life and only brings that up when its convenient to control me or the situation. We have JUST now reached a place where he is not driving me crazy with demands and threats, and I am trying hard to keep the peace there. But know he will lose his mind if/when he finds out I am getting married again. (We have been divorced over 5 years and were separated for 5 years before that - its been OVER a long time.)
We want to have a quick justice of the peace ceremony when my fiance arrives, then plan a bigger more involved wedding a year or so later once he's here and we can plan accordingly. BUT here is my issue, in my tiny town they publish EVERY marriage license in the newspaper and my ex-husband would likely find out if not on his own, via co-workers or such.
Now, I don't plan to keep this a 'secret' forever, I have full custody of our child and he's given up rights (all on his own, and still doesn't wish to be involved in our child's life, just mine - which blows me away, my child is awesome!)
We just don't want to stir things up, when my fiance first gets here, and cannot work for the first 6 months til his authorization comes in, its not a time I want to spend at war with my ex-husband. Or hiring lawyers and getting protection orders - when I can just lay low for a while and things won't be so horrible around our special time.
So I am struggling to find out how/what I should do to keep the peace for this occasion? I would love to get married quickly and quietly, but how? How can we keep them from publishing this in our paper? Or if we zip out of town and get married can it be surpassed? Will they only publish it in the county we apply? Any tips/experience on this would be appreciated! (We will be living in Missouri, if that helps.)
{And please, no judgment on the above situation - there are many details I left out to keep this post manageable, and you really cannot know unless you're IN the situation, and that's something that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy! Truly....}
Thanks in advance for your help and thoughts.
God bless!
