Topic : 03/23 Nasty Custody Battles

In so many instances the spouse who is leaving is saying " The kids would not want to see Me unhappy".. and we as adults say this to justify the harm we do.  The reality is opposite.. the kids dont care if you are happy or not.. they want mommy and daddy to stay together.It seems to me there is some bit of advice given some where about coveting someone elses spouse. 

He went back, and you patiently provided the escape hatch for him. If you were not at all available.. and that exit was closed it may have altered the situation. Once the escape hatches are sealed, people work harder at the relationship. 

No there is no other man living MY life, i have never been married. 

My "opinion" seems to have touched a nerve with you... and YOU were the one who brought up the idea of it "maybe being your fault"... methinks you may be protesting too much.. 

Do you have weeks to understand my story.  Are you going through the same issue.  You may be one of the lucky mother's that father respect their child's mother and their children. But what about us women that don't have the same respect.   

For you to reply stating you are tired of hearing mother's complain about father's not wanting to be in their child lives, and they do try.  Well what is a father too you? Just someone that visit their children and negatively impacts the child mother to them.  If so I think you have you issue crossed.  

Father too me is everything a mother.  Someone that takes care of their child from all aspects including finances.  Caring, loving, and protecting.  Do you know my background? Do you know my child's father's background.  Honestly I didn't think you did. I asked for help not ignorance.  

Unless you are in a similar situation honestly, you have no room to comment. Yet this America and Freedom of Speech is required.  

I am tired of people accusing hard working mothers bending over backwards to make sure their child has everything they need, that they want more child support. Obviously you are as slow as my ex.  It is not the mother that configures Child Support it is the state and the earnings the fathers make.  NOT US. HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO SAY THAT. IT IS NOT THE MOTHERS.  HELLO GET WITH SOCIETY.  

It strikes me as strange that men, no matter their obvious flaws seem worth marrying and once there are kids on the ground, so many are worth divorcing. If he was at one time such a great guy, let him go an let him be able to afford to have the family he wanted. 

If he is so terrible that he needs to be divorced from his wife and his kids.. remember he is the same great guy you married. 

Women who are desperate to have him gone should be prepared to divorce his wallet too. 

If you meet the strong protective guy who fights the other guys for you in highschool and you think his jealousy means he loves you.. you should not be suprised when he is exactly that guy a few years later and he is controlling and domineering. It is too bad that women seldom pay attention to the obvious sings at the start of the relationship.. or decide "he will change" if you marry him.. when she turns out to be wrong..HE gets to send her a cheque every month.  A woman I know fell in love with a sports fan who watched TV sports all week, she was sure he would change once he was married and with a family.. I know a guy who is divorced who sends a support cheque to a woman he told.. "hey I am a sports fan.. and I have no plans to change that".. 

Sign the cheque.. send it to the woman who married you in order to change you... not really fair in my book anyway 

I'm new to this board to I might as well tell you about myself.   

I'm a divorced dad of two wonderful children, I know for a fact that family courts don't work, or at least in my state, NY.  You see, one person, a Family Court Judge, ruined my daughters and my lives by allowing a move away to occur when teachers, friends and family all testified that these children should stay where they had known everything their entire lives.  Now they live with a man who was married twice before and arrested twice for domestic violence.

All I've ever wanted to do is be a dad to my daughters but being that I see then for all of 4 days a month, that's impossible now.

All family court does is make divorces an adversarial situation. If Shared Parenting were the law, less fighting over children and money would occur so parents could focus on what is right for children and not themselves. 

Although I can agree with you to an extent, not all children want their parents together.  When I was much younger I remember wishing my parents would split up.  Not because I didn't love either one of them, and not because I wanted our family split apart.  I knew, even at that time, that it was the best thing that needed to happen.  And not too long after, I was told that they were getting a divorce.   

They also didn't go through a court battle over us.  They worked with one another and came to agreements on different issues.  One parent didn't bash the other, we weren't made to "take sides", and were taught to love and respect.   

I don't care how bitter one person is over everything, there is no reason to put that on the child. 

You had originally stated that every case was different, yet you totally generalized all dad's into your question.  You are upset, and probably with very good right, at your ex and what he is doing to get out of support.  I am not saying that there aren't dad's out there trying to get out of paying more child support (or any at all!)  But, in fact, it does happen that women can and do affect how much child support they get.  The women I said I have heard in various places giving "tips" to other moms in similar situations gave such advice as: having friends be the "caregiver" of the children so they can claim higher child care expenses.  This even happened to someone I know.  The mother had claimed she was putting out over $600 in child care expenses for her 2 children in elementary school.  In fact, she was getting state assistance for child care expenses, and when asked to provide proof of how much she did pay out, it turned out she was paying less than $100 a month for her sister to watch the kids and nobody was actually watching the kids (they were latch-key kids.)  Do you know how much that affected the child support outcome??  Once the real figures were put in, the original child support amount came down $400 per month.  I was not trying to offend you, but I did have a hard time with your complaining about Dads in general, when there are moms out there that work the system too.  (and I'm not saying you are doing that!) 

To answer your question, "what is a father too [me]?"  In a divorced couple where a mother has custody and the father does not... I would say a father's role is to be in his kid's lives as much as possible; to make the most of the time he does have with his kids; to show his kids love, not just tell them; to work with the mom to have open communication about what is going on in the kids lives.   

I am going through yet another custody battle with a very vindictive ex and his vindictive new wife. 

Me and the children are going through family counseling, because the games played are so severe they are destroying my life and damaging the children 

I left him 8 years ago and fled to another state because of domestic violence, I built myself from ground 0 to owning my own home, in the country, with land to own horses again. 

He is so obsessed with destroying me through the courts, that it is taking a toll on the kids. myself and our finances. I could lose my home because of what those 2 are doing. I hate the new wife because she is too selfish to see what this man is actually trying to do. She professes to be a christian, yet helps the ex spin lies to try to rape me of my children. 

I constantly have to live on egg shells anymore. Those awful people had my daughter sneak pictures of our home behind my back. A clay volcano she had made on an old dinner plate appeared to be something else, and now they are claiming I have a filthy house. 

My older daughter has trouble learning reading skills, and they claim it is my fault, when it is her as a person. 

They also showed up unanounced for a weekend visit, and tried to make it look like I was refusing his court ordered visit. 

On top of it all, the State of Ohio is too selfish to allow court jurisdiction to be in my state so I can have a FAIR trial. 

Any advice in this situation would be a great help. 

. 

I really think that until a step parent builds a good relationship with the kids and the biological parent, a step parent should never dicipline anothers child. 

The step mom to my girls is very disrespectful to me. She has been emotionally abusive with both. ie......made my 9 year old wear a diaper over a water ballon fight she had with a bunch of kids, who were not being supervised by any adults.............she accused her of wetting her pants. 

Then she told my daughter, I told her to do this. 

It is bad step parents who should not dicipline, in my opinion. That step parent on the show was awful, and I really feel for that mother. 

I think Dr. Phil was correct. 

Count your lucky stars. I am not a believer that children need to know their absent parent. I see case after case of the courts ordering visitation be given to a parent that has little or no positive influence on their child because it is the parents right. It sounds as if you have been fortunate to find a good "father" for your son so don't push things. Your ex could be demanding "his time" with your son only to be dragging him from one innapropiate enviornment to another. And do you want your son to grow up believing it is OK to walk out on his children for whatever reason? If he spends much of any time with your ex, he will be exposed to this line of reasoning and just may adopt it as his own because "his daddy did it so it must be OK". 

You ask what kind of dad would not want to know his little boy or girl. Well it is apparent, at least from this side of the story, that your ex has little or no bond with his son. He is probably like so many others in this world and is only interested in his want or need at this very moment. take this opportunity to teach your son how much more there is to life if one does not live that way. turn your negative situation into a positive experience. teach him to fill his sense of loss by helping others. He will go far in life if you do. I know. This is what my father (really my stepfather) did for me.