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April 21, 2006, 4:18 pm PDT
04/21 Baby Wars
Quote From: melissagI am a woman, I am a mother, having said that, I know there are many devious women out there. Now, I am not classifying all women, but, there are women who elect to get pregnant for mere entrapment. Currently, my husband and I are in this boat. Prior to my husband and my courtship he had a brief relationship with a woman. They had sex together and created a baby. First off, my husband because of medical reasons was led to believe he could not conceive children, this women said she was on birth control and stated she was to old to have children. During our relationship prior to us getting married she came forward stating he was the father of her child. She never disclosed this to any of us, her pregnancy or the fact that there was a possibility of him being the father although she swears she did. Even on legal documents she stated, she never intended to disclose this baby, she was forced to when she fell on hard times and needed assistance from the state she was residing in. She also tried to lie on her application checking a box stating no children. It was found that my husband was in fact the father through paternity testing. At this point, both parties had agreed prior they did not know where there relationship would lead and children were not an option. Now, my husband is forced to pay child support for a child she will not even acknowledge as her father. Court Ordered child support exceeds over half of his actual disposable income. Our state also gave her retroactive child support even through all this documentation that put him in the arrears automatically for appx 1 year of support. During this time, he was also injured on the job and only receiving 66 2/3 percent of his wages, then was abruptly cut off from these weekly wages. We have petitioned the court at least 5 times for some relief and to no avail, we have lost every time, even with medical documentation. The law states, that when a parent is behind in child support it is not modifiable or at the discretion of the Judges. However, in our case, Judges were never used, they use, hearing officers that actually work for the State Revenue Departments. This child support obligation is not only ruining our lives, but also ruins the lives of many others. The term Dead Beat dad, really should be reviewed in its entirety. I say this because with a man, father, having no rights, they are already behind in support payments, obligations and such even when the situation was manipulated. How will they ever get ahead. This has been a battle in our life for now almost 2 years, leaving my husband at the end of the work week with less than $100.00 from his paycheck. How does one truly survive on this pay without neglecting his family, children etc for having to obtain a second job. I believe men, fathers, anyone, have rights and should be equal. Women fight everyday for equal rights, equal opportunity employment. If we make our bed, we need to sleep in it ! If this woman or any woman chose to have an abortion, my husband, any man, would not have the right to say, choose or demand different, but because a woman out of wedlock chooses to have a child, she hunts the father like a hungry tiger. This is unfair, unlawful especially if the man was not willing, able to care, either financially or emotionally for a child. I mean really, what is better, having a man who cannot pay, be there...or having a man who is man enough to say this is a task I did not want, you knew I did not want....To say that the man should be the only one to "protect" during sex is absurd. As a woman, we have much more to our disposal that is more precise in the way of avoiding unwanted, out of wedlock children, than a man. Condoms break, wearing a condom is his word against her word, for women there are birth control pills, injections, diaphragms, implants. A man has 2 choices, a condom, a vasectomy ? To say that a man should have surgical intervention because he is having sex and not ready for a baby at that very moment, is like telling a woman she should have her tubes tied as an unwed woman having sex but hopes to have children in the future. The fact is, no-one can or ever will be able to stop sex in unwed women, men, teens etc. Maybe, just maybe, if women were held accountable as well for there actions we wouldn't be in this baby boom generation of babies having babies, single mothers, dead beat dads and unwanted and truly unnecessary pregnancies. If the father continues taking the blame, because he was so cursed with the sperm that fertilizes the egg than this just tells women we can sit, spit out babies, and collect a check and we truly wonder why the world is going bankrupt ? Please understand, I am also on the other side of the coin, I am a mother of 3 children from a previous marriage. There father is nothing other than a dead beat. He is true meaning of dead beat. He is in more trouble than he is ever out of it. I have never received one dime of support for my children. To me, you can't get nothing from nothing ! It is also my responsibility to care for my children, financially, emotionally, physically, morally etc. I know this man cannot do any of these things in his current state. I also have to take responsibility for the fact that I helped create these beautiful children. but in my eyes, I would rather take full responsibility than allow a man who is not fit to care for my children. What is the lesser of 2 evils ? I am a firm believer in everyone having rights. Even a purple polka dotted man who fell from the moon and landed on this earth. This is America, the land of the free, where choice is given to every one of us but not the man. Now, would I agree if a man and woman are married having sex and suddenly become pregnant. No, why ? Because as man and wife, our duties are far greater and different to each other. We are suppose to know each other, wants and needs, it is our duty to communicate and compromise with each other as man and wife, brief encounters, short term relationships this is not the case. I do believe safe sex should be used....I do believe that somewhere as a society we have focused so much on practicing safe sex for STD related issues that everyone forgot , YOU CAN STILL GET PREGNANT. When is the last time you seen a commercial advertising a condom and the prevention of pregnancy, it is all about STD's, maybe everyone needs to be reminded , have it in there face ! Maybe we should get back to basics, like when I was in school and an assignment we had in HomeEch was to pretend play with an egg as a baby, boy, we did not dare drop that egg ! We had to take it everywhere, find a babysitter if we wanted to go out....whatever happened to home ech and the basics ? I read every word you wrote. I'm in somewhat of the same boat. A single mother of two, from two different fahers. One pays without court order and has a beautiful relationship with his child. The other is a true dead beat. I choose not to go to court because morals should be what we go on and not court orders. He doesn't show up when he says he will. He was paying what he could afford until he met the woman he ended up marrying but he sure pays for her kids well being. For years I was both mother and father to this child until I met my husband. I might add before I go on about my husband that I raised my children for years without government assistance. Okay here's my husbands story. He married for the first time at 23 after dating for three years. He and his first wife decided to have children after another three years had passed. When his youngest was not yet two his first wife decided to trade him in. They divorced, she married the guy she traded my husband in for and until I came into the picture they all got along famously. They switched weekends when needed, hung out together, and when my husband had to go on medical leave from his job they all agreed he didn't have to pay support until he returned to work. They all believed it was more important for him and the children to continue seeing one another and he couldn't afford both the $500/mon and rent of $450 going from a disposible income of $3500 to a mere $1000. It would leave him with $50/mon. Sure it was enough to fill his gas tank but what would he feed them? And so it was agreed, verbally. Everything was great to begin with, we continued to switch weekends when needed we all hung out together and child support payments remained on hold. Until his ex-wife found out we planned on getting married and then surprise one day what did we recieve in the mail? You guessed it. Government papers stating my soon to be husband was behind child support payments by eight months. Remember the verbal agreement, they didn't. Together my new husband and I began to pay off his arrears and make the montly support payments. We sent in 52 cheques to the govenment agency post dated for every friday for the next year. Payments went through smoothly until my husband came home one thursday night and told me the last payment was still in the account. I told him not to worry. Next thursdy the same thing happened. The following thursday he came home to tell me four payments were taken out of the account. He was making the fourth payment. And so the four payment bounced because the government submitted a check a head of time. This went on for another three months. The govenment not cashing cheques and then submitting too many. We tried to fight this and told them they had no right to submit cheques until they were due. They sent us all of the cheques back and told us to send in money orders. We talked to his ex-wife and asked her to take the cheques and take the order out of the govenment agency. She said no. Then I ended up sick and our income was cut. We tried to at least keep up with the monthly payments but because the arrears were still not paid off the government took away his drivers license. With that we could no longer see the children as I can't drive and they refused to bring the children to us. We would make arrangements with friends to drive us to the kids but she wouldn't even allow us to bring the kids to McDonalds let alone out of her sight saying if we didn't pay the arrears off in full we couldn't have visitations out side of her yard. Then she turned around and made sure they weren't home when we planned to show up. We haven't seen the children in three plus years. She changed her phone number every time we were able to get it. This went on for some months but has since stopped. All of this for a mere $4000. How sad it is that this great man can't have a relationship with the children he wanted because of the inability to pay off arrears and pay $500 a month as well. Remember I told you about my child who's father doesn't pay, after doing some quick calulations he'd owe me over 20,000 but I still let him see his child. In my mind he doesn't owe me a thing but he does owe his child, a child he wanted a relationship and that doesn't cost a thing.
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