My 16 yo lives with me and my current husband here in TX. My ex-husband lives in NM. I moved out of NM in 2009, and my daughter lived with my ex from 2009-2011. In 2011, my daughter decided to come live with me because my ex was going thru a nasty divorce. My husband was really mad/hurt that my daughter left him to live with me in another state. Since then, their relationship has been pretty bad. He's oscillates between outright hurtful and passive aggressive. We have a court order from 2004 that was the order in place when we both lived in the same city. Since I moved out of NM we have just been using our own agreement that was never filed in any court.
My daughter had decided after her last Christmas visit that he was just being too much of a jerk and she wasn't going to visit him anymore. She told him so and he had told her that he wasn't going to force her to visit him. Then on June 1st, he changed his mind and demanded that she come visit him. In July, we ended up going to court here in Tx. Everyone told me that no judge was going to force a 15 yo to visit her noncustodial parent, but we got the judge that is very much pro-father. We didn't even get to give our arguments. She had to go visit him for almost 4 weeks over the summer, but we still don't have a court order in place. I'm really not sure what to do. I can request a final hearing that would generate a court order, but I haven't heard from him since this summer. He has only contacted my daughter a couple of times. My daughter thinks that we should wait and see if he'll just disappear, but I really don't know what I should be doing at this point. Christmas is coming up and it's too late to schedule a final hearing before Christmas. I'm not sure what would happen if he bought her a plane ticket and I just didn't make her get on the plane.
Before the initial hearing in July, my lawyer was really confident that we would be heard and that my daughter wouldn't be forced to see her dad, but we were thoroughly spanked. Now she seems much more reluctant to give me any advice other than to try to pay for a home study or other things that cost money.
My daughter had decided after her last Christmas visit that he was just being too much of a jerk and she wasn't going to visit him anymore. She told him so and he had told her that he wasn't going to force her to visit him. Then on June 1st, he changed his mind and demanded that she come visit him. In July, we ended up going to court here in Tx. Everyone told me that no judge was going to force a 15 yo to visit her noncustodial parent, but we got the judge that is very much pro-father. We didn't even get to give our arguments. She had to go visit him for almost 4 weeks over the summer, but we still don't have a court order in place. I'm really not sure what to do. I can request a final hearing that would generate a court order, but I haven't heard from him since this summer. He has only contacted my daughter a couple of times. My daughter thinks that we should wait and see if he'll just disappear, but I really don't know what I should be doing at this point. Christmas is coming up and it's too late to schedule a final hearing before Christmas. I'm not sure what would happen if he bought her a plane ticket and I just didn't make her get on the plane.
Before the initial hearing in July, my lawyer was really confident that we would be heard and that my daughter wouldn't be forced to see her dad, but we were thoroughly spanked. Now she seems much more reluctant to give me any advice other than to try to pay for a home study or other things that cost money.