Topics

We went to court this morning to answer ex's petition for support modification.  My lawyer couldn't be there because of a previously scheduled case, so we asked for continuation.  The ex got really mad, I guess because she was expecting to get more money today.

So, in retaliation, she's just told me that I have to start picking the kids up at 730P.  Our custody agreement just says "weekends" (we're working on clarification, that was continued as well).  For the last six months (according to a written agreement we have via e-mail) I have picked them up at 6P on Friday, she has picked them up at 730P Sunday.  Now she says I have to pick them up at 730P Friday because a weekend is a "48 hour period".

Any suggestions as to what to do besides just wait for the court date?

My finace is in the military, and back in June was sent on TDY for six weeks, and subsequently missed 4 weekends of court ordered visitation.  We thought that there was nothing we could do about it, but I have been reading a lot of posts in here that mention "makeup visitation'.  Is this something we can ask for, and how exactly does that work.  How can we enforce it?

We are currently working on amending our visitation agreement because the BM is not working with us on "reasonable" visitation, and we would like to work out a schedule for missed visitation.  Any suggestions on how to do that?

We are looking for help before we go to court.  My fiance's has court ordered visitation on specified weekends and holiday's, and in addition has "reasonable visitation" otherwise.  For four months now he has attempted to see his kids for dinner and has been denied.  The excuses have been everything from too much homework, to "we have lots of fun stuff planned", to them having planned to spend time with her SO's family.  My fiance has tried all sorts of different days, and ways of asking, all to no avail.  He's even offered to let her pick the day and he would rearrange his work schedule to make it happen.  (His ex doesn't work, BTW)  She still wont agree, and always says that it's not her fault that thier schedules never agree.  

We have become increasingly concerned because she has been bad-mouthing my fiance to the kids, calling into question his character and thinsg of that nature.  She even went so far as to tell the kids that he wouldn't care for them if something were to happen to her.  She has not been home when he went to pick up the kids for weekends on several occaisions, and then delivered them late to his house.  We're worried that her behavior will continue to escalate until we take her to court.  

We have read that we can file a "show cause" order, but we are considering doing it on our own without an attorney because of financial concerns.  What types of things should we bring before we do this?

Thank you to anyone who can offer us advice!

My husband and I have been ordered by the court to attend co-parenting counseling with his ex and her new husband.

I was wondering if anyone else has been through this and what their experience has been.  So far, it hasn't helped much at all - but we're hopeful that, if we ever have to go back to court, we'll have an unbiased 3rd party who's been around to see what's really going on.

I'm not sure if it would be helpful though, or how much weight the court would give the counselors testimony, or if they would consider the counselors recommendation as to who would be the better parent.

I'm interested to hear others thoughts, experiences, suggestions.

we are trying to resolve a child care issue.  Ex is leaving the children (8 & 11 years old) in the care of a 15 year old for 8-13 hours per day, 4 days a week.  We think that this is too much responsibility for a 15 year old.

I haven't been able to find anything for our state regarding child care - just that it should be "appropriate".  Very subjective...

does anyone have any helpful information?

I don't have a question or an issue... just still processing the circus that was my husbands custody case last August.  We were assigned a GAL, and I believe that his testimony was a big part of the judges decision.  The GAL happened to be a criminal defense attorney.  I don't feel that he took our case seriously at all, and that he didn't look into any of the issues that we brought to him.

I would imagine that someone who acted as a GAL would have experience as a family court attorney.

I also looked into what the GAL is supposed to do in our state.

http://www.courts.state.va.us/gal/gal_standards_children_080403.html

In this document, several things are listed that the GAL 'should' do, that our GAL did not, and that I think would have had an impact on the outcome of our case.  

I know there's nothing that can be done about these things, but to me it represents just one more breakdown in the system.

In my experience with custody proceedings, it seems that the courts treat a fathers request for custody the same way they would treat a case where they were terminating a person's parental rights - as if they were terminating the mother's parental rights by changing custody to the father.  I think this is a flawed way to look at things, because no one's parental rights are being terminated.  It's supposed to be the 'best interests of the child' - and it's clearly not about that - at least not in our experience.  In order for there to be a change in custody there has to be something severe - not just 'the best interests of the child'.

And what about this child's wishes?  They clearly expressed to the GAL what they wanted - which was an equal amount of time in both homes.  No one even mentioned that during our custody case.

I guess we're still grieving - processing, etc.

It's been 8 months now since I filed my petition for a custody change, and I have read so much stuff in so many places that tells you how important it is to document.  That you need to document everything, etc.  So, I have.  The problem is that the GAL, psychologists, home study people, etc. that I have met have ALL made one negative comment or another about someone having lots of documentation.  I hear stories about how some guy came in with a binder full of stuff tabbed and indexed, and how they thought that he was the most controlling person they'd ever met, or how they didn't think that was necessary, or they didn't like it when people did that.

So, I have to ask myself (and should have asked them I guess) - what does a person do when they are faced with a liar, a manipulator, and someone who has a history of making false accusations?  How do you show these people who are supposed to be evaluating the situation what's really going on?  Either you have all this documentation (because proving that someone is lying is an arduaous process), or it's your word against the word of a master manipulator.  

So, I ask, what do you do?

1.  I'm 99.9% sure that BM lied about income in hers, but how do we find out if that's the case?  No one asked me for verification, and just took my word for it.  I'm sure they did the same thing on the other side.

2.  BM's study was done when children were there, and mine was done when the children were not.  I think this creates an unfair bias, as the social worker could see her parenting the children, but did not see me parenting the children.  Is there anything I can do about this?

3.  BM's live-in boyfriend was not present at the time of BM's home study.  I don't know if she interviewed him at a later date or not.  Don't they have to interview all the people living in the household?

4.  When my home study was done the social worker mostly asked questions about my family history, the divorce, and how we got where we are now (in court).  She didn't ask me anything about how I would parent the children if they lived with me, where they would go to school, if I had any childcare plans, etc.  Aren't they supposed to ask you about that stuff?

5.  The social worker barely even looked at my house.  She did the "five minute tour" basically.  Never went into the backyard, never looked in a drawer, closet, cabinet, anything.  Is this unusual?  I thought they would be a little more thorough than that.

6.  Why is it that the attorney's can see the home study reports, but the person the report is on cannot?  I have an attorney, but I was wondering what you would do if you were pro se.  I was told by the clerk that you can't see the report if you're pro se.  Does anyone know if this is true?  How can you properly represent yourself if you can't see these reports?  That seems wrong.

Is there any way to prove that someone is bad mouthing you to the kids, or pumping the kids for information?  We know that this is happening, but how do you prove it in court?  Has anyone had an experience like this?  

I have to complete these for upcoming custody hearing.  Does anyone know how detailed the answers should be?  I want to be honest and address the issues at hand, but don't want to sound like I'm bashing.

Has anyone here had a home study done in VA?  Ours is coming up, and I'd like to know what to expect.

Thanks!

Does anyone know if discovery is done in custody disputes?  I'm in VA, and I haven't heard anyone mention it.

I need help writing a letter to give to my child's tharapist demanding to see the notes on my child.  I have requested these verbally, and have so far been denied access.  I am going to present her with a letter, but I'm not sure how I should word it.  If anyone can make a suggestion, or has seen a letter and knows what it should say, I would really appreciate it.

My fiance finally meets with the GAL tomorrow.  We have gotten so many mixed messages about what you should and/or shouldn't tell the GAL.  Some people say tell them everything, others say don't trash the otehr party.  My question is this:  We are asking for custody because of a myriad of problems.  How do you show the GAL that you're having all these problems without making it look like you're trashing the opposition?  If everything was hunky-dory we wouldn't be here in the first place?

We asked our attorney about this, and he said to tell the GAL "everything".  I'm just afraid that we'll say too much and end up looking like we're the problem.

Does anyone know if there's any way to prove financial instability in court?  I know that my ex has a lengthy history of writing bad checks, not paying bills on time, accounts going into collection, etc.  I don't know if a judge or custody evaluator would consider this type of information.  I think that they should.  It could end up affecting the kids if her lights get turned off, the heat gets turned off, they get evicted from thier high-dollar apartment, her car gets reposessed, etc.  The problem is proving it when you don't have access to her bank records or credit report.

What should you tell your ex about why you filed for custody?  Should you even discuss it with her?  If you don't, will the judge look at it negatively?  She wants to know, and I'm afraid to tell her anything.  Any advice out there?

My fiance has decided to go for custody of his kids.  A telephone call where she trashed him in front of the kids (again) over a bill that she made AFTER they were seperated, yet expects him to pay for some odd reason.  Went on about how he doesn't pay for anything...  anyway, we need a good attorney in VA.  We want someone with a proven track record of winning these cases.  We're willing to spend the money to win.  We are in the Hampton Roads area.

Any advice is appreciated.

This weekend my step-kids told us that they are sleeping over at a babysitter's house one night a week because their mom has to be to work at 630A.  We feel that, if their mom isn't available to care for them for an overnight period, she should give my husband the option to have them stay with us.

There's nothing in the order about this.  We live in VA.  Does he have any grounds to ask her to let the kids stay with us if she's not available for overnight care?  The kids are 7 and 11.

What's really frustrating is that my husband needed to make up visitation that he missed due to military deployment.  He wanted to have the kids for a full week so that it wouldn't take months for to make up the visitation.  She refused to let them stay with us on a school night - saying that it was too disruptive and that it wouldn't be good for the kids because they were used to going to school from her house.  She said all this in the counselors office too.  So he's still making up the visitation he missed.  Now she's having them spend the night at a babysitters house and go to school from there.

She's also been avoiding going to counseling.  It's been two months since we've gone, and every time we do manage to get her to agree to an appointment time she cancels it.  I think it's because she knows he's going to bring this up.  Is there anything we can do about that?  The order says "parents are to engage in co-parenting counseling".  Since the order was signed (9 months ago), we've been to 5 counseling sessions, 45 minutes each.  Obviously this isn't helping anything, it's actually causing us more grief because she keeps manipulating the appointments.  We haven't been to a single session that she hasn't done this.  She either schedules it during his parenting time, or she agrees to a date and time in session and then cancels or changes it without talking to me.  She scheduled the first session on our wedding day, and then refused to change it, and she and her husband went alone.

Our custody agreement doesn't cover child care.  Over the last year we've had numerous incidents of the kids having inadequate or no supervision at home.  Last week my 7 yr old came home with a 3 inch bruise on her leg from a 12 year old boy who lives at her mom's apartment complex.  He apparently hits them, throws them on the ground, etc, on a regular basis.  Mom did nothing about it, and doesn't supervise them when they're outside.

This morning I got a call from my other daughter because her mom left her home alone while she went to class.  My daughter was running a fever when she woke up, so her mom didn't send her to school, just left her home alone with a fever.  She said this is the 3rd time this has happened.  I don't think that this is safe.  She just turned 11.

I'm at my wits end because my ex won't agree to getting child care, and insists the children aren't being left unsupervised.  I can't file anything with the court because our agreement doesn't cover it.  So I was considering having an adendum to the order drawn up that covers child care and asking her to sign it.  If she won't, I'm considering asking the court to add it to our agreement.

Any thoughts?

A little background... my husband and his ex (along with myself and the ex's husband) were all ordered in September to attend family therapy.  The judge thought they had a problem cooperating, and that this would help.  We were told to work together to select a therapist.

So, the ex makes an appointment with a therapist of her choosing without including my husband in the selection process.  We sent her a list of 5 therapists that we liked and asked her to select from them.  She said she wouldn't see any of them.  So we sent her a list of 5 more - same response.  She said she would only see the one she picked.  She also made the first appointment on our wedding day, refused to reschedule for another day, and then went on about us not attending the session.

We did a little background checking on the therapist, and it turns out that he came highly recommended, so we agreed to meet with him.  He told us in our first session that he had to bill everything under ex's name because he had to diagnose someone.  We said that was fine and agreed to split the co-pay 50/50.

Since then we've had multiple issues with scheduling the appointments.  Ex insists on having complete control of the scheduling, and we're just supposed to show up when we're told.  She schedules appointments at the most inconvenient times for us (of course), they are always during my husbands parenting time with the children, and she refuses to reschedule them if we ask.  If we schedule any appointments she will call and cancel or reschedule it for another time.  

Since she's technically the patient she has full control and we have none.  Of course, if she has contorl of anything she'll manipulate it to cause us the maximum amount of distress, so this isn't a good situation.
It's gotten to be extremely disruptive and unbearable to deal with.  We have asked repeatedly in the counseling sessions to have a set day and time, and she refuses.  My husband is sick of it and ready to just stop going.  I don't know how a judge would react to this.

Any suggestions on what to do?  We were considering sending her an e-mail stating what days and times we were available for counseling and asking her to please not schedule any appointments outside of those dates and times without prior agreement, and asking her to give us 14 days notice of all appointments.  Do you think this would work?

My husband posted a few weeks ago about his oldest child be left home alone before school in the mornings.  We were able to get that resolved by using our "co-parenting counselor", who told his ex that it was "questionable" as to whether or not that was acceptable, and that she needed to find care for the child before school.

Now his youngest told me that when she got home from school today her mother wasn't home.  Her mother is enrolled in school, and tries to work her school schedule around the kids school schedule so she doesn't have to pay for daycare.  (Even though we offered to pay for 1/2, over and above the child support.)  Apparently, sometimes she doesn't make it home on time, and this isn't the first time that it's happened.

The problem is that his youngest is only 7 years old, and there is no one around who she can go to if her mom isn't home when she gets home.  She said she's been going to her friends house, but the problem is that her friend is a 9 year old who stays home alone while her mother is at work.  There is no adult available to make sure she gets off the bus, or to supervise her if her mother isn't there when she gets home.

We have had several serious issues with the kids being unsupervised, this being the most recent.  This child has some behavioral problems, and started a fire in the woods behind the apartment complex a few months ago.  

Is there anything we can do?  Can we go ask the court to modify the custody agreement to say that the children must have adequate supervision when the mom is not available?  

If we try to address it with BM, she denies anything is happening.  The counselor had to talk to the oldest directly to find out what's going on.  She refuses to tell us what her class schedule is, so we have no way of really knowing when the kids are being left home alone.

There has to be something we can do about this.  The kids are having increasing behavioral problems, and their grades have been slipping since their mother started going to school full time.  My husband and I think that this has a lot to do with the fact that they're being left alone on a regular basis.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Whenever I pick my kids up for weekend visitation I ask for their homework so they can work on it at my house.  I'm always told by BM that the homework has been done - but when I talk to their teachers I'm told that homework given over the weekends is late or incomplete.  One teacher sent me an e-mail telling me that the child said that BM wouldn't allow them to take homework to my house because they didn't have time to do it there.

She was using homework as one reason to limit the amount of time I could spend with the kids, but now that we have a court date approaching for a custody hearing she's practically pushing the kids on me in an effort to appear cooperative - but the homework thing is still an issue.

I have talked to her about it several times, and she doesn't budge.  What do you think a judge would say about this?  What about a GAL?  

I'm also worried because she's been SO cooperative for the last six weeks - basically ever since she was served the petitions.  I'm worried that a GAL or judge will look at that and think there aren't any problems, even though I have more than six months of documented interference and alienation.  Anyone else have experience with this?

123