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My dh has two kids that bm had custody of until about a week ago. He's been taking care of the kids most of the time for well over a year. He finally got joint custody.

BM would tell him they were going back to co visitation schedule every time she got mad, but the truth is, she can't handle taking care of the kids. After lots of documenting, we talked to an atty. He sent her a proposed custody agreement, which she refused to sign. He then sent her a letter asking to go to mediation, which she refused. Finally he served her with papers to appear in court to get custody modified. She appeared at the hearing w/o counsel and did not contest motion.

Now,  here's what the atty told us about the law. In our state, in order to get a judge to consider modification of a custody order, you have to prove either that the children are endangered (very difficult) or that they have been integrated into your home with the custodial parents consent. We could easily prove that the kids have been integrated into our home. They never really moved out, since we live in the same house the kids have lived in since they were born. We used a color-coded calendar to show that the kids spend more nights here than in their mother's home. The "consent" part is the tough one, and our atty has lost cases on this technicality. He never had a good feeling about our case, and was thrilled that everything was so easy once we got to court.

I think the first thing you need to do is talk to an atty--a good one. Let him tell you what he thinks about your case. If you decide to move forward with it, the best advice I can give you is be patient. Nothing happens fast.

Did he have a lease? A landlord? Did you check with them to see if there is a forwarding adress? The person living in the home should be able to give you the name and # of the landlord, or real-estate agent, if he owned the home. What about the post office? Can you check with them for a forwarding address? Are the police even trying to help you?

I really hope you find your kids.

On Dec 10, a judge told pbfh that she could NOT take the kids to AK on or before Xmas, but could take them after Xmas. Also, pbfh agreed to change custody to joint physical and to go to mediation to work out all the details, and dh agreed to pay her the same amount of cs while she is still enrolled in her nursing program full-time--after that he would have it reviewed to comply with state guidlines for joint custody.

Dec 17 pbfh blew off their mediation appt. Dec 18 she called dh begging him to let her take the kids to AK on Xmas day, since that was the only time she could get seats on such short notice. He said no way. That night she had the kids call to tell him they really wanted to go. He said that he was sorry she could not get tickets after Xmas, but they were not going to leave on Xmas day.

Dec  18 she was supposed to cancel the reservations she had made on a 24 hour hold. She didn't. Dec 19 she filed a modification offer he had given her back in Sept. She did this behind his back without telling, but he signed it in Sept. At that time, there was no way in hell she would sign it. This offer gave her cs until June 2005--he threw that in to encourage her to go ahead and sign it w/o having to go to court. It also reversed the holiday schedule from their divorce j & d so she would get the kids Xmas day instead of Xmas eve this year. We didn't realize they were switched. The judge signed the order on Dec 23, and we found out about it on Dec 24. Dec 25 she picked up the kids at 9am like the order said she could. Ruined our Xmas plans. Flew to AK w/kids. She was supposed to return them to our home at 9am Dec 26 to stay until after church on Dec 28. That's what the order says. She didn't care about that part, and now she is violation of the very order she shoved through. Does anyone agree with us that she just gave dh custody of the kids?

She knows he called the police, and she is worried about going to jail for this. She actually thinks he might just say she had permission to do this so she doesn't get in trouble.

DH and I both took this test when he was having a custody eval done 3 years ago. BM took it as well. The best thing is to answer it honestly.

For all of us, I think, they said that the results showed we answered "defensively" (to different degrees for each of us though). This, I was told, is really common in custody cases, because the people are trying to make themselves look good. Different personality traits stood out in me and bm, which were reported in the eval. DH's test results were deemed "invalid." He didn't have any emotional or mental problems they could find, so I guess they decided he must be lying. The evaluation report said that he "claimed virtues not humanly possible." Sometimes I think my husband has virtues not humanly possible, so this doesn't surprise me.

I have heard of other people taking this test for an employer, and been told they were lying, so they had to take to it over. The first time when they answered honestly, they were denied employment. The second time, when they answered a little different, (not as honestly--to make them sound a little cuckoo) they passed and got the job.

DH took that test a second time, for another reason, and was told he was a perfectly normal and well-adjusted human being with no emotional or psychological problems. I think part of it is who is reading the test. (The custody evaluator was VERY biased against him.) And I think they expect everyone to have a certain amount of stress when facing divorce and custody battles, so that would make them a little emotionally unstable.

Anyway, the best thing is just answer honestly. Don't think "How are they going to interpret this?" before you answer a question because you just don't know.

Today dh and his ex had an appt w/mediator. She has been trying to get out of it all week. First it was a $$ issue. Dh has offered to pay her portion. Then, this morning she said she was going to cancel because she didn't know how to get there. Then back to the $$ issue. DH assured her that he is going to pay for this appt.

She also called him this am to tell him about big problems she has w/the parenting plan he gave her. (I took the one from this site, changed it to fit our situation, and retyped it for him, with his input, of course.) Besides various other things she doesn't agree with, she has a huge problem with the statements about step-parents' rights. Now, this doesn't concern me much, because I believe legally step-parent has these rights anyway, if they are married to the child's custodial parent. But I thought it was a good idea to have that in the parenting plan because she's said several times that I can't volunteer at their school, go to their conferences and stuff like that. I told dh that when she brought this up in mediation, they would probably tell her she's cracked.

Then she called him back and told him that she's not going because ss is sick. This is total BS! He offered that he could come over here and stay with me if he can't go to school, of course she refused. He talked to ss and he said he had a headache. DH asked him if he was nervous about the meeting today and he wouldn't answer him. He asked if he okay, and he wouldn't answer him. Now if in fact, this child is sick, it's because she made him sick. She's been drilling these kids about this crap for the last three days, and now she's using him for an excuse not to show for this meeting. There is going to be a cancellation fee of about $100, and dh certainly shouldn't have to pay it, but if they bill her, she won't pay it. Then they will probably refuse to see them until it's paid.

She told dh this am that she tape-recorded the kids telling her that I wrote this document, not dh. I would really like to see her try to use that in court. I think the judge would tell her she is a mental case for using her kids like that and take them away. Besides that, I also think the judge would acknowledge that she herself uses someone else to do most of her typing for her.

I was so hoping and praying that we were nearing the end of this. Doesn't look that way now.

This week I have a constant tension headache. I was so happy after court last week when the judge said she would grant them joint custody. Haven't seen that order yet, and they still have mediation on Wed to work out the details. She has been calling every day since court being a total B**** about this and that. I copied the sample shared parenting plan from this site, and have spent a lot of time retyping it to make it relevent to dh's case. I want him to go into this meeting with a clear cut idea of what we want so they have something to go on--make sure no detail gets missed. This will make it so they don't have something to fight about EVERY DAY.

Well, Sunday she called trying to get out of the meeting. She can't afford it. He will pay her part of the FIRST meeting. She told him on the phone she hasn't received cs in two months so she's broke. I asked him why would she even say that? The state takes money from his check every two weeks. We know she gets it. He said she probably said that because her boyfriend was sitting there and she is getting him to pay all her bills.

Today she said doesn't even know if she can afford the gas to get there. Gimme a break. I finished the proposed agreement today, and he dropped it off there tonight because he had to bring some stuff over there for the kids. She was calling withing 15 minutes. She has huge problems with all sorts of things. Namely, the statement that neither of them can call each other's homes from 8:00 pm to 8:00 am. She said that's illegal, and the judge said so in court. I'm beginning to think she was stoned when they were in court, because she didn't seem to hear what was said by the judge at all.

I told my dh tonight that I feel like I'M fighting with his ex through him, and he's sitting there going "Leave me out of it." (He's not saying that, it just seems like we are arguing about so much, when we both want the same thing.)

I just want this to be over. The worst thing is, the kids are there this week, and she manilpulates their minds so much, if she's pissed at dh about what's going on, you can be sure she's either trying to convince them to be pissed at him too, or treating them like garbage because they are not pissed at him.

If the current custody arrangement is working well, she would have the burden of proving that a change would be in the best interest of the children. Doesn't sound like she can do that. They are doing well in school and are well adjusted psychologically, yes?

If she tries to take the kids away from their father who is unwilling to give them up, she will be in for an uphill battle she is probably not prepared for.

Of course, if she can prove over a period of the next 18 months that she is committed to changing her lifestyle, and putting her kids first, for the kids sake maybe your dso should consider a custody change, to allow the kids a chance to have a relationship with their mother.

If she is not exercising her parenting time now, and is way behind in her child support, she doesn't really have a chance should she try to fight him for custody.

Yeah, I know. Getting joint custody now, though, since she will agree to that, puts us in a much better position for getting full custody later. So we've been told. I was telling dh the first day after court, that if they end up back in front of that judge because they can't work their stuff out, there will be no chance of joint physical custody anymore.

We have been documenting all this crap for almost two years. We also have police reports on file of her messing with his visitation. We saw first hand that the judge does not look kindly on that. It would be nice to have some peace for a while for the kids sake, though. Hopefully they will get their issues worked out in mediation, so there won't be much left to fight about.

I think she's just freaking out because she can't handle the idea of not having control over everything anymore. I just hope this order goes through before she changes her mind. If she does, though, at least there is a court record of her telling the judge that he is absolutely wonderful with his kids. He He. That one's going to come back and bite her in the butt!

The judge hasn't even signed the order yet, and already they (dh and bm) are proving they cannot get along. She's a wacko. She picked the kids up from school on Friday. It's dh's weekend, but since ss was "missing his mom" so much on Wed, we decided thought they could go over their Fri for the night. We were going out anyway, so they would've been w/a sitter here.

Well, dh called to talk to the kids between 4:30 and 5:00, just to say hi and see how their day went. She freaked out! She goes " I can't believe you're doing this already! They have not even been home an hour, you are going to see them in less than 24 hours!" She wouldn't let him talk to his kids. They did call him back, though, when they found out he had called. They were each going to spend the night at a friend's house. (Missed Mom eh?)

He picked them up at noon today, and she's called here like, 4 times since they got here. The kids were getting ready for bed the last time, and I made a comment to dh about how many times she's called today and he thinks she's trying to prove a point. Whatever. So her last call got disconnected after about 5 minutes, and the kids went to bed. She called back and dh told her they were in bed, she started screaming at him!

I am typing up a proposed parenting plan for dh to bring to the mediation meeting on Thursday. It's going to say that she can't call here after 8:30 pm. She won't like that, but too bad. That's when they go to bed here. Can we limit how many times she calls in one 8 hour period? Geez!

What is the new evidence, and how old is the original ruling?

Good luck!