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Just to clarify because I realized how it sounded after I read it lol, it was my ex who found out his father wasn't his bio father, not my son. There is no question who my son's father is. Just realized it might have been a little confusing after I posted it
-Sharon

Thank you so much for your quick reply Davy.
   Just thought I'd address a few things so every thing is clear for any one else offering advice.
I know that when our son was born, his father signed a declaration of paternity in the hospital. But there may be some complication with that.(Long story short, my ex's parent's lied to him his whole life and it wasn't until my son was almost a year old we found out that his father wasn't his bio father, and he actually had a different legal last name that what he had gone by his whole life. Way more complicated, but I'm summarizing for the sake of time).
   So I'm not sure if signing the declaration of paternity meets any sort of legal requirement of establishing paternity for his part, or if the document is even legal because it wasn't signed with his legal last name, but rather the name he thought was his.
   As far as relationships go, he hasn't had a serious relationship with any one since he left two years ago. I have had two I guess you would call it "boyfriends" in that time. We both set up a rule from the start that the kiddo wouldn't be allowed to meet any one we were "dating", unless it was serious and we talked to the other first about it. Our son has met those two boyfriends, the first one because he was a family friend that he already knew from before, and the most recent one, because it has become more serious, and with my ex's approval the new boyfriend has been interacting with our son for about 4 months now. They get along great, and my ex seems to have no problem with it as far as I know.
  As far as I know, my ex has no real interest in "dating". He has ( and honestly I think just to get under my skin) messaged me a few times to tell me about random women he's "hooking up" with, and to tell me how great it is to not be tied down. He's admitted to 9 women in the past 7 weeks. Which I understand has no bearing on the kind of father he is, but it is still a source of tension between him and I.
  At this point, it's almost starting to feel like a teenager rebelling and acting out more than anything, and I'm not sure if I should go ahead with this custody thing, or even if I need to. I don't want to do anything that I can't take back, and I don't want to harm the peacefulness we've had up until this point.


Thank you for your kind words Davy, I appreciate that you took the time to reply to me. Hopefully all the posters on this site prove to be as helpful and thoughtful as you've been.
-Sharon

I'm brand new to all of this, and by that I don't mean just this site. I mean having to fight over custody. Let me introduce myself first. My name is Sharon, 26, mom of one, from California.
His father and I have been apart for almost two years now(Never legally married). We were together for four years before he left. It was rocky at first, but him and I were able to mostly remain friends through it, and never had an issue as far as custody went. It was the one thing the both of us agreed on, and never had trouble with. He'd give me a call when he wanted to hang out with the kiddo, or I could give him a call when I needed to do something and wanted him to take him for a bit. No big deal on either of our sides.
Now all of a sudden the past few months it's becoming a problem. The only thing that has changed with us is he just graduated from boot camp for the Marines, and I'm not sure if that has anything to do with it. But now everything is just angry with him. Last minute changes with our son, not keeping his word about when he's bringing him back, doing things like cutting his hair with out talking to me, which might not sound like a big deal I suppose. But the big deal right now is, last week, when we yet again had an issue with him bringing our son back when he was supposed to(wanted to bring him two days later), I told him that maybe it's time we go ahead and get a custody order in place, just so we can be clean about where our son is going, with who, when, and for how long. So we don't keep running into this problem. His first reaction was to start yelling, cussing, and to tell me that he was going to take full custody of our son and that I would never see him again.
It's not like him, and I'm not sure what's going on. I've never had a problem with our son spending time with him, I've always encouraged it, he loves his dad and I know his dad loves him. But now with the threats he's been making, I don't feel okay with sending our three year old back over to that house with out the protection of a custody order. I have no way of knowing that I'll ever get him back otherwise.
I need to know if any one has any advice on this situation. Or if any one knows how to get a custody order in place with out an lawyer, which is something that I have no way of affording right now. I'm a full time college student, lost my job three months ago to down sizing, and I don't even have child support to lean on because he's never paid a dime of it in two years(another story for another time).
Any advice anyone can offer would be a great help and I thank you all in advance.
-Sharon