SPARC Forums

whitedove

My girlfriend and I have terminated our relationship.  We have a 2 and half year old son, which both of us love dearly.  We were doing fine up until January 15th with shared parenting.  I started paying child support in November and have not missed a payment.  She has no basis whatsoever, but in Jan, she decided that I was not going to see him until I got a court order.

I have hired a lawyer and we have a hearing scheduled for next Thurs (Apr 7th)  My problem here is the judicial system.  I hired a lawyer the first of Feb.  Well, there was a lot of red tape....getting records transferred from one county to another.  It seems the system favors the Mom and the Dad is already a deadbeat.  Doesn't it seem that since I was abiding by the law and paying the child support that she couldn't have kept him from me all this time?  She had nothing to prove that I was unfit, and who would I have gone to with this problem other than a lawyer..  So why am I the one that suffered and she called all the shots?  Why couldn't there have been a temporary order so that I could have seen my son until the hearing?

Her problem started with me confronting her in a lie that he had to be enrolled in the daycare that she works at so that Job and Family Services would pay for it.  Which wasn't true.  I called the J & F S. and they assured me they would pay for partime.  When I posed this to her, she went off on me and that's when she told me I couldn't see my son anymore.  Is this legal?  Does she have this right?  What are the laws?
My lawyer is usually too busy to return my calls and I can't get any answers from him.  When I look up these questions on web sites all I get is what the laws say that are decided in court.

Maybe there is something already written that both parents have equal rights before court.  I haven't been able to find them.

If you could please help me, it would be much appreciated.

Thanks

If you are adjudicated as the father of the child, she has no legal right to preclude you from seeing the child or vice versa. The problem here is not a gender bias. the problem,is that she had the children first. If you had them first, arguably, you could have done the same thing with the same impunity until a court hearing could be held.

Unfortunatly, the only way for that issue to be resolved is in court and it is not a basis for an emergency ex parte order to seek immediate contact.  Her failure to allow you access could backfire, however, and will undoubetedly not sit well with the court.