Update..court in three weeks, can she do this

[Gram]

I disagree. Children do not need both parents from day one, they need their mothers. Generations of children have been raised primarily by their mothers. It's only been in the last 25 years or so that some men in this country have decided to argue for "parenting equality." Young children, especially babies and toddlers, primarily need the care of their mother. That's not to say that fathers aren't important. They are. Relationships with involved and loving dads are critical to a child's growth and development, and these relationships evolve over many years. But the relationship between a child and his mother begins before birth, and is the child's most important bond. For heaven's sake, he was part of his mother's body for 9 months! I don't think the BF has to "serve" the mother, but in the interest of what's truly best for the child, the BF needs to treat her with respect and compassion. If the BM is a loving, nurturing parent, the father ought to be grateful for that. It makes sense that he should see the young child frequently, but for short periods of time. Young children do not need to spend long periods of time away from their mothers.

[Ref]

For someone who claims to have been an educator for so long, you sound completely uneducated. From reading your posts I honestly can't tell whether you are a troll or simply an old lady with antiquated ideas.

You have obviously not walked in any of our shoes and you speak as though you are an expert. We don't need you here to play devil's advocate. Many of us on this board are both mothers and stepmoms. Look at Mixed Bag for an example.

I am not sure why you continue to post on this board. Are you trying to help or do you enjoy trolling?

Please educate yourself before trying to give such aweful advice or just read and don't post.

Ref

[MixedBag]

I haven't read the entire thread -- but I get the gist of what's going on.

Recently, I was given a copy of a study that recommends for parents living close to each other that a primary residence based on care taking history be selected.  The non-residential parent has short, frequent visits DAILY depending on availability and caretaking history.  If dual primary parents, share daytime caretaking, estalbish one night time caretakeer.  Overnights are not recommended.

This is NOT ME speaking.  This "source" that I was given is dated 1988, authors Baris, Mitchell A. PhD. and Garrity, Carla B. PhD., "Childrenof Divorce: A developmental Approach to Residence and Visitation, Psytec Corporation.  I only have a copy of part of that study which is the table format of the "short version" of the "Developmental Guidelines for Residence and Visitation Arrangements."

This same study recommends starting at age 2 the following:  Time initially distributed in proportion to parent's direct caretaking prior to divorce.  May introduce longer visitation periods for child gradually thoughout this state to a maximum of a split week.  Implement overnights for child - 1 per week initially, extend to a maximum of 3 per week toward the end of this stage.  Long weekend, short weekend concept, preferably including a week day visit, is a possiblity ifone parent works fulltime during th week and the other does not.

So even at the age of 2, they recommend migrating toward CLOSE to 50/50 time with both parents.

Bonding is critical to both parents particularly during the first 2 1/2 years of the child's life.

MOST people/posters here believe that both Mom and Dad can be primary caretakers from the very begining for infants.

So -- there are studies out there that support a point of view that most of us here don't agree with.  However, this particular study recommends MORE time (after the initial infancy period) than most of us NCPs get with our children.  So there are pros and cons to citing it.....

Bottom line is that children need both Mom and Dad in their lives and that EX-husbands and EX-wives (or EX-girlfriends/boyfriends/partners) need to get OVER the intimate relationship of marriage or partnership that they used to have, and migrate to a parental partnership until their child emancipates.

[MixedBag]

so how about starting a new thread and giving us an update on how court went?

We learn from each other's experiences here, so please share yours!

[MixedBag]

so how about starting a new thread and giving us an update on how court went?

We learn from each other's experiences here, so please share yours!

[MixedBag]

so how about starting a new thread and giving us an update on how court went?

We learn from each other's experiences here, so please share yours!

[b1798]

This reply is coming from the stepmother.....and I am going to end this debate with "everyone can have their own opinion". My husband truly loves his daughter and would give anything to have more time with her. I understand that I am not her mother nor do I want to be, yes I want my own children but a little bit of respect for treating my SD like my own would be nice. I guess in some twisted way some BM would want the step parent to treat the child like crap so they would be considered better, but i wont do this. Yes she is not mine but i will absolutely treat her like she is. No her BM is not some horrble abusive drug addicted parent and we are not trying to say that at all, but neither is my husband so our inquiry was simply based on why BM are automatically given the heads up. Have you ever been told you could see your child 8 days a month? Obviously not, this is not for our ego's at all we simply want that little girl to know we want and love her just as much as our own chilldren. You can not tell me that by that little girl entering my home 8 days a month and especially after we have more childre she is going to feel comfortable.

Money
This is by far the least worries for us....no one can go through 2 years of court cost and lawyers and tell me we are doing it to pay less money. We pay BM $700 a month and thats not a concern for us. We are young and not rich but wee arent going to succumb to being deadbeats either.  I would love to be able to pay for all of our childrens colleges, weddings, first home down payments, etc. but feasibly it wont happen. BM has offered us joint custody and 50/50 visitation if we continue to pay her for sole.....who is it about the money for? We decided against it b/c we refuse to sell our souls to the devil over it. My husbands abilities as a father and love for her should be enough. Oh and she filed not us.

You are right it was a one night stand and he should've known what could happen as she should've too. They are both adults but her opinion as is yours was that he was simply a sperm donor. We arent going to quit and we wan it over before SD gets old enough to know what is going on. I truly hope that your childrens father never puts you through this because it brings emotions you never knew existed. Ignorance to being open minded seems to stop many people from believing that we live back in the stone age when the mother was the child's rock. This is no longer true.

We will have our own children one day when I am ready , but I commend my husband "for stepping up from a one night stand" and being a real father. This is one of the main reasons I married him.

To thos of you fathers or families going through this it is a tough battle but worth it, I truly believe what goes around comes around and that in the end GOD will make it right. Good Luck

Update...Court is tomorrow at 10 am I will update with a new posting on the verdicts...please say a prayer for us

[b1798]

           This reply is coming from the stepmother.....and I am going to end this debate with "everyone can have their own opinion". My husband truly loves his daughter and would give anything to have more time with her. I understand that I am not her mother nor do I want to be, yes I want my own children but a little bit of respect for treating my SD like my own would be nice. I guess in some twisted way some BM would want the step parent to treat the child like crap so they would be considered better, but i wont do this. Yes she is not mine but i will absolutely treat her like she is. No her BM is not some horrble abusive drug addicted parent and we are not trying to say that at all, but neither is my husband so our inquiry was simply based on why BM are automatically given the heads up. Have you ever been told you could see your child 8 days a month? Obviously not, this is not for our ego's at all we simply want that little girl to know we want and love her just as much as our own chilldren. You can not tell me that by that little girl entering my home 8 days a month and especially after we have more childre she is going to feel comfortable.

Money
This is by far the least worries for us....no one can go through 2 years of court cost and lawyers and tell me we are doing it to pay less money. We pay BM $700 a month and thats not a concern for us. We are young and not rich but wee arent going to succumb to being deadbeats either. I would love to be able to pay for all of our childrens colleges, weddings, first home down payments, etc. but feasibly it wont happen. BM has offered us joint custody and 50/50 visitation if we continue to pay her for sole.....who is it about the money for? We decided against it b/c we refuse to sell our souls to the devil over it. My husbands abilities as a father and love for her should be enough. Oh and she filed not us.

You are right it was a one night stand and he should've known what could happen as she should've too. They are both adults but her opinion as is yours was that he was simply a sperm donor. We arent going to quit and we wan it over before SD gets old enough to know what is going on. I truly hope that your childrens father never puts you through this because it brings emotions you never knew existed. Ignorance to being open minded seems to stop many people from believing that we live back in the stone age when the mother was the child's rock. This is no longer true.

We will have our own children one day when I am ready , but I commend my husband "for stepping up from a one night stand" and being a real father. This is one of the main reasons I married him.

To thos of you fathers or families going through this it is a tough battle but worth it, I truly believe what goes around comes around and that in the end GOD will make it right. Good Luck

Update...Court is tomorrow at 10 am I will update with a new posting on the verdicts...please say a prayer for us

 

[MixedBag]

tomorrow after 10 am has happened...

[b1798]

Hi- Sorry...I was not in the office yesterday. We walked away with joint legal custody, which we had none before. Same visitation schedule as before only 3 weeks instead of 2 vacation. Everyother year tax exemption and we agreed to pay 50% of all health costs. we didnt end up going to trial but settling outside the courtroom. It still took almost 8 hours of negotiating and we walked away not happy but not sad, we are content.  We have Wednesday overnights noow and BM wanted to put in agreement that they would cease once child became of school age, but we refused unless she was willing to determine then and there where the days would be made up. She refused, but we stuck in there and didnt give in, we ended up wording the agreement that both parties agreed that the minor child entering school was a major change in circumstance. This would not allow the BM to just take away our Wednesday when child started school. But if she was not willing to reach an agreement with us about a new vistiation schedulel that we liked, it would be HER responsibility to take us back to court in 3 years. (She is the type that would just take them away and that was that. We also got all federal holidays appended to he weekends we had her in our custody only problem is Labor Day and Memorial Day fall on the same parents weekend for 7 years in a row so we are discussing making those seperate holidays and rotating them. We ddefinately would've liked more visitation, but if we had gone to trial we probably wouldnt have gotten joint legal which is a plus. She has final decision making power though so i dont know how beneficial it will be to us.  I believe overall we did well, we accept the fact that we will probably be back in court in three years but until then we have our lives back. As for the daycare nothing was changed but wee made special note to all parties that we didnt agree with the arrangement and that any mishaps that became of her staying there were under the sole decision making of the BM. That way if something happens we can use it against the BM for making the bad choice. Its true in court you never WIN  and i dont feel a lot better or a lot worse. I am still dealing with the fact that this will be ongoing for the next 16 years.  It does bring some satisfaction in that the mother wanted to change her mind on the agreement at the last minute and wasnt allowed to . So atleast i know she left more upset then us, which to some may be cruel but to me is a small victory after the hell we have been through. We are still working through some small gliches like Memorial Day and Labor Day and I will let you know what comes of them. Aim high in what you want, but dont put all your hopes into it....be willing to JUST be satisfied. Good Luck to all of you fighting, who knows over the years the system may get better..lol