CS Account Closed

[txblonde]

After 19 years of child support, we were finally emancipated in February of 2008 due to the child graduating early.  We were never notified by the school or the PBFH and ended up overpaying by a month.  CS office says they will send her a letter to ask her to refund us the overpayment, but we know we have no recourse and she will keep the money.  It took less than a week for our cs account to close permanently.  

We had kept a copy of every single cs payment made, every court order, letters, school records, insurance, threats, phone records, police reports, basically over 5,000 pages that we went through over the weekend before throwing everything in the fire.  We discovered in 19 years that PBFH was NEVER held responsible for any of threats made by her, we NEVER had a paternity test (husband lost by default), she never paid her attorneys and we saw her one time in 19 years.  

After paying $100,000 for 19 years to a child we have never seen or will never know is DH's and $20,000 in legal fees, we are moving on with our fabulous life.

The best advice I have been given on this site is "The fact that PBFH will have to be herself for the rest of her life is her own life sentence of self-punishment".  So true, since PBFH later married and refused to have her husband adopt the child, because she wanted 18 more years of child support.  She said if he was dumb enough to believe she was on birth control, he was dumb enough to pay her cs.  Her husband cheated on her, she filed for bankruptcy, house foreclosures, and her latest blogs on myspace on how miserable her life is.... (all info available on internet).  The second best advice was "When one person stops playing the game, the game is over".  Instead of reacting to all her malicious instigating, we decided to have no contact whatsoever.  The first year, every day was a harrassment, the second year, every week, third year, every month, until finally we had absolute silence for the last 13 years.  We never answered a phone message and never answered letters.  We put all our bills, cars, house in another name so she had no access to us.  The only contact she had was a p.o. box and our attorney.    

I will never know why we had to deal with this PBFH, who had no morals, ethics, values or basic human decency.  I wish I could prevent other men from having one night stands, so they don't have to go through the mental and financial pain we went through.  And yes, we forgave her a long time ago, it was for our benefit, not hers.  Today, we are forever free.

Signing off in Texas!

[Kitty C.]

I'm proud of you guys.............you took the high ground and never compromised your morals or standards..........while the PBFH obviously never had any in the first place.

I think it's high time you owe it to yourselves to something VERY nice...like a second honeymoon or something equally nice??  ;-)

One word of caution, tho.  Be careful that the 'adult child' doesn't come looking for you some day for a handout.  I wouldn't be surprised if the PBFH told the child to contact you directly if they ever 'need help'....like getting bailed out of a bad situation, maybe?  DH got a phone call like that a few years ago.....long story but no contact practically from the get-go.  DH had no choice but to tell the kid he couldn't do anything for him, since he didn't even know the kid or even if he was the biological father (that had never been proven, just assumed, and this was a case that was established before DNA testing was done).  All I'm saying is just don't let your guard down..........

[MixedBag]

Hope you enjoy!