''The List'' by Tom now permanently archived

[kittencaboodle]

>Do I sound bitter? Do I sound vindictive? Maybe so, but just
>as the "List" states and what I found out the hard way,
>Divorce is war and you better be prepared for the battle. If
>you are not prepared for the battle or educated to the way
>"most" divorces proceed, then you will for sure always be in
>constant debt (paying C/S), you will loose your home, and you
>will loose the most important thing/your children. You will
>not gain custody and you will be granted visitation and be
>regulated to a mere visitator in your children's lives.

If you wage a war of attrition in divorce by claiming it a battle then you have already lost your children because I can tell you right now, without compassion and mercy you will hurt them and hurt them hard.  

My husband has asked me to wage his battles for him because I will be merciless when dealing with his ex, but not at the expense of his innocent children.  I cannot and will not support screwing one person, no matter how deserved, at the risk of ruining more lives in the process.  

As I stated, I suffer still from the war my step-father raged.  I went from being a child of the upper middle class to fighting to support a family of 3 on $60 a month.  

[Peanutsdad]

What you are missing here kitten,,, is many of the parents here,, have already been in a war of attrition,, and lost DUE to being merciful and compassionate.

Many here have already lost their homes, their money, their families. They are held in the hands of an ex who may or may not ALLOW them to see their child/ren.



With that as a premise,, I will fight tooth and nail to ensure my children are safe and happy.

Im sorry you suffered at the hands of your step father,, I am not he,, nor are any of the people here. MOST of us want simply,, to be able LEGALLY to raise our children to the best of our ability. To have the RIGHT to be involved with them.


It takes two to make peace,, but only one to make war. Question is, do you roll over and accept all the other side wishes to dish out ? I chose not to do that.


The simple facts are,, most of the courts do not care who's right, who's wrong,, whats in the best interest of a child,,, all they care about,, is what is it gonna take to get this case off my books?

Right and wrong dont enter into the family court equation,, just what can be proved or disproved and who has the better credibility.

[tjraid18]

   Sheeesh!!! Talk about a rock and a hard place. I'm tellin' ya, this whole scenario would never ever in a million years have entered my mind when my ex wife told me "honey, I'm pregnant." It's so ugly to have to deal with these situations were in; with our children in the middle. Alot of vindictive custodial moms totally take advantage of a completely,almost criminally unfair family law legal system. With no regard to what their children are put through. As long as they win. I agree 100% with kittencaboodle about losing your kids as soon as you look at it like a war. No matter who wins, the kids lose.
     I also agree 100% with peanutsdad and others who feel that they have no choice but to fight fire with fire. Either that or essentially lose any semblance of a life. And lose your children on top of it. It's usually an individual judgement call on how to deal with each personal situation. It's great to have "the list" available as long as you realize it's not to be used  for vindictive purposes. We, as single fathers have no tools to help us be able to see our kids. Every day I'm seeing more and more reasons why courts should enforce sanctions against these moms who do not comply with parenting agreements. Manipulating ex-boyfriends/husbands by using their children against them is just as abusive as a man hitting a woman. Lying and making false accuasations is just as criminal as robbery or theft. And probably more damaging. If people were'nt allowed to get away with these things in court or out of court, then the list would'nt even exist. It's just an ugly tool for an ugly situation.

[kittencaboodle]

>What you are missing here kitten,,, is many of the parents
>here,, have already been in a war of attrition,, and lost DUE
>to being merciful and compassionate.
>

Wrong, I'm not missing anything.  As I stated in my original post, I am a step-mother married to a man who has 4 kids.  He tried to do what he thought was best for the kids by giving his ex everything she wanted.  


>
>With that as a premise,, I will fight tooth and nail to ensure
>my children are safe and happy.
>

Even if your fighting makes your children miserable?  If that's the case, it seems to me your fighting more for yourself than for your children, and then YOU are the one missing something.  

>It takes two to make peace,, but only one to make war.
>Question is, do you roll over and accept all the other side
>wishes to dish out ? I chose not to do that.
>

I chose not to do that either.  My husband is incapable of treating anyone with the uncompassionate viewpoint that any legal battle requires.  He asked me to do it for hime and I show his ex no mercy.  One thing I should thank my step-father for would be the ability to legally take someone down and not flinch.  But not if it comes down to harming the kids.  

>Right and wrong dont enter into the family court equation,,
>just what can be proved or disproved and who has the better
>credibility.
>

So that makes it all right to use chioldren as pawns?  

Please tell me that's NOT what you're saying, because if it is, I feel nothing but pity for you.  You've already lost.  

[tjraid18]

  kitten --- We understand your point. From your last post I sense hostility and feel that maybe you don't know where some of the dads are coming from. You were'nt there when my ex wife would call my house from a payphone nearby with the kids in the background to supposedly find out if I was home before she brought the kids over. After not seeing my kids for two months I would answer the phone and listen to her say ---- "hello, are you there? -------- Sorry guys dads not home, guess he doesnt want to see you." and hang up. Never once was I not there on my visitation time with my kids. The things she did were pure torture and abuse. How about the time she picked me up after work one day when I was working two jobs ; with the kids in the car -- and accused me of sleeping with some little bimbo that I worked with at my part time job. She yelled and screamed at me for 15 miles then kicked me out of the car in the middle of nowhere, and I didn't even do anything!!! She was telling the kids they were going to have a little brother or sister because there dad got some "bad word" pregnant.
    Then she ends up becoming friends with this girl and had some kind of a weird relationship with her. I went to file a restraining order on her the next day and she had filed one against me for nothing ---- she just went to the courthouse and lied about a bunch of things. While crazy things like these are going on, I get a rare visit with my kids and my daughter tells me her mom took her to some house and went in a room with some guy or guys while she was left alone in the living room with some other guys. My daughter said the guys were looking at her really weird and scared her alot. There was nothing I could do about it. Her mom would just deny it, and make things even worse for me if I tried to do anything about it. And with the courts and other agencies being biased, they would'nt believe me or help me. Some fathers feel they need to fight for their children because the short term harm to the kids wont be as bad as the long term harm of growing up with a parent who cares more about themselves than their children. Alot of these fathers are probably right.

[kiddosmom]

NO and I do mean NOONE has the right to USE children. Not the mother OR the father.

You can fight for custody without it affecting the children overmuch if both parents act like adults and do not get vicious.

PD terms this custody dispute as a 'fight' because that is what he had to do. The mother refused to let him see, speak or be near his own child unless he paid her X amount of $$, and even then she did not want him seeing her. Is that not the MOTHER using the child as a pawn?

 It is 'termed' fight, battle ect because that is what it feels like, we have to fight to see the child to begin with.

Fighting does not mean getting in the mothers or fathers face and hashing it out. It is going to court for your rights as a parent.

[kittencaboodle]

I understand perfectly where the dads are coming from.  

I'm not anything like the ex-wives (or in some cases, ex-husbands) either.  I have to watch my husband deal with the loss of his kids every day.  I have to deal with putting my own life on hold because his ex refuses to do the mature thing, not that she ever has.  

My own desire for my own family has to wait because she was selfish and lied about birth control.  

Believe me, I would like nothing more than to make her cry.  I want nothing more than for her to suffer as she has made my husband suffer.  

But I don't.  I control the base urges that compel me to act as some primal beast and rend the flesh from her limbs.  If I were to do what I wanted, the only ones hurt would be the kids.  And I cannot do that to my husband or his children.  

Do I have hostility in me?  Yes.  I watched my step-father try to crush my mother for 6 years and he still tries to this day.  Then I marry a man whose ex-wife tries to do the same to him.  

The harm these battles do to children is anything BUT short-term.  Counseling doesn't help a small child understand anything.  It doesn't even help a big kid.  If this were a better world, everyone would be nice, there would be no divorce, and sunshine would flow from my butt.  Kids wouldn't have to deal with this.  

But the world isn't perfect, sunshine doesn't flow from my butt, and kids do have to deal with this.  Why make it harder by turning it into a war?

[Kitty C.]

What YOU don't understand is that the dads here don't want to do that either!  Our PBFH is an idiot and IMO a candidate for involuntary sterilization.  I've seen her scream over the head of SS at DH while SS is bawling his eyes out.  I would have liked nothing better than to rip her a new one right then and there.

But I am a decent human being with compassion and I would NEVER resort to that level.  And as angry as I've seen DH in regards to her, I know he feels the same.  The 'FIGHT' we're talking about here is a HUGE process, starting with NCP's learning just exactly what their rights are AND the rights of their children, then fighting for them in court.  We're not talking about going for the throat literally, but figuratively and in an acceptable, humane manner.  After all, our children will be watching this and how we conduct ourselves.  

Maybe they will suffer temporarily, but what we're fighting for in court is for the REST OF THEIR LIVES, not just for the next couple years.  I've heard of many a child come back as adults and ask their parent 'Why DIDN'T you fight for me, knowing what you did?'  Children are extremely perceptive and we don't give them nearly enough credit in that.  I've been watching my SS for 7+ years and have watched him go from worshipping the ground his mother walked on at age 4, to hating her guts at times, and he's only 10.  I can only imagine what it will be like when he hits 13+.

'War' and 'fight' are ONLY figures of speech.  The reason we call it that is because of the mindset one must attain to be able to navigate thru the mess of dealing with a child custody dispute.  No one here, in their right minds, would consider literally tearing down their ex, as it would only serve to expose them in the same light as the ex.  Here we like to think that tho we are in for the long haul, we WILL take the high road and never lower ourselves to the immature, vindictive, vicious levels that many CP's do.  We will set an example for our children and show them that rights must be stood up for and you MUST stand up for them or lose them.

[tjraid18]

     My mother was married four times. I know all about stepdads and the damage caused to kids who come from hostile, broken homes. Thats a lot of the reason I don't want to have to put my kids through "a war". But if I would have fought tooth and nail for custody like peanutsdad did and maybe got custody of my kids, I can't help but feel that their quality of life --- for the rest of their life -- would be so much better. A few rough years would leave some long term damage. But playing soccer and football and baseball and taking piano lessons and doing better in school, eating meals together, going to church, and all the other things that enrich childrens lives would more than make up for going through a custody battle. Don't blame fathers for wanting to make sure their kids are raised well ----
     I look at it like my kids didn't ask to come here. They were brought here by their mother and I. We both have a responsibility to make sure they grow up healthy. If I feel that that isn't happening, then I have the right to do whats necessary to make sure it does happen. Of course I'm thinking of the kids first, so I'm not going to carelessly rip them apart in the process.
                                                                 

             MAGIC LITTLE SEED THAT MAKES IT ALL GROW!!!>    tjraid

[nosonew]

BUT, as a child with a stepfather-who is more of a father to me than my own father (via his choice), and a bio mom who has a great ex, and a stepmom who has  a vindictive witch to deal with, I have this to say:

EVERY situation is different.  EVERY father should have this list made available to him for use IF NEEDED.  Perhaps my bio dad left and didn't come back because of problems with my mom, I DON'T KNOW, but I do know, HE NEVER TRIED.  Perhaps his pocketbook and/or his relationship with other women were more important than his kids, I DON"T KNOW, and now, I DON'T CARE, I have a "dad" although not biological, but he is MY DAD.  Because my other dad either didn't care or GAVE UP.

My ex, I dislike.  Or I wouldn't have divorced him.  BUT, he is a great dad, and has been involved in every aspect of OUR sons life since our separation.  I could have made it tough for him, but why?  It just hurts our son.  We now, over 13 years later, I get along great with his wife (whom I personally feel sorry for, lol), and I get along fine with him too.  I do this for my son.  

My ss's mom, I feel sorry for now.  She is mentally unstable I believe. The things she has done to us and her own son are incomprehensible to me.  However, what goes around, comes around.

So, don't JUDGE other people until you have been in their shoes.  All are different.  And I mean, walking in their SHOES!  Which you cannot do, so chill.  Just keep an open mind that your experiences are not like all others, not everyone should or will think like you, react like you, or do as you do.  

That is all I have to say, whew!