Good news!!!!

[stk_agn]

I talked with a couple people in the chatroom a few months ago about my son and allegations of child abuse on my ex's part.

But for those of you that do not know what happened I will explain as briefly as I can.

First of all, my ex and I had 50/50 custody with NO primary.

In November 2005, I got a phone call from DCBS requesting a meeting with me. They told me that they had received a complaint against my ex-husband for abusing my son who is 13 yrs old.

We went to court, judge took my son from my ex AND me and put him in foster care. I could not figure ot why she took him from me but I did as she told me to. (I did see son every day so he wouldn't freak out by being in foster care.) Father was ordered to stay away from son.

In Dec 2005 we went back to court to try to get son back in my care,,, judge said, "No Way!!" and continued custody to DCBS. We then took it to the Circuit Court on Jan 6, 2006 and the judge gave me temporary custody of son pending the outcome of the hearing on Jan 9, 2006. (Yes it was only 3 days.)

Jan 9th hearing district judge took son away from me again and put him back in foster care. So this made 3 times that she refused to let me have my son because his father doesn't know how to keep his hands to himself.
Keep in mind that all this time there has not one time been anything negative said about me, no investigations, no complaints, NOTHING.. But the judge wouldn't let me have son back because of her own personal opinion. (Yes she did remove son from my care based on her own motion.)

We went back in front of district judge on Jan 26 on request for "written Findings of Fact". Knowing that we were going to go over her head again, district judge gave me custody of son back and order no contact with son's father. Ex plead guilty to child abuse in Feb 2006 and ordered to counseling.

It has been 4 months since my son has seen his father. Not because I won't let him but because father refuses to complete psych evaluation he was ordered to do, he also refuses to complete anger management classes that he was ordered to do. He has also refused to schedule the supervised visitation with DCBS because he wants visitation to take place in HIS home and DCBS says no way,,, not safe.

The whole purpose of this post is to encourage people to NOT give up. I felt like I was going to lose my son to the foster care system even though I didn't do anything to him. The judge just took him because she wanted to prove that she could do it without reason.

Just don't give up on your children no matter how bad things seem to get. Let them know that you love them and that even though you are not with them everyday physically, that you are with them in their thoughts. I know that sounds corny but I don't know how else to say it. My son was in the foster system for 3 months for no reason.

I wish everyone much much luck in their court battles.

[backwardsbike]

I am happy you got custody of your son.  I deal with a judge who makes decisons based on his own personal feelings, not law.  Thus far, 5 years now, I have been unable to get anyhting changed.  Your post was inspiring.

[MixedBag]

your success story.

[stk_agn]

Thank you for the responses,,

Just a note or two.

The judge finally told me the reason that she removed my son from my home. Her reason was that she thought I was "weak" because I don't work.

That pi**ed me off and I showed her exactly how weak I was. I started yelling at her and was a total smart a**. Then I asked her in the loudest, most hateful tone possible, "There are millions and MILLIONS of women in this country that don't work. Are you trying to tell me that they are weak too?!!? Just because I stay at home with my children and spend time with them and help them with their homework does NOT make me weak!!"

Needless to say, she was not happy. She asked DCBS (as well as the County Attorney, TWO of my old attorneys, my current attorney and the GAL) what their recommendations were and they all agreed that my son should be placed with me. My ex's attorney objected and the judge told him that if he didn't like it to take it to Circuit Court because she was done with it and gave me custody.

My ex was to complete 4 different kinds of counseling before he could request supervised visitation and he has yet to even begin any of it. Like I said in my other post, it has been 4 months now since he has seen my son.

He has, however, made sure that my son's friends tell him that his dad hates him for "ruining his reputation". He has also made sure that my son knows that his brothers and sister from his second wife "hate" him too for what he did to their dad.

The only thing I can stress to my son is that HE didn't ruin his dad's reputation his dad did it all on his own. Maybe next time his dad will keep his hands off my son's neck. (That is how we were finally able to take it to court, he left a hand print around my son't neck.)

My son his happy here, loves his new school, is playing basketball for the first time, is playing softball this year. He has gotten all of his check-ups (physical, eye, dentist) that were all 3 yrs overdue.

Again, I wish everyone much luck with their cases.