Shared custody but how to relate to child support?

[spinner]

Ok, beginning of this week I had a discussion with my ex-wife and I wanted to switch to share custody of our 3 year old child and stop child support.

I wasn't waiting much out of it how ever she had for argument that she wanted child support, blbalblallblal that all I wanted was to get off of child support (wait for the end to see who is the greedy one here) ballballballba and that the issue really to her was child support.

So I took her up on her world and told her: fine, let's forget Child support for now: can I see our kid more.
Answer was "what would you like? " and I said, well we can do everyother weeks.

My biggest surprise was when she said yes as long as I keep paying the Child Support (greed greed greed). so we are on a "switching to shared scheduele) the week-ends get longer till we are at 1 week each.

Here is the thing. She won't put ANYTHING on paper. NONE.

Here is my question:
How can I make it official or at least "verified" by someone that we are doing shared custody? I definetely intend to take this matter to court to get CS changed but my priority is to see my child more so I don't want her to "back fire at me" and take away the shared custody so I want to be more than 600% prepared with proofs once I take this issue to court.

What are your advises ?

[tulip]

Of course you have to document your time with the child. Keep records of all communications with her. We were advised by our atty when we started court proceedings last year that in order to get a judge to change a custody order you have to prove a.) the child is endangered or b.) the child has been integrated into your home with the consent of the other parent.

 So you'll have to increase your time with your child, and wait it out for a while. After 6 months to a year goes by, (I would consult an atty for advise on that) you ask her to change the custody order out of court, or go to mediation to resolve it.

If she refuses to work anything out with you then, you'll file for a modification of custody. When we did this, the kids had been spending more than 50% of their time in our home, but when PBFH would get po'd, she'd say "Ok, we're going back to the co." Our complaint in the motion was that the kids had been living here, but now she was "sharply curtailing" dh's time with the kids. He had offered her a settlement before filing to change custody to 50/50, with the cs amount remaining the same for another year and a half, to prove his motive was not the $$.

I'm sure your situation is somewhat different. Our BM is very stupid and crazy, so once things started to going to court, she completely lost it, and now dh has complete custody of the kids. I hope this helps some though.

[spinner]

this helps a lot, thanks

BM of our son I guess is loosing interest in him, he isn't the quiet little girl she wanted but is a wonderfull full of life little boy.

Add to that that she has a boyfriend that isn't too much of a kids guy, ...

Anyway, I am trying to fit myself in all of that, ...

[Lawmoe]

Minnesota Answers at http://www.divorceprofessionals.com

"How can I make it official or at least "verified" by someone that we are doing shared custody?"

Any agreements between the parties are not binding or enforceable unless and until they are memorialized as part of a court order.  However, the longer you contimnue to follow a schedule of one week on, one week off, the more likely a court is to order that schedule in the future.

"I definetely intend to take this matter to court to get CS changed."

Unfortunately, child support offsets are only available if custody is joint. Custody may only be changed if there has been endangerment and the benefit of the change otweighs the harm. Without such issues, there is an very unlikely chance that child support will change regardless of how much you have the child in your care.

Your best chance is to seek to change custody arguing that the child has been incorporated into your home with an agreementof the other parent. It is not the strongest argument, but it is the best one that you have.

[jurroppi1]

This is true, if this goes on for 6 months or more, there is a de facto change in circumstances, and you are legally in the right to pursue this to that end. Tread lightly however, because once the "CP" catches wind of a court motion because of a de facto change in custody, the extra time will likely abruptly come to a halt. You can use that as evidence of estrangement to an extent, but it also shows that the CP is unwilling to act in the best interests of the child by abruptly changing from one norm to another. This creates chaos and unpredictability in a child's life, and any reasonable court official should frown on that big time!

I would request that the Hortis - Valento formula be used for CS witholding, and that the custody arrangement be entered into the record as the current/future custody arrangement - along with custody being termed as joint legal and physical custody. This is the fairest way to deal with all of this...