How to overcome StayAtHome Mom issue for child custody

[confuseddad9]

My wife has been a stay at home mom since my son was born a little over 1 year ago.

I could go on for a LONG message about the verbal abuse, constant interference of any quality time I have with my son (she will distract him if I am playing or feeding him) and the screaming tantrums she goes into if I express any desire to do anything my way from feeding him his bottle to dressing him etc. (this also includes leaving the house to do anything other than go to work or take out the trash).

I share (gladly) a lot of the parenting responsibilities AND a majority of domestic (household upkeep) and avoid saying anything that could trigger her hostility and outbursts in the interest of peace on day at a time.

I am willing to share parenting time 50/50, and absolutely see the joy our son has with his mother. She believes child will be best with her and only wants me to have minimal (20% approx) visitation time. I fear loosing any right to have any say in my childs future and any meaningful role.

Several attorneys have told me the abuse if not physical or directed at child is not enough to overcome the stay at home mom factor, and I am leary of the father's rights attorneys who contradict this with rosey "new legal rights of fathers" scenarios but seem too slick and money-billing oriented. Money, property division etc is all distant second to having an ongoing relationship with my son and some say in his upbringing.

This divorce has parental alienation syndrome written all over it as well as possible future anger (now directed solely at me) being directed our son.

What are my honest chances of ever receiving primary custody?
Is the time to make my strongest stand now or in the future?

(i.e. get the best visitation I can get during divorce and wait for P.A.S and her to re-enter workforce to pursue more and attempt to reverse ruling).

[ocean]

Most likely the court will give you the min. every other weekend UNLESS the parents agree to the 50/50. Otherwise they will give one of you primary and it usually the mother. It is very hard to switch custody once it is established unless there is major abuse. PAS is VERY hard to prove in court and some do not take it that seriously yet.
Good luck!

[gemini3]

I agree - it is extremely hard to prove PAS, and just as hard to change custody once it's been established.  My husband tried to get custody (long story), was able to prove a lot of the alienation that was going on, and the judge still let the mom retain custody.  He didn't see that it was having an effect on the children.  The emotional toll it takes on you and your family don't matter, your right to be a father to your child don't matter, unless the children are having serious problems.  At which point, in my opinion, the damage has been there for so long it may be hard to reverse.

Emotional and verbal abuse are also very hard to prove.  

[confuseddad9]

Thank you both for your replies.

I am concerned about the statement regarding the "min" for visitation being every other weekend. I was of the impression that even if other parent did not agree to 50/50 that a 40% share (in FL) was quite common and a right of the NCP.

I am of course concerned about bouncing a toddler back and forth between parents but isn't that offset by the benefit of not loosing someone he has a strong bond with (me) at this phase of his development.

I had read alot about <3 yr olds being better with more transitions to keep the primary parent from being away for more than 2 days at a time while still keeping NCP a regular, frequent relation.

Looking online at sample parent plans this could be such as...

Every other weekend, with 1 weekday overnight during the week with weekend visit, and 2 weekday overnights on the week with no weekend visit) That's 5 nights out of 14 (only 35%).

Is this not realistic based on your experiences?

[gemini3]

50/50 is not a standard.  The "standard" is every other weekend and a period of a few hours on Wednesdays.  I think the view is that it provides frequent and continuing contact with the NCP, but also allows for stability for the child.

In my experience, children are very adaptable and would do fine with 50/50 custody, as long as the schedule is predictable.  The problems arise when the child isn't sure where they're going to be, etc.

50/50 custody usually happens when the divorce proceedings are without conflict, and the parents agree to the situation.  If there's a lot of conflict a judge will most likely make one person the primary custodian, and hopefully it will be the person most likely to support the child's relationship with the other parent.  Unfortunately, in a lot of cases I've seen, it's the person who lies most convincingly.  Especially when you're dealing with BPD.  They are very convincing liars.

Look at the best interest of the child statutes for your state.  Go down the list and (as objectively as you can) write the pro's and con's for you and for your wife on each item, and who you think wins.  This should give you a fairly good idea of what your strengths and weaknesses are pertaining to custody, what hers are, and a good idea of what your chances of getting custody are.

You're not going to get everything you ask for, so better to ask for everything and end up with 75% of what you wanted, than to ask for what you think is fair and end up with 50% of what you want.  Ask for everything now so you have some room to negotiate.

[confuseddad9]

I have reviewed best interst child statutes as you suggested and have articulated what I believe are my advantages to the attorney I had initial consultation with... am waiting to hear answers.

Does anyone have any experience with mediators and how that process occurs?

Has anyone had a case where they requested evaluators and or pschological testing? Did it work or was the spouse/ex able to "snow" them?

I am inclinded to take the approach that has also been mentioned in much of the feedback of:

"Fight hard up front but don't hold out much hope for primary custody, be prepared for limited visitation, and don't spend all of my life savings in the beginning but be ever persistant and do the best I can to stay involved in the future and hope for the best (even though reversals of primary custody or increased visitation time seem as unlikely as a positive judgement up front).

Is that really it?

[gemini3]

We had a GAL, a DSS home study, and a psych eval of one of the children (there were false allegations of abuse).  We wanted a psych eval of the ex, but didn't get it.  We believe that it would have changed the outcome of the case.

The DSS home study was a joke.  They basically just printed all of the lies that the ex spewed, and there was no accounting for what was true and what was a lie.  The study was done with 2 weeks notice, so she was able to do a thorough cleaning and send some of the 7 pets she has in her 900 sq ft apartment over to a friends house before the eval.  The evaluator interviewed her with the children and my husband and I without.  She did not interview step-dad.

The GAL was also a joke in my opinion.  He just wanted to collect a check and not do any work or offer any advice to the court.  The psychologist that did the eval of the child was great - he saw through everything, and made a very thorough report to the judge.  That was the one thing that helped us, because we were able to get the order revised to protect my husbands rights with the children, even though he didn't win custody.

[confuseddad9]

Followup Questions:

How is custody/visitation determined once divorce filing occurs? How quickly?

Is setting up a seperation agreement (in FL) worthwhile? (especially if spouse is set on limiting visitation this will be a heated issue but I don't want to set a precedant by agreeing to less than my ultimate goal. Does it factor into ultimate decision by court if it goes that far? (which I think it will).

[ocean]

As soon as you have an agreement in place it most likely will stay that way so do not settle in a separation agreement. You can get temporary orders if she is not letting you see them now and that may be changed but really once something is on paper it is VERY hard to change especially when she does not agree.

They will not do 50/50 or anything more when you do not agree because that takes a lot of work between the parents (activities, school, clothes) and you need to be able to communicate. If the court sees any arguments they will give primary to her, especially if she gets a lawyer.

[superdad01]

From my experience you can't beat a stay at home mommy. It's impossible. Our job as men and fathers is to stay working so the cash can keep rolling in.

What I did  which might benefit you in the long run is to attempt to get an agreement that has you having parenting time with the child as many days as possible. As long as mom keeps the overnights to secure their chils support the mom might not care that you have time with the child every day or every couple days.

For instance I have my parenting time with my child 10-14 days. I don't have the required overnights but I do have consistant meaningfull time with my child.

Down the road if mom ever works I am hoping that the judge will notice this and grant me a 50-50 split when we go back to court.

I feel I am in a lot better position then say someone with a standard every other weekend and a wed or something.