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Custody Update

StepMadre's picture

So we gave BM the initial papers our lawyer wrote up for us and she was calm and agreeable until she saw that since we would be 50/50, she would get very little CS, if any at all. She then threw a hissy fit over the phone (to H) and hung up on him when he was in mid sentence! She couldn't have made it more obvious that it's not her kids she cares about, but the money.

Our lawyer is actually really happy about all this and how things are going because she said it is going to be very obvious to a mediator or a judge that BM just wants H to support her and irrationally feels entitled to anything she wants and is delusional enough that she thinks H owes her money.

The next step is that we are going to have BM served with papers directly from the court, requesting that she respond within 20 days. If she doesn't respond, the suit automatically defaults in our favor. She is so disorganized and crazy that I wouldn't be surprised if it happens like that. She is really falling apart and we got two calls from SS12 this week, saying his mom forgot to pick him up and could we come get him and on the last day we had them and she was supposed to pick them up, she completely forgot about it. It was 8:00 at night! How can you not notice that your children aren't home?!! She wasn't just a few minutes late either, she was forty five minutes late and because her phone just got cut off due to non-payment, we had no way of getting a hold of her and wound up having to drop them off ourselves. Instead of being apologetic, she was completely bitchy and rude and shut the door in H's face when he was trying to ask her about a summer school recreational program that SS12 is in. This is interesting because that is how she is with me; she has always been hostile, nasty and bitchy, but until recently she has kept things fairly civil with H and has acted like they have some special bond that I am excluded from. The fact that she hasn't been able to hold herself together is very significant because that only happens when she knows she's not going to get what she wants and things are going really badly (for her).

I think it's finally hitting her (FINALLY!) that H hates her guts and that he wants nothing more than to have no more contact with her for the rest of his life. The only reason he does deal with her is because he has to for the skids. She has made creepy comments up until fairly recently, implying that H is interested in her life or cares for her on some level. She can't separate herself out from her kids and so when H is sweet and kind to the skids in front of BM, she acts like she is included in his affection and like she assumes that he would still be in her life if they didn't have kids!!! Now that we have initiated the custody modification, she has finally gotten the picture and now knows that not only does H hate her, but that he is determined to fight for his right to have his kids half the time.

When she served him with custody papers right after we were married (after agreeing to work things out without lawyers)it turned out that she didn't really realize that it was a legally binding document and that it held her responsible too. After all the papers were signed and filed that first time, she kept trying to go off the court ordered schedule and then when H refused she threw a fit and said that the custody agreement was a "guideline." She was the one who initiated the law suit and then didn't even want to follow it herself!!

This time, we are serving the papers to her and it will be interesting to see how she responds. Even if she is a total bitch and refuses to sign the papers and it goes to court, we have such a strong case that neither H, nor I, nor our lawyer are at all worried. Our lawyer says it is pretty much a cut and dry case and that any judge would see that the current schedule of dropping the kids off at Psycho's at bedtime is more disruptive to them than just spending the night with us on those nights and it will also be clear that she just wants money, not time with her kids because she gets to see them for about five minutes before they fall asleep and then she has random babysitters watch them in the morning and take them to school because taking them to school interferes with her job! If she goes to court to fight for five minutes in the evening with her kids and having them asleep in her house for those two nights a week and then having a babysitter be with them before school, it will be extremely obvious that what she cares about is the CS that is based on how many overnights each parent has, rather than time with them.

Our lawyer is writing up the court petition now and as soon as she is done we are serving her with the new papers.

As soon as things get rolling, i'll post more updates...Prayers and happy thoughts would be appreciated!!!

Comments

GreysMom's picture

good luck!! we went throught that crap for years...finally bm is moving away and relinquishing her cs...AND alimony !!! halelujia!!

caya506's picture

That's the nice thing about our situation with the parenting time, the new parenting time order didn't have to say anything about CS, there is a separate court hearing for that next month. BM signed the paperwork to have it changed to 50/50, but doesn't realize that CS will be reduced to I believe $0 due to BM and BF's imputed income being pretty much the same (BF is a full time student right now, and BM quit her job a few months ago). I wish I could be in the court room when the judge tells her that CS is being reduced to see the look on her face, and to see her start whining about how hard it is, and how she needs the money, then see the look on her face when BF asks her if money is so tight, then how could you afford the new boobs you just got?! I would pay to be there! lol

That's great that BM is doing that, showing what her true intentions are. Any judge worth his beans is going to (hopefully! Smile ) see that for what it is and act accordingly.

stepmom2one's picture

"because her phone just got cut off due to non-payment,"

yup, she is getting upset becuz her CS is getting cut. Who else is supposed to pay her phone bill, right? :sick:

ohxitsxapril's picture

Bm here would never agree to 50/50 custody even tho dh jus moved there recently and they are in the middle of a custody case as well. Bm keeps saying she wants full custody yeah only so she can live off the govt and get extra child support! Little does she know that dh is going to ask for more visitation and she was asking for a raise in cs. Glad you guys have a good lawyer. Dh's used to be good but as this thing drags on he's getting harder to get ahold of kinda scary. Good luck and hope everything turns out in yalls favor!

StepMadre's picture

Thanks for all the support and comments! Much appreciated! Smile

Yep, I just can't believe some of the stuff this kind of BM tries. I wish we had thought of having her sign the schedule change papers and having the CS hearing later, that's a wonderful idea. She's a total idiot and I don't think she would have even noticed the CS change if her lawyer hadn't pointed it out. The funny thing is that she is freaking out because we don't know her actual income right now, so our lawyer put her income at minimum wage and calculated the CS from that. With 50/50 custody and BM at minimum wage, and H's income, the CS he would pay would be about 160.00 and she had a complete hissy fit over that. What she doesn't know is that once we know her real income (she is required by federal law to furnish her income) it will definitely be more than minimum wage (we know the place she works and the pay isn't great, but is higher than min. wage) and it is most likely that CS will be recalculated to very little or nothing. Technically, if we have them exactly half the time, it should be a fair and even split with no CS. We already cover more of their expenses and pay the rent for a nice, three bedroom, two bath apartment so they can have their own bedrooms and bathroom (and I get my own girly bathroom with no Spongebob underpants lying on the floor!). BM rents an apartment out of an old shack that looks like it should be condemned. The horrible part is that her living situation doesn't have anything to do with her income, she is just unwilling to find a nice place to live. She got that apartment when she had an income that is three times what we make and she spent all her money on bars, parties and stuff for herself (like a new laptop) instead of paying rent on a decent place and taking care of her kids basic needs (such as daycare and clothes). She is going to lose it when she finds out that she won't be getting a huge chunk of money from us anymore. I am keeping my fingers crossed and am still anxious about how it will all work out, but with everything that's happened recently and everything in the past few years, there is no way we won't get at least 50/50.

Our lawyer is really confident and I'm really happy with her. She is one of my mom's friends too, so that kinda helps in the calling-people-back department, luckily. Our first lawyer was a "shark" but he basically only went to bat for people with a lot of money (not us!) and we feel pretty bitter about him. He talked H out of going for 50/50 custody initially because he said that our state favors the mom automatically and that we would end up with a worse deal than what BM was offering. We were inexperienced and stressed and so we settled, but our current lawyer said he shafted us and that it was just laziness and given BMs personal issues, history and documented lack of ability to provide for her kids, she thinks we would have had no problem getting 50/50 even back then. Now, BM has COMPLETELY fallen apart and is a total mess and has been screwing up in some pretty major ways, all of which will dramatically help us with the case.

It's so stressful though! We are staying positive and optimistic, but I will be so relieved and happy when we are through this! We have a great friend who agreed to serve BM with the court order, which is wonderful (and will save us 30.00). BM doesn't know him so there won't be any weird history and he is very straightforward, polite and calm so we think he will be perfect. Our lawyer was joking that the worst person to serve her would be me! Lol. That would pretty much guarantee drama and further shenanigans...

So, fingers crossed! I will definitely post an update as soon as we find out anything! Smile

mom2five's picture

We went through that. BM actually came out and told the kids that she couldn't let them live with us because she needed the money. We got custody. But it was a difficult process.