Stepmom and School
Ok, I will keep it short for now... Here is the story, I am the SM and we had his daughter at our house for the past few days, I have been taking my step daughter to school, step daughter had gotten sick and called me to pick her up. I got to the school and I was not on the list for pick-up. And it gets better neither was dad. So dad came to the school showed his divorce papers where it states he has equal rights to his child, they added me and dad to the pick-up list.
BM found out and was irate. She went to the school and told them she wanted our names removed from the pick-up list. The school contacted the School Board and a secretary for the attorney who represents the School Board stated “If BM has primary residential, then it is her choice as to who picks up the child even though the papers state they have shared parental responsibilities” but the BM could not remove dad, BUT could remove me the SM and he has no say in the matter.
Anyone have this happen to them? If so, what can be done?
Not yet, but there is
Not yet, but there is another thread somewhere that addresses this.
You and your DH can remind her of this next time she wants DH to get the child and he is unavailable and you are free to do it.
Comments
You said "You and your DH can remind her of this next time she wants DH to get the child and he is unavailable and you are free to do it."
If DH is unavailable on her schedule she simply tells the child that DH does not want her and would rather spend time with his *h*re…
Yeah I was taken off
I was really embarrased but the school said "Dont worry we see this all the time" and "She is using the kids to get to you"
Here in FL Both Parents have rights to pick up the kids on their visitation days BUT since I am not married I am only allowed to p/u from school and daycare. She has to say its ok for me to P/U at her house though
I wish I could sell her for what she thinks she is worth,
I'd be a millionare twice.
SM have no rights
Yes she does have the power to take you off the list. But you have the power to do what she feels a SM should do and that is absolutely nothing. When SD is there don't pick her up or take her to school. Make her or DH do.it I know it may sound mean, but don't let anybody use you or hurt your feelings. Because i know that that situation has hurt your feelings. BB kill me with this i won't you to deal with the kids when its convenient for me otherwise don't associate with my kids. Whatever.
If raising children was going to be easy, it never would have started with something called labor!
It gets even better
I contacted our attorney who stated they have shared parental responsibility. I went to the school to get the information needed so that our attorney could contact them. As I was there an officer was there, he overheard the situation, so he walked over to the conversation. He asked me if I had the divorce papers, and of course I did (sad we kept a copy in each vehicle just for this purpose) well he read the papers and he to said the father has just as much say in who can pick the child up as the mother, that the primary residence only means that the child lives at an address and in our papers does not mean that she has more say (control).
So he and the Vice-Principle contacted the School Board, well come to find out no one has ever pushed the envelope on this situation and the School Boards legal stand on it is that the “Primary Residential Parent” has all rights to do this. The officer argued with them and stated that no court would agree with this policy. But it is their policy, and come to find out since BM did not add the father that he also can not pick up the child, only who she designated so he has now been removed.
After all this conversation, what is sad is that the child is hurt by all of this. And the school feels bad, but they have to keep policy. We completely understand that, it’s that we have a bitter ex who manipulates her rights. And he has to prove his rights through court.
We have a meeting with our attorney who states we have to get a modification to the divorce and put specific language to his rights. It’s just very sad that he has to prove he has rights, and that she can get away with taking them without proof.
This happened to me as
This happened to me as well..we had been married for a couple of years and I had lunch and went on field trips with my SD because I was available more to do so. I got away with it a couple of times. When the BM found out...she was not going to have that oh no...so she took care of with the school and never told me until next time and I showed up for lunch and was humiliated! With all this confusion I decided if I was not good enough to attend school functions or pick the kids up from school..then I would not be good enough on DH weekends when he was out of town or working on his weekends to pick up the kids then either. This caused quite a stir since BM enjoyed her kid free weekends.
So how does a step mom get
So how does a step mom get legal rights to pickup kids at school? If Dad has residency and tie breaking authority is that enough.
I haven't had any issues yet as most people have never even seen bio mom and see me all the time but I'm sure once she thinks of it she'll do ti.
I assume it's different in
I assume it's different in every state but I was really surprised by the update, all the drama with the School Board etc. Then I looked more closely and saw that the update happened several years ago, so perhaps times have changed a bit in greeneyedgirl's community, also. I know that after my husband went through his latest rounds in court with BM in early 2012, he was able to rattle BM's chains the next time they signed Emergency Contact and pick-up lists and all that, and add both me and his mother, because he finally had OFFICIAL joint legal and physical custody (prior to that he had 50% physical custody but they had come to that agreement out of court and BM had insisted 100% legal was rightfully hers because of her Golden Uterus). Until that point, BM had always filled out every slot however she saw fit, putting in my husband (because, honestly, he was her errand boy for YEARS) but also her current boyfriends, neighbors, tenants, other randoms...never me, the stepmother, or any of the numerous local paternal relatives. DH made her erase half the form so he could fill it out with his choices for those slots, and she fumed but could do nothing about it as she had already knew our lawyer was on standby just waiting for more shenanigans to smack down. In our case, what mattered was the legal custody issue, not the physical or primary residence (SD has never really had a 'primary residence' as her parents were never married and she has always lived in both houses).
OMG I have had so many
OMG I have had so many problems with BM. Thank goodness she has not done this to me!!
My DH pays to send SD to a
My DH pays to send SD to a private school, BM did not want to pay for half of the tution ($12,000 per year) so DH pays all tution, has all educational decisions, and BM has to live within 10 miles from the school.
I can pick up SD, be class mom, and sub at SD's daughter and BM can say nothing.
Get with DH's attorney and see if you can blow her out of the saddle, if you enroll SD in private school.
See this is what I worry
See this is what I worry about! My DH is in the military so sometimes he is not available to pick her up. BM has a TON of people on the list that is allowed to check people out of school: my MIL, BM's mom, BM, DH, BM's dad...you get the picture! The list is huge. The other day I checked her out of school and brought her right back. I had permission from DH to do this and I sent a text to BM to let her know (maybe that was my mistake) the next thing I know BM is at the school in the child's classroom when we return to school. Apparently she was really upset by the whole thing. She complained to the teacher, she called my MIL to complain, she complained to BM's mom you get the picture. I'm waiting to see what happens next year. I am sure if she finds out that she can do this and that DH has no control over it I probably won't even be able to volunteer at school events. PS the only time that I have EVER signed the child out of school in the middle of the day was this one particular time and I was told that BM was not going to be coming back to school. I guess she changed her mind and I got caught haha.