This is the first time for me to post anything on this site-besides some replies. I need to get some things off my chest involving the court system and if anyone is in our situation I feel for you. I started with 2SD's ages 5 and 8. No children of my own. BM was an alcoholic and barely saw the children-my H worked alot so I took the kids to school-dr's-dentists-clothes shopping etc etc. I kept records of how many times the BM saw the kids. She was a stewardess so she got away with saying she was at work when in fact we would see her home. My H paid CS up until she got her second DUI-lossed her job and had to leave the state. We tried to talk her into signing temporary custody over to H until she came back-but she still wanted to collect her CS! (That was her only income) Also during the time when H was paying CS BM got several raises that wasn't reported to DA like court papers said which would of lowered his CS significamtly. (Both have joint no custodial) We lawyer up-it takes us 3 months to find her and once she see's that her CS is gonna stop-she comes back out here-says she was taking care of her "sick mother" and her family re-establishes her. The courts let the kids see her in sleezy hotels for 4 months because she was homeless (unsupervised) We finally get our day in court and because she went to 3 meetings they said she was rehabiltated! They also raise H CS because he had significant OT and then that went away-we almost lossed our house-over this. 9 months later... The oldest leaves at 12:30 am and says she has had it with her mothers drinking and is scared to death of her. We lawyer up again... (different one this time) Hoping they can see H lossed OT and we were losing everything. Then I become disabled through a dibilitating disease and lossed my job of 22 years because of it! This time she loses custody for 6 months-doesn't have to pay a dime of CS. The courts let her keep her unsupervised visits and she tortured the oldest daughter by reading the court papers to her every night!! Now the SD feels the system let her down. She was 12! BM tore up school prodjects-screamed at her and took her out of our house crying and screaming every visitation. Younger SD really didnt understand what was happening. We took the girls to Alanon-counseling and the oldest just clammed up and wouldn't say anything. Now here we are finally done with court (we can't win) the judge said the passed is the passed. Husband gets more CS tacked on-we are going BK and we have to show her check stubs every 3 months! She then shows these to the kids and they think we are holding out on them! We can't even afford to go clothes shopping for them! Every time she gets CS check she gets them massages-facials and manicures! But claims she's very poor. She makes money under the table and we had someone come forward proving this-but that didnt work. She has a roomate that pays her-but she says she lives alone. When court was over we were like "we are done!) The SD told us after what happened to her she would never tell us if BM is drinking again. She has said so many things about us that the kids have turned on both of us. All we wanted was her to be sober! She has lived in 14 places in 2 years and us 1. Now she has told the kids my H has no intention on sending them to college.-They are now 14 and 12, They look at us like we are scum. Our visitaion is 7 days on 7 days off. When we got letters stating we were done with court-both lawyers signed off-30 days later we find out she never let her lawyer go. So we get letters from her lawyer wanting more money than his YTD and we keep paying it because we're afraid we have to go back to court. We have no money for a lawyer now. I also find "court papers in the 14 year olds room." Still.. I don't know what we can do or who to turn too? Would just going to the DA be a good idea? We need help-its almost like extortion from the BM and her lawyer. I looked online and it doesn't say anything about her re-retaining a lawyer again. Any advise would be appreciated.
Thank you