If you have 50/50 what is the schedule like?

Here's ours:

One week, we have: Monday,Thursday,Sunday
Next, Tuesday,Wednesday,Friday,Sunday
The week after: who knows?

It changes, day by day, week to week. Oh, Darth Vader wants to go fry SS9's skin again at the beach on Saturday? Ok. Oh, one of Darth Vader's sometimes-best-friends has a pool? Ok, here's Friday and Saturday. Oh, Darth Vader signs SS9 up for EVERY.SINGLE.SPORT.EVERY.SEASON? Sure, then complain that we never take him to practice because you sign him up on YOUR side of town, and so you end up getting practice days AND the weekend, because poor old you has all your time taken up by the sports activities THAT YOU BULLIED HIM INTO! (He says every season he'd rather not play...yes I think he's caught in the middle of pleasing both mom and dad, but that's a whole other issue.)

So, for the past 3 weeks, she's had practically the whole weekend, if not the whole weekend (she thinks either us or her getting him after church on Sunday is splitting the weekend). And I told DH about THREE parties we have coming up for this next weekend (Friday, Saturday, Sunday--Friday is an annual end of school bash, and Sat/Sun are birthday parties for SS9's cousins). But DH seems to think it's not fair to ask for all three days. WHAT?!?

DH got a text at 1:30 p.m. yesterday, can we meet to get SS9 at 3:30 because she has a wedding to go to. WHAT IF WE HAD FREAKING PLANS FOR, you know, MAYBE A DATE? Not like we would (but we need to) and then, it always seems like we never get enough time with SS9 because the schedule is so asinine, so we'd cancel to spend time with him, instead of letting him be with whatever babysitter we had for DD2.

DH assures me he is going to speak to her about the schedule. He says he is going to say it needs to be, 3 days one week, 4 days the next week, as it is now. BUT (and we figured it out on a calendar for next month and it would work very nicely), every other weekend, each parent gets either Thursday, Friday, Saturday, OR Friday, Saturday, Sunday. THEN DH says, she (and us) will just have to plan special stuff based off the schedule. No more will the schedule be based off of her life. And if SS9 misses something from one family side or the other, then oh well.

I'm thinking that would be such a lovely thing, to have something that isn't solely dependent on the dark side.

But yeah, some judge, 6 or 7 years ago, agreed to such a stupid schedule. The original divorce papers state something like, Darth Vader gets her non-working days, plus 2 other days. DH gets whatever the other days are.

I met DH when they were filing for divorce (had been separated for over a year and a half) and three months later it was final. I can tell you, the schedule has NEVER been solid. It was always changing to please her. DH went along with it because for a very long time, it meant he got SS9 WAY more than 50% of the time. But for the past 2 maybe, 2.5 years, she's been a stickler about the 3 days/4 days stuff since she seriously dated and now married Lame-butt who has 2 sons. I also mostly have records of who had SS9 for almost every single day for the past 5 or 6 years.

One thought though. What if DH gets her to agree to a solid schedule. Then what about holidays. In the papers, they're supposed to share holidays (if she gets Thanksgiving, we get Christmas...but it doesn't really specify Christmas Eve or anything!). So what has been happening, is she is getting all or part of Thanksgiving Day, we have had Christmas Eve for the past 4 or 5 years, and she gets him before lunch on Christmas Day. TALK ABOUT AGGRAVATING.

But here's where I get worried, aggravating as it may be, if we hold her to a solid schedule, what if all the holidays this year or any other year, fall on HER days. What then? And what if SS9 starts missing out on lots of family stuff on our side because it just never works out on our days? We can't ask our families to plan around a custody schedule...

My personal wish? We win the lottery, pay for the best lawyer in the country, have the whole custody and CS(talk about a can of worms there) papers changed. I'd even pay her off to not change it ever again.