What do you wish was in the custody agreement?
SO is finally ready to take GUBM to task it would seem. He is calling lawyers in NJ tomorrow to find out what he can do to protect himself and his rights as SD's parent from here on out, what he can do about GUBM pulling SD out of school (and failing to list him as a parent/guardian in the first place; as I understand it, she messed up in doing this because w/o a CO in NJ, they both have equal parenting rights as paternity is established through the fact that SD was born during their relationship and SO's name has been on SD's birth certificate since the day she was born), and what he can do to verify the type of education SD is receiving now.
His ideal is to draft an agreement that covers legal custody (he wants joint legal custody), physical custody that explicitly outlines his visitation and telephone time with SD, and CS (he's not sure if he wants to keep it set at $600/month or if he wants to tempt fate and see what the state would calculate it at because NJ might impose an income on GUBM, but, if they don't, he could be required to pay a lot more than he does now).
He knows that GUBM will bicker and fight over anything that doesn't give her complete control and takes advantage of SO, but, he's willing to fight for his rights as SD's father. SO wants me to help him figure out what he should be requesting beyond the basics - like that wonderful information about college that MissLynnnie shared with me yesterday. But, he knows that my time is precious as I work part-time and am enrolled in school full-time, finishing up my last semester of undergrad. So, he knows I don't have all the free time in the world to surf the net all day finding sample custody agreements that relate to NJ custody law.
I'm worried that GUBM might get a bug up her butt about SO cohabitating with me, even though she cohabitates/cohabitated with boyfriends since they split. It's plainly clear that she hates me - not me personally, but, just the fact that SO has a partner and has not been spending the last four years crawling back to her on his knees. Although, she might hate me personally because SO's relationship with me has been very good for his self esteem and he's grown a spine over the past four years. So, *shrug*.
I've seen sample agreements online that dictate that the NCP can't have "overnight guests" that aren't related to them through blood or marriage and I fear GUBM trying to include that kind of a stipulation. We do plan to get married eventually, but, we aren't going to rush out to do it anytime soon and certainly not to cover our asses in that kind of a situation. So, I hope SO keeps his eyes peeled for something like that when she responds to his requests and doesn't just gloss over things - hopefully if he has a good enough attorney, they'll catch that.
So, I figured I'd pose a question to all of you: What do you wish was in the custody agreement between your SO/DH/DW and their ex? Or, what is one thing that you are glad was included in the agreement?
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Comments
Hahahahaha.
Hahahahaha.
Check your laws...often a
Check your laws...often a custody agreement modification requires a revisit to CS.
There is no custody
There is no custody agreement. There is also no CS agreement. So, it's not a modification.
This would be a brand new custody agreement where none existed prior.
Then CS will absolutely be
Then CS will absolutely be visited. Just be prepared.
In our case, they did NOT impute BM's wages, even though she had *just* quit a $60K a year job. (By *just* I mean within two weeks of the hearing.)
I've heard of NJ judges
I've heard of NJ judges imputing income, but, that it depends on the judge
Transportation - pick up/drop
Transportation - pick up/drop off location n times
Spell out what legal custody entails
Id suggest making sure
Id suggest making sure whatever y'all agree to is made detailed. For instance- DH is to pay 50% of the unpaid med bills & co- payments. BM was to mail them to us monthly & DH would send her a check for his half. Problem is the part where it talks about it was very vague & this allows BM to just make her own rules about it. So she held onto them for a year & handed them to DH at drop-off. She refuses to allow DH to ever hand her a check. Says he must mail it & any other correspondence - but doesnt abide by her own rules. She also git snippy & vile with DH when he asked her 'why' she held onto them for so long then texted DH 3 days later demanding a ck be mailed "today". Umm... Sorry chick, thats why DH asked 6 times (in writing yay DH) for the past year for the med payment stuff & ea & every time told BM he couldnt afford months at a time. She ignored ea of those emails. Her excuse " it doesnt state in the CO that she should send them monthly or frankly any time frame at all. Nice. So DHs response was that it also didnt give a timeframe of which he had to pay them either. Hahaha. She didnt like that too much. Of course DH will pay it in full- but by sending payments.
It would have been super helpful had their CO specified how when & where things are to occur & all. So I believe being as specific as you can helps to drown out all the BS!!! This applies to vaca schedules & Holidays as well. Less to squabble over later on!!!
Be as detailed as possible!
Be as detailed as possible! As for the CS they will probably figure that, even though the two of them are considered separate matters. Ask the lawyer about the CS payments that he has been making and whether or not they would be considered valid. My SO had given BM CS weekly for about a year before they came to temp hearing and the judge wrote off all of his checks that plainly read "Child support" as gifts! Weekly freaking gifts!
Transportation- Who drops off, who picks up? At what time and where? If she moves six hours away will your SO still be willing to maintain his transportation responsibilities or will she then be responsible for all transport?
What will the visitation percentage be? 50/50? EOW, EW? Be as specific as possible. State when the visitation should begin and when it should end.
Decision making responsibilities- As to education, medical, dental, religious training, mental health..etc. Who has them? Is it joint? Will your SO want them or give them to BM?
Holidays- Do you want alternating holidays? Split holidays? State the start and end hour for each holiday.
Vacations- Who will the children spend their school vacations with? Start and end hours for these as well.
SO's state includes medical and child care in CS so we didn't have the option to state who pays what but you will want to make sure that this is listed out as well. Who pays what? What percentage? Time frame in which the bill must be received? Must be paid? etc..
Phone time? SO did not put this in the CO, it hasn't been much of a problem but could be for others. Be specific about the times and days.
SO also stated that Neither parent can schedule activities on the other parents time unless agreed upon by both parties. This was helpful because my SO only gets them EOW and wouldn't you know EOW they had something that BM had scheduled for them an hour and a half away and expected him to shuttle them back and forth all weekend. This put a stop to it.
Basically anything that you know is a problem or could possibly be a problem SPELL IT OUT. If it isn't then there is room for interpretation and crazy ass BM's LOVE the wiggle room!
Go to your states website. They usually have a CS form that you can fill out and figure out how much CS would be. Try it both ways, one with BM not having any income and another with her having min. wage.