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PLEASE HELP

Sammers0108's picture

My SO and I have been together for 4.5 years. He has a 4.5 yr old son. BM and him had split up before she even knew she was pregnant. Him and I moved in together when SS was only a week old. Since the beginning the BM has never put her son first. She is more into friends and drinking then she ever has been into her own son. Long story short, my SO has been paying child support since day one. When the support was determined he was a full time bar manager with 42 hours a week and 10.50 and hour. About three months after the order his employer got rid of his position. He stayed on as a bartender but went down to 25 hours at 7.50 an hour. For the past four years he never went back to change his order so he has been paying 450.00 a month. The 450.00 was based on the fact that he was full time and making three dollars more an hour, and because there is no court ordered custody, it is also based on the assumption that he never has his son. Since day one BM and him had the agreement that he has his son Sunday morning from 10 am to monday at 8:30 pm and Wednesday 6:30 am to Thursday at 6:30 pm. Outside of the agreement, we have him whenever she has something come up (i.e. work, parties, not feeling well). About four months ago, SO lost his job. He has not gotten a new job yet because of a few factors:

He has SS sunday 10 am to tuesday 630pm. I guess the reason is she works in the morning and cannot bring him to school (he has school tuesdays and thursadays 915-215. Then he gets SS back at 630 am on wednesday and we usually have him til about 5pm on friday. We also have him one to two Saturdays a month because that is when the parties come up.

We have a daugher together who is only one month old. I make more then he is able to make, so he stays home with the kids while I work. He would not make enough to cover daycare alone for the two children.

With that being said, we are still paying the court ordered child support of 450.00 a month. Plus we have to pay for school which is 200.00 a month.

I have had no problem paying either of these monthly payments. I have no problem paying them even though he doesn't make any money, let alone the amount that he did at the time, and I have no problem paying them even though we have him 5-6 days a week. We pay for everything he could possibly need and even want when he is at our house.

Since SO lost his job, the child support payments have to be made by us. He used to have it taken directly out of his paycheck. When it was taken out of his paychecks, she would ask us for money early or bitch if she didn't get it right away, but we simply told her we had no control over it.

Now that we make the payments personally, she will text us almost every other day asking for money. Saying she can't pay her insurance with out it, or any other reason she can think of. She always wants the CS early and she yells at us and holds SS against us if we will not pay early and or we will not give her cash. We did give her cash once and we did deposit cash into her account once. I know it was stupid but at the time it didn't seem as stupid. She still has not reported that cash and it has been three months. Our case worker said that she hasn't even mentioned it. Two problems have arised from this:

SO's account shows he is in arrears that 800.00.

The case worker informed us that they will take those two payments (when and if she finally reports them) but will not honor any more after that because the county does not want us to take the order into our own hands.

That being said, the last few nights SO and BM have been full out fighting because she feels it is owed to her that we give her cash and we give it to her when she wants it. She also feels it is ok to text me 50 times a day harrassing me about money but when I call her out on not reporting the other 800.00 I gave her she responds with "I am done with your bs and cs. Don't ever text me again." Last night SO and BM got into it over texts. Not only is she harrassing him about money and threatening time with SS, she is accusing us of not being able to take care of him. She says we have no clothes that fit simply because we ALWAYS send him back in exactly what he came in. We do this beacuse of a few reasons:

We NEVER get any of our clothes back

She sends him in sizes 6/7 when he wears 4/5T

There are many times she will send him with no shoes (we wont send ours there because we want to make sure we have some when she doesnt send any)or without a jacket when it is cold, or in PJ's. Just yesterday she sent him in RAIN BOOTS! We just got a foot of snow and the high yesterday was 10 degrees. Last time I wore rain boots there wasn't any insulation what so ever.

She also says that we don't feed him. She says we always send him home hungry and he is starving. I really wish we could just record the entire day at our house because he eats ALL DAY LONG. If he isn't eating bfast, lunch, or dinner, he is snacking. Not to mention she has never gotten him after dinner. It is ALWAYS before dinner. Guess what we don't let him fill up on snacks and treats just before dinner.

She says we don't think of him first at all. All I can say is we think of him first in everything we do. To top it all off, every time she does actually have him on a Tuesday, She keeps him home from school.

Now comes a question on my part!

Does SO have any chance at getting as much time with SS as he has now if he files for custody?

Here are a few facts about each.

BM:
Lives with her BF ( we love him! This is the second boyfriend she has lived with in two years.)

She is on her 7th job in less then 3 months

She spoils SS with Toys and treats when he is there

She would never do anything to hurt SS intentionally other then not put him first

She refuses to give us a medical card making it almost impossible to make appointments for him. ( she still has not gotten him into the dentist)

Last time we went into the ER (he ended up with croup)She didn't show up, and when they ran the insurance on SS she had not paid it so he wasn't covered anymore. (this is the third time we have brought him in and found out he had no insurannce)

She can't dress him for the weather EVER! (also likes to let him play in the snow without a jacket and with no socks and shoes on)

She sells all of the clothes that she has that fits him and dresses him in the ones that are huge on him.

Uses SS against him when it comes to money

SO:

He is unemployed (staying at home with the kids because I agreed to pay his bills. Including CS)

SO, I and SS and DD rent out my parent's basement while we look for a home to buy or rent

Makes sure he is in school

Has never said "no" to extra time with SS

Would love to have full custody and BM could see SS ANYTIME she wants.

Is with SS 95% of the time already

Provides a safe place for SS and his BABY SISTER

Has plenty of clothes, food, toys,ect for SS

Puts health, education, and needs and wants of the kids before all else

Doesnt even care if the CS ever changes as long as he is garunteed time with SS

The reason I am asking is that all we want is a stable life for SS and a set routine for him and us in which we do not have. We would also love to live without the stress caused by her holding SS agianst us for money.

I am at my wits end and have exhausted every solution I can come up with.

PLEASE HELP

Sammers0108's picture

Thank you. All he really wants if 50/50 because we know how important it is for him to be with both parents. We just werent sure if we would have better chances getting 50/50 if we went for more.

bartlett5157's picture

It really depends on where you live. Like I live in Massachusetts and the court systems really advocate for the mothers and leave the fathers in the dust, we learned this the hard way with my DH and this also happened to my father when I was a kid. I see two problems with you guys having the child most of the time. Some of the things you mentioned are the things the judge will look at. 1. he doesn't have a job and 2. you live at your parents house. Normally a child need to have their own room once they get to be a certain age so a basement is not going to sound good to a judge if he has his own room at his mothers. Another thing is it is very hard to prove that a mother is being neglectful unless you document/take pictures/video tape everything and get a good lawyer. You would probably have to document things for a long period of time also so the judge could be certain it wasn't just a handful of time it happened, that it happened consistently. I would absolutely consult with a lawyer before even thinking about taking her to court. The fact that she has a place to live and he is getting his basic needs met means it will be very hard to take time away from the mother. I wish I could say different but my SS was being abused and neglected and they still took her side, it took over a year to fight her in court. Good luck.

Sammers0108's picture

He does have hoods own room. We have three bedrooms, a kitchen, laundry room, bathroom, living room and our own entrance. We do not want to prove her neglectful, we just want 50/50 established custody. He needs get just add much as us. We are also not taking time away from her... We have him way more then 50/50 right now, we just want to make it official so she can't use him as a pawn in a game