I almost don't care if it is, but I should.

My ex TBM wife is fighting me on seeing my children during what is supposed to be an expansion of parenting time when the children reach a certain age. She's playing gate-keeper and being all around controlling just because she can, and just like she did in the marriage for the reasons I divorced her.

I had saved money to help my oldest attend college this fall. Now I am probably going to have to spend a few thousand to take the ex to court to get the dispute settled so I can get the time I deserve with the younger children.

I told my oldest (19y/o no-mo) that I may not have the tuition because Mom is acting up. I hinted that the oldest could tell Mom that her obstinate idiocy is wasting the saved tuition (I was more tactful in saying it) by feeding lawyers for no real good reason.

I'm pissed.

Without knowing all the details...

I would tend to want to talk or write to the Mom first, explaining just what you said about college.

If college is important to her it might help

like ... lawyers or college, your choice

Best

I think it would be good to talk to (or e-mail) the ex and explain that the lawyers fees will have to come from the college fund and that she's unintentionally hurting her own kids. And tell her that you'll be explaining this to your college-bound kid as well. I'd be careful not to make this sound like a threat or trying to alienate her child, but just a matter of fact.

Your 19 year old is old enough to understand the situation. I wouldn't attach any judgement to your ex, just state the facts, and that you are sorry about he situation.

On second thought, maybe you should check with your lawyer before you say anything to your EX.

I think putting your child in the middle of it is a bad idea.

This brings back bad memories of my older teen years. The parents think you are old enough to handle being a ping pong ball, but you aren't. It always feels awful to be given the role of ping pong ball.

First of all, you do not have to have a lawyer to go to court. Many, many cases are handled without lawyers.
You can do this yourself. It's done by thousands of parents every single day. Get well informed, know the laws in your state, and get visitation and parenting time taken care of . In CA that is usually done with a Mediator. Those you have to pay - each pays half. It can be $225 an hour for instance.


And please, please, don't involve the children in any of this. It's not in their control, and it can and does backfire.

I am speaking from my experience with Family Court.

I wish the OP the best. I feel & know that pain.



SusieQ#1 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> First of all, you do not have to have a lawyer to
> go to court. Many, many cases are handled without
> lawyers.
> You can do this yourself. It's done by thousands
> of parents every single day. Get well informed,
> know the laws in your state, and get visitation
> and parenting time taken care of . In CA that is
> usually done with a Mediator. Those you have to
> pay - each pays half. It can be $225 an hour for
> instance.
>
>
> And please, please, don't involve the children in
> any of this. It's not in their control, and it can
> and does backfire.
>
> I am speaking from my experience with Family
> Court.


One thing I have noticed in SQ's response to my predictaments of this kind, she has a typical court viewpoint, and that viewpoint is often (documented and painfully obvious) biased against the non-custodial parent. That is often the father.

From my perspective she gives advice that essentially harms fathers. From my perspective she does not get the plight of fathers. From my perspective she seems judgmental of fathers.

Sorry SQ, but that's how I see it, and I feel to warn others in similar situations.

Jesus Smith Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I wish the OP the best. I feel & know that pain.
>
>
>
>
> SusieQ#1 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > First of all, you do not have to have a lawyer
> to
> > go to court. Many, many cases are handled
> without
> > lawyers.
> > You can do this yourself. It's done by
> thousands
> > of parents every single day. Get well informed,
> > know the laws in your state, and get visitation
> > and parenting time taken care of . In CA that
> is
> > usually done with a Mediator. Those you have to
> > pay - each pays half. It can be $225 an hour
> for
> > instance.
> >
> >
> > And please, please, don't involve the children
> in
> > any of this. It's not in their control, and it
> can
> > and does backfire.
> >
> > I am speaking from my experience with Family
> > Court.
>
>
> One thing I have noticed in SQ's response to my
> predictaments of this kind, she has a typical
> court viewpoint, and that viewpoint is often
> (documented and painfully obvious) biased against
> the non-custodial parent. That is often the
> father.
>
> From my perspective she gives advice that
> essentially harms fathers. From my perspective
> she does not get the plight of fathers. From my
> perspective she seems judgmental of fathers.
>
> Sorry SQ, but that's how I see it, and I feel to
> warn others in similar situations.


WHOA.... I am a BIG proponent of father's rights!! Fathers have just as much right to their children as mothers. I do nothing to harm that. In fact, I was the one that got the supervised visitation of FATHERS STOPPED and helped by my reports to get their custody back in every case I had!! I'm a strong advocate of father's rights.

Too often women make false allegations that are believed by the court and they loose their custody. In CA for instance, the general rule is the court will give 50/50 custody or as close as possible.

Parenting plans including visitation are generally handled by the mediators in So. CA in my experience. The judge just rubber stamps their recommendations after it's been worked out.

I even go so far as to advocate fathers live close to the mothers to be involved in their children's schooling (live in the same school district if at all possible) and to know the law so they can make sure they get their parenting rights.

It's possible to know the law well enough to represent yourself. It's done all the time. In fact in one family court, I rarely saw an attorney.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/17/2012 12:22PM by SusieQ#1.

Ultimately, you consider every possible way to handle your particular situation, and make your decision based on what will work best for you.

Yes, mothers and fathers can be manipulative and can push your buttons to get revenge, get control, etc. It's an emotional battle most of the time.

There are lots of resources for divorce situations: counselors, mediators, attorneys, even the Internet (to learn the law in your state, for instance).

I worked with judges, attorneys, psychologist/psychiatrists, been a witness, been a C.A.S. A., sat in many court sessions dealing with Family Court. I am speaking from my experience, however, if it does not fit your particular situation, please ignore it. No one statements first all.

My best wishes to get your parenting plan worked out with ample visitation! That is a goal that is so important for the children in my view.

Not that I'm making excuses for SusieQ -- she often seems to miss out on empathy and/or compassion.

>I would tend to want to talk or write to the Mom first, explaining just what you said about college.

While in this case I have talked with her, and she effectively shut me down in complete stubborness--In the past talking with the ex results in her obtaining information out of me that she finds ways of using it against me like a master chess player. I know, a lot of details left out, but it is not pretty.

> I wouldn't attach any judgement to your ex, just state the facts, and that you are sorry about he situation.

Very good point. Thanks.

> I think putting your child in the middle of it is a bad idea.

The 19 y/o is in the middle of this. Tuition deep. And is an adult.

> First of all, you do not have to have a lawyer to go to court.

Yes. The court has said that the resolution is by child legal representative, which comes out of my pocket. No choice.

I understand you have other children........ will they be attending college?

Kids grow up and will come back to you even if you don't see them as much as you would like - just keep the door open

To be thinking about college for a couple of kids says you have money. What is the best use of it for you?

just thinkin

I think a 19 year old is old enough to understand the economic facts of the matter. The kid has probably already made her own judgments about mom's behavior. I know at 19, I had a pretty clear picture of which parent was more screwed up. I wouldn't say that to younger kids though.

I do see the value in calmly and rationally asking the momma, "Do you really think this battle is what's best for the children? Why do you want to take potential tuition money away from them just to prove your point? How are the children going to benefit from this power struggle? How can we find a compromise that everyone can get along with that doesn't suck the college coffers dry? Do you want the kids to start out their lives burdened with ridiculous amounts of student loan debt?"

How many and how old are the other kids, roughly?

It's manipulative on her part, and I'm very sorry you're going through it.

But it's also manipulative on your part for your college-bound daughter. I understand explaining why you can't help with tuition -- that's reasonable -- but try not to ask her to interact with her mother on that front. It's putting her in the middle of your disagreement and not healthy for your daughter.

Perhaps you can give your daughter a place to stay over the summer so she can work and save up for her tuition?

I can understand your frustration with your ex, but it's cruel to put your child through that. My father is an @$$hole who abused us and did everything he could do to pay as little child support as possible. He once emailed me, telling me that he hada college fund set up for me, but he would only let me have the money if I convinced my mom to agree to end the child support. He made close to a 6-figure salary, so he had plenty of money. If he truly cared about me, he would've just given me the college fund, but instead, he told me that he would use it to take my mom to court to try to reduce/eliminate child support. Which he did...he also used it to go to Italy with his wife-to-be.

What I'm getting at, is that if you love your child, you can't tell them that you can't pay for college because of your ex being a b****. You'll drive them away, and make them resent you, or both of you. The kinder thing would be to just have not told the kid about the fund in the first place if you thought you might've needed to spend it on something else.

If you want to show your kid that you're better than your ex, take that money, put it into an account in the kid's name, and tell your kid how much you love her, and even if their mom wants to go back to court, you're still giving her college money.

As a girl who was in your daughter's position just a couple years ago...you're going to drive her away by telling her "hey, here's money for college! LOL JK I'm spending it on lawyers".

Also, if you really did use the words "because mom is acting up"...you're going to look bad. It makes you look like you don't take your ex's feelings about anything seriously, that they have no validity. And hey, maybe they don't. But your kids love her, and they'll see stuff like this as an attack on her, even if they also believe she's being ridiculous.

I'd ask her why she doesn't want to share parenting time with the little ones just to give herself a mommy break.
But I am not a fighter. I would spend the money on college for your older child and let chips fall where they may. Kids grow up and get on their own. Time goes by fast.
I didn't fight my ex and regardless of what others say, for me it was the right choice. My kids are grown and all of them are at peace with me. I lost precious time with them but chose to have a good life and be happy. I went on vacations and did things without them as my ex hubby had sole custody, more family support and the better lawyer.
Yes, the very unpopular opinion. My children respect and love me. They tell me things they won't tell their dad. They know how much I love them and in the end it worked out and they are well adjusted and happy. Your children don't forget you.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/17/2012 03:36PM by suckafoo.

This happened to my husband and his TBM ex-wife when he tried to get further visitation with his daughter. (The daughter lived with the ex in another state about 400 miles away.) My husband ALWAYS advocated with his ex to keep their daughter out of the issues that were coming up - increased visitation, child support, etc. The ex basically said "FU and the daughter needs to know what is going on" - this began when she was about 12 years old. My husband tried to keep the daughter out of "their stuff" even when she turned 18, but the ex involved her at every turn.

I think the daughter is pretty messed up from it all (she turns 20 this year). She still has nothing to do with her Dad and won't speak to him about anything.

The exact thing happened to me. My dad was the one who said to not tell me things, but my mom told me everything anyway. I will admit that my dad was overwhelmingly the worse parent, but due to all the stuff that my mom told me over the years, my relationship with her is tainted. I don't have good relationships with either parent because of all the crap I was dragged into.

I can't look my dad in the eyes because I know he tried to make my mom abort me, and I can't look my mom in the eyes because she told me about it to make herself look better. Even if my mom was the "better" parent, involving me makes her just about as bad as my dad ever was.

Oh, I'm so sorry . . . parents really have to be careful about things that are said to their children, especially concerning the other parent.

Why don't you take that college money and set up trust funds for each kid? You can set the age at which they can control disbursements themselves, and that age can be 18 or whenever they are accepted to a college. The more I think about this and the more people post, I'm wondering... if the oldest kid is 19, why aren't you already paying tuition somewhere, rather than holding tuition hostage? Better yet, just park the money somewhere so that only the kids can get to their share when they need it.

I called my 19yo, said that I read wrong to imply talking to mom, that it is my responsibility.

I don't know how I will live up to the promises to be a dad to all the kids, given how much it will cost, but I'll find a way.

Thank you for taking your poor daughter off the hotseat. Your relationship will benefit from it.

You might want to see if there's a father's advocate group that might be able to help you in some way -- even if it's just with the support of people who've been there. There are a lot of those sorts of groups now.