Deadbeat dad suddenly files for custody - help

[razemarie]

I have a five year old son with my ex. Undiagnosed BPD and alcoholic. For the first two years of our sons life he was barely involved. Now he sees him every other Friday night through Sunday morning. Nothing beyond that by his own choice. For those of you familiar with my story, He (my ex) has refused to let me go, threatened suicide and has harassed me for years. Now that I have met someone new and am in a serious relationship, he has suddenly served me papers for custody. I am wondering what I need to  do in order to best protect myself. I would like to try and file for a harassment restraining order but don't know what sort of evidence I would  need to provide. Also any advice about facing him in court. It is in my child's best interest to be with me as i provide  the only stability he has known. My ex's lawyer is expensive and well known for fighting for father's rights. So I am feeling intimidated and scared.

[ForeverDad]

What precisely is the current status and what he's seeking?  Understand that many courts split legal custody as one item and parenting time as a roughly separate item.  So, what does he have now versus what he wants?

Do you have joint legal custody and for the schedule he has alternate weekends?  That's the most common.  If so, then what is he seeking?  Sole legal custody?  Equal time?  Majority time?  Once we know what he has and what he wants, we can answer better.

Documentation of past issues, incidents and patterns is important.  You mention drinking... .does he have a history of DUIs or something else that might have a tangible impact on him as a parent.  Also, find ways to document his harassment, for example, bringing witnesses with you, filing police reports or recording exchanges and other encounters.

You need to be able to demonstrate your good history of parenting and his poor history of parenting, substance abuse, etc.  Whether you can succeed at a "holding action" keeping custody and support as it is, we don't know.  It's possible that a judge might give him some extra time, hard to guess without knowing the local court environment, his history, etc.

Has he been paying child support?  Is that part of the reason he's filed for custody, trying to reduce his child support?

It's not a surprise that he may have been triggered by your new relationship, he perceives it as a loss of control over you.

BTW, any past suicide threats you have documented will come in handy showing his lack of stability.  That can be significant.  Remember, such threats are usually in one of two categories - either he is truly suicidal and needs professional intervention or he's trying to manipulate/control someone/you.  Generally you're not considered qualified to determine which it is so suicidal threats need to be reported to proper professionals, perhaps emergency responders.

Finally, court is usually reluctant to make drastic changes to the status quo.  If you are the primary parent he should have a hard time dislodging you from being primary.  However, two footnotes here.  First, some courts are more willing to give fathers more equal parenting these days.  So you'd need to explain to the professionals why that wouldn't be advisable.  Second, even if you can show that he's been a less involved parent and even an unstable parent or parent with issues, the court might be willing to give him a little extra time, for example, an evening in between or something like that.

[razemarie]

We currently do not have a court ordered agreement in place.  For the first two years of our son's life his involvement was sporadic at best.  He was still heavily drinking during that time and behaving erratically.  Since then, he has opted to take our son every other Friday evening through Sunday morning.  It's been supervised, since he currently lives in his parents basement.  He has actually been there since our son was a year old, so four years.  Same thing in regards to child support... .nothing court-ordered. For the first two years, payments were infrequent and the amounts varied.  For the last three years he has paid $430 a month (half every other weekend), but oftentimes late.  He holds payment when he is angry at me and used to refuse to pick up on our son on his regularly scheduled weekends whenever I did something he did not approve of.  He is now seeking full physical and joint legal.  On paper it appears that I make more money than him, he is hiding assets and funds which is something my lawyer is looking into.  He works construction.  So that means long hours during the spring, summer and fall.  Which has always been his excuse as to why he could not spend time with him during the week or ever help with drop-offs/pick-ups from daycare.  He is off of work during the winters, which is typically when his drinking gets worse.  I am in the process of collecting documentation on his prior DUI's.  There are two that I am aware of, possibly a third.  He has a history of underage consumptions, possession, and DUI's from the time he was 17, up until 6 years ago which is the last time he was arrested for it.  He was ordered to complete mandated out-patient treatment for a year.  About a month before he was set to be done, he was kicked out of the program due to him showing up drunk.  In 2014 I reported his harassment and repeated suicide threats to the police and requested a wellfare check.  That was the last documented incident.

[razemarie]

He has hired a very aggressive attorney who is trying to gather any evidence to support that he has been involved since birth.  He sent me an email (that was clearly written by her), that gave me a glimpse as to what angle they are going to play.  She basically said that I have been using email going back five years to try and create false allegations as to him not being consistent or involved in our son's life.  He has only made cash payments to me and did not track amounts or any dates he spent with our son.  I am more than willing to be fair and give credit for the times he has been involved or amounts he has paid.  But they are trying to strong arm me into saying he has always been involved and paid for both child care and child support consistently since the day he has been born which is not true.  Before I learned about BPD, I had hoped he would stop his crazy behavior and step up and be a good dad for our son.  But it never happened.  He loves him in his way, but it is not in my son's best interest to live with him more than he already does. I am the only stable thing he has.  I have printed all emails that show a pattern of harassment and erractic behavior (both sober and drunk).  MAny times he admits in the emails to what he has done. I am hoping they will help.

[ForeverDad]

When I first dealt with family court I learned two things:

• Court considered most incidents older than 6 months as 'stale' or outdated.  Of course, DUI's, past programs, mental health issues such as suicide remarks and other major incidents could be referenced to establish a History of behavior patterns.



• The past and current parenting history means a lot.  If you've been the majority time (primary) parent without major issues  — in your case your child's entire life! — then the other parent would have a very hard time changing that.  Your female gender would make that exceedingly hard for him to overcome since courts often give default preference to mothers.

As for custody, his lawyer is asking for only joint legal since it is very hard to get sole custody without significant basis.  (It would be easier for you to get sole custody than for him to get it.)

What triggered this?  Often it's about money.  Men are the default Deep Pockets picked by the courts.  If he become primary parent then you would be paying him rather than him paying you.  Another reason might be that a recent incident triggered him to overreact.  Another reason might be that he's planning to move away and if he were primary then he could take the child with him.  If he's just turning 26 then his parents may not be able to cover his health insurance any more and may need to spend his money on his extra expenses.  Another reason might be that he's trying to impress a new love.  Does he have a new relationship?

There is a chance he's expecting you to be intimidated or fearful of heading to court and willing to cave in to his demands.  But he has a very weak hand.  Although we here can't guarantee results, likely the best he can realistically hope is to lock in the current arrangement.  Almost surely he's lied to his lawyer.

• You have been and are the 'primary' parent.  You need court to put that in writing.



• Your child will soon be attending school.  You need to get the court to declare you the Residential Parent for School Purposes.  That way he can't move away and force you to follow.



• You need all the parenting details put in writing and ordered by the court... .Residential Parent, parenting schedule, support amount, exchange locations, the level of supervision he should have, etc.



• Do not share too much information with him or his lawyer in advance without legal advice from your lawyer, doing that could give away your strategies and enable them to sabotage you with altered strategies.  (And you can always ask us for our thoughts and suggestions before you do anything.  We are peer support after all, we've been there and done that.)



• Although it is an added expense, many here have needed a Custody Evaluation ordered by the court.  A perceptive evaluator will note his history, have sessions with all of you and administer Psych tests such as the MMPI2 that can give indications of his mental issues.  Court doesn't go in-depth but a CE does.



• Despite how he and his lawyer are making you feel now, you are in a relatively strong position.  Don't "gift away" too much when in negotiations, mediation or settlement talks.  That is an otherwise wonderful character trait we nice, polite and overly fair parent have to counteract for this situation.



• Do not fear court.  Court can document the history and set the ground rules going forward for residency, support, schedule and whatever else for parenting.  Yes, courts prefer settlements but it is astounding how an impending court hearing or trial can motivate a disordered parent to let go of some of their entitlement and control.

[razemarie]

Thank you, this is helpful.  He (my ex) is 36 years old.  So he has a long history of criminal behavior, drinking, and suicide threats.  Nothing in recent years as for DUI's, but emails between the two of us discussing incidents as recently as last year.  I also have an email from a friend of his (someone I have never met) dated two months ago stating that she was concerned for him and the amount he is drinking.  She claimed he was drinking a case of beer per day and driving drunk on a regular basis.  I have had extremely limited contact/parallel parenting since the last suicide threat in 2014.  So I can't say first hand if he is currently drinking or not, although he was displaying signs in recent months.  The main thing that triggered this was that I am involved with someone now and it's serious.  He has done his best to prevent me from moving on or dating anyone for five years.  I told him that if I became serious with someone that would be in our son's life, I would let him know.  I did and four days later he filed for custody. I'm sure money plays into it as well.  Prior to him filing for custody my boyfriend and I had discussed moving in together.  My boyfriend lives about 20 minutes further north than where I currently live. I had planned to look at schools in the coming months before registation for kindergarten began. Now I don't know what my options are with that.  Would it be better to move before the court process begins or should I wait and see what the judge decides in regards to custody?

[ForeverDad]

Ah, yes.  You starting a relationship is definitely a recognized trigger for overreaction.  He's losing his control and entitlement over you so he had to push back on your previously untested boundary (separate lives except for parenting issues).  With BPD and the other acting-out PDs an ended relationship is almost always painted black (blacklisted).  Save those emails.  They may be helpful if you wish to link the reason for the timing of his 'sour grapes' actions.

Once a case is filed lots of things 'freeze'.  Not sure to what extent and I don't think a small move should be impacted but if you were already planning a move I would see what you could do to go ahead and document your plans.  How about visiting or contacting the school and speaking with the staff, getting a tour and the required enrollment forms, etc?  Any documentation resulting from that could be used to show your plans are already "in motion".

This is why you want the Residential Parent status resolved, so you as primary parent are free to move as needed.

Would you be changing counties?  Likely your current county would be considered the child's residence, but check with a local lawyer on that.  Distance-wise, twenty miles shouldn't greatly impact exchanges, though you may wish to consider finding alternate locations, perhaps a police station or restaurant parking lot halfway between, if you don't wish him coming to your new residence.

Another consideration is his reported drinking and driving.  Is he currently driving with your child in his vehicle?  His sobriety while driving is a valid concern.  (You may have allowed it until now since you don't really know whether he's currently drinking and driving with the child while under the influence.  However, if he's ever gotten a DUI and your child was in his vehicle that would probably be actionable.)

About his past suicide threats, either he was trying to manipulate and/or control you or he was truly suicidal.  You were justified to report them since you're not qualified to decide how they should be handled.  That's to be left to the emergency responders and professionals.  However, if you didn't have witnesses to his threats or have them recorded then he could easily deny he ever threatened suicide.

[razemarie]

I pulled the police report in regards to his suicide threat and the officer indicated that he was intoxicated, so at least I have that.  I also requested another police report I filed when he refused to let me leave our home and was so intoxicated he could hardly stand up or talk.  He currently lives with his parents who monitor him while he has his children (including our son) and make sure he is not drinking. It's only three days a month that he has the kids so I feel assured that during that time at least, he is sober.  I have presented my concerns about his questionable sobriety and past drinking issues to the lawyers.  We were supposed to have our first court date two fridays ago.  Two days before, his lawyer announced she had a conflict and wanted to push the court date back until the end of August or September.  Our thinking is that they want time to try and build a case against me.  The next day my lawyer received a letter from his stating that I am a drug addict, sleep around and that I am not the best fit for custody.  Yet they want me to continue caring for our son until the end of September?  It makes no sense to me.  I offered to take a chemical evaluation and any other steps necessary to prove myself. They have absolutely no proof of any of their allegations because they could not be further from the truth. It would almost be funny if this wasn't such a serious situation.  My son has started to show signs of acting out and no longer wants to visit his father or talk to him on the phone.  I do my best to keep all of this from him, but he's a smart boy and is picking up on things. I am looking into counseling for him to help him through this process.

[razemarie]

My lawyer advised me about moving. He said that he sees no reason why I can't live my life as planned.  I have lined up a school tour in the new school district (which is a new county).  My ex and I currently handle all exchanges of our child at a local gas station which is always full of police officers. I have offered to keep that meeting place so that he doesn't have to drive any further out of his way. He is demanding that our son go to the same school he did as a child which is no where near where we currently live or plan to move to.

[ForeverDad]

He can demand whatever he wishes, the courts and lawyers and virtually the entire system enables any and all claims.  Doesn't make it so.   So yes, you can move to the new school's area. 

His lawyer claiming a schedule conflict... .Clearly a delay tactic, considering the communication the next day about new allegations.  Likely his lawyer told him there was no way court would ever order a drastic switch in the historical parenting pattern or schedule without substantive reasons (extreme adult behaviors or substantive child abuse, child neglect or child endangerment).

Hmm... .I wonder whether his lawyer's strategy is also to make any prior police reports to be further back in time.  Courts generally only want to look back about 6 months for prior incidents.  Could his lawyer want them older so that their stance can be that they're too old (legal term: stale) to be meaningful.  If that's what is claimed, then try to argue that even if they're older than 6 months

If the incident reports are older than 6 months already, don't fret, you can still use them to demonstrate a long term pattern of poor behaviors.

Also, be aware that courts generally give more weight to parenting behaviors over adult behaviors that don't impact parenting.  It addresses the parents as they are, not as the other wants them to be.  And court won't try to live your life or his life.  If he has a new GF each week, court won't care much except maybe to tell him to wait months before introducing the children to the new relationship that managed to last that long.  Same for you.

Adult behaviors that can impact parenting orders... .drug abuse of course... .alcohol abuse, generally just before or during parenting time... .driving with the children while under influence of drugs or alcohol... .etc.

Before agreeing to drug tests, etc, require that they must be reciprocal, that is, if he wants you tested for drugs, then he must get tested too.  Depending on his drugs of choice, you may want to have unscheduled tests done.  The point?  You are not the one being scrutinized.  You both are.  Don't let him skew it to just him making claims.  It's hard to win if you're only playing defense.  Ask any football fan.  Fortunately, you're in a good position regarding the history but you can't afford to risk his wild claims game, keep the field level.

[ForeverDad]

Why was your lawyer will to agree to such a long continuance?  Most continuances are just a couple months, more or less.  Your lawyer needs to be aware that this is not a case where it's okay to be the usual collegial, trading usual lawyer agreeableness or considerations for scheduling, etc.

You have history solidly on your side.  But you still need to be alert, proactive and have solid strategies.

[livednlearned]

That's good that he is supervised by parents while your son is there. Phew!

Your ex and his lawyer are trying to rattle you and throw anything they can to disparage your character. My ex did the same thing, and it all fizzled out. I wish I didn't lose sleep over it, tho of course this is hard to do when your heart is pounding so hard to protect your child from his own parent. Gah.

A strategy to consider is matching the claims by asking for a hair test (for sobriety), a psychiatric evaluation, a deposition -- these are all tactics that put the ball in his court to get it out of yours. Part of dealing with family law court is to sit above the fray and offer solutions that will help the court better understand the situation. The judge is technically considered your case's supreme witness, so make an offer to the opposing party, and to the judge, to help everyone see what's going on.

My judge eventually turned to ex and said, These seem like reasonable requests. You'll do anger management, substance abuse testing and treatment, and a psychiatric evaluation within 30 days. Until we have those results, visitation is on hold.

Ex never did any of those things. Too much coordination, too much vulnerability, too much risk.

And yes, I agree with you about counseling. Get your son into it as young as possible. Pick the best psychologist or psychiatrist you can find and learn validation communication skills. You'll probably be the biggest part of your son's healing, the therapist a close second.

[razemarie]

Thank you for the advice. I did request that he also complete a chemical evaluation in return. He used to brag to me about how easy it was to pass them, so I am not expecting much to come of it.  One other question I had... .about three months ago his best friend's girlfriend (who I have never met) reached out to me via email to let me know she was concerned about my ex and his drinking.  She claimed he drank a case of beer minimum per day and was constantly driving drunk.  She did state that she had never seen him do it when he had the children.  Can I use that email in court?  I forwarded it to my lawyer but have not heard anything back yet. 

[razemarie]

My lawyer stated in our response that while we were agreeable to a continuance, it must be rescheduled as soon as possible or within a reasonable time frame. Unfortunately the police reports, treatment, etc. are outside of a six month time frame.  But we are hoping to show a long history of alcohol abuse and criminal charges.  I also got letters from the two daycare providers I have had who state that he has never communicated with them about our son's progress or shown any interest beyond picking him up from their care every other friday afternoon. 

[ForeverDad]

My lawyer used to say affidavits and letters were easily objected to by a lawyer.  He said, "I can't cross examine a piece of paper."

Maybe she could be deposed or appear as a witness.  Just her presence in the court room may impel his lawyer to accept the letter or emails rather than have her get up on the stand and spill even more stuff about him.

Whether all that will be needed, I don't know, depends on how aggressive his lawyer is and how the case seems to be going at the time.  Could it be he wants something other than just extra time or control of custody?  Did he want to impress a new GF, parole officer or his parents?  If his parents, then do you think he would be dumping the child off with them?  Is he trying to claim the child to offset taxes?  Is he trying to avoid paying child support?

[razemarie]

No, he is doing all of this because I am in a new relationship. He has harassed me for five years trying to force me to be with him. It's all about control.  I heard from my lawyer today. Our new court date (pre-trial) is set for May 13th.  We are in the process of lining up the SENE (Social early neutral evaluation process).  Has anyone been through this?  Any recommendations?

[ForeverDad]

No, he is doing all of this because I am in a new relationship.

The one question I forgot to ask.  Yes, now it makes sense.

[livednlearned]

No, he is doing all of this because I am in a new relationship. He has harassed me for five years trying to force me to be with him. It's all about control.  I heard from my lawyer today. Our new court date (pre-trial) is set for May 13th.  We are in the process of lining up the SENE (Social early neutral evaluation process).  Has anyone been through this?  Any recommendations?

I hadn't heard of that evaluation. We did ask for a psychological evaluation. The first time, it was relatively lame in terms of a proper diagnosis. It was four sessions with a psychiatrist who basically took notes. The second time we asked, it was the MMPI-2 done by a forensic psychiatrist. We picked three and gave him the choice. He found something wrong with all three and then stopped cooperating altogether.

If you can, make sure you get someone with forensic experience -- these are psychiatrists who have experience testifying in court.

[flourdust]

I believe that the social early neutral evaluation process is unique to one state. (I won't name the state here.) My understanding is that the court appoints two evaluators -- one male, one female -- who interview both parents about what they want as far as custody and their reasons. The evaluators then make a non-binding recommendation. I've been told that while it's not a pure mediation process, it can act as a proxy for how mediation would go, and if you can come to agreement using the evaluators, it can save a ton of time and money in the divorce.

I've been told it's a good idea to come to the evaluation meeting with well-organized documentation to support your custody request. If you're planning to claim that custody should be affected by your husband's alcoholism, for example, then bring clear documents showing how the alcoholism has been a problem.

This is all second-hand, as I have not (yet) been through this process ... .so please run all ideas past your lawyer first.