new court order, extra access,extra problems

[bus boy]

Over the years I had to fight for every scrap of access. Xw kept s10 away from me as much as possible except for any access she could tightly control. 100% of my requests would always be denied. It has been a nightmare. In 2015 xw and I had a settlement conference and I was happy with the access but xw was her usual devious self and I had to take her back to court. I was hoping to keep what I had or get 50/50 shared custody but when we went back to court last month the judge said shared custody would confuse the child so he crafted a very complicated order that gives me lots of extra time, probably equal to 50/50. The problem now is, I need my non access weekends to earn extra money or I can't survive. I don't live large, I don't drink, I'm wise with my money but I need $800 a month extra to stay afloat. Xw is after that extra money big time, her bf drives by my place of part time employment every day looking to see if I'm working. She never went after extra money in the past but now it's her new quest. I'm all ready paying support on $5,000 a year I never see, union dues and benefit plan. Now the order gives me 3 weekends a month instead of 2 and in the summer s10 is with me 5 days a week taking up every weekend. That means my earning is very limited in the summer. I have tried to make reasonable changes on this new order and xw won't budge. Her first quest was total control of my access, the court took that away so she turned her sights to my extra income. In the past I always gave extra, when I was sick with my brain tumor and missed a year of work, I paid my support based on my regular pay not sick pay. After 3 major brain surgerys, xw pursued me mercilessly for that particular months support. I have lots of access but now I lost my 2 weekends a month I need, xw knows this and now she will go the other way and stick with this order to keep me from earning extra and there is no compramising, she will not accept a little extra she will want everything she can get. I've been very good to xw but it means nothing. I would love to know what I did to her? It never ends, we've had several orders and every one creates a new thing for xw to make things miserable and manuplate, I thought this new order would change things but it did not. I might request going back to the old order.

[david]

Your time is your time and you can do whatever you want with it. If you have a support system, family/etc, they can watch S10 when you go to work. As he gets older things will change. It is all temporary.
Our boys are older ,18 and 13 now, and I have gone to work a few times when they are with me. I view it as me being a single parent and making decisions based on that. In the beginning our order had a right of first refusal. Those instances led to the most amounts of conflict between ex and I. We still have a ROFR but it doesn't become a conflict anymore because I stopped letting conflict happen. I noticed the less I reacted to whatever my ex was doing the better things became. I view my time as mine and that is that.
If she takes you back to court for more money those circumstances have changed too so it might lessen your payments.
I live in Pa. and support is pretty straight forward. There are support calculators online and they are very close to what happens in support conferences. Pa bases support on both parties earnings, number of overnights, and who covers health insurance. There are other things but they are the main ones. One online calculator, from a law firm in the area, looks exactly like the one they use in our county.

[david]

Another thing, if the order really does approach 50/50 then the judge probably made it look confusing to make it look like no one won. I actually was awarded more time, slightly, than 50/50 but the judge made it look like ex won because he admonished me several times in court and said things that appeared that I "lost". It made ex feel good at the time. I noticed she smiled at times in court. I suspect the judge noticed the same things.
That happened in 2010. I didn't realize all the implications and never deducted our boys on my tax return until last year. I emailed my ex letting her know and she went ballistic. She threatened to take me back to court because I was "breaking the law". I ignored. She then sent an email and cc'd it to her attorney saying she wanted to take me back to court. I ignored that too. Nothing ever happened since I was in my legal rights to do what I did.

[Ananass]

You seem to be doing well taking care of your s10. You are putting a lot of hard work and it will pay off. Keep doing what you are doing and mainly focus on s10. Instead of being nice to xw, be nice to yourself. She will never reciprocate the good that you do to her. It is also very likely she will never acknowledge the good you do to s10. As hard as it may be, ignore all negativity coming from her and perhaps limit interaction with her. The better parent you become, the more negative she becomes. Hang in there, your time is coming. Kudos for putting up with so much.

[bus boy]

David, I should look into the monthly payment a bit deeper, xw makes more money than I do, has a much better medical plan than I do and her bf lives in her house, no one lives for free, no descent man would live off his GF. In my province, as far as I know, the province looks at the payers before deduction wage and uses a scale based on how many children.

I think your right about the judge, I think he made xw feel like she won. My T came to court and did lots of observing of the judge, xw and xw bf. My said when I was on the stand the judge listened very close and took lots of notes, when xw was on the stand the judge often had a look on his face and stopped writing many times. Maybe this old judge they dug out of retirement has more on the ball than I give him credit for.

I had some knowledge of the changes to my court order 3 weeks ago so my L sent a letter to xw L seeking compromise on some changes. Xw did not reply u til the day the order was signed, than text me trying to trick me into a change and told me to hurry up with an answer. The cagey way she worded her text for the changes I was seeking would of resulted in a great loss of access. I replied with a very clearly worded response as to what I would agree to and xw got her face in a knot her emotional immaturity kicked in.

Yesterday when I dropped s10 at his mother's, her live in bf stood on the door step like I was a teenage boy dropping his daughter off after our first date. I was saying good buy to s10, her bf was standing there with the house door open as if to tell s10 to get in the house, in fact when her bf stood in the door way s10 kind of got ancy to get going. Xw bf haven't done any of those posturing things for a while. Xw must be pulling the strings with him or driving him crazy bc sometimes he waves to me, or her times he looks at me like I'm garbage. One thing for sure xw wants to keep a form of conflict between bf and I to make sure we will not talk on friendly terms. He tried but he stopped.

[bus boy]

Thank you Ananass, your words are spot on. Xw never has acknowledged my kindness towards her and has never acknowledged anything I did for s10 to s10. We are bonding so good, my son is seeing that I am a there for him father. I am re framing this new order to fit in my brain and use this to be clear of xw as much as possible and grow. Instead of a negative twist I will make it work. As my father would say, success is the best revenge.

[david]

I noticed that when I no longer reacted to ex and instead focused on our boys and what I thought best for them that things started changing. The saying from a few years back was , "negative engagement is still engagement." That kept having a deeper and deeper meaning to me. When I stopped feeding the negative engagement it eventually became less and less. My ex wasn't getting what she wanted out of the conflict so she stopped trying to create conflict. She tries from time to time but not like before. In the last six months she has actually sent me some nice emails. At first my guard went up because it wasn't her normal. Nothing happened so I guess there is some kind of change. Not much but it has been getting better. This all started in 2007 so it does take time.

[scraps66]

David, I should look into the monthly payment a bit deeper, xw makes more money than I do, has a much better medical plan than I do and her bf lives in her house, no one lives for free, no descent man would live off his GF. In my province, as far as I know, the province looks at the payers before deduction wage and uses a scale based on how many children.

Something doesn't seem right.  With 50/50 physical custody and ex making more than you, there shouldn't be much if nay child support?  Is there alimony?  I make way more than my ex, have 50/50, she has had  alive-in bf like yours, and I pay nearly $1200 a month.  Ex lives like a Princess, lavish vacations and lots of them.