Chances of full custody?

[sadmanwithkid]

I have a wife with BPD, and a 3 year old. She lies and steals. Has 2 misdemenours for shoplifting. Has put our immigration status in crisis. And has now put adultery in her list of things. She continues to lie about it and continue it.

She was diagnosed with BPD/Depression/PTSD 2 years back. Since then she's only gotten worse. No DBT started yet.

I'm at the end of my rope. Divorce will hurt my child the most, but i don't see any other options now. What are the chances that i get full custody of the child, given her psychological and criminal history?

[worriedStepmom]

Most states default to joint custody - both parents share legal rights, so you both have the right to take your child to the doctor or talk to the teachers.  Generally one person is designated as the primary parent - they have the sole right to determine the child's official residence (and which public school they attend).  It can be pretty difficult to get sole custody.

Then there's possession - the schedule of who sees the child when.  This is where her behavior will be considered.  The courts generally look at how each parent's behavior affects the child (so adultery isn't likely going to impact custody schedules) and how involved each parent is.

Have you talked to a lawyer yet?  They'll be able to give you the best answer. 

[SadtimesAZ]

I just went through all this. My ex is no different. You never know what is going to happen with the courts. Even mentally ill people have a right to be a parent unless they pose a serious threat to the child. Push mental illness and you can look like the bad guy, agree to things freely and you get walked all over. Even the judges ruling is ultimately just an opinion. Find a lawyer and get legal advice where you live, ask about experience with mental illness. They will have a good understanding of how the judges in your area rule on these types of issues. That's my best advice.

[MeandThee29]

Divorce will hurt my child the most, but i don't see any other options now.

Divorce is indeed a horrible process. It hurts everybody involved.

Keep in mind though that most studies say that younger children actually adapt better in terms of long-term coping than older children. Older children are more likely to question their childhoods, feel insecure long-term, and to act out with harmful behaviors.

There are also studies that indicate divorce can actually bring about stability that improves the coping and outlook for children long-term if there were major problems in the family related to addiction, criminal behavior, serial adultery, and/or mental illness.

[40days_in_desert]

The courts will generally only look at behaviors that might affect the well being of children in determining custody. A diagnosis of a mental illness alone generally doesn't move the needle toward one parent or away from another. Documented behaviors, on the other hand, can move the needle. As WorriedStepmom stated, adultery most likely would not be a factor in determining custody because that doesn't directly affect your child. What would be a factor is if she left your three year old home alone for a few hours while she was engaging in the extra-marital affair on several occasions. Doing hard drugs (meth, heroin) while caring for your child is another example. In other words she has to show a pattern of behavior that puts your child at risk to be awarded sole custody. I'm not a lawyer and jurisdictions vary so this isn't a one size fits all but rather a general interpretation. Judges don't want to take children away from either parent unless it's a last resort. In my opinion that's a good thing.

Custody is not always straight forward. Here is what I've learned in my state. Other states may call each one of these something slightly different. 

Temporary custody - Refers to the arrangement until the divorce case is finalized. A lot of times the temporary becomes the permanent arrangement unless both parties agree to a different schedule or one parent is incarcerated, etc.

Joint physical custody - Refers to both parents having custodial time but not necessarily 50/50.

Joint legal custody - Refers to both parents having equal rights in regard to medical, educational and spiritual decisions for the children. Sometimes there is a tie-breaker designation.

Sole custody - Where the child(ren) live with one parent and that parent makes decisions on matters regarding medical, education, spiritual, etc.

Visitation - When one parent has sole custody, the other parent may be awarded visitation. This may include an overnight a week and/or 1-2 dinner nights a week for a few hours. 

Reasonable and liberal visitation - This is when one parent has sole custody and there is no specific schedule for visitation with the other parent. This may be due to an erratic work schedule or the parent has proven to not be able to consistently adhere to a visitation schedule. It basically means that there is no specific restriction to visitation but that there is no specific schedule in place for visitation.

I have full custody of all five of my children. It wasn't due to my ex doing things so bad that I had to fight for custody. It was due to a string of bad decisions on her part that led her to a point where she has no place for her to have them. She also has no specific schedule for visitation so my L and I went for the "reasonable and liberal" option. Reasonable is where you might have an issue with a pwBPD. You will probably have a different definition of "reasonable" so it would be a good idea to define that if you ever end up with this set up. Saying that you want to pick the kids up with a 20 minute advance notice isn't reasonable for most people. Neither is keeping them an hour and a half later than agreed on a school night. Just saying...

I hope it works out for you and that you can get as much time as possible with your son to provide as much stability for him as possible. ForeverDad has a good history to share where he started off with very little time custody-wise and ended up with much more in the end and what it took to get there along the way. I'm sure he'll share that on this post in the near future.

[ForeverDad]

Your spouse's infidelity is basically a matter between you and her.  If you feel that breaks the marital bond or is wrong, no one can fault you for deciding to divorce.  Family courts in most (but not all) states ignore adult moral behaviors.  If one parent wishes to divorce, they will not stop that person but will administer their divorce process.  I don't know whether it matters to immigration authorities.

In general, most courts will default to joint legal custody, with one parent as the Primary Parent.  Some states separate custody as separate from a parenting schedule.  There are variations from state to state.  While our peer support experience and time-tested strategies are invaluable, they cannot replace local legal advice.

I started with a temp order where my spouse had temp custody and temp majority time.  I did have protection from another court (Threat of DV) and had temp possession of our residence but I assume that was ignored since it was between adults.  Divorce took nearly two years and I walked out with Shared Parenting (joint), equal time and Primary Parent for school purposes.  Problems continued so I sought full custody.  The case took 1.5 years but I did become Legal Guardian.  It was more for parenting obstruction than for abuse, endangerment or neglect.

What I learned was that family court does try to treat parents as though both are reasonably normal — and only temporarily misbehaving due to the separation, hoping the issues will subside as the parents become accustomed to post-marriage life.  It generally takes time for the court to be convinced otherwise if there aren't any documented incidents that rise to the level of substantial child abuse, neglect or endangerment.

Ponder which are your priorities.  Top of the list are two:  your children's welfare and your own welfare.  Much lower is your ex or her immigration status.  Sorry, but you can't fix her.  Maybe a professional can get through to her but it would require your ex's full cooperation and diligent application of therapy over months and years.  You can't count on her recovering normalcy.  Maybe she will, but you couldn't be sure of it for a long, long time.  Until then you have to deal with this as she is, not as you wish her to be.

As for the question whether you can get full custody early in the case, a big factor is how extreme her poor behaviors are toward the child.  If they are documented and seen as 'actionable' — substantive abuse, neglect or endangerment — then you have a strong case.

Even if the officials are reluctant to grant full custody at first, they may see that you are the more stable parent and you can request that the order order assigns you some level of Decision Making or Tie Breaker status.  That would include taking charge of his schooling, very soon he will be in school.

Be the parent proposing solutions.

[livednlearned]

What are the chances that i get full custody of the child, given her psychological and criminal history?

The chances that you get full custody also depend on you and your character.

My ex was a former trial attorney and told me during our marriage no judge would believe me, I would lose access to our child, etc.

I ended up with full custody.

It's a long game. I treated it like a rescue mission for my son.

[Panda39]

In my partner's case gaining full custody happened in parts over time. 

When he initially separated and left his wife he had minimal custody.  He saw his daughters (then 11 & 15) every other weekend and Wednesday evenings.

At his divorce hearing he was able to prove neglect of his children by his wife.  Not getting their youngest daughter with a toothache to the dentist for over 3 months. Dad finally found a dentist open on weekends and he took her on one of his weekends.  Mom also against the wishes of dad and advice of their older daughter's teacher and school principal pulled their older daughter out of school to home school her through on-line classes.  Daughter did nothing for a year 0.0 GPA her freshman year of high school.  Younger daughter stayed in school but had high absenteeism.  A stomachache on Monday could mean mom would keep her home for a week.

Dad was able to document his efforts to take care of his kids and that mom was blocking those efforts.  Mom would rather have conflict with dad (negative attention is still attention) rather than meet the needs of their daughters.

When the divorce was final dad was awarded M-F custody and 1 weekend a month.  He also was awarded education, medical, and dental decision making. 

3 years later mom did things to their daughters that they couldn't tolerate (by this time their daughters were 18 & 14). Mom also had several evictions by this time and didn't have her own place (couch surfing and hotels).  At this time both girls voted with their feet and moved in with dad full-time. 

So what I'm getting at is that you may not get full custody all at once in the beginning.  It may involve going back to court to gradually gain more.

Panda39

[AND-01]

The chances that you get full custody also depend on you and your character.

My ex was a former trial attorney and told me during our marriage no judge would believe me, I would lose access to our child, etc.

I ended up with full custody.

It's a long game. I treated it like a rescue mission for my son.

If you don't mind me asking but what was your long game, what steps did you take, how did it pan out and how was your son affected by it?

[Sluggo]

I got less than 50% custody ordered by the judge even though the custody evaluation recommended I get 50%.  The court evaluation even stated that the court should grant me full custody if the alienating behaviors of my exbpd wife continued. The evaluation gave detailed accounts of her behaviors.  Despite all this evidence, I believe the court sided with her because she was a stay at home mom , we have kids with disabilities, and the prelim decree gave her primary custody.  Signing the prelim decree was was the biggest mistake, it may have ended up the same way but I am not sure  .   

After prelim and before final decree, I spent so much time and money trying to get 50% custody for my 7 children. 

But then 7 months after final decree and court giving my exbpdwife primary custody, exwife said she no longer wanted the children.  She did not want the kids for any bdays, holidays, etc.  All she wanted the kids for one month in a summer.   

So all that time and energy trying to get my kids even 50% of the time, then wife gave them back to me after she was awarded them in court.  In 2 weeks, we rewrote the order, ex signed off and judge signed it giving me full legal and primary custody.