UPDATE post #33 Custody/Visitation questions VERY LONG (SORRY)

[mmmom]

Originally Posted by z2akids I agree with Photomikey. Only communicate the necessary information. If she wants to take you to court no amount of discussion in your letter will stop her. If she does take you to court, your attorney will tell the judge what you did and why you did it. There is no reason to potentially give her ammunition. Dear Ex, Per our visitation agreement, the children will be available on August ___ to begin their 3 week stay with you. I have located the midway point between your new residence and ours and will meet you at the (give her a public place like a McDonalds) at ____ p.m. on that date. I will also be at that same location at ___ p.m. on August ___ to pick them up. If these times and locations are not convenient, please e-mail an alternate location. That's it. You don't need to communicate anything else. If he wants to change the agreement or get a psych eval, he needs to have his attorney contact the court. If she's in default, then apparently she'll have to pay, so he may as well go ahead.

I completely agree this is definately a situation where less is more. The letter contains alot of information that does not pretained to the issue currently at hand, which is the 3 week visit in Aug. I would address that issue only everything else comes off threatening, kind of like "OH yeah well you did this this and this" which may be true but is not productive
The other issues need to be address in court, you DH needs to file papers and her contempt of court needs to be addressed there.

[photomikey]

Originally Posted by shanree Thank you for your feedback.... Why would you leave out the other stuff though? Each thing listed is a specific item in the custody agreement that she has defaulted on.

Because... who cares? If you think she has defaulted and you can go back to court and reduce her visitation... then do it. Don't write a soliloquy about it.

If she thinks she can go back to court on your dime and get more custody, and you think she's wrong, then let her take you back to court. From hearing your side of the story, it sounds like you think you'd win. Why on earth would you talk her out of it?

Furthermore, she is trying to suck you into her drama (and it's working). When you mud wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty but the pig loves it. It doesn't really matter who wins, because the pig enjoys the fight.

[imasupernova]

Originally Posted by photomikey Because... who cares? If you think she has defaulted and you can go back to court and reduce her visitation... then do it. Don't write a soliloquy about it. If she thinks she can go back to court on your dime and get more custody, and you think she's wrong, then let her take you back to court. From hearing your side of the story, it sounds like you think you'd win. Why on earth would you talk her out of it? Furthermore, she is trying to suck you into her drama (and it's working). When you mud wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty but the pig loves it. It doesn't really matter who wins, because the pig enjoys the fight.

The emotion, ALL CAPS, extra punctuation is not what you want to give her because it seems that is what she wants. Drama mama...

The letter was great but I would definitely save that letter and make the letter short and to the point directly addressing the situation at hand. Any extra information you give her is like was pointed out, possible ammunition for her.

Good luck mama!

[shanree]

Thank you all so much for the advice. I had never considered that I was handing her the game plan by sending something like that. We took yall's advice to heart and replied to her with a very simple one sentence email. DH is saving my letter as his outline for what his lawyer needs to address in court.

[photomikey]

GOOD JOB!

[dragondance]

Originally Posted by shanree Thank you all so much for the advice. I had never considered that I was handing her the game plan by sending something like that. We took yall's advice to heart and replied to her with a very simple one sentence email. DH is saving my letter as his outline for what his lawyer needs to address in court.

Excellent

[kais_momma]

I'm glad you didn't feed into her "game." From the sounds of it that is what this is to her. What you really need is a new custody agreement and one that is out of state friendy. However if you all really think she needs and will fail a psyc eval you need to get that done, cause if she does fail there is a good possibility she will only get supervised visitation. If they find that she does need that then do you really want the kids to go to her now? It may even bennifit everyone. She could get the help she needs Possibly making co-parenting between parties easier, and the kids will get the mom they knew back. Which they deserve. Also think about how much car time everyone will be getting. Your original agreement puts the kids in the car 8 hours every other weekend, if you stick with it and she starts taking them on her weekends they will be in a car 12 hours every weekend. That's not easy on anyone, let alone kids. not saying they shouldn't get to see eachother, but there are better ways. That much car time on a kid is not fair IMO. My BIL and exSIL are parenting between 2 states, it's hard, but they have figured it out and everyone gets their time with as little travel stress on their DD as possible.

[Michelle_M]

I think that letter is very thought out, and very thourough. I appluad the attention to detail and how you kept records of when the mom screwed up.

I would send it to her via certified mail (the kinds he has to sign for it and ONLY she can sign for it, right?), as well as email it to her. Of course keep a copy for yourself, as well as keep the reciept from when she signed for the letter.

And ya know what, I wouldn't wait for HER to take this to court as threatened.. I would go to court anyway to get the visitation thing revised to what your DH and you want! Surely he has enough proof of her instability!!! Leaving the kids with strange men is TOTALLY unacceptable.

And I'm sorry, I haven't been following this from the beginig, but how old are the children?

Good luck and God bless!