Men are not the only

  Whether you are a custodial parent, a non-custodial parent, a first wife, a second wife, a girlfriend, a boyfriend, ask yourself if you're behaving in the best interest of the child.    

'95 Bm filed for increased child support. She's lived with her parents (retired for years) since '86, and will continue to live with her parents. Her financial shows she pays no bills. She gets the increased support, but the judge assigns to her minimum wage as salary and sternly tells her to get a job. She gets a part time job.

'96 Dh files against bm for severe visitation denial. Her parents hire an attorney to find dh in contempt for not paying support. He had to admit he didn't pay for 5 months after the unemployment.  5 days in jail, a year's probation.  Visitation order was improved.

Visitation denial, unable to reach ss over phone, weeks later ss finally calls dh sobbing that his mother told him his dad is a bad man cuz he went to jail and he shouldn't see his dad anymore.  Dh is calm and candid trying to calm ss, but bm is in the background feeding ss her own agenda. She finally demands ss hang up cuz "Your father's upsetting you too much!"

The crisis blows over. Visitation is better.  We didn't do a tit for tat and tell ss about his mother's time in jail years ago - he's not ready to learn about that.

A year later dh is served with papers that he's violated probation. Dh and I show up in court, obviously to DA's surprise when the case is called. We have to wait while they get "quick" cases out of the way. At one point DA sits and studies us for about 20 minutes seemingly puzzled over our calmness.

We finally get the time to talk to the DA. We show the paperwork that all support was paid this last year.  

Puzzled even more DA looks at his notes. Bm called and wrote so often demanding that the da take action against dh, they felt obliged to take it to court. 

We'd paid $2000 and skipped a month.  Child support payments of $682 a month were paid in advance thruout the year.

To satisfy bm and to resolve the issue quickly the DA asked that dh agree to an additional year's probation. Dh refused. A pretrial date is set.

Next court date, another trip from Vegas to CA, bm was subpoenaed. Her own paperwork shows all support paid in full for the year. Judge demands to know why dh is here. DA tries to make a case that a payment wasn't made that month. Judge isn't buying it, but explains a trial would require 2 more court dates.  Dh, feeling vindicated, agrees to another year probation.

A year later another DA calls making threats. Bm is calling him often complaining payments aren't made on time each month and demanding they find dh in violation of probation. DA learns what bm is like, and works closely with us each month to get the payment in to NV, who gets it to CA, til probation is over and DA can get bm off his back.

Summer '99 custody was changed. Bm's delays, our attorney's personal issues delaying getting in to court to modify child support.

We pay full support of $682 a month to bm for 3 months after custody was changed. Then my ex goes on unemployment.  I get 25% of his unemployment for my 2 kids for the next 6 months. My ex's "unemployment" ends and I don't receive any support from him.

We made $100 payments each month to bm on arrears during my ex's unemployment. Dh gets a call from another new DA that bm is demanding dh be found in contempt for not paying full child support since custody was changed.  Again the DA is at first threatening, then learns what bm is like, and learns to trust us. We keep her apprised of developments toward getting in to court.  She even tried to help us by getting in touch with our attorney.

A year after custody was changed, a court date is set for 9/19/2000.  Bm doesn't respond with her financial. She responds with a scathing letter that our expenses couldn't possibly exceed disposable income, a hardship deduction for dh's daughter, and my 2 kids is "not supported", our installment payments and debts appear excessive and are "not supported" and she demands to see check stubs, that "this filing appears to be, if not fraudulent, at least frivolous", she is not available for court til after the 27th, and she will not supply her financial until her demands our met.

Assuming she grosses $2000 a month, she'll be paying dh a whopping $13 a month in child support.

Concerned Stepmom