non-married couple who has custody?

[dee2208]

IL


I have been living with the father ( my boyfriend) of my 1 month old daughter. Things are not working out. Who has legal custody since we are not married? We live in Illinois, in DuPage County.

 

[I AM ALWAYS LIABLE]

IL


I have been living with the father ( my boyfriend) of my 1 month old daughter. Things are not working out. Who has legal custody since we are not married? We live in Illinois, in DuPage County.

My response:

Then, get some counseling. Damn it, you have a child together. Work it out. No one ("Noone" for my friends on this site) said relationships were all a bed of roses. Get at least 6 months worth of counseling with him, and WORK IT OUT !

IAAL

 

[pthalo]

IAAL = tactless

You'll have to forgive IAAL, tact is not a word that appears in his dictionary..

Although I agree with him, I think it can be better said like this:

Why isn't it "working out"? Do you want a relationship with dad? If you don't work things out, do you have a place to live and a way to support yourself? Considering that you are unmarried, has paternity been established (voluntarily or through testing)?

These are just a couple of questions that I feel need answered to give you a better idea of which path to venture down.. All-in-all though, you both have rights to custody, but without the details its hard to give any advice..

 

[h0rsepwr]

You both have equal, yet no custody. Until something is done legally, either one of you can take the child and run. But, being that you are the mom, Illinois for some reason likes you better whether or not you are the better parent.

 

[stealth2]

I have to agree with IAAL

The kid deserves to have the two of you suck it up and do some of the hard work that comes with being parents.

"It's not working out" What does that mean? You can't agree what pizza to order or what movie to go see? Or he beats you? There's a world of gray shades between the two. But the two of you decided to have sex and have a kid together - that kid deserves for the two of you to at least try to *make* it work out.

IM(never to be humble)O

 

[dee2208]

Illinois


Things are not working out because he can not adjust to fatherhood, and the fianancial responsibility. We argue constantly. He blames me, that he has no money or time for his friends. He obviously was not ready for fatherhood. He said he would help with the baby and he can not handle her at all. Yet he gets angry with me because he can't. He quit his job, now that a 3rd mouth needs to be fed. I do not drive. I have to rely on him to even go grocery shopping. He is just very unreasonable about the whole situation. He has his money, it is not ours. I do not work. His mother does his checking account. I realize it is tough with a baby, but he does not understand it will get better but we need, a "we" relationship, not just his and hers. I am not ready to bail, but I need to know what my rights are, if he can not feed me and our daughter, do I have the right to leave with her? I need to think of her. He took the car seat the other day when my girlfriend was going to take me to the grocery store, and said he paid for it, so I could not use it. So I could not go to do the grocery shopping. I wanted to take the baby for a walk, he would not let me use the stroller, since he paid for it. What else could I do with him being so unreasonable? So for the attorney, with the counseling advice, learn to gather the facts before you blow some senseless tact! And stick to the question at hand, I want to know my leagel rights? In Illinois? I am sure counseling is great in some cases, but how do you change a person? And no discissions have been made, I just am gathering information. Thanks for those of you who are willing to help.

 

[pthalo]

advice is advice...

Listen the advice here is free, so don't bitch about is, you get what you paid for... Everyone here is right in telling you to get counselling and try to get dad to be a dad..

He gets angry and possessive b/c he doesn't feel that he can do it right.. some of this may come from you and some of it may come from his own senses of inadequacy.. Try to get him to go to parenting classes.. This is alot of stress on a man and he just needs some other people to relate to on this topic.. I don't know if he would be willing but he can email me and possibly call me if he wants someone to talk to about these issues..

It is very important that you try to make this work if you can. A child benefits much more from love and care of both parents than just one..

 

[4LilMan]

Sorry guys. I agree that the child benefits from the love of 2 parents, but the child can recieve love from them whether they are together or not. It is not good for the baby to experience the turbulence of a disfunctional relationship. Sounds to me like this guy just needs to grow up. His mother balances his check register for God's sake. No job. Come on. If he is not willing to do some 'growing up' then the relationship will not work. And it doesn't sound like he is willing to do so. Keeping the car seat so her friend can't drive her to the grocery store? More like she is not 'allowed' to go ANYWHERE with her friends. Control Freak!!

Now on the other hand, you need to get your license if you do not have one. And you also need to get a job or an education if you do not have one. You need to call the courthouse in the county that you reside in and ask them who would have custody of the child if you were to leave the relationship. State laws vary. But if he files for custody, you are going to have to show the judge that you are capable of taking care of your child as well as yourself. So if you can't work things out with him, then you need to get some help for childcare. Go to Family Services to see if they offer childcare vouchers which can significantly reduce your childcare costs. This is a work program. If I were you, I wouldn't tell him if you plan on leaving b/c he might throw away the car seat, take the stroller apart, and lock you in a room and throw away the key! Just get your stuff together and when you feel you are stable enough and have a place to go, make your final decision.
And if you do split up, do not use your child as leverage. Some custodial parents tend to do this and it only punishes the child. Always encourage a relationship with the other parent. Be mature enough to remember that just b/c you may dislike the other parent in the end, does not mean that your child doesn't need both parents. But first, make sure that you have custody so that he can't take off with your child.

 

[njmom]

hey Lil....

You couldn't have put it any better than you have!!!.....I totally agree with your post!!!!!

 

[JaneyS4]

Re: advice is advice...

Listen the advice here is free, so don't bitch about is, you get what you paid for... Everyone here is right in telling you to get counselling and try to get dad to be a dad..

He gets angry and possessive b/c he doesn't feel that he can do it right.. some of this may come from you and some of it may come from his own senses of inadequacy.. Try to get him to go to parenting classes.. This is alot of stress on a man and he just needs some other people to relate to on this topic.. I don't know if he would be willing but he can email me and possibly call me if he wants someone to talk to about these issues..

It is very important that you try to make this work if you can. A child benefits much more from love and care of both parents than just one..

pthalo: Listen, I understand that you're a father and automatically sympathetic to a fathers "needs" but lets put this in perspective please.

Having a baby means stress, period. Not just for dad but mom too. But isn't it funny that when a mother acts like this she gets called a no-good neglectful parent. But for dad its just stress? Come on now. Plenty of people have babies everyday, plenty of men get slapped in the face with fatherhood, and most of them don't do stupid things like quit their job, deny mom access to the grocery store to buy forumula and diapers because they paid for the car seat, and get mad because the baby is fussy. Do you know why? Because they try to be responsible. Now, after reading these posts I tend to think this might be a very young couple here (Mom does the checkbook?) but there is NO excuse for having a competition on who is more childish, dad or baby. Sounds like this mother is just trying to figure out a way to take care of her child, and I don't blame her one bit. Children need two parents, thats true, but they need to eat even more.

You seem like an intelligent person, and a very caring father but this is twice now I've seen you excuse unacceptable behavior from a man just because he was a man. Not all men are like you.

 

[pthalo]

read more carefully

I wasn't defending the guys behavior, I was giving a male insight to where the problems originate.. I even offered my direct assistance... I am a very compassionate person and hate to see situations like this happen.. I am in a nasty situation myself and I hate to see someone slipping into a similar situation if I could offer assistance that might prevent something bad from happening.. I think both mom and dad have alot of growing up to do, but I think there is also a blame game going on here that needs to end... Mom blames dad for this and dad gets angry and so on and so on... I don't think that I could ever claim that men suffer more stress than women when it comes to pregnancy and children, but I do think that socially and culturally the woman's stress is more acceptable and understood.. The movement of men becoming more involved in actual child rearing and interaction is relatively modern, and because of that it is still fairly uncharted territory.. I don't defend men I just understand where they are coing from.. Men need just as much help as women but the systems are not in place to support these men when they need a venting post or a reassuring word...

 

[pthalo]

One more thing Janey

You make me out to be all about the dad.. That's not true.. I am all about my son and all the children that I hear about that need a healthier situation... Most people, when you bring up a child's health and happiness think in this order,

1. Child(ren)
2. Mom
3. Dad

Don't you think that by the time you get to dad that people are too distracted by the mom and child to really dedicate themselves to help.. Especially considering that males have for centuries carried the image of strong and independent... You know if I was defending a mom here, not one person would have come after me, but say one thing about what dad might be feeling and I am not taking things into perspective.. Give me a break.. There are articles floating around out there that I think you would absolutely love that cover topics about fatherhood (usually written by NOW) If you read those and agree, then come back to me and I'll show you some articles that remove that terrible sex bias and show things for what they are.. Fathers are on the short end of this stick and mothers keep trying to take more..

Fire away (EVERYONE) I think I've got enough amunition to fight back an army with this one...

 

[4LilMan]

dee2208

Please let us know what happens. We are all very opinionated but still want to help....we know you are probably young and I am curious to find out what you are doing to make the situation better for you and your child. Don't be intimidated to come back on here b/c we are so opinionated. I think of it as 'constructive criticism'. This way it doesn't bother me. Then I try to look at myself & my situation in a different perspective. Good luck.

 

[JaneyS4]

Ergh!

You make me out to be all about the dad.. That's not true.. I am all about my son and all the children that I hear about that need a healthier situation... Most people, when you bring up a child's health and happiness think in this order,

1. Child(ren)
2. Mom
3. Dad

Don't you think that by the time you get to dad that people are too distracted by the mom and child to really dedicate themselves to help.. Especially considering that males have for centuries carried the image of strong and independent... You know if I was defending a mom here, not one person would have come after me, but say one thing about what dad might be feeling and I am not taking things into perspective.. Give me a break.. There are articles floating around out there that I think you would absolutely love that cover topics about fatherhood (usually written by NOW) If you read those and agree, then come back to me and I'll show you some articles that remove that terrible sex bias and show things for what they are.. Fathers are on the short end of this stick and mothers keep trying to take more..

Fire away (EVERYONE) I think I've got enough amunition to fight back an army with this one...

I do not intend to make you all about dad. I believe I said that you seem to be a very caring father, and I genuinely applaud that because I have seen several examples of the opposite both in Dads AND moms. (As we are currently battling a worthless mom now, I don't see how anyone could think me pro mom but this is just a forum and no one really knows each other)

But what I said was, "This is twice I've seen you excuse unacceptable behavior from a man just because he was a man." I will now clarify that statement since this seems to bug you.

There are things in life that are excusable. If the young lady above had said she and bf are squabbling alot, etc, then I would have found your comment about dad being stressed appropriate. But the second she mentioned dad denying access to a car seat to go by GROCERIES, his behavior became way out of bounds to my way of thinking. Being mad at mom is one thing, but punishing baby by not allowing food (such as formula) to be bought is another. Thats selfishness to the utmost, and I am sorry but he deserves what he gets for that one act alone.

I am NOT anti-dad. But I am VERY pro child. I agree with you when you say child comes before anyone else. The second someone makes their child suffer for their own satisfaction they become useless to me. No excuse, no sympathies, no anything. And I don't care if it's dad or mom.

Let me put it to you another way...If it were YOUR son, no matter how angry you are with the mom, can you see yourself denying her access to your childs carseat to buy groceries for him and her? I bet the answer to that is no, and the reason for that is because you recognize your child comes first.

I think that basically you want to think that everyone cares about their kids like you and I and most of the regulars on this board do, but its just not true.