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Rights as an unwed Mother

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aidensMom18

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Missouri

I am the mother of a 2 month old son. His Father and I were never married and now we are split up. He is on the birth certificate and my son has his father's last name.

I have a couple of questions:

1.) Can I ask for full custody and get it?

2.) How do I go about getting child support ordered?

3.) If he tries to take off with my son and I don't give him permission, is that considered kidnapping?

4.) Does son's paternal grandmother have any rights to see him if I say she can't see him?
 


Isis1

Senior Member
You can ask for full physical custody, but dad can counter and ask for the same. It's up to the judge to decide. Judge will most likely grant primary to one of you, with joint legal to both.

Request for child support to be determined by state guidelines.

If there is no court order saying he has no parental rights, then it would not be kidnapping. Same as no court order is requiring you to hand over the child for visitation.

Granny has no inherent rights for visitation. BUT, that will not stop dad from taking the child to visit granny on his time.
 

LdiJ

Senior Member
You can ask for full physical custody, but dad can counter and ask for the same. It's up to the judge to decide. Judge will most likely grant primary to one of you, with joint legal to both.

Request for child support to be determined by state guidelines.

If there is no court order saying he has no parental rights, then it would not be kidnapping. Same as no court order is requiring you to hand over the child for visitation.

Granny has no inherent rights for visitation. BUT, that will not stop dad from taking the child to visit granny on his time.
I am going to disagree a tad with the bolded. I am pretty sure that in MO an unwed mother has full custody on a defacto basis until a court says otherwise. Therefore its not guaranteed that dad could simply snatch without potentially serious consequences.
 

aidensMom18

Junior Member
I am going to disagree a tad with the bolded. I am pretty sure that in MO an unwed mother has full custody on a defacto basis until a court says otherwise. Therefore its not guaranteed that dad could simply snatch without potentially serious consequences.

My grandmother (who was a paralegal for 15 years and worked on quite a few custody cases with the 2 attorneys she worked for), told me that if he tried to take off with my son, I could have him arrested for kidnapping. But she wasn't for sure because his name is on the birth certificate.


Does that affect my rights at all, having the father on the birth certificate? I don't want to take away his rights, I just want to make sure that he can't just run off with my son and move away, or something crazy like that.
 
You should file for the establishment of custody and visitation with the courts. Until then...my understanding is that if both parents are on the birth certificate they have equal rights to custody of the child. I would recommend you file ASAP.
 

LdiJ

Senior Member
You should file for the establishment of custody and visitation with the courts. Until then...my understanding is that if both parents are on the birth certificate they have equal rights to custody of the child. I would recommend you file ASAP.
While that can be true in a handful of states, I am pretty sure that it is not true in MO. Not in an unwed situation.
 

acmb05

Senior Member
You would likely know better than I would... :D
Ldij is correct on his one. While he would have had to sign an AOP to be placed on the birth certificate that does not give him any rights to the child. That has to be established through the courts.
 

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