Separation agreement woes

What is the name of your state?Virginia


I have been separated from my first wife since Feb 2001, it took us until August 2003 to agree on the separation agreement and we were finally divorced October 2003. From this marriage we have 2 children ages 11 and 8.
She has custody with me having the children every other weekend,2 weeks a year vacation and our agreement states we should have an equal division of holidays and birthdays. Herein lies the problem that I am facing.
Since we were separated in feb 2001 and it took until aug 2003 to complete the agreement, my attempts to get the children during major holidays has met with "no". I have never had my children Christmas eve,christmas morning,thanksgiving, easter or either of their birthdays. This has occurred since the August finalization of the separation agreement. My exwife when asked replies, "They are used to their routine now and disrupting this routine would be detrimental to them". The children have asked me about seeing them on these holidays and Ive discussed this with them and her reply is "they may be unhappy with specific situations and guidelines ; however they seem happy and fewer changes means less turmoil" This is in light of the fact that the only reason she has a routine is because she never allowed them to be with me from the beginning.
I discussed this with my attorney last november and he told me of something that we could file that basically suggests that she is not adhering to the agreement. He did not want to persue it at that time and wanted to "wait" and see what she did this year if I was more persistant with her. What was he wanting to file and can I do it myself and represent myself. I felt he was very sympathetic to her acting and did not represent me as I seemed to get more done when I spoke to the Judge on my own behalf.
Any suggestions? Any comments? Any similar situations?
Thank You,
Derreke

Derreke

Since it took you so long to write your agreement, I am surprised you weren't more specific as to the exact time for visitaiton during holidays. My agreement is very specific, for example: Every Christmas father has visitation between 2:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. On the side, I invite their dad to come over early to watch our children open their gifts (which makes things more "normal" for them).

I would tell your wife that you have spoke to an attorney and that you need to come up with a SPECIFIC plan or you will proceed with whatever is necessary (to ensure that you will see the children over the holidays). She is definitely not being fair to you or the children, by leaving you out of the mix.

Iaal

Thank you for bringing the type-o to my attention...

OP... What your lawyer was talking about was a contempt motion. The reason he likely wanted to wait is because, a month after the order was entered, there had been no contempt. You can't file about possible future contempt. And as long as there was no order, she was under no obligation to follow any agreement.

I agree with Stealth. Make sure you document everytime she tries to stop you from seeing the kids or tries to go against the order in some way. As stealth said, when she starts denying visitation or going against the order in some way, you can file for contempt but you need to document it and let her do it enough times to hang herself. Metaphorically speaking of course. I *think* it is possible to seek full custody of the children if she tries to alienate you from the children for an ongoing period of time.

You might want to see about trying to make the court order more specific about pick up and drop off times, locations, who is responsible for the method of transportation, rescheduling missed visitation, advance notice for cancelling a visit, phone calls, etc. There are lots of things that may come up that you didn't think about before. So if problems start arising, you may want to see about having the order modified.