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Runaway wife with child

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rwv

Junior Member
What is the name of your state? Virginia.

My wife left on June 27th to go visit her family in Illinois with our 7 year old daughter and called to say she wasn't coming back to Virginia! We also have 2 sons that are 4 and 2 years old who happen to be visiting my parents in Charleston S.C. My wife has no money and no job and expects my parents to bring the boys to her in Illinois. She left me with negative $24.00 in the bank and a $1100.00 rent to pay on July 5th. She expects me to find a place and move all of our belongings by August with no money and no help. Is this legal and what rights do I have in such a situation? Can anyone help me?!
 


LdiJ

Senior Member
rwv said:
What is the name of your state? Virginia.

My wife left on June 27th to go visit her family in Illinois with our 7 year old daughter and called to say she wasn't coming back to Virginia! We also have 2 sons that are 4 and 2 years old who happen to be visiting my parents in Charleston S.C. My wife has no money and no job and expects my parents to bring the boys to her in Illinois. She left me with negative $24.00 in the bank and a $1100.00 rent to pay on July 5th. She expects me to find a place and move all of our belongings by August with no money and no help. Is this legal and what rights do I have in such a situation? Can anyone help me?!
Well, you certainly have the right to tell your parents to bring the boys to you rather than to your wife. You also have the right to file for custody and ask the judge to order your wife to return your daughter to VA. Whether or not you will win depends on the facts of the situation.

Unfortunately, the financial issues are less clear. Since your wife has no money and no job then its obviously not her fault (or at least not entirely her fault) that the rent is due on July 5th and you don't have it. If you have been the "breadwinner" in the family then there isn't much you can do as far as any financial claims against her.

What's the whole story here? Did your family finances take a nosedive and stress your marriage?
 

rwv

Junior Member
family finances

Yes, our finances took a big hit back in February and we were living in a home that we could afford at the time but cannot anymore. I had been pressing for us to move after we received our tax returns because we had the money to do it then but she wasn't interested and wanted to stay where we were. As time went on our tax return kept going towards rent and was finally exhausted. I had been asking her to look into getting a job, she has a degree in Anthropology and has a social work background. She got a job that was 1 night a week and brought in around $300 a month. Nice but not enough to help with the bills. We eventually ended up on food stamps. We had the opportunity to move into a home in a community where I had some friends for just $500 a month and she refused. This was definitely putting stress on the marriage. She finally decided to look for jobs at places like Marshalls, Target, and TJ Max. She didn't even try to find anything that would be truly rewarding for her. When she left we agreed that she was just going home to visit and would come back and get a full time job to help out and then she just abandoned me and the boys.
 

djohnson

Senior Member
Go to an attorney quickly. You need to file for emergency custody of all kids. If you let her establish residency there then she can fight it there. Definitely tell your parents to bring you the boys. Since there is no court order you both have the same rights and residency is still with you (your state) so she would have to come back to fight it or to file. Give her up and do the best you can.
 

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