he won't be there...

[rowenasmum]

I would only like to say that in MY case, and EVERY OTHER case that I'm remotely familiar with, the standard advice that we give, and tell a parent that they ALWAYS have the right to just go pick up their child when they're not physically with the other parent is WRONG.

My ex routinely travels for work. I'm telling you right now, if I had EVER just shown up and picked up the girls from school on "his" time EVEN when I KNEW that he wouldn't be home for the duration of their stay with them, I would get SLAMMED HARD.

And even if I decided that my kids could spend every second of my 6 weeks in the summer with my Mom 2 hours away, if HE went there and just picked them up because, well, they're with a legal stranger... HE would get SLAMMED.

If it's my weekend and my sister picks them up from school and whisks them off for the weekend because I have plans or am out of town? He can't just go pick them up and insist on having them.

That just isn't the way it works in reality.

If there's no ROFR, then it really is NONE of the other parent's business AT ALL who, exactly, the kids are with on the other parent's time. The COURT presumes that the parents are both fit, and as such will choose to do what is in their child's best interests at all times - EVEN WHEN IT COMES TO CHOOSING A CAREGIVER in their absence.

that's how it works in OUR reality.
in fact.. one of us would never send our daughter to stay with a family member or friend or anything without consulting the other.. we BOTH agree that we BOTH should know where our daughter is and who she's with at all times.. that may have to change in the future when she's a little older.. but for now.. it works.
we don't have a legal rofr agreement..
but that's basically the system that he and i have agreed to use. we have settled most of our issues outside of court.. we've both agreed that we don't want the court telling us how to raise our child and we've agreed on a set of rules that work for us..
so if i'm unable to pick our daughter up from school.. i call him BEFORE i ask my sister to do it to see if he's available.

if you disagree.. well.. you have a right to your opinion..

 

[CJane]

if you disagree.. well.. you have a right to your opinion..

Of course I do. And this has nothing whatsoever to do with YOU or my opinion of YOU and your parenting decisions.

The LEGAL fact in MY reality and the reality of most of the divorced couples I know is that if a responsible adult shows up to pick up kiddo in Dad's stead and you refuse to allow them to have the child, you'll get away with it once or twice.

And then, when Dad tires of all of it and files contempt, he'll likely win and you'll get slammed.

It really is best LEGALLY to just let it go now. It doesn't matter if you think you know SMom well enough or not... there are a billion people your child will interact with in her life that you don't know intimately. Get over it.

 

[Hisbabygirl77]

Of course I do. And this has nothing whatsoever to do with YOU or my opinion of YOU and your parenting decisions.

The LEGAL fact in MY reality and the reality of most of the divorced couples I know is that if a responsible adult shows up to pick up kiddo in Dad's stead and you refuse to allow them to have the child, you'll get away with it once or twice.

And then, when Dad tires of all of it and files contempt, he'll likely win and you'll get slammed.

It really is best LEGALLY to just let it go now. It doesn't matter if you think you know SMom well enough or not... there are a billion people your child will interact with in her life that you don't know intimately. Get over it.

Um Cjane there is no court order for her to be in contempt of. I believe......OP is there a set parenting plan?

 

[CJane]

Um Cjane there is no court order for her to be in contempt of. I believe......OP is there a set parenting plan?

She mentioned a divorce, and a parenting agreement.

She's mentioned lots of verbal agreements too (the ROFR that isn't legally binding, etc). But I find it hard to believe the divorce was a verbal agreement.

 

[Hisbabygirl77]

She mentioned a divorce, and a parenting agreement.

She's mentioned lots of verbal agreements too (the ROFR that isn't legally binding, etc). But I find it hard to believe the divorce was a verbal agreement.

LOL ok I meant I didnt see anything about set days who has who when that sort of thing but you may be right. Either way they seem to be handling it well. And OP I dont think Cjanes post was meant to you anyway. It was meant more to us other posters who sometimes state go get your kid if parent doesnt have them.

 

[rowenasmum]

Of course I do. And this has nothing whatsoever to do with YOU or my opinion of YOU and your parenting decisions.

The LEGAL fact in MY reality and the reality of most of the divorced couples I know is that if a responsible adult shows up to pick up kiddo in Dad's stead and you refuse to allow them to have the child, you'll get away with it once or twice.

And then, when Dad tires of all of it and files contempt, he'll likely win and you'll get slammed.

It really is best LEGALLY to just let it go now. It doesn't matter if you think you know SMom well enough or not... there are a billion people your child will interact with in her life that you don't know intimately. Get over it.

our child is four years old..
i'm not sending her with anyone unless it's someone i know.
and her dad is the same way..
once again.. we settle our disputes OUTSIDE of court..
we don't hire lawyer people.. we don't pay court fees.. our child isn't stuck in the middle of huge fights.. there's no name calling.. there's no furious texting aweful threats.. we both have equal say in parenting decisons.. it's a pretty decent arrangement. maybe strange.. maybe not like anything you've ever heard of.. which is kind of sad.. but it's how we do things.
sorry if you don't understand.
of course our divorce wasn't a verbal agreement.. that's completely silly. however, the visitation schedule was what we agreed on outside of court. the agreement that i'm referring to was between my ex and i.. there is no court ordered visitation because we both felt that we were mature enough to handle it without dragging our daughter through a custody battle.. and we were..
it's worked out fine..

 

[Hisbabygirl77]

our child is four years old..
i'm not sending her with anyone unless it's someone i know.
and her dad is the same way..
once again.. we settle our disputes OUTSIDE of court..
we don't hire lawyer people.. we don't pay court fees.. our child isn't stuck in the middle of huge fights.. there's no name calling.. there's no furious texting aweful threats.. we both have equal say in parenting decisons.. it's a pretty decent arrangement. maybe strange.. maybe not like anything you've ever heard of.. which is kind of sad.. but it's how we do things.
sorry if you don't understand.

OP I realize that since you feel you have been attacked by other posters that you are being defensive. As I stated above I dont believe Cjanes comments were directed to you. You guys are obviously working this out between the two of you and hopefully that can continue until the child is 18 which I dont think anyone here would fault you for working together definetly not Cjane.

 

[CJane]

our child is four years old..
i'm not sending her with anyone unless it's someone i know.
and her dad is the same way..
once again.. we settle our disputes OUTSIDE of court..
we don't hire lawyer people.. we don't pay court fees.. our child isn't stuck in the middle of huge fights.. there's no name calling.. there's no furious texting aweful threats.. we both have equal say in parenting decisons.. it's a pretty decent arrangement. maybe strange.. maybe not like anything you've ever heard of.. which is kind of sad.. but it's how we do things.
sorry if you don't understand.
the visitation schedule was what we agreed on outside of court. the agreement that i'm referring to was between my ex and i.. there is no court ordered visitation because we both felt that we were mature enough to handle it without dragging our daughter through a custody battle.. and we were..
it's worked out fine..

Then why are you on a legal advice site?

If there's really NO COURT ORDER AT ALL (which I still find difficult to believe), then you could just refuse to let Dad see kiddo ever. Let alone StepMom. Of course, HE could do the same to YOU.

But LEGALLY (which is what this site is all about) you'd be on safe ground.

So why are you here? It certainly wasn't for LEGAL advice.

 

[rowenasmum]

Then why are you on a legal advice site?

If there's really NO COURT ORDER AT ALL (which I still find difficult to believe), then you could just refuse to let Dad see kiddo ever. Let alone StepMom. Of course, HE could do the same to YOU.

But LEGALLY (which is what this site is all about) you'd be on safe ground.

So why are you here? It certainly wasn't for LEGAL advice.

it was for legal advice.. i didn't know if i legally had to let my ex's wife take our daughter.. it never occurred to me to not let him see his daughter.. it didn't occur to me that there should be court ordered visitation.. should there? is this something that we should fix? i mean.. we've only been to court the one time to settle our divorce.. we both agreed in court that we'd settle visitation and parenting decisions outside of court because neither of us wanted someone else telling us how to handle our child..
i'm 26.. this is my only child.. i've never been married or divorced before. i'm sorry if i've been defensive.. i have felt attacked by previous posters..
but now i'm feeling worried.. what if he up and decides to not let me have her back one day?
it never even crossed my mind that might happen... i don't think that he'd do something like that..

 

[Hisbabygirl77]

it was for legal advice.. i didn't know if i legally has to let my ex's wife take our daughter.. it never occurred to me to not let him see his daughter.. it didn't occur to me that there should be court ordered visitation.. should there? is this something that we should fix? i mean.. we agreed in court that we'd settle visitation and parenting decisions outside of court because neither of us wanted someone else telling us how to handle our child..
i'm 26.. this is my only child.. i've never been married or divorced before. i'm sorry if i've been defensive.. i have felt attacked by previous posters..
but now i'm feeling worried.. what if he up and decides to not let me have her back one day? it never even crossed my mind that might happen...

If he did you could go down and file for custody/visitation at that time. Or you could do it now if you want it as an order that is up to you.

 

[rowenasmum]

the conversation that we had when we were deciding how we were going to go about deciding the visitation and custody issues was that we felt that our daughter watching us argue and bicker about who gets her when would only affect her negatively in the long run. we thought it might give her issues later in life in her relationships and we didn't want to hurt our daughter simply because we could no longer be married.. which is why all of this is done without lawyers outside of court. when i said that the divorce had been rocky.. i meant that it had been emotionally upsetting.. not that we had fought a lot.. i'm guessing that "rocky" means something different here..
anyway.. we only did the bare minimum in court.. got in, got the divorce over with.. signed our papers.. pushed aside our differences and got on with raising our daughter.
the only reason i came on this site today was because i had what i felt was a legal question... which, apparently, it was not due to our arrangement.. but i didn't know that, i just wanted advice. that's it, and i've been defending myself since.
that said.. cjane..
i'm sorry for getting snappy and defensive with you. i understand that you were providing valuable information and i'm sure it's going to help someone. at least i hope it does..

 

[Proserpina]

I would only like to say that in MY case, and EVERY OTHER case that I'm remotely familiar with, the standard advice that we give, and tell a parent that they ALWAYS have the right to just go pick up their child when they're not physically with the other parent is WRONG.

My ex routinely travels for work. I'm telling you right now, if I had EVER just shown up and picked up the girls from school on "his" time EVEN when I KNEW that he wouldn't be home for the duration of their stay with them, I would get SLAMMED HARD.

And even if I decided that my kids could spend every second of my 6 weeks in the summer with my Mom 2 hours away, if HE went there and just picked them up because, well, they're with a legal stranger... HE would get SLAMMED.

If it's my weekend and my sister picks them up from school and whisks them off for the weekend because I have plans or am out of town? He can't just go pick them up and insist on having them.

That just isn't the way it works in reality.

If there's no ROFR, then it really is NONE of the other parent's business AT ALL who, exactly, the kids are with on the other parent's time. The COURT presumes that the parents are both fit, and as such will choose to do what is in their child's best interests at all times - EVEN WHEN IT COMES TO CHOOSING A CAREGIVER in their absence.

You know I can't - reasonably - even begin to dispute what you've said here though in the past I may have tried.

Nicely put.

 

[Rushia]

Listen people, these kind of arrangements CAN work. I've been doing it for years now. If she drags Dad back into court NOW, it can seriously bite her in the butt. It could cause the animosity that they are BOTH trying to avoid. I still say OP and her ex are doing the right thing.

OP, you never know.....My ex's wife is my best friend. I did the same as you and she turned out wonderful. I laugh at her choice in men, but well, do we ever like all of our friends hubbies?

 

[LdiJ]

I would only like to say that in MY case, and EVERY OTHER case that I'm remotely familiar with, the standard advice that we give, and tell a parent that they ALWAYS have the right to just go pick up their child when they're not physically with the other parent is WRONG.

My ex routinely travels for work. I'm telling you right now, if I had EVER just shown up and picked up the girls from school on "his" time EVEN when I KNEW that he wouldn't be home for the duration of their stay with them, I would get SLAMMED HARD.

And even if I decided that my kids could spend every second of my 6 weeks in the summer with my Mom 2 hours away, if HE went there and just picked them up because, well, they're with a legal stranger... HE would get SLAMMED.

If it's my weekend and my sister picks them up from school and whisks them off for the weekend because I have plans or am out of town? He can't just go pick them up and insist on having them.

That just isn't the way it works in reality.

If there's no ROFR, then it really is NONE of the other parent's business AT ALL who, exactly, the kids are with on the other parent's time. The COURT presumes that the parents are both fit, and as such will choose to do what is in their child's best interests at all times - EVEN WHEN IT COMES TO CHOOSING A CAREGIVER in their absence.

This case really isn't the same as yours.

Mom isn't going and picking up the children from stepmom. The children are already in mom's care and she isn't comfortable releasing them to the stepmom when dad isn't going to be there at all.

If dad picked up the kids, turned them over to his new wife, and then went away for the weekend there would be nothing that mom could do.

This would be like you being gone for a week, and D'Man showing up at your ex's house to pick up the kids and keep them for the weekend. I can't see your ex cooperating with that or a court dinging him for not cooperating.

 

[Ohiogal]

So, if it were a weekend that he were going to pick her up on a Friday, then leave town all day and night Saturday to return home sometime on Sunday, would you expect him to return the daughter while he's gone?

Legally speaking, I would assume since it's his weekend he can choose who to leave her with in his absense no matter how you two have verbally agreed to handle such situations.

Legally speaking it is not the same thing. Please do NOT give advice.