joint custody

[anotherstepmom]

i live in georgia, and my husband has joint custody of his son.his ex wife is now in contempt of court on the custody
order,she says that she will not make my step son come if he
doesn't want to, we really do not know what's going on.this has come about all of a sudden, he says i yell all the time ,which is not true,everytime we have him ,his grandmother calls to see if she can take him out of town for the weekend.He is already living there 1/2 the time.they both get mad if my husband refuses to let him go.our arrangements are we have him 7 days and his mom has him 7 days,i feel like those plans should be made when he is at their home.we have filed for contempt and are awaiting
a court date,when she was served the contempt warrant , she
mailed a registered letter providing a place to pick him up. when my husband arrived his son ran from him and would not talk to him and still refuses to, there was a sheriff's deputy present, she said if my husband took him against his will that she would have the family and children services
come and remove him from our home.while the deputy was talking with my husband sheleft with the child. now we have
to wait to go to court, in the mean time my husband calls his son almost everyother day and never gets to speak to him
or never gets any calls returned,i really need some kind of support or advice until we get through this ,
we do not want to lose our joint custody , actually we really would like to get full custody back.my husband had full custody when we started dating but out of the kindness of his heart he let her have joint custody .the mother has not had full custody in 6-8 years.he will be 13 in oct,

 

[concerned stepmom]

my husband and I are going through the same thing with his controlling ex wife. she got mad at me because her son obeyed me and not her in public and has refused to let husband see his son until last week. when we went to pick him up, she let him see him but wouldn't let him take him for weekend because of me! then, she said i traumatized him and made him cry that day, but he was already crying and hitting her. that is the only reason i even went over there. also, it was OUR weekend to have him (this happened at his bball game). basically, she had no control over him and can't stand it that my husband and I do. she was messed up because in response to contempt charges we placed, she said that she encouraged him to go with us, but she didn't make him, BUT she wasn't even home 4 of the 6 times we went to get him. basically, she is jealous that her son likes me and my husband and I have a wonderful relationship. she grills my stepson everytime he goes home and constantly tells him negative things about me and my husband. we are wonderful parents to him, much better than her situation.
if your stepson's living situation is anything like ours, he probably has more freedom with mom. my husband's ex wife lets his son get away with anything. if this is the case, be sure to let your lawyer know. our lawyer said judges were usually pretty good about seeing through the lack of discipline as reasoning to want to stay with parent.
Advice: DOCUMENT! DOCUMENT! Keep a journal of everything she and her family has said and done. if she won't let you have him for visitation, video her refusal. unfortunately, i don't think you can record conversations, but i wish you could.
our lawyer told us there was basically nothing we could do until we went to court, outside of getting a deputy to go with us to force her to let us see him. he advised against this because said judge would look down on that because mom would look like criminal in child's eyes, SO did she involve police or you?? if she did get lawyer to bring that up in court that she made child think he had to have police protection to visit his father.
what other evidence do you have other than denial of visitation??? trouble at school? confession from child that mother is persuading him not to want to be with father?? things like that??
hang in there! we have been going through this for 2 months and at first it was AGONY! we were so frustrated because we knew we didn't do any wrong, and here she was getting away with it!
I hope this advice has helped. it's not much but it is what i have learned so far. don't give up and keep trying to contact him. Remember, DOCUMENT!

 

[anotherstepmom]

i'm so glad that i found this sight ,i hate that we are having these problems ,but i'm glad that there are others
in the same situation that's willing to lend support ,
we have been documenting everything,you are right , he does as he pleases when he is with his mom,they put him on a pedestal and tell him that he does no wrong, so when he's with us he thinks that we are treating him badly if we don't do the same , we have other children in the house and were not going to treat him any differently than the others,
he's a child and needs to learn disipline,the sheriff's deputy told my husband that he thought my step son was spoiled rotton,he never has acted that way around us before
but his mom and grandmother(the main problem)were both there,so he acted like he wanted to, it just irritates me that after all these years, now there is a problem with all of this. we are hanging in there , we will be going to mediation near the end of June ,we have our fingers crossed
thanks