My stepdaughter doesn't want to go home

[phillybug]

What is the name of your state?Indiana

We have a real dilema. My 13 year old step daughter (she will be 14 in Oct) has decided she wants to live with us. We got custody of her brother in February after months of fighting (he was 17), and now we may have to do the same thing with her. Her mother has primary custody, however she and her family have threatened my sd (her mother has gone as far as to threaten suicide if she moves out), we have had to call the police because she came to our home and tried to forceably remove her, they have played such mental games with her mind that she is terrified to even go to her mom's house. We feel stuck between a rock and a hard place because on the one hand her mom has custody, but on the other hand our first priority is to my sd. My husband has joint legal custody and shared physical custody. Will letting my sd stay at our house effect our chances at court?

 

[LdiJ]

What is the name of your state?Indiana

We have a real dilema. My 13 year old step daughter (she will be 14 in Oct) has decided she wants to live with us. We got custody of her brother in February after months of fighting (he was 17), and now we may have to do the same thing with her. Her mother has primary custody, however she and her family have threatened my sd (her mother has gone as far as to threaten suicide if she moves out), we have had to call the police because she came to our home and tried to forceably remove her, they have played such mental games with her mind that she is terrified to even go to her mom's house. We feel stuck between a rock and a hard place because on the one hand her mom has custody, but on the other hand our first priority is to my sd. My husband has joint legal custody and shared physical custody. Will letting my sd stay at our house effect our chances at court?

If you want to guarantee that you will lose the custody battle...then let her stay at your home. However be prepared for your husband to face some pretty serious consequences for contempt as well.

If you want any kind of real chance at custody, then obey the current orders and send her back to moms....and do things the legal way.

 

[stealth2]

What is the name of your state?Indiana

We have a real dilema. My 13 year old step daughter (she will be 14 in Oct) has decided she wants to live with us. We got custody of her brother in February after months of fighting (he was 17), and now we may have to do the same thing with her. Her mother has primary custody, however she and her family have threatened my sd (her mother has gone as far as to threaten suicide if she moves out), we have had to call the police because she came to our home and tried to forceably remove her, they have played such mental games with her mind that she is terrified to even go to her mom's house. We feel stuck between a rock and a hard place because on the one hand her mom has custody, but on the other hand our first priority is to my sd. My husband has joint legal custody and shared physical custody. Will letting my sd stay at our house effect our chances at court?

Wow. Yeah, letting her stay will affect the chances for custody. Negatively. If she is being allowed to stay past the court-ordered time, Mom was well within her rights to come to get her - and a judge will likely be less than impressed with Dad's refusing to allow her to take the child.

 

[phillybug]

I know and then again there is a long history. She has done some pretty bad things (the mom I mean). When we were going to court to get custody of my stepson last year because he was staying with us more than he was staying with her she threw such a fit at school about it (because we live outside of the school district) that they kicked him off the football team. We had no problem paying tuition for him, we just wanted to wait until the court battle was over. We ended up just going to school paying tuition from the beginning of the school year, thus she was pretty much saying she was giving us custody so she then had to sign papers giving dad full custody. She ended up screwing herself, but my ss got hurt the worst in the whole thing. She has already done similar things to my sd when it comes to her horses. She is very active in 4-H and the Rodeo. My husband works 3rd shift and my sd has taken to getting into bed with me when she thinks I'm asleep if it has been an extremely bad day in dealing with her mom. It has been a terrible summer for her. Thanks for the input. THese kids are my babies and it kills me to watch them get hurt by their own mother so bad.

 

[phillybug]

Just wanted to give you an update. The Judge ruled that my sd gets to stay with us until our emergency hearing on August 25. Thanks for the input. We are trying to handle all of this the legal way to make sure we get to keep her for good.

 

[Mbarr]

My husband works 3rd shift and my sd has taken to getting into bed with me when she thinks I'm asleep if it has been an extremely bad day in dealing with her mom.

Don't take offense, as this is no reflection on you personally, but you may want to rethink letting sd share your bed with pending custody battle. Think Michael Jackson, and the outrage voiced by numerous people about him sleeping with children unrelated to him. Pretty much everything gets used as ammunition in a custody battle, so just bear it in mind.

 

[phillybug]

I'm not offended, I worried about the same thing. I immediately emailed my husbands attorney the first time it happened. She hit the roof. Not because she felt I did something wrong, but because she felt it was sad that my 13 yr old sd was so emotionally distressed that she had to sleep in our bed to feel safe. She advised me not to encourage it, but there's not much I can do if she comes to our room at 3:00 in the morning. Thanks for watching out for what's best for the kid. That's exactly what's important.

 

[stealth2]

She advised me not to encourage it, but there's not much I can do if she comes to our room at 3:00 in the morning.

Well, that's not really true. There IS something you can do - send her back to her own room. If necessary, take her back, stay for a minute 'til she settles, and then go back to your own bed. Lather, rinse, repeat. Most parents go through this, just when the child is younger.

 

[TNBSMommy]

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Stealth that was cute, got a chuckle out of me!

OP, also you should reassure her throughout the day, and then at bed time, verbally encourage her that she can stay in her own bed, and should, and that she is safe there, no matter what...

 

[phillybug]

It has gotten a lot better since my husband got temporary custody. Never having been in this situation throws you off guard at first. It was such out of character behavior from my sd (miss independent) that I didn't know what to do or how to handle it. We are spending a lot of time doing damage control (for lack of a better word). She needs to learn to deal with this situation because she is going to have to return to her mothers whether it is to visit or God forbid the Judge orders us to return her. Life is not always going to be easy, she is going to have to learn that now. This was her first real taste of reality. Just so you guys understand why this has been so hard on all of us, we recently lost a very dear friend in death (a very sudden, unexpected death) that has hit my sd the hardest. Joe and her were extremely close. She would not even go to his funeral. She screamed when we told her she had to, so we dropped it and told her she had to go to the calling and pay her respects and that was all we expected. It has not been an easy few months. She and I are very close and I had a minor heart attack and had to be put on medicine and I think now she is afraid of losing me too.
Thanks for the info. Its great to have you guys as a support system.