Is my wife using the legal system to leverage me for money in our divorce is similar to a drug dealer calling the cops when he gets robbed?

[gotmilk]

LOL... my wife and her sister... eh.. prolly not beneficial to my case.

I disagree. Priceless

 

[Turd Ferguson]

I have no problem paying child support. Lets be clear on that.

I do have a problem with financing my ex-wife's lifestyle though. Especially since her lifestyle is dangerous for my daugther. That would be called "Enableing' her in by drug counselors.

Being a attorney you should know that the 'Statutory' amounts have alot of leway to play with depending upon how the worksheet is completed and how the numbers are played with. Her proposal assumes a lot of factors that bias the end result 100% in her favor. If I calculate it the same way with all factors biasing me.... there is over an $800 a month difference.

In fact... if you beleive in this statutory amount... let's look at someone else's situation that know:

Facts:

1. Wife makes more money.
2. They are going to share legal and physical custody 50/50.
3. The statutory amount he will pay her is in the neighborhood of 500/month.

The statute says nothing about who pays who. So in that situation, if it was calculate with HIM as the presumed reciipietnt of child support he would receive over 700 a month since he makes less.

So explain that to me? Nothing about statutory amounts is as cut and dry as it may seem. There are alot of factors to be toiled with, she has toiled them in her favor... I will turn them in my favor and then we will arrive at a number that *I* am comfortable with to make sure my daughter has everything she needs in both households without putting excesive amounts of *MY* money into the hands of a drug abuser.

Or.... we'll go to court, and we'll see what court decides on who is the more fit parent.

Basically... divorce law, child custody law, is so biased in women's favor it's not even funny. I know some women have gotten the shaft, so don't even start in with those examples - I don't deny their existance. I am talking about generalities that I beleive to be accurate... and I am talking about my specific situation.

I am no deadbeat dad... I know people don't know me personally on here... with the exception of one or two orbs... but they can testifiy, I am good dad - better than most, and my daughter has everything she needs from me and then some. She always will.

Not wanting to be uber fucked some bitch that already fucked me over once does not equate to being a deadbeat father. Any suggestion to contrary is resented.

Wonder who that is in your example? The support isn't really about me paying for him to live or paying her for his expenses other than we are equally splitting his school tuition and in the future daycare at latch key. His daycare is $800 a month now so if you split that, its $400 a piece. That gives an extra hundered a month for whatever. Not that bad. We also agreed that latch key wont be that expensive and when we get to that point we can talk again. Since the court won't be involved in garnishing my wages I just pay her it makes it easier to work that out in the future between us without paying lawyers and gettting the court involved.

It is completely different in your situation, your wife is out to get you. Mine is looking at splitting the costs pretty fairly IMO.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

Yeah... that whole custodial / non-custodial thing seems to be crap. If you are spliting 50/50 legal and physical custoday...

The *ONLY* difference that I can decifer is that the 'custodial' parent is the one that gets paid the money - EVEN IF THEY MAKE MORE. So if everything is 50 / 50... what gives one parent the label as 'custodial' over the over?

What determines that?

So in my case... say I get labelbed the custodial parent. Should my wife pay me money even though she makes say 19% of the income?

If so... am I still a bastard and wanting to let me child starve while in her custody if the law says she should pay me? LOL... I am just curious how the 'custodial' label gets determined - and why two parents that are spliting custody down the line - legal and physical - can end up with the dad still paying the mom even if the mom makes more. Simply because of an otherwise meaningless label on a decree?

I am not sure I see the justice in that situation.

My situation isn't that bad... I know I make more money, and I am willing to pay support. Just not to excess. And yes... I know it's hard to look at this situation and wonder why I am just not clear out going for full custody. You know... Maybe I should.... Maybe I will. But I would PREFER if she got clean because of my pressure, because I have alot of fears about raising a daughter all by myself. Is that so bad? To want her mom to be around to help? Am I a terrible dad for not WANTING the custody battle? They are nasty... I don't want to have to bring up the drugs in court... I don't want to drag anyone through the mud much less my daughter's mom. I will if that's what I have to do...

But obviously... the best outcome is this:

She gets clean, we split custody 50 50...
I pay a reasonable amount of child support knowing that she is clean and won't use my money for drugs.

Who can argue that isn't the best outcome of this bad situation? That's my goal.

all good points JH. I think if your worried about K being clean then go for full custody and she can have supervised visition. If you think she is at least being a good parent and just likes her drugs then maybe you try the 50\50 split. My thing on the 50\50 is that I'm not sure it is in the childs best interest. I think a kid needs a place to feel like home. Unfortunately my house isn't really what G considers home. He like to come and we have a great time, but at his age he needs to feel comfortable. To a kid comfort = safe. At times he wants to go home, what has always been home. I have to respect that.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

With regard to public choice theory economics, it is called "rent seeking". Using the government to take a dollar out of someone's pocket and put it into your pocket is rent seeking. It happens all the time and the rent seekers are using this rent to float their lifestyle unjustly and at the expense of someone else.

Who ever gets full custody should pay fully for it - full financial responsibility, With regard to economics, on one hand they are gaining all the utility/satisfaction of having the kids, they should pay a premium for this utility that the other parent is being robbed of. On the other hand, you should not have a situation where a parent is stripped of their children and suffer the loss of that utility and pay the "rent seeker" a high premium for it so that they can enjoy a better standard of living at the expense of the non-custodial parent.

However, if custody is split 50/50, there should still be no welfare payments/ transfers of wealth between ex-spouses since they are sharing the burden equally. I in no way can see how wealth redistribution in this case is ever effective or justified.

My point exactly, with my wife we are really splitting the cost of his school, so what is the difference if I pay have his school to her or half to my wife and she pays. same difference.

 

[mrplunkey]

all good points JH. I think if your worried about K being clean then go for full custody and she can have supervised visition. If you think she is at least being a good parent and just likes her drugs then maybe you try the 50\50 split. My thing on the 50\50 is that I'm not sure it is in the childs best interest. I think a kid needs a place to feel like home. Unfortunately my house isn't really what G considers home. He like to come and we have a great time, but at his age he needs to feel comfortable. To a kid comfort = safe. At times he wants to go home, what has always been home. I have to respect that.

You can make a 2-home arrangement work very well, but you face a 100% increase in living costs. Double clothes... double toys... etc. etc. Its brutal in terms of cost, but a zero-pack arrangement will work.

 

[jh1]

all good points JH. I think if your worried about K being clean then go for full custody and she can have supervised visition. If you think she is at least being a good parent and just likes her drugs then maybe you try the 50\50 split. My thing on the 50\50 is that I'm not sure it is in the childs best interest. I think a kid needs a place to feel like home. Unfortunately my house isn't really what G considers home. He like to come and we have a great time, but at his age he needs to feel comfortable. To a kid comfort = safe. At times he wants to go home, what has always been home. I have to respect that.

Yup... and on that same point, who says that shouldn't be your home and wif shouldn't have skidaddled and found her own place?

I agree it's hard for the kid to want to be 'home' when he is with you. That's heart wrenching. But you know what... he's young enough, he will get used to it and the need to have a father overrides the immediate feelings of 'displacement'. Once he gets used to it, it will be no big thing. You just got to stick through that.

 

[jnevin]

Tough situation, and I see where you're coming from with this 100%, but why don't you fight to get sole custody of your daughter and make the ex work to earn time with her? It sounds kind of rough, but it's better than having her go on some bender and have something happen to your little girl.

 

[jh1]

Tough situation, and I see where you're coming from with this 100%, but why don't you fight to get sole custody of your daughter and make the ex work to earn time with her? It sounds kind of rough, but it's better than having her go on some bender and have something happen to your little girl.

I might have to. My reason for not going full out, and hoping we can come to an agrreement is that the best outcome for everyone involved, especially my daughter is that mom gets clean, we share custody.

Quite frankly, I am scared to death of the responsibility of raising a little girl without help from her mother. I know things can change, but when I signed up for this - I guess I just never thought I would be facing the possiblity of raising her on my own and I am not ready to just retire and accept that. She should have a mother.

 

[velvett]

Where are you coming from?

Are you reading that I have said I know and agree with child support? I have said it in every post. I am simply saying the amount she is requesting is excessive in any case.

In this case not only is it excessive, it is dangerous. She has a drug problem. Do you think I should finance her drug habits? I want her to get help, I want her to be forced to get clean, I want her to be part of her child's life and I am willing to make sure my daughter has everything she needs wether she is with me or with her mother - but I don't think it's a good idea to put lifestyle changing amounts of money into a person's hands that has a daugther to take care of and is / will be recovering from an addiction that she obviously has very little control over.

How does that equate to not wanting my daughter to eat?

WTF? Seriously. Where did I say I want my daughter to starve when she is with her mother just to get mom back?

If your wife is a drug addict she should not have any sort of custody until she's clean and has show some sort time frame in being "clean". Besides I don't know too many judges that award custody to drug addicts.

As an observation of a (male) friend who just divorced and now has a special custody/visitation arrangement with his ex for two children under the age of 3 - he's totally fucked - his ex can't get her fat lazy ass out of bed early enough in the AM to pick up the children so he can go to work. He's recent found a new job something with a future for him if he's late three times in one month he's fired, he's not in a position to lose such a great opportunity.

He's spending $600 a week that he can't afford on a babysitter because the mother of his children can't get up before 2pm.

That said, I think situations vary and children aren't always better off having "mommy" or "daddy" around just because the had some involvement in their creation.

Tread wisely.

 

[heatherrae]

You sound just like my attorney, that's why I hired him. I agree with all these concepts in theory.

However... I have a little bit of a conflict in my own mind about this last part.... in bold. I am not sure how to feel about it... I agree with what you wrote... but perhaps having one parent not being able to provide for them at the same level as the other might cause the child to prefer the parent that can provide 'more' for them...

I am not talking about food, but maybe fashionable clothes, material stuff, etc... I am not sure... I feel it's my money, but I don't want my child to be conflicted. Additonal thoughts?

You, sir, should come post on my divorce threads more often. All these haters trying to make me out to be a bad dad...




Heatherae... I hope you're not offended by my argumenative nature. Do you care to respond with your thoughts to Mr. Plunky and Jimsbbc's posts?

I think that I made it pretty clear what I think. I am coming from a completely different perspective, though. I am coming from the perspective of an attorney who has represented men, women and children in these cases. I hear this shit every single time from the non-custodial (language they use in Kentucky) parent. They often try to micromanage every dime that is spent or they want me to bring a motion to bar the father from taking the kids to McDonalds (unhealthy, you know) etc. I get a pretty good read on when people are being overly emotional.

Look, normally in practice trying to actually have the kid live at two seperate homes gets to be tedious for the child, especially once they get to the age where they want to hang out with their friends. Normally, one parent's house is going to be "home" and they go on visits to the other house, even if they have a room etc at the other house.

Raising kids costs money. I don't think it is fair for the person who pays the lion's share of the living expenses for the kid to have to live like a pauper and have every dime of their income be justified as going to the child. Believe it or not, guys, we women too deserve to be able to keep a little bit of our income too.

What is SADLY missing from most of the men's arguments here is the BEST INTERESTS OF THE CHILD. If you didn't want to have a child, no one forced you to have sex. Now that child is here, and you have an obligation to act like an adult and seperate your bitterness about giving your ex some money from your duties as a mother or as a father.

I am the first to say that I oppose any statutory or case law that does not value the care of a father as equal to that as a mother when making custody determinations. That being said, the party who contributes the most to the financial care of the child should be able to receive contributions from the other parent for the child's care.

You guys need to set aside the man/woman issues and bitterness. This isn't a sex based issue. You agreed to the custody arrangement. No one made you pay child support because you were a MAN. They are doing so because you are the non-custodial parent (or whichever term your state uses) BY YOUR OWN CHOICE! This ISN'T ABOUT YOU! It is about your child -- the best interests of your child.

Let it go. Focus on being a good daddy. Focus on being in the moment and living a happy life. You are just eating yourself away over petty shit.

PS. Yes, your lawyer agrees whole-heartedly, most likely because he has a fat retainer check with your name signed on the bottom. If your wife's name were on the bottom of that check, he would be telling her what a bastard YOU are...lol.