I agree with something I read in a blog tonight. We should not be attempting to tip the balance in favor of fathers, but we should be working to obtain an equal chance to be an equal part in the kid(s) lives. We should not be shouting about how evil all women are because we are bitter about circumstances in our divorce.

My situation is this: I got married Jan 1988 and divorced in July 2000. My kids were 11, 10 and 8. We had been separated about a 9 months prior to divorce. The divorce was my ex-wife’s decision and she surprised me with divorce papers, an ex-parte order preventing me from being on the property of MY house, with claims of being harassing and threatening. Less than 2 months after the divorce was final she got remarried. We lived in a town of about 1200 people. The judge was buddies with my ex’s lawyer. The guy that “she was not sleeping with prior to our divorce” was a cop and he too was friends with the judge and lawyer.

All that aside, the divorce, after the shock, anger, hurt, depression, was a good thing because she had some major mental issues as it turned out. The worst part was going from the every day dad, playing with my kids, helping them with homework, coaching baseball, to being the every other weekend dad, with no home and no possession and a car that she had failed to make payments on that the judge stuck me with. I had to move in with my parents because now I was responsible for paying a bunch of money in child support to my ex AND financing a whole new life for myself. When you get a divorce that you do not plan for, you not only have a court ordered child support amount, you also have the threat of prison if you dont pay, but at the same time you are expected to find a house, rent or own and then buy beds, furniture and etc, after almost half of your income after taxes is being sent to the ex.

The money aspect hurts. It makes life hard, very hard. Going from a 1 1/2 income family to a 1/2 income family (because half my income went to taxes and child support) while the ex not only got to spend tons of time with the kids, she got the money too. But again, the worst part is being forced to be a part time parent. No matter what anyone tries to say this really affects the children very much. Mine went from being happy, singing go-lucky kids, to sad, sullen and hurt children. It was only a matter of a few months after the divorce before my kids behavior changed dramatically and the ex can only say that they were just being kids.

Without rambling, since the divorce, my ex-wife has attempted suicide in the presence of my 3 kids, about 3 years ago now and in the presence of her two little kids, that were 1 and 3 years of age. Then she was placed on medication and she was having frequent angry arguments with my oldest daughter because the ex was forcing her to be the full time child care provider for the 2 little kids from her new marriage because the ex was so deep into depression that she could not function.

BUT when I went to court after the suicide attempt, the JUDGE decided that these circumstances did not warrant me getting at least half time custody, even though the kids were all teenagers and even though the judge asked them what they wanted to do and they said they wanted to stay with each parent half time, as we live in the same town. All I got out of the modification was an increase in the child support amount while the judge altered the visitation periods so that I lost my job and had to find a different one, which caused me to no longer be able to have health insurance.

My two oldest are graduating high school this year!
I guess what I learned from this system is that you can have all the laws you want that say what is best for the kids should dictate how you set up custody, but if you have a good ole boy network, or if you have a judge who is stuck in the 60’s and 70’s, he can still do what he wants all in the disguise of what is best for the kids. All divorced fathers should really band together and cry out very loudly or nothing will change.

–Danny