New Thread for Help

[broke]

CWOL,

So glad your son's confidence is coming back and he has baseball to enjoy during this rough time. I am also glad you worked out a parenting plan together. It is great you could do this without the L's getting involved. Unfortunately, I don't know how support works, but maybe you have to go to court to get an order? I will be thinking about you tonight during the talent show and dinner afterwords, it is so tough to be around the WAS with the kids right there. So much tension! Good luck

[mahhhty]

I'm glad it worked out for the schedule aspect.

I'm not sure why her Ls are not talking to your Ls. It sounds as if that will cost extra money. But I don't have any experience with that.

Keep your chin up!

[CWOL]

I'm not sure why her Ls are not talking to your Ls. It sounds as if that will cost extra money. But I don't have any experience with that.

Keep your chin up!

My L is sending them emails and documenting attempts for settling the matter. He will present to the judge our good faith attempts at settling out of court and ask for sanctions against them if they do file. My L's wife is a family court judge in another district so he should have some pull, hopefully. It's ridiculous what WW's L's are doing, trying to pump their fees.

[CWOL]

Question: I believe my WW rented a one bedroom apartment. There's only one bed but she claims that she will have my S11 sleep in the bed when he's there, and she will sleep on the sofa outside. She used to sleep with S11 in his bed sometimes, when he was younger, and she was there after BD. Several days after BD I told her to stop doing that, it is not healthy. So she reluctantly moved to the guest bedroom.

Are there any laws on custody about this sleeping arrangement arrangement? I just don't think it's healthy as my son gets older for him to sleep with his mother in the same bed.

Also, at DivorceCare last night they had a child therapist as a guest speaker. She mentioned, and a lot of the older divorcees agreed, that once the child reaches a certain age, (12 or 14, they weren't sure), he can voice his opinion in which home he would stay. Have you heard of that?

[CWOL]

My frank discussion with my lawyer worked, I got his butt in gear.
My surveillance paid off and I figured out what my WW was planning. My L pre-empted it by sending two emails to resolve it before her L runs off to court. Her L is really bad, she is pumping the billable hours, she wants ME to contribute $12K to her legal fund!

So my L implied that he will ask the judge to sanction her L if she keeps going to file things without giving us a chance to negotiate first. That put an end to it... We worked on a support and custody offer and fired it off today.

My WW lacks self-confidence and knowledge. She thinks just because her L is working around the clock she is "fighting hard" for her. In reality she's just taking money away from both of us and our S11. Very sad.

[Vapo]

Let her know calmly it is her divorce and she can (and WILL) pay for her lawyer herself!

[CWOL]

Ok, somebody explain the logic of this to me.
Our state (as well as most other states) use this computer program to calculate temporary support. Because I make 95% of the income and my WW makes 5% (she works a 15 hour per week part-time city job), it spits out these numbers.
I need to give 42% of my take-home pay to my WW, even though we are going to share 50/50 custody. It would have been higher if I weren't diligent in keep track of various expenses I've been fronting. My L said the % will come down if the divorce is finalized, and there will be an adjustment time for the judge to scale up her hours and make her go get full time employment. But probably not for 6 months to a year later. She has a BS and worked full-time before we married.
How is any of this fair, for someone who cheated on me, breaks up the marriage? I have to help facilitate her lifestyle???
Basically it's detachment but for my money!

[Tyler12]

It's frustrating to see what you are expected to give for child support, now if you were able to guarantee that all the support money went to your kid like food, clothing all that stuff. Then it wouldn't be such a big deal.

What bugs me is that like you said it facilitates the lifestyle they chose. The $ I pay to first wife is high as well. Higher than what I would need to support 2 kids.

I feel for you I truly do. No matter where the money goes I tell myself it is for my kids. Helps me out a little.

[CWOL]

Thanks for your prospective Tyler.
I have zero problems paying child support. It's the alimony of about $3K monthly, which is double the child support about $1,700 that bugs me. Because I have my WW having an easy lifestyle by working part time and spending most of the time shopping and doing her hair and nails, now I have to pay her spousal support to maintain her "lifestyle???"

[CWOL]

We spent most of Saturday together as a family. S11 had a great game again yesterday and he is doing really well. We watched and cheered but I sat behind the plate to video my son, partly on purpose. After the game we stayed and watch son's friend's game together and chatted with other families we know.
We went out to a new restaurant for dinner at my suggestion. I observed how disrespectful my WW is toward me. One of our frequent disagreements is which restaurant to go to, since WW rarely cooks (she claims it's because S11 and I complained about her cooking, which is not true). If I have any suggestions, she would shoot them down. Restaurant A is too "smelly," Restaurant B is too "crowded." Then if I ask her where she wants to go then, she would say, "I dunno." So I usually just give her a choice of A, B, and C and go from there.
So last night again was the same thing. She complains about this and that, every little thing that she didn't like at the restaurant. I tried to be as pleasant as possible, but I did not engage with her on these issues. I think this is the crux of what is wrong with our relationship, the disrespectful behavior she has toward me. I guess I can only overcome that by detaching and sticking to my guns.