Child arrangement court order

Razz I know a case where the grandparents forced a father to go to court. He has agreed his ex wife could move, signed everything. She moved, enrolled kids in schools. Happy life.

His parents lost the plot. Forced court, he refused to pay support until she moved back.

She’s now living with family, away from her new partner, kids have no space to call their own. He’s swanning off with the younger woman he left wife for. Gives all his fought for parenting time to his parents.

Absolute nightmare.

Stupid sense of humour

Don't worry Mad.

Often when I get crossed wires online it's because 6 stupidsemsep humour doesn't come across in type.

I can't remember where I read it now Smile but it did seem to suggest it happens often. I don't know how they could quantify it either though. Lots of parents do not bother with their children or provide for them sadly.

What is the organisation you referred too that goes into schools to talk to children whose parents are divorcing Razz?

My understanding is that a child has to be a certain age before their feelings are taken into account, and that if a judge believes those feelings are to be taken into account before a custody ruling is made, they are spoken to by the judge usually with a social worker present.

How could that information be available? Who would know if a parent was only going to court because it's what the GP's wanted?

Mad I think your comment was fair but it is frustrating to be accused of doing something you are very determined not to be doing. There is nothing between the lines of what I am saying here. I have been supportive on many occasions to EPs.

Razz I hope I didnt come over as accusing you of anything. That was not my intention

If my AC wasn't making an effort to his/her children I would do everything I could to get them to remain in contact, not for my sake, for theirs and primarily for the children.

I don't understand parents that walk away from their children following a divorce. It's bad enough that the children see their parents' relationship ending.

I would think it very unusual that a parent not pursuing contact with their children would be forced into doing so by their parents just so they, the GP's could see them.

I was reading the other day that, often when one parent has no interest in their child, the grandparents will force them to go to court for access to the child so that they can see them. Even though the parent doesn't want to. Realistically that would mean that grandparents are using courts for access much more often than it appears.

What are peoples thoughts on that?

Summer that is very interesting and backs up a lot of my thoughts on this. There is an organisation here that comes in to interview the children in school when parents go to court and the children often are given their own representation to make sure their needs are put first. The children are more important and completely innocent no matter who is at fault.

These ‘opposing truths’ may even then get incorrectly reinforced by either of the parties:

GC of GPS visits afterward and says ‘I wish I could have come over but mom was dishonest and said she had other plans, but we stayed home’.

And most GPs that have turmoil will just agree, ‘yep, sorry.. I knew she was dishonest’

Or on the parents end:

GC says ‘I wish my GPs would have come but they said they had other plans.’ And mom answers ‘they always make up a dishonest excuse when they don’t want to see us, I’ve had it my whole life’

Detrimental reinforcement of assumptions that we have become predispositioned to expect. Opposing truths amplified, until finally ‘the last straw’ is in sight.

No, Smiles.

It goes both ways. From GPs or from ACs.

In this case, I’m saying that a GP (or AC) that assumes the mother (or GP) is dishonest because the GP (mom) doesn’t know all the facts is manipulating based on wrong or bad assumptions. It goes both ways for parents or GPs.

Bad and wrong assumptions based on partial information.

The GPs that accuse the mother of ‘being dishonest’ without having access to all of the reasons they didn’t come for dinner, reasons that could have caused the mother to:

1: not go to the GPs

And/or

2: not keep the original plan to go out with friends

are manipulating and creating false, unfounded and ill informed bias that ‘Mom is dishonest’. This could be reversed for an AC that invited GPS for dinner that didn’t show also.

Mom could have been very honest, but the child and the GPS may not have access to that information that moms honest decision was based on. It doesn’t mean that Mom was lying, or that she’s dishonest. But most of us are predispositioned to assume the worst about folks, which creates opposing truths.

Guiding, creating bias or manipulating the event to a pre-determined ‘Mom is dishonest’ theme without having all the facts, is ... manipulation.

Specifically, manipulation to a false narrative. GPs and parents are both flawed in their accusations when make assumptions without having all the facts. Opposing truths are the foundation for most of all estrangement cases, and this is one method that opposing truths are created on each side.

I’m almost sure you are aware of this.

Or maybe we just agree to disagree in principle.

www.verywellfamily.com/before-you-sue-for-visitation-rights-1695438

I found this very interesting

My daughter is aspergers so she needed to know some plans in advance, especially doctors and dentists or places she had never been. People she was close to not so much because she would get anxious waiting for it to happen and explode when it finally did into every one of her quirks. She makes her own plans now thankfully

I still remember the tantrums Summerlove. Our children did tend to know in advance what our plans were, maybe if they hadn't we'd have been spared a few.

smile, My children never knew what the plans were until five minutes before hand. Plans change all the time, and I was not prepared to deal with tantrums when they did.

Razz

Ah me too Smile, me too.

As I said, not everyone is reasonable and I'm sorry that your mother wasn't Razz.

My mother wouldn't have accepted any excuse without a guilt trip so I would probably have tried to accommodate her if one of my legs fell off

Are you saying that a child who hears his/her mother saying they can't do something because they're doing something else, who knows that they aren't, is a manipulator *TwentyTwenty?

If previous plans had fallen through presumably the child would have known about those previous plans, that they were supposed to be going out, or that someone was supposed to be coming for tea or whatever.

That explanation would certainly explain that response Razz and I agree that a reasonable person would play it down but not everyone is reasonable.

Lol!

Razz, If I ever invite you to dinner; I’d almost rather hear anything else than you have ‘runny bum’ to excuse yourself from the event LOL

Or even if they did hold it against me, play it down for the children's sake

I would definitely know that my children would have said I was a mean liar to me before telling someone else that if that is what they thought. So they would have got the explanation and if they then went to my father or my husbands parents and said I was a mean liar, I would hope they would play it down and give them the same explanation instead of holding it against me. Everyone has off days when they just don't want to or days when they have heavy menstrual cycles or runny bums and just don't want to tell the other person that lol

To be fair, I have used this excuse many times when I needed a reason that didn't hurt someones feelings. The real reason being that I just didn't want to. I don't think my children ever noticed. If they did ask 8 just would have explained to them that I didn't want to hurt the other persons feelings