SS doesn't want to see us?
If you've followed my very sporadic blog entries, you know BM and DH are modifying CS, things are stalled and as a result she has been keeping SS11 from us. We live out of state, try to talk to him at least three times a week and visit at least one weekend a month. For the last month and a half she has been rejecting DH's phone calls or making excuses (SS is out, showering, etc) whenever we call, and the last time we visited she never answered her phone and we didn't get to see SS. Well DH managed to get a hold of her today and told her he wanted to see SS this weekend. She said sure, she would call him later to set up details about time and place for pick-up. She called DH about half an hour ago and told him that SS didn't want to see him. DH was obviously totally surprised by this and so she said something along the lines of "SS is right here if you want to talk to him yourself." So she turns on the speaker and DH says he heard SS say he didn't want to talk to him and that he didn't want to see him. I didn't hear what happened, but DH says SS sounded really upset and just kept screaming that he didn't want to see him and started crying.
SS and DH are pretty close and he always gets REALLY excited when we visit or when he comes visits us here. I am totally shocked by this. I don't know if its because he feels like we haven't been reaching out to him (I seriously doubt that BM is telling him we call and that she's the one not answering) or if he has overheard things said by BM to her family about the whole court thing and is upset about it. We don't really know what to do. It's pretty expensive to go out there and we have been pretty strapped for cash lately with the lawyer fees and some other expenses. I'm worried about spending the money and having SS refuse to see us, but on the other hand I feel like we should still try. If he is upset because he thinks we're ignoring him or something like that, maybe if he sees we went out there even if its only to see him for a few minutes he'll know we're still trying. Or maybe once he sees DH he'll change his mind and want to spend time with him. It's a 5 hour drive so it's not like if he calls Saturday morning and says he's changed his mind, we can just show up. It's cheaper to take the bus so we've been doing that instead of driving, and if we decide not to and he changes his mind we risk not getting tickets or something like that. Honestly if we weren't stretched so thin I would not think twice about it and would just go. I'm sort of at a loss. We felt like BM was the one keeping him from us, but maybe she was making excuses when we called because SS didn't want to talk to either of us? I'm at a loss, please give me some advice!!!
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Comments
Adult decision, not kid
11 yr olds don't get to decide.
He's 11, he doesn't get to
He's 11, he doesn't get to decide not to come. If I were yoiur DH, I'd insist on having his son and I'd make sure that if BM understands that if she gets in his way I'd be going after her for contempt and for alienation.
He HAS to do this or his son will truly believe his father doesn't care ...
I agree with the others. BM's
I agree with the others. BM's poison these kids so much. They don't know what thoughts are their own and what BM has put in his head. We deal with this too with SS13- though never like that. My advice is to go as soon as it is your next scheduled weekend. If BM refuses, call the police, show the current order and ask for a report. They won't likely force BM but you can get it on record. Use it in court. More and more judges see this crap for what it is and flip custody. Don't give up on SS. This isn't him. This is BM just wanting her paycheck (CS) and her ex gone. It doesn't work that way. SS deserves his dad.
This is exactly our BM. She
This is exactly our BM. She acts like she and her husband are the parents and the only people that matter, unless it's about money and then she immediately tries to guilt DH saying SS is his responsibility and he needs to foot the bill for whatever she wants. She used to say so many mean things about DH and I but since we moved away about three years ago I feel like she had really calmed down and stopped. It all started again about two months ago with the CS support thing. We had considered requesting custody, but SS has always lived with BM in their town, he has his friends, his school, even DH's family all live there and moving to the city where we are would be a complete 180 and we just don't know if it would be the best thing for him. I think we're going to go and see how it plays out.
If she refuses, park on the
If she refuses, park on the street in front of the house and call the non emergency police number and request someone come out. Make sure you bring the current order with you that states you have this weekend!
What does your CO say about
What does your CO say about seeing him? Are there particular times when you're supposed to have SS? If so, he needs to be very firm with BM that SS needs to be made available to him, and if not he needs to file for contempt. It's tougher if the CO is vague, but if you're in court with her for CS anyway, you might as well try to get something more enforceable set up.
The CO was not modified when
The CO was not modified when we moved, so it says we have him Wednesdays for a couple of hours and every weekend (which is what we had when we lived in the same town). DH and BM didn't modify it because they were getting along when we moved and basically just tried to work around each other's schedules. It worked fine until the CS thing started but I think DH is going to try to address it when they go to court to have something more formal and to try to get phone time included in the CO.