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Shorted on CS because SD15 refuses to come home

Burned2ManyTimes's picture

Submitted by Burned2ManyTimes on Thu, 05/16/2013 - 8:16pm

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Teenage Stepchildren

OMG! SD15 has refused to come home for three weeks so BM shorted her CS payment by some arbitrary number "because I have expenses." FDH tried to explain to her that changes in CS MUST go through the courts and she said, "well I'm doing it this way."

WTF????

What to do?

Disneyfan's picture

Submitted by Disneyfan on Thu, 05/16/2013 - 8:36pm

SD could stay with her for the next 50 years. If mom doesn't go to court to have the CS dropped or switched so that dad pays, she's going to rack up huge arrears.

Burned2ManyTimes's picture

Submitted by Burned2ManyTimes on Thu, 05/16/2013 - 8:49pm

Thanks for this response, Disneyfan. So tempting to let her rack up those arrears. She will never go to court to change her CS amount. She's lazy and ignorant, and will never take the initiative to go to court herself.

oneoffour's picture

Submitted by oneoffour on Thu, 05/16/2013 - 10:31pm

Also she is not encouraging a co-parenting supportive environment by allowing SD to stay at her place. This makes it seem like it isn't all about the money. Wink :jawdrop: :sick:

Bojangles's picture

Submitted by Bojangles on Fri, 05/17/2013 - 4:17am

And this is what it comes down to. You can have all the court ordered arrangements you like but if a 15 year old decides to stop coming, and her mother either actively encourages that, or simply makes no effort to support DH's time with his daughter and make her come, there is very little you can do. It totally totally sucks. Misguided teens with no idea what is good for them end up in a position where they can dictate terms to their parents.

Apart from the eldest who religiously stuck to the access plan till she was 18, ALL of DH's children started decided their own access from the age of 14. BM totally supported it and DH was scared of alienating them further by trying to force them to follow the agreement. For a while it all went sour for BM when YSD decided to live with us aged 14. Over the next 2 years it was mind blowing to see the hypocrisy as BM suddenly began complaining that DH was not supporting HER access with SD and moaning how difficult it was to maintain the relationship when she saw her so little. This from the women who allowed 2nd and 3rd SD's to reduce DH's time to very infrequent visits from the age of 14.

DH managed to retain a fairly close relationship with his daughters regardless, once they had got past the rebellious years, so there is some hope. In some cases if you let them go and steer a steady course they will come round in the end, and for some teens forcing them to follow a plan in which they had no say presses all their rebellious poor me buttons and will just result in more alienation. You need to assess the situation with your particular SD. I would probably leave the CS issue for another few weeks, see if SD comes round if her own accord. If not then DH should go round and talk to SD and find out what's going on.