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Old 06-06-2009, 08:27 AM
 
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One of my sisters is divorced and has spent thousands on lawyer fees to fight off attempts by her ex husband to gain more visitation and custody rights. She is close to bankruptcy from the whole thing.

Anyway, during the last court battle over his desire to gain 50 percent custody I was shocked they never asked the twins what they wanted. They are 12 years old and speak very well and are highly intelligent. It should not be their decision totally but you would think some judge or counselor would interview them and see what they think. (They hate spending time with their father and wish he would go away. I assume that they sulk and go mute when they are forced to be in his presence)

If you were in charge how much impact should the wishes of the two kids have in the custody decision?
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Old 06-06-2009, 09:53 AM
 
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Is he paying child support? If so, I would think he's entitled to at least 50% visitation and custody -- unless he has any kind of criminal record.
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Old 06-06-2009, 10:01 AM
 
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And I don't think at age 12, the kids should be the ones who decide these issues because in some cases, they can be manipulated by one parent.

It depends of course on what is wrong with the ex-husband, but so many kids today have no fathers or completely uninterested fathers that kids whose fathers want to be a real part of their lives are fortunate.

Divorce might be tough, but unless the father is a drug addict, drives drunk with the kids, beats or abuses them, then I think the mother should encourage the kids to visit and spend time with him. Later the kids may resent the mother for trying to tear them from the other parent. Whatever hurt she may have suffered, the kids need both parents if both parents are reasonably sane. Kids shouldn't have to divorce a parent just because the parents couldn't make it work.
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Old 06-06-2009, 10:18 AM
 
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At age 12 their opinion is generally considered. I know when my parents divorced we originally lived with my mom but circumstances changed and we wanted to move in with my Dad. A representative from the courts came out and interviewed us each individually and asked why. The questions were quite probing and someone with any experience would be able to see through any parental manipulation pretty easily.
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Old 06-06-2009, 11:02 AM
 
Location: State of Being
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It depends on what state they live in as to how much the court will take the wishes of the children into account. I have seen in many cases that the judge has made an assumption AGAINST allowing the kids to express their wishes when custody battles have raged on for a long time. Why? The judge will take into consideration that perhaps the custodial parent has tried to alienate the kids against the non-custodial parent. (Which is what Golfgal was saying, too).

Courts do NOT take in consideration whether the dad has been paying child support or not. THey separate the two issues as far as custody arrangements are concerned. So even if a dad has not paid a penny in C/S . . . that doesn't mean he won't be allowed to see his kids - two different issues addressed in different courts in many states.

By the time the kids are 14, I believe all courts in the country will pretty much listen to what the kids have to say about their living arrangements.
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Old 06-06-2009, 11:15 AM
 
Location: coos bay oregon
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it varies from state to state. At 14, my daughter requested to have her voice heard in court. She wanted to be able to tell the judge her thoughts/feelings and in her own words. She even begged to just have him read a letter from her, she had put so much effort into it and she really felt since she was the one directly and most effected by it all, it seemed reasonable. The judge highly disagreed. What was sad, was that it really blew my daughters faith in the court system, especially regarding her welfare. I do think its a tough call, and i can see both sides, but I think if the child(ren) is actively pursuing time to be heard, then it should be granted. For my girl, she wasnt going through serious abuse, but it was a lot of little things that added up. Things like how if anyone did anything stupid or such, her father and his girlfriend would should out "You pulled an Erik/Tiffany" (meaning her stepdad or myself) they let the gf daughter say anything she wanted to my daughter ( tell her she is stupid, tell her that nobody wants her there, that her stepdad is just some guy that her mother married, that he doesnt love her, and she should ignore him, etc.) they'd tell her "thats so sad that you have to look like your mother, shes so ugly", they took her cell away and told her she couldnt talk to me, or any of her family on my side because it was "THEIR time" with her....sigh, so lots of just little cruel/dumb/immature stuff thats hard on a kid. Nothing we were allowed to say/use in court. but my daughter wanted to be able to tell the judge these things, and how her father would put on a grand show in court, but when out, he either was mean/immature towards her, or just totally ignored her. So, what we did, when it started getting even worse and the things they were saying got more and more vicious we engaged a child councelor and started up weekly sessions for her with him. We had her take the emails her father sent her (some with some unbelivably disgusting and cruel stuff in them) and show them to the councelor. What can happen then, is that HE can be a voice for her in court. At this point, we have just gotten lucky and my girl doesnt have to go over there anymore. She put her foot down and told them unless they stopped their games and cruelty, she would refuse to go. They told her (OMG) that they were going to call the police to come and forcefully drag her to them (they described this in nasty details) and so my brave girl told them she was being backed up by a councelor and that he was going to be her voice in court, that she had told him stuff they had done/said and they totally backed off. The sad part was that they ddint decide to make some changes, but instead told her they didnt want her around anyhow and posted/said some pretty terrible stuff about her. Sigh....but anyhow, long story, sorry for all that, but if you have a similar situation, where the kiddo is not in an abusive situation per say, but not a healthy one either, an impartial 3rd party therapist might be of help to you as well. Cant do any harm, right?
Best of luck!!!!
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Old 06-06-2009, 11:22 AM
 
Location: In the real world!
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The judge needs to talk to the children and see how they feel. At 12, kids see and can figure things out. The judge can see what is real and what isn't.
Has your lawyer asked the judge to talk to the kids ALONE? If not, he needs to.

It also needs to be explained to the kids that this would be their ONE TIME to be heard so they must tell the truth..

My Son's ex wife has 4 girls, they all complained to her that he ignored them and used them for babysitting all the time of his new wifes kids while they partied all the time. They told their Mom about mistreatment, neglect and just downright mean stuff he did to them. He had custody and they begged her to come live with her. Social workers were sent out to talk to the girls but they did that in the girls home with the parents sitting right there. So much for that sort of investigation. The kids were always punished by their Dad for the social worker being called..

When it finally went to court, the judge talked to each one of the girls ALONE, not all 4 at one time but one on one with each girl. The Mother warned them all ahead of time that this one be their ONE chance to be heard and if they didn't tell everything to the judge that they had told her, that the Mom would not do anything more to help them so they better be completely honest and open, telling everything.. Tell it now or SHUT UP forever!

They went in and told ALL. Dad ended up facing charges for the things he had done to the kids and for neglect.
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Old 06-06-2009, 03:23 PM
 
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In Michigan you can have a Friend of the Court represent the children. It is sort of a cross between a counselor and lawyer.
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Old 06-07-2009, 12:17 AM
 
Location: Orlando, Florida
43,854 posts, read 50,862,909 times
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I think trying to keep kids from one of their parents is fruitless and a waste of money. The old saying 'Blood is thicker than water' has merits for a reason. Kids have a right to either forgive, overlook or decide to stay away from a parent. I'm not sure anyone else should make this decision for them unless the kids are subject to physical harm.
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Old 06-07-2009, 05:25 AM
 
3,562 posts, read 5,203,406 times
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Do they not have joint custody?


I have watched several kids in the middle of two very angry, spiteful, hateful ex's. Kids are not stupid, they will re-evaluate their lives on a consistent basis as adults. If one parent is a ******, they are going to remember that.

I think that if the kid says that they want to live with one parent then the courts should say, ok at 12 of course. Depending on the child/ren, it is running the risk of setting up the next 6 years of total hell. The more that one parent stands in front of them, the more they want to go.

Here, each parent would have a psych eval that would dictate who would become primary caretaker in the event of a custody battle.
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