The Name Game

Ohhhhhhhh how this can get sticky sticky sticky!!!!

We all know that 2 people have to have sex to have a kid. They don't need a license, they don't need any type of classes or books on how to be a mom & dad. They just don't. Personally I DO think that there should be some sort of parenting classes for new parents. Especially with all of the teen parents that are coming to be.

When you get divorced it should be a NO brainer that mom is mom & dad is dad. Unfortunately, and all too often the name game starts. Some step moms instantly expect to be called mom by children that barely know her. Some moms expect their children to call their new honey dad even though they barely know them themselves!

My ex is with a wicked bitch who would LOVE for my children to call her mom. Newsflash, not happening. When you openly discuss how much you hate ME, hate my children & hate who I am, my babies are NOT going to be cozy with you! They know that I'm mom. With my ex husband's first divorce (yes, he's on his 3rd marriage) she put IN the divorce that the parents keep their respective names. Aka Mom is saved for her & dad was saved for the ex. I thought this LUDICRIS! Are you kidding me???? WHY on God's green earth would I EVER force a child to call me mom?!?!? Now I understand why!

Do not under ANY circumstances expect for your child to call your new honey anything BUT their real name!!
Do not REFER to her as mom or mommy, or the new guy as dad or daddy. Refer to them as their REAL name.

This is one of the touchiest subjects there is aside from visitation & money.

My babies DO call my honey daddy. Put the torches down... When I got with my honey my babies were 4, 5 & 9. After MONTHS of correcting them & telling them, no you have a dad, this is *honey's name*, they continued. Then it was after *honeys name* & I get married then you can call him dad. This wasn't good enough. They started about a month after they met him & continue to do so. My honey & I tried in VAIN to get them to call him by his name & they wouldn't have it.

As I was tucking the now 7 year old in bed she questioned me on why I expected them to call my honey by his name. I explained that they already had a dad & while it was ok to have 2 dad's it might hurt their real dad's feelings by calling my honey daddy. I got a massive smack in the face when my 4 year old said, "Mommy, he treats us good. He loves us. He is always with us. He goes to everything for us. He's my daddy." Blew me away. Even at the tender age of 4, my daughter knew what it was to be a daddy.

In all honesty my honey has ALWAYS treated my babies like his own. He gets weird when I call them MY babies. As far as he's concerned they are OUR babies. All 4 of them. The then 4 year old had a point. He does & always has gone to their parent teacher conferences, dr. appointments, their games, their gymnastics meets, their programs at school, take daddy to school day etc. The school wouldn't know who the hell my ex husband was if he showed them his id. They'd be like you're not their dad, *insert honey's name* is their dad.

Bottom line, don't force it. If it comes naturally then it does. If they are young, try and correct them. If they are hell bent as my children are, then just hang it up. lol!

Forced To Take A Break

I had to take a break from blogging because I found myself being sued by my ex. Him saying that I was in contempt of court for refusing visitation & not alternating every other holiday. I was flabberghasted. Then I found it comical that he was so stupid to file papers that were absolutely NOTHING but lies. 

$2,200.00 later I got myself a female version of Gerry. Oh how I miss Gerry!!! My new attorney is amazing. She's flat out the best there is. 

There were plenty of OMG moments in the court room. Let's start at the beginning so as not to confuse anyone. 

4/30/2011--My ex husband & his wife got into a fight. It was a pretty big fight where she cussed at my 7 year old daughter & used (explained) my ex husband's genitals in the fight as she was screaming at my daughter. I only found this out after I picked my babies up from their dad at 10 pm that night. I asked the ex to sign a paper saying that it was in our children's best interest NOT to be around his wife. She's a lose cannon & high strung. He signed with no questions asked, said that that wouldn't be a problem because he was divorcing her. I've heard this song & dance before. 

I texted him quite a few times requesting that he see the children. If he were anywhere near where I live I would meet him with the babies so that they could see him. July 2011 he saw my babies for 2 hours. That was it. 2 freaking hours. 

8/30/2011 He texted me to see if he could get the kids for a weekend. My reply was simple, "As long as your wife is around no." 

I knew then to get an attorney & I did just that. I went online and looked up our divorce record & saw that we had a pending court case for 9/21/2011. I called the court house to find out what was going on. They explained to me that *I* was being sued for contempt of court. My mind was B L O W N! Are you kidding me? He filed the papers 8/28/2011 & asked for visitation 2 days later? How does that work? 

I saw my attorney & she shook her head. She asked me if I had done anything or if the ex was bitching about anything. I said, "No. This came out of the blue." It did. We are filing back against him for an up in child support, modified visitations & a change of venue. 

He was served with notice of court less than 24 hours after I was served. 

I went to court on Wednesday, nervous. The presiding judge can be a hard ass & quite frankly doesn't necessarily like women. That is just MY opinion of him. 

We get there & of course the ex brings psychotic wife as well. Our case gets called up & I went through the doors, the ex went through & of course his wife went hauling ASS through the doors. The judge gave her a cock-eyed look & said, "Are you his counsel?" She PROUDLY said, "NO, I'M HIS WIFE!" The judge looked at her & said, "Go sit in the galley." CRACKED ME UP! DUMBASS! 

Here we go!! The judge looked at the ex & said, "What proof do you have that she has been refusing visits?" He said, "Your Honor, I haven't seen my children since July." That was his evidence. I looked down.. tried not to laugh. The judge addressed my attorney & asked why I shouldn't be held in contempt of court. My attorney provided the written statements showing that he agreed NOT to see the children as long as his wife was going to be there. That he was free to see the kids at any time as long as she wasn't around. 

The judge hopped up off his bench, made copies & showed them to the ex. He said, "Yes, those are my signatures." The judge asked if he had ever told me that he & his wife had reconciled? The ex said, "No, but I talked to her last week." The judge chuckled. He said, "We don't play like that." 

The issue came up of us moving jurisdictions. The judge asked if the ex had any concerns about moving the case. The ex opened his stupid ass mouth & said, "Well your honor you've presided over our whole divorce & so I think it's necessary that you continue to." The judge looked at him & said, "I haven't seen you guys in 3 years!" I hung my head.. held my giggles back. 

While all this is going on, his wife is just DYING to speak. She keeps having little out bursts. I'm actually surprised that the judge didn't throw her out. 

The judge said, "Ok that's all, I can't find her in contempt b/c she's not." The wife, from the galley said, "BUT WE'RE NOT DONE, THERE'S MORE!!" Then the ex spoke up, "We have more." The judge said, "Uhm, first page? All it says is contempt of court for refusal of visitation & every other holiday." We're done. The ex said, "There's more on the back pages." The judge said, "Those issues weren't filed correctly." HAHAHAHA! 

I was ready for all of it. The contempt of court, him dropping his salary from 60K a year to 13,200.00 a year etc. DO NOT MESS WITH MY CHILDREN YOU WILL LOSE! 

Court was adjourned. 

My attorney asked to speak to the ex & as usual 300 lbs of stupid (the wife) went hauling ass behind the ex. My attorney turned around & looked at her & said, "I WANT TO SPEAK TO HIM, NOT YOU!" HAHAHA! She came back out to the waiting area & plopped her 300 lb ass down. She stared me down the whole time. I giggled as I texted, I looked at my amazing ring, knowing that it was eating her alive. 

Not only do *I* know how stupid the both of them are, the judge knows too! The judge kept telling the ex that he should probably get an attorney b/c he can't give legal advice. 

As we were walking out my attorney said, "I told him that his wife was a bit high strung and she needed to chill out & that she could understand WHY I was fearful to send my children with him." I said, "If you can get him away from her, he's not bad to deal with. It's HER that's screwing this all up." 

It IS 300 lbs of stupid that's screwing this all up & the reason my babies don't want to go on visits with their dad. For the longest time I blamed her for the way she treats my babies. I blame 400 lbs of stupid now too though b/c he tolerates it & allows her to treat them that way. He's just as guilty as she is. 

Bottom line with the advice in this blog---

DO NOT LIE when you file papers with the court. You will look stupid. 

GET A GOOD ATTORNEY!--You'll need one, especially if you are dealing with children.

DO NOT BRING YOUR HOT HEADED SPOUSE TO COURT! 

If you are going to bring contempt charges, I suggest you have PROOF. 

KEEP EVERYTHING! When I went into court I have over 2 YEARS of emails between my attorney & I & my ex & I. I keep texts. I always have & it's proven CRUCIAL to my cases. 

DO NOT VERBALLY SPEAK TO THE EX ABOUT VISITATION, MONEY OWED, ETC. Do it all where it can be PRINTED out! Trust me, when they get into court, they lie. This can PROVE that! 

This week was stressful. Even though I KNEW I had the upper hand, it was still stressful. 

We have another court date coming up & so I'm sure as the time gets closer I won't be blogging again until it's over. This one I am the plaintiff & he's the defendant. 

Rule #7 Attorney & Court

GET A GOOD ATTORNEY!!! Seriously, it's dealing with the kids, GET A GOOD ATTORNEY! I can NOT stress this enough!!!

My attorney was amazing in my divorce. He wiped the floor with my ex and I received alimony, child support, 401K etc. He was awesome. I got the visitation stuff that I wanted AND for a judge who rarely does anything BUT 50/50 custody, I was awarded sole custody of the kids. I have custody of their doctor appointments, schooling etc. My word is THE final word.

Unfortunately my attorney committed suicide back in February. RIP sir. I loved him AND his secretary. Now someone else has taken over that I don't care for nearly as much. Him OR the secretary.

I met with the 'new' attorney back in April/May..somewhere in there. I was not impressed by him. Not at all. He is NOT even 1/2 the attorney my old attorney was. I felt safe with my old attorney. This one, not so much. I'm meeting with a new attorney on Friday. I can't wait. This is the same attorney that my honey used in his court case. If we could take this one up north for my honey's custody stuffs we would!

I am headed back to court because I'm being sued for being in contempt of court. I'm ready for it. Let's go. With a good attorney you don't have to worry about much. If this means you have to feast on Ramen for months then do it. A good attorney is the difference between hell and hope. My ex's attorney, that my ex eventually stiffed for money, was hitting on me DURING court. Get a good attorney.

Before you go back to court & issue notice to your ex that you aren't happy, try discussing it. It's been 3 years since I've been in court & I was content with everything. I was content with pulling child support from only 1 job instead of all 3 that he works. Apparently he is not, so therefor I am no longer content with only pulling child support from 1 job.

Stop and think before you file contempt charges. What you write is an affidavit & is considered sworn testimony. If your ex can prove you wrong, you have perjured yourself. Judges don't like liars. However if you are the defendant in the case & CAN prove that the plaintiff has perjured themselves, this is awesome for you. *bows*

Before going to court sit back and think about WHY you are suing the other person. Is it worth it? Play out all the scenarios. Have you done everything in your power to make things work? Have you fostered a relationship between ex and the children? Does s/he owe you money? Is there a chance that this could turn out poorly for you?

It seems as such the ones who WANT to go to court consider themselves the 'underdog' or victim. If you are an adult, unless it's a heinous crime, you are NOT a victim. A victim is a helpless person who has no choice. Those would be the children. So often people forget that this is NOT about them, it's about the children.

All of this being said, I'm ready for my court date. I'm ready for my honey's court date. Let's go. I'm ready to rumble.

Rule #6 Court

Document, document, document, document, times, dates, what was said, who was said it etc. Personal records are better than nothing. You can't go into court & say, "Around this date.." That doesn't work. If you have it on a piece of paper, this is the date, this is the time, this is what was said, it will look A LOT better for you. The more you can prove, the better.

Stick to the facts. X said this, I said that. Do NOT put Derelict *ex's name* said this. That won't work either! Keep it objective. Think about it, when someone is telling you a story of a fight that they had with someone else, it gets long and drawn out. Keep it short, to the point, and keep the details in it. 

That's all the judge wants.