Residence and contact order

FBaby

Absolutely and you need to explain this to her in a way that she doesn't take your no defensively and assume you are preventing additional contact. Hence if you mention that you'd like to discuss contact for next holiday so that she believes you mean it, she is more likely to work with you rather than becoming difficult.

shooby337

Well it didn't go down to well with her. She then produced a letter from mediation for family and finance (we got a house), saying that she taking me back to mediation. I already have the divorce and finance going through court/solicitors after mediation broke down, and I'm not going to stop that now.

Can she take it back to mediation whilst it already been dealt with by my solicitor/court?

rpc

Court beats mediation. If the contact order is recent (as it sounds), a court isn't going to be interested in varying it without very good reason.

Speak to your solicitor.

Depending on why mediation broke down, it may or may not be worth a go over the other issues. She can't force you to mediation, but refusing without good reason could look bad for you. That said, if the matter is already in front of a judge then the time for mediation has probably passed.

Sounds like she is trying to manipulate and bully, but that's only based on the little detail posted here.

Egypt191

Your situation sounds very similar to mine a year ago.

My ex-husband had overnight contact taken away due to concerns, and holidays etc were left in my hands if/when I thought it was appropriate. He also tried to ignore the order a few weeks after it was granted and push for overnight night stays, which I didn't think were appropriate at the time. All I did was say no at the time, but we'll look at it further down the line.

One year on and my children see him once a week and have the occasional overnight stay, usually for one night as when they've tried two it appears he can't cope very well, which impacts on their behaviour.

I would suggest taking it little bits at a time, and go with your gut instinct, remembering that the other person is their parent too ( I'm sure you do this, but I know it's difficult sometimes).

As for holidays, my children have still not stayed during the holidays yet, but they are due to stay for a week this summer as I do think its important for him to spend time with them. We were uncommunicative at the beginning, but now things are a lot better as we both know it's what will work best for the children.

As for mediation, if you are already going to court, and mediation has previously broken down, you are under no obligation to return. However, just remember that solicitors are the only winners in divorce ( I represented myself, but my ex has a bill outstanding for over £8000.).

As FBaby has said the more amicable you can be the better, and believe me, I know it's difficult but it's the best all round. Good luck, sounds like your doing a great job.

shooby337

Thanks for the kind words. Glad to see it can work. I represented myself for the residence, but have a solicitor for divorce (as managed to get that before legal aid ceased).

I would like to him to see her more, but obviously have concerns about that. He to has behaviour issues when he been with her, and gets very rude and argumentive with his granny, which I'm sure is caused by his mother telling him to do it. She has mental health issues which is part of the reason children services decided he would be unsafe with her, although they allow her to have her 9mth old twins (not mine), so she has decided that it's my mothers fault that the marriage broke up. But the reason the marriage broke up was because I worked full time then came home to have to cook the dinner (not even our son would have had dinner provided by her!), do all the housework because she done none, look after our son till bed, put him to bed (which took nearly 2 hours every night as she would sleep in with him and then let him sleep in the day!), then I finally get to sit down at about 11pm! Plus I'm certain there were other blokes sniffing abou (fact she was pregnant within 2 weeks of me ending the marriage kind of backs this). But besides all that I want him to see his mother, although my family think it's not a good idea. It's difficult to get help from children services with it all, because he is deemed safe with me so doesn't have a social worker, but if he was her he would have one. They kind of left me in the lurch the moment they decided he was safe, gave me no support in court, they insisted on supervised visits but the judge decided unsupervised, and services weren't there to back me.

Now on top of all the family stuff, I think she going try and take to the cleaners for more money out of the house even though their little equity and I've took all the debt because she agreed a lump sum.

Egypt191

If you have concerns about him seeing her more at the moment, don't let him go for more than the order states, you have to do what you feel is right for him. Like I said it took a good while before my children were aloud overnight again and I could see he had attempted to change.

There is always one party who is bitter in divorce, and blames everyone else but themselves for the split ( in my case it was my ex), but in the big scheme of things it doesn't matter, the fact is you decided you didn't want to be with her, she needs to accept that ( although my ex still doesn't , but that's his issue not mine). Your sons behaviour could be due to anything, the change, cause she's saying something or just because divorce is difficult for kids. My children's behaviour was awful for two days before and after they'd been to their dads, now, after a routine is in place they're so much more settled. I won't say they love going, because it appears they don't, but they're resigned to it and know they'll be home after a short while.

Children's services are fantastic at doing their job then leaving you to it, overworked, underpaid sort of thing, I know mine had a massive caseload to get through when dealing with my ex, and as soon as they'd done their bit to try and keep my children safe they were off, never turned up in court, but luckily gave a good enough report that the judge upheld what they said.

I also had the same input from family and friends about them not seeing him, but like I said you need to go with what you feel is right, family will always back you in the long run.

It's good you've got a solicitor for the financial stuff, I didn't and to be honest, this was the most difficult bit to fight on my own. It sounds so similar to mine, the more proof you've got the better, if you can prove she had a lump sum then great, and same with marital debts, it's about proving they were accumulated during and for the benefit of the marriage. I found that the judge was pretty astute on this and shared them regardless.

If it's any consolation it does get better and easier.