Defying Contact Order

duchy

scaredofdebt wrote: »

He can't do that easily as he is self-employed and works alternate Saturdays, to change would mean changing his entire diary which isn't simple and may result in him losing business.

But your assumptions are correct.

I am also not inclined to go down this route as it will teach her she can get her own way/B] and do whatever she likes in future, the order will not give us the certainty that it is supposed to provide.

Thanks for the advice.

It isn't your job to "teach her"

So lets suppose you go to court.

She says she has always given you alternate weeks but due to a change in her domestic arrangements it suits her as the resident parent better to off set by one week. The children are still seeing you every other weekend .

You then complain that the new arrangement doesn't suit YOUR domestic arrangements as you prefer to have all the kids of all the marriages at the same time rather than alternate them (I'm guessing this is why changing the week means they see less of step siblings).

So the judge is left to decide if your convenience is more important than hers. Why should your needs outweigh hers ? The judge might see that you want the children to spend time together .....but equally they might feel that all the children would benefit from time with you without needing to compete with other children for your time - as access is about the child's contact time with the parent not with having other playmates around.

With no loss in long term contact hours by offsetting by a week you really don't have much of a case and a judge might decide the new arrangement is perfectly acceptable. "Teaching her a lesson" isn't something a judge will be interested in doing for you as it would in no way benefit the children which is the primary concern of the court.

scaredofdebt

Appreciate the comments, thanks everyone.

My son is 11 and daughter 13.

The problem is it is causing a lot of issues at "our end" - she can change the weekend without any problem as nobody else is involved. At "our end" it is more complicated. My wife cannot easily change the weekend she has her children with us as her ex is self employed and works Saturdays, so he would have to do a lot of reorganising and may lose business because of this, so he may not be willing to accommodate the change, there is no court order in place between my wife and her ex as he is a reasonable human being.

If we do swap but my wife doesn't - this means my children lose some contact with their step-siblings which is something they don't want to happen, the children are all similar ages (aprt from the baby) and enjoy spending time together. It also means we won't be able to take the children on days out on Saturdays (or there is certainly less scope/time for this) as my wife's children would need to be back in time for them to go to their father's as they "handover" on a Saturday due to their father's work commitments.

However, my main concern is if my ex changes things without any agreement from me and I do nothing about it she will continue to do this in future and that means the court order is in effect worthless. I went to court in the first place to get some kind of certainty so we can plan things to do wtih the children. She has in the past changed things so my children missed half of a holiday that we had planned and I spent an entire day driving 500 miles to pick them up so they could at least spend some of the holiday with us.

We are also planning a holiday for August, I now have no idea if my children will be allowed to accompany me. I am at the mercy of someone who cannot be trusted to act in the best interest of the children.

However, it seems there is nothing I can do so I must simply suck it up and be the grown up in this "relationship".

silvercar

What is her motive? To disrupt your life so that you don't get a weekend to yourself with out any kids or to ensure her children get your undivided attention?

scaredofdebt

I cannot be certain but she does appear to be jealous of the fact I have moved on while she cannot maintain a relationship.

This seems to happen every time a new boyfriend comes on the scene.

She also seems to enjoy disrupting our family life and doesn't like to think the children are having fun when they are with me and their step-family.

LannieDuck

scaredofdebt wrote: »

However, my main concern is if my ex changes things without any agreement from me and I do nothing about it she will continue to do this in future and that means the court order is in effect worthless. I went to court in the first place to get some kind of certainty so we can plan things to do with the children. She has in the past changed things so my children missed half of a holiday that we had planned and I spent an entire day driving 500 miles to pick them up so they could at least spend some of the holiday with us.

We are also planning a holiday for August, I now have no idea if my children will be allowed to accompany me. I am at the mercy of someone who cannot be trusted to act in the best interest of the children.

However, it seems there is nothing I can do so I must simply suck it up and be the grown up in this "relationship".

Based on your earlier post, she's changed arrangements once in the last three years (do correct me if that's wrong...). And her newly proposed suggestion still fits within the contact order.

Your concern as highlighted above has no basis in fact, given the details you've told us.

Given what you've written so far, you're coming across as very controlling.

rpc

scaredofdebt wrote: »

My son is 11 and daughter 13.

So of an age where a court would take great interest in their views, and may (within limits) defer to them.

So if you do push this, it would be on the grounds of keeping arrangements in line with your children's wishes and not to do with parental spats or messing around.

zagfles

scaredofdebt wrote: »

I cannot be certain but she does appear to be jealous of the fact I have moved on while she cannot maintain a relationship.

This seems to happen every time a new boyfriend comes on the scene.

She also seems to enjoy disrupting our family life and doesn't like to think the children are having fun when they are with me and their step-family.

If this really is the case - then use it to your advantage. Pretend the new arrangements are far better for you, get the kids to rave about what a fab time they had etc. See how quickly it gets changed back

A friend of mine who had a petty, vindictive, jealous ex used to do this all the time, and his daughter got in on the act too from quite a young age. In fact it was mainly her! They knew exactly how to get what they wanted - they simply made out what what convenient was inconvenient and vv. The ex would change the contact arrangements all the time thinking they were disrupting his life when they were in fact exactly what he wanted! They'd have long discussions (dad and daughter) on skype planning it. It was almost cruel

Mind you she's a brilliant actress - seriously into AmDram, have seen her a few times.

scaredofdebt

LannieDuck wrote: »

Based on your earlier post, she's changed arrangements once in the last three years (do correct me if that's wrong...). And her newly proposed suggestion still fits within the contact order.

Your concern as highlighted above has no basis in fact, given the details you've told us.

Given what you've written so far, you're coming across as very controlling.

Yes the last change was around the time her previous boyfriend appeared on the scene. I cannot control the frequency of such events so I am concerned about how frequently this may happen in future.

I am not controlling but I do want what is best for the children as that is also best for me - this change isn't in their best interests.

She even said in an earlier text that she wants to change weekends as it suits her and her new boyfriend better.

duchy

Frankly if you claim she "keeps messing with the arrangements" and it then transpires she has changed them once in the last three years you aren't going to look very reasonable .

You ARE coming across as controlling

Lots of families change access arrangements over the years as needs change - It is unreasonable not to accept this.

As for teenagers having less contact - at that age surely they are capable of sustaining social contact if they want to -it isn't as if they are small children after all.

scaredofdebt

Before the court order she changed arrangement without my agreement on a regular basis, since then it has been much better.

If she thinks she can change the contact arrangement and there's nothing I can do about it, I expect it will become more frequent. I will keep a diary of this and go back to court if it becomes persistent.

Until then I will just have to make the best of a bad job, thanks for all the comments.