Hi everyone,
I have been lurking on this forum for a bit, but only just started posting. So I thought I would introduce myself and give you my story and current situation.
I was with my ex for 11 years, but only married for the last 3. We have three children the eldest is hers from a previous relationship, but I am the only dad he has ever known and I officially adopted him after we were married.
We were (and still are) a single income family, my ex did some childcare and some other casual work, but nothing huge (has never made enough to pay taxes since before the kids were born). I was always asking her to look for jobs because I wasn't able to cover everything on my own, and we were running a deficit. I frequently had to tuck my tail between my legs and ask my parents for help when some of the bills got out of hand. He reasoning for not getting a job was because she was convinced that she couldn't get a job that would cover the child care costs and still be worth working. I disagreed, but there was never a true attempt to gain full time employment. She does have an BSc from university and I'm convinced she could get a decent job if she put some effort into her search.
Our relationship had been increasingly toxic for the past 4 years at least, I was dealing with major depression (was off work for 13 months) and despite marriage counselling we separated last May (I asked in one of our counselling sessions after a particularly bad sequence of events. Things were pretty good for the first few months. We originally separated with the intent of reconciling but after about a month and a half it was clear that we were not going to get back together. I was temporarily living at my parents, but maintained that I wanted to be in the matrimonial home with the kids and only agreed to not stay at the house because she "had nowhere else to go" and to keep our conflict away from the kids.
In July we had a document signed and witnessed stating that we would have "Shared legal and physical custody of the children" agreed to a temporary 50/50 access schedule and eased the children into the schedule over a month and a half so that by the time school started they were well adapted to the new schedule.
Even after we had done this she still was resisting going to mediation or formalizing any agreement. There was still conflict between us, but it was getting better, and though she never said it she was trying to get me back into the relationship and stressed to every one that she didn't know why this was happening.
In October she found out I had been seeing someone post separation.
Then everything changed. I used to have liberal access to the kids and the house (even when it was not my parenting time), that stopped. I used to be able to get things from the house without trouble, that stopped. She started to accuse me of having an affair, accused my parents of condoning my 'adultery'. She also tried to twist friends and family against me.
8 days later there was an incident, I won't go into details or claim to have been completely innocent in the matter, but it was a healthy back and forth between us and unfortunately some of it was in front of the kids. My ex took this incident to claim that I was threatening and abusive and took the kids out of the house and went to a women's shelter. When I found that she had left, I had no idea where she was I called the police but they wouldn't help, so I had my lawyer (who up until that point was just a resource for me. There had been no formal legal action) send her a letter via email asking for several things and stated that if we had not had a response in a few days we would be filing an emergency ex parte motion in court. On Thursday we received word from her lawyer and found that she had beat us to the punch and filed an application in family court. I felt like she baited me so she take this action.
I did not see my kids for month and had to open my life like a book to the CAS as they investigated my ex's claims. Two weeks after they fist spoke to me they said I didn't require supervised visits (as my ex had been requesting) and soon after my first weekend with the kids (still took two weeks for my ex to 'allow' even a weekend of access) the CAS closed the file. I thought "great, now we can get back to the 50/50 parenting arrangement", but no such luck. I have been stuck in EOW situation since then and my ex refuses to discuss increasing my parenting. I have had to fight for extra time over holidays, to help my son with his school work (he asked to do his science project with me).
The time she is allowing is very inconvenient for me as I do a lot of singing (hence the name) on the weekends, but I make the most of it. This is not a recreational thing for me, but a secondary income as most of the gigs I do are paid. She knew the problems this was going to cause when proposed the time of the access. I didn't want to refuse anything as I had been away for the kids for so long, and thought this was just a first step.
I paid CS voluntarily for November and December, and was ordered to pay CS in a temporary order stemming from our case conference in December. Unfortunately we only had about 15 min with the master (was end of the day) so not a lot was accomplished. We both wanted the involvement of the OCL, but for different reasons. She was asserting that I was unable to sufficiently provide for the children and was potentially dangerous (even though it was refuted by the CAS). While I felt the wishes of the children were not being respected. I was frustrated because the document we signed in July was not even considered.
She moved into a new place just before the case conference, but still refuses to let me know where she is living, stating safety concerns. This despite her having letters from three different doctors that say that I am not a risk to her or the kids and the CAS closing the file.
So here I sit in the midst of an OCL investigation waiting to see what the result is, hoping for a favourable outcome.
I am already preparing material for a motion, that will be comming after the OCL has submitted the report.
Believe it or not that is the Cole's Notes version of my story.
SD
I have been lurking on this forum for a bit, but only just started posting. So I thought I would introduce myself and give you my story and current situation.
I was with my ex for 11 years, but only married for the last 3. We have three children the eldest is hers from a previous relationship, but I am the only dad he has ever known and I officially adopted him after we were married.
We were (and still are) a single income family, my ex did some childcare and some other casual work, but nothing huge (has never made enough to pay taxes since before the kids were born). I was always asking her to look for jobs because I wasn't able to cover everything on my own, and we were running a deficit. I frequently had to tuck my tail between my legs and ask my parents for help when some of the bills got out of hand. He reasoning for not getting a job was because she was convinced that she couldn't get a job that would cover the child care costs and still be worth working. I disagreed, but there was never a true attempt to gain full time employment. She does have an BSc from university and I'm convinced she could get a decent job if she put some effort into her search.
Our relationship had been increasingly toxic for the past 4 years at least, I was dealing with major depression (was off work for 13 months) and despite marriage counselling we separated last May (I asked in one of our counselling sessions after a particularly bad sequence of events. Things were pretty good for the first few months. We originally separated with the intent of reconciling but after about a month and a half it was clear that we were not going to get back together. I was temporarily living at my parents, but maintained that I wanted to be in the matrimonial home with the kids and only agreed to not stay at the house because she "had nowhere else to go" and to keep our conflict away from the kids.
In July we had a document signed and witnessed stating that we would have "Shared legal and physical custody of the children" agreed to a temporary 50/50 access schedule and eased the children into the schedule over a month and a half so that by the time school started they were well adapted to the new schedule.
Even after we had done this she still was resisting going to mediation or formalizing any agreement. There was still conflict between us, but it was getting better, and though she never said it she was trying to get me back into the relationship and stressed to every one that she didn't know why this was happening.
In October she found out I had been seeing someone post separation.
Then everything changed. I used to have liberal access to the kids and the house (even when it was not my parenting time), that stopped. I used to be able to get things from the house without trouble, that stopped. She started to accuse me of having an affair, accused my parents of condoning my 'adultery'. She also tried to twist friends and family against me.
8 days later there was an incident, I won't go into details or claim to have been completely innocent in the matter, but it was a healthy back and forth between us and unfortunately some of it was in front of the kids. My ex took this incident to claim that I was threatening and abusive and took the kids out of the house and went to a women's shelter. When I found that she had left, I had no idea where she was I called the police but they wouldn't help, so I had my lawyer (who up until that point was just a resource for me. There had been no formal legal action) send her a letter via email asking for several things and stated that if we had not had a response in a few days we would be filing an emergency ex parte motion in court. On Thursday we received word from her lawyer and found that she had beat us to the punch and filed an application in family court. I felt like she baited me so she take this action.
I did not see my kids for month and had to open my life like a book to the CAS as they investigated my ex's claims. Two weeks after they fist spoke to me they said I didn't require supervised visits (as my ex had been requesting) and soon after my first weekend with the kids (still took two weeks for my ex to 'allow' even a weekend of access) the CAS closed the file. I thought "great, now we can get back to the 50/50 parenting arrangement", but no such luck. I have been stuck in EOW situation since then and my ex refuses to discuss increasing my parenting. I have had to fight for extra time over holidays, to help my son with his school work (he asked to do his science project with me).
The time she is allowing is very inconvenient for me as I do a lot of singing (hence the name) on the weekends, but I make the most of it. This is not a recreational thing for me, but a secondary income as most of the gigs I do are paid. She knew the problems this was going to cause when proposed the time of the access. I didn't want to refuse anything as I had been away for the kids for so long, and thought this was just a first step.
I paid CS voluntarily for November and December, and was ordered to pay CS in a temporary order stemming from our case conference in December. Unfortunately we only had about 15 min with the master (was end of the day) so not a lot was accomplished. We both wanted the involvement of the OCL, but for different reasons. She was asserting that I was unable to sufficiently provide for the children and was potentially dangerous (even though it was refuted by the CAS). While I felt the wishes of the children were not being respected. I was frustrated because the document we signed in July was not even considered.
She moved into a new place just before the case conference, but still refuses to let me know where she is living, stating safety concerns. This despite her having letters from three different doctors that say that I am not a risk to her or the kids and the CAS closing the file.
So here I sit in the midst of an OCL investigation waiting to see what the result is, hoping for a favourable outcome.
I am already preparing material for a motion, that will be comming after the OCL has submitted the report.
Believe it or not that is the Cole's Notes version of my story.
SD
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