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  • Working on adjusting a court order

    After creating a court order with my ex over a year ago, she seems to continue to find loopholes in the wording of things. Where we could agree to a meaning in court and the "spirit" of the court order, she chooses to manipulate things as much as she can. Does anyone have advice on somewhere I can look to "word" a court order so that it is more like a government document with no loopholes, or as few as possible?

  • #2
    One example. Because she insists on alternating long weekends I put in a clause that says that if you have the weekend before, and then the long weekend, the other parent will have the weekend after. For some reason it always worked out that one parent would have our daughter for 3 weekends in a row and even if it fell with me having her I did not think it was fair. So because "summer access overrides regular access" my ex said that because the weekend before Labour day was her "summer access" and labour day was her long weekend access, that the weekend after was still hers because the weekend before labour day was not a regular weekend. I am at work and not sitting with the order, but its things like this that she always does.
    It will be sad that our order has to be 30 pages thick with all sorts of legal wording in it, but that is what I am dealing with.
    If a long weekend falls to her regularly, there are times that she will claim that the weekend after is also hers, as the long weekend pushed her regular weekend back. Has anyone had to deal with that sort of thing before?

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    • #3
      What is the access schedule?

      50-50?

      If that is the case, the long weekends should be with whoever the weekend falls with in a 50-50 model. It all works out to be pretty much equal over the years when the children hit 18 anyway.

      The best thing to do with a highly conflicted other parent (or if both are) is to not deal with the long weekends unless it is an EOW situation then every long weekend is spent with the EOW parent.

      Comment


      • #4
        We are in an EOW schedule. For the summer I have our daughter for 4 non consecutive weeks, I am hoping to change it to 1 week and 1 week throughout the summer, its slightly different and will save arguements in the future.
        For Christmas right now I pick up our daughter on Christmas day at 4 PM and she picks her up NYE at 4 PM, that works well.
        Long weekends, as it stands I get May 24-she gets canada day, I get civic and she gets labour day. We do not do anything for family day as my company does not allow us the day off.
        March break we alternate, problem being is do we start from Friday to Friday, or only use the actual 5 days in between. All these things need to be clearified.
        We alternate Easter and Thanksgiving, but my ex claims that easter holiday access does not start after school Thursday, but at 3 PM friday and since its not specified she could be right.
        I am hesitent bringing her in on contempt because I have been burned by "technicallities" like these before.
        That is why I am trying to rework the court order so it is as Iron clad so that I have something behind me when I have to go for contempt in the future.

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        • #5
          I am looking for a program to help me word it correctly.

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          • #6
            Don't think a parent's failing to adhere to custody access would amount to a contempt charge, at least not in your case with what info you have provided. Contempt of court can take away someone's liberty (jail) and is a very serious charge. Do you really think a justice would impose sanctions (fines, jail) if you or your ex didn't agree on weekend scheduling for your kids?

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            • #7
              Originally posted by arabian View Post
              Don't think a parent's failing to adhere to custody access would amount to a contempt charge, at least not in your case with what info you have provided. Contempt of court can take away someone's liberty (jail) and is a very serious charge. Do you really think a justice would impose sanctions (fines, jail) if you or your ex didn't agree on weekend scheduling for your kids?
              That is why we need to take the ability to change things out of ones hands. Since they cannot do it reasonably it needs to be set in stone. I knwo thats not the best option for working on being constructive parents but sometimes it is the only option. Finding out after a schedule has been set that she is changing it 2 days before access is to begin because she finds a loophole will not amount to contempt, so we must elimate loopholes. Over time a consistent show of her unwillingness to follow a court order will lead to something being done, but while she is working within legal loopholes nothing can happen that is positive. Try being an EOW parent who is unable to plan a life because you may not get your daughter. I have had Christmas in February, birthdays a month late and so on and so forth but there is only so much I can do.

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              • #8
                Wait before you go get your "loophole crisis" booted out of court for wasting it's time....remember the good things ...your seeing your kid,,,your ex isn't destroying your relationship with your kid (lots of exes with that major problem).......the access aint workin but it may in a little while, document the stuff that pisses you off if you need something to do. Fire nobody follows court orders to the letter and nobody gets punished for it maken adjustments ...itll take a year just to go through 3 conferences for gawd sakes before your denied a trial because you have no real issue...regards

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by MrToronto View Post
                  Wait before you go get your "loophole crisis" booted out of court for wasting it's time....remember the good things ...your seeing your kid,,,your ex isn't destroying your relationship with your kid (lots of exes with that major problem).......the access aint workin but it may in a little while, document the stuff that pisses you off if you need something to do. Fire nobody follows court orders to the letter and nobody gets punished for it maken adjustments ...itll take a year just to go through 3 conferences for gawd sakes before your denied a trial because you have no real issue...regards
                  Thank you for being so helpful. I have never been to court before and know nothing of these ways...I hope you can notice the sarcasm.
                  Maybe you have never had a life and it does not matter to you when you have your child and when you do not have your child, and can jump at a whim to pick them up or cancel all plans if your ex says the day before that you cannot pick them up. Thats not me, while my daughter is on the top of my priority list I do have other things going on as well, and having no possible way to plan a life because you never ever know when you have them and when you don't is no way to live.
                  So like I said, I am asking if anyone knows of an online program to help develop a court order that is worded with alot less loopholes. That way we can have a schedule and know what to expect. Once I have something drafted up I would file a motion to change and go from there. I doubt we would ever get to an actual motion because my ex knows that what she is doing is wrong, that is why she is doing it. I just need to go over and over it with a fine tooth comb to word it so strongly that she cannot get change it on a whim like she does.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Originally posted by MrToronto View Post
                    ,,your ex isn't destroying your relationship with your kid (lots of exes with that major problem).......
                    She is trying to, believe me about that. Not going into detail about the alienation that she is trying to do and all sorts of false claims and so on and so forth. Having a defined court order would help to stop her from doing this.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      There is an expectation that the parties will employ a level of common sense and some good will to "make the order work" to the best of their ability. There needs to be some compromise when terms of the court order are not so clear cut. Unfortunately, if one party is unwilling to make the order work and is always looking for loopholes, they will find them. Court orders can not cover each and every circumstance, because they are often not crafted with this foresight in mind.

                      Someone once said on this forum (think it was DTTE) that the court order starts losing its value the minute it is issued because circumstances change. Reasonable people would just make it work by reaching an agreement outside of the order, others may insist on having the court order varied to reflect the new reality. But in my opinion, there is no full-proof way of wording a court order that it is going to stand the test of time or be exact to the smallest detail.

                      Sorry, no advice for you as such, but just wanted to let you know you are not alone in facing this.
                      Last edited by Nadia; 09-19-2012, 10:37 PM.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Originally posted by Nadia View Post
                        There is an expectation that the parties will employ a level of common sense and some good will to "make the order work" to the best of their ability. There needs to be some compromise when terms of the court order are not so clear cut. Unfortunately, if one party is unwilling to make the order work and is always looking for loopholes, they will find them. Court orders can not cover each and every circumstance, because they are often not crafted with this foresight in mind.

                        Someone once said on this forum (think it was DTTE) that the court order starts losing its value the minute it is issued because circumstances change. Reasonable people would just make it work by reaching an agreement outside of the order, others may insist on having the court order varied to reflect the new reality. But in my opinion, there is no full-proof way of wording a court order that it is going to stand the test of time or be exact to the smallest detail.

                        Sorry, no advice for you as such, but just wanted to let you know you are not alone in facing this.
                        Thank you, I know that I can only close so many things but what I want is for some of these loopholes to not become the status quo. That is my main issue, to allow it to continue to happen and allow the fact that she is dictating how the order will work and which parts she will use at what time just sets us up for failure. I know that compromise is needed, and I know that we need to learn to work together, but unfortunatly as time goes on she continues to feel that she has this "ultimate" power over how the access schedule works and its really frustrating. I do alot of volunteer work, and some of it is not age appropriate but I am going to have to start giving these things up because I have no idea whatesoever when I will have our daughter anymore. It seems that every long weekend she changes the rules and any chance she can she adjusts things to her benefit.
                        Last edited by fireweb13; 09-20-2012, 08:15 AM.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          This is what we have for Easter weekend in our court order:

                          "The parties shall alternate their time spent with the children each year foe Easter Weekend with the applicant father having the children in even numbered years and the respondent mothers having them in odd years. When the applicant father has the children for this weekend, he shall pick the children on the Thursday at their school(s) or daycare(s) and keep them until Tuesday morning when they will be returned to their school(s) or daycare(s). If the weekend falls on a weekend in which the children would normally be with a parent, the parent will have the children on the following weekend."

                          Could this be applied to your long weekends?

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Originally posted by Nadia View Post
                            This is what we have for Easter weekend in our court order:

                            If the weekend falls on a weekend in which the children would normally be with a parent, the parent will have the children on the following weekend."

                            Could this be applied to your long weekends?
                            Great, this is the line that I could see causing problems. Would this wording work? "The parent who does not have access on the (long weekend, easter ect) will have the child the following weekend and the EOW schedule will continue from there."
                            I do not like the last bit, but we are on a start now. Thank you

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Working on specific clauses. Can anyone help with wording a clause for Funerals. I know it sounds like it should be reasonable that if a family or very close friend passes away that the child should be allowed to attend without any problems, but this has happened in the past where I was not allowed to bring our daughter to my fathers funeral. I am looking for a clause that states that if someone very close (family or very close friend) passes away, regular access is suspended and the child is allowed to be with the parent who has had someone pass away.
                              Problems being that I have alot of family about 6 hour drive away, if someone passes away it would mean a several day trip and could be 4-5 days. So I would like to be able to bring our daughter for this sort of thing. But I also need to make sure that there is nothing in it where my ex can take advantage of it. I know it sounds silly, but it was a big upset to for myself and our daughter that she did not get to say goodbye to Grandpa.
                              Any help on wording would be great. Thank you
                              By all means, I would not ever do that to her, if her father or someone close passed away I would not question a thing and would be there to support her if she needed it. I got slapped with missing 3 months access directly after my father passed(working on the bitterness about that subject).

                              Comment

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