I recently had a friend say to me that if we had custody of my step-daughter we would feel that joint custody doesn't work. I am sure we would. It's hard to know the pain of being a non-custodial parent until you are one. Having been on both sides, I can assure you as a custodial parent I would have never understood the pain of a non-custodial parent. I want to clarify that when I speak of custody, I am really speaking about time spent with your child. No matter how you shake it, if you are on the side of the "visiting parent" you become just that in your child's life- a visitor. You cannot truly be a parent to a child you see every other weekend. It is the day to day interaction that children need. I want to put out here how it really feels to be on the side of the "visiting parent". Every other weekend you have to plan and squeeze in two full weeks of activities into two half days and one full day. Sometimes, you might only get to spend one weekend in an entire month with your child. That's right, if it so happens Thanksgiving break falls on your regular scheduled weekend and it is the custodial parents year for Thanksgiving you won't get to see your child for THREE full weeks. This will happen again at Spring Break and maybe Christmas. How would you feel if you were denied seeing your children for three weeks at a time? I also had another friend say over summer vacation "not seeing your child for a few weeks isn't bad, I send mine to see their grandparents for a few weeks over the summer." I am sure if you have your children every day a few weeks over the summer isn't that bad. However, when you have 4 overnight visits a month with your child every second becomes precious. Perhaps if we all knew what it was like to live without our children we would be less likely to deny one parent the time. The fact that the courts order this kind of visitation alienating one parent is not in any child's best interest. All too often you have a bitter ex-spouse who uses thier child as a weapon against their ex. This is the way it is in our case. It is so evident that my step-daughter is a weapon against my husband. Anytime he and his ex get into a disagreement she will deny him time with his daughter. That's right, his daughter is the one to get punished. Further, the parent with custody has so much opportunity to shape the child's mind and turn them against the noncustodial parent. Look at it from the child's view. Why shouldn't children have both parents after a divorce? I assure you that in almost all situations both people played a part in that divorce. Or perhaps someone was a bad husband or wife, does that make them a bad parent? There are a lot of people who love their kids and want to be involved. Why are we accepting this standard visitation in today's society? Don't get me wrong, I know there are a lot of people out there that wish they had someone to help with their children. I have a friend who is a single mom and has two beautiful girls. Their father won't pay child support, won't visit, and will not even call to talk to them. This woman works everyday, takes care of those two girls by herself all of the time, and I know she wishes she had someone to help raise those girls. I know there are people out there who want to walk away, but I also know there are people who want to be involved and can't.
1 comments:
I too, like the person writing the blog have been on the both sides of this terrible situation.
The thing that always amazed me is, two people who cannot continue their relationship have to go through the system to dissolve their marraige. At that time, someone who does not know you, your child, your soon to be ex spouse takes information that two attorneys who do not know either of the parties very well except on a very biased and decides that it is better for the child to live with one person full time except for every other weekend from Friday at 6:00pm until Sunday at 6:00pm. The judges, also detemine that one parent makes all of the decisions for the child or children as far as medical, dental, education, extra activites. They determine that the "visiting" parent will never get to take that child to school ever on their first day or be there to pick the child up on their last day. They determine where the child spends his or her holidays and summer breaks. They also tell you that family court is "always" looking after the best interest of the children in each situation.
I am still today trying to figure out how any of that is in the best interest of any child, 9 years later.
A child is use to being with both parents, seeing both parents, depending on both parents and loving both parents. Now a child has to deal with the fact that mom and dad are no longer in the same home and he or she only gets to see one of them every other weekend. I am not sure how you can explain to a four year old how that is in the best interest of their well being. As a "visiting" parent in South Carolina you have less parental authority than someone who has been convited of a crime and been released from prision and the goverment has been raising their child while they were in custody and they get out and they hand the child right over to releasee. I have seen cases where children have been removed from homes due to drug usage and abuse while in the presence of children and given right back after a short stint in some minimal drug program.
The system needs a very serious over haul. Joint/Shared custody is a very ideal situation, but lawmakers/judges cannot expect two people who are dissolving their marriage to be able to do this on their own. If people got along that well they would not be dissolving their marriage. People should be forced to co-parent just like people are forced to pay child support. Another joke as well in my opinion. If we had a shared custody arrangement then there would be no need for child support. If a child lives equally at each home 50% percent of the time why should one person essentially pay the other to raise their children? Especially when you have the "visiting" parent who begs and pleads to be with their child more and is more than willing to help out. Again I think the family court system is a vicious money scam. From the attorneys who take advatage of poor broken hearted parents to the lawmakers who have parents locked up for being behind on child support when they do not have a job, their homes have been foreclosed on and they barely have money to feed themselves. Sad very sad, if they are in jail how can they look for a job to get themselves out of the terrible situation that the goverment has helped to create in the first place. (another story different day). Enough from me..... just my two pennies worth for now. We need a change, an overhaul bigtime! Who is willing to take a stand?
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