Child Support Enforcement Can Bite Me

That is appalling! It goes to show you that kids don’t matter to a lot FWs (and govt officials) once they’re out of the mother’s womb! Probably deliberate to create a class of servants to underpay. Glad to hear there are organizations out there like this fighting the good fight! I haven’t had this child support issue, but that’s because my ex would literally die of embarrassment if word got out that he was a deadbeat. Gotta luv those shame-based narcissists! they’ll begrudgingly pay to keep up the image!

YES YES YES — thank you Tracy!

“It’s the bias that the money goes to mom for her lux bonbon lifestyle, …It’s the trope that women are gold-diggers. (I HEARD THAT SO MUCH!) When the fact is we have ZERO support for parents in this country, let alone single parents. Let alone single mothers. Fuck, we’re not even allowed bodily autonomy since Roe was overturned. Are we going to address child support now that we’re forcing parenthood on a new generation?”

And that’s exactly where my mind went too. I love that you pointed out that cars and houses are easily taken when payments aren’t made —- but CHILDREN? No payment? Oh the fuck well, I guess.

And no matter your stance on abortion, if fathers aren’t legally forced to support, then how can women be forced to carry the entire burden with no rights to their own bodies (or finances)? In 2023???

Every chump — man or woman — deals with abuse … if the law can’t protect against the emotional and financial abuse (and physical and health) for the Chump, can’t they at least “repo” for the child?

It is appalling that people don’t step up to the plate and pay support while the custodial parent is left scrounging for dimes in the sofa to meet their kids’ basic needs. I realistically knew that I would never see a dime from my cheater ex because he was an addict and his money all went to support his addiction. Enforcement would have been impossible as he was rarely working.

Ultimately his addiction caught up with him and he died shortly after the divorce of an overdose. Thankfully he had worked long enough in jobs that paid adequately so that I now get nice payments from the US government in the form of social security benefits for our two children until they each turn 18. So far the social security administration hasn’t been a deadbeat. Sadly, the ex is worth more dead than alive.

My ex emptied his seven-figure retirement accounts, quit his mid-six-figure job and fled the country, leaving me and our two pre-teen boys. Ex hasn’t seen or spoken to the boys in years and, because he’s apparently transferred his money to Europe (and/or his girlfriend), the state can’t collect any of the child support he owes.

The unpaid amount is now approximately $100k, but I doubt the kids or I will ever see a penny of it.

As a grandparent with complete and sole legal custody (all parenting time and all decision making), I am grateful that I do not have to go through co-parenting struggles any more, and neither biodad nor granddad (my ex) are allowed any contact. Biomom has not wanted or requested any contact for over a decade. NOBODY pays child support, although both parents were ordered to. It’s particularly egregious that biodad was court ordered to pay a minimum of full time at minimum wage, yet somehow, without my knowledge, was able to reduce that to $5o per month, which he gets out of paying by refusing to work. Repeatedly when biomom is working, Child Support Enforcement fails to garnish her wages until I report where she works–quite difficult since she’s no contact. It should be automatic. And remember those COVID payments? Per government, at least in my state, only the first payment could be garnished. Subsequent funds went solely to the bioparents. That money should have gone to help these kids.
Fortunately, there are programs that help grandparents and other kin raising these kids. If you are, or know someone who is, look for local resources for grandfamilies or kinship families, and check into Generations United https://www.gu.org/what-we-do/public-policy/grandfamilies/ which supports us and advocates for legal changes, including child support.

This hurts so much to even read because I’m living it every day. I loved all the “use an attorney” guidance yesterday, but I can’t afford it. I can’t afford it in part because my ex doesn’t pay what he owes. It’s a vicious cycle.

I plugged those numbers in the US Inflation Calculator. Talk about a real kick in the gut.

Inflation Calculator
If in
1993
(enter year)
I purchased an item for $
5,786.00

then in
2022
(enter year)
that same item would cost:
$11,718.35

Cumulative rate of inflation:
102.5%

FWs who do not pay their child support are criminals – IMO.

As an employer, I have always been amazed at how inept the state government is at enforcing child support. We are happy to garnish wages and mail in support payments when the order authorizing this finally gets to us, but it is often sooo slow in coming. All it should take is a software program cross referencing once per week social security numbers of those owing support against social security numbers reported on income tax withholding reports from employers (i.e. employed fathers). The orders go out, and the employers follow the orders. But I have known employees who went for years owing before the government finally produced the paperwork we need to garner wages. Government sucks at everything. There should be a commercial alternative. Like private debt collectors who flat fee this processing to ensure the garnishment orders quickly follow the employment of the father.

Thank you Chump Lady for shining a very brilliant and bright light on this issue as only you can. Your analysis is so incredibly articulate, cut and clear. The comparisons you make to the repo man, etc are right on point! We need you addressing Congress! You truly are a wordsmith – thank you for everything you do.

The system is and has been broken. Seems like no one in power cares to change it. My experience: in a progressive western state, youngest’s child support was at the “max” and amounts to 1/90th of XH’s monthly income. I put every dime received into her college account because I have the privilege of earning enough to do so and pay for our lives and I knew XH would use $$ to threaten and manipulate her if I didn’t save $$for her college. Fuck him and his threats now — she doesn’t need his filthy money to get educated. I got sole custody. It cost 5x the child support to actually support her and that’s living a life far economically reduced from what it was during our 25 year marriage. That’s reality of divorce. I earn 1/7th of what XH earns. I am so glad I divorced him — he’s a monster.

I’m fortunate that I don’t have to pay because of almost 50/50 and I cover medical, but it’s still a kick in the teeth to pay half the bills when she’s making more and used me as a bank account and cheated, and is sooned to be married. My fault for trusting someone like her.

I really wish there was at fault, but that’s not going to change.

When they’re done, they’re DONE.

Long before they left you they made a conscious decision to lay to waste their past. Your welfare, or that of their children, is rarely of importance forward. Few are those whose impression management stays the long course.
Fewer are those that manage to both support and make time for their children. If you get even a few years of support, consider it a bonus.

The hard truth is that you cannot have expectations nor count on these people to be responsible or obligated to anything but themselves. You have to forge a new life that covers the needs of your family and children without expecting anything from the ex. It’s not fair, but it is reality and bears out that breeding with disordered people comes at great risk.

I promise the following is relevant to issues of child support, divorce, abuse and cheating.

I’m hoping multiple organizations like Jane Does Well will view the Ana Walshe case in Massachusetts as a rallying point to add coercive control legislation to domestic violence laws in that and every other state and will join forces with legislative lobbies like Americas Conference to End Coercive Control (the acecc . com).

Following the Walshe case has given me nightmares and nausea and I really don’t have the stomach to be a true crime follower but I’ve been transfixed since the first national report of Ana Walshe’s disappearance on New Year’s day. I immediately Googled her name and the word “divorce” after seeing the missing person headline because I sensed the story was loaded with issues that are discussed on CN. I was also thinking of the case of Jennifer Dulos in Connecticut, a situation in which an emotionally abusive cheater– after his wife refused his demented bid to move his AP into his marital home with his wife and kids, left him, filed for divorce, reported his harassment and verbal threats and then filed for full custody– “disappeared” his wife in a case that began with a simple missing persons report just like the Walshe case.

Also like in the Walshe case, the body of Jennifer Dulos was never found. Like in the Dulos case, there was an apparent history of emotional abuse, threats, coercion and control by accused killer Brian Walshe and also potential money and custody motives. The Dulos case and the very similar case of another Connecticut mother who was murdered by a STBX formed the basis of “Jennifer’s Law” in that state, a “coercive control” statute that was added to existing domestic violence laws that gives victims of “sub-violent” psychological/emotional/verbal abuse, coercion and control grounds to get orders of protections before the abuse spirals into violence or murder. Civil coercive control statutes in Hawaii and California are similar but go farther and aid victims of chronic sub-violent abuse in getting full custody of children. Criminal coercive control laws in the UK and Scotland go the farthest and can involve prison time for offenders.

As the Walshe case unfolds, even more similarities to the Dulos case are becoming apparent and now Brian Walshe has been charged with murder. I may be jumping the gun but I suspect the Walshe case will underline further reasons to get behind coercive control legislation even if it’s not clear Ana Walshe was actively trying to escape at the time she was killed. Would Ana Walshe, who may have been particularly vulnerable to coercion because she was an immigrant originally from Serbia, have stayed in what appears to have been a messy and menacing marriage if she could have been assured her husband couldn’t carry out any of the classic coercive and controlling threats we can imagine an abuser in this situation making (taking full custody of children, getting her deported, wrecking her career, goading her that he’d never have to pay child support, etc.)? Does the very depth of Stockholm syndrome in victims partly hinge on the viability of coercive and controlling threats or even just victims’ gut sense that abusers will take things that far based on general coercive behavior? What would happen if these types of typical hamstringing threats were made empty? Aside from protecting victims after escape, would effective coercive control laws even lessen the likelihood of victims sinking fully into captor bonding and hesitating to escape until it’s too late? I’d like to see that social experiment.

Just a side note on the case that may be relevant to child support, there was a report today that convicted fraudster and alleged killer Brian Walshe did a Google search for the “best state for divorce for a man” shortly before his wife’s disappearance on New Year’s day this year. One headline prematurely blared that Brian Walshe killed his wife because he wanted to divorce her (hinting that he decided divorce was too expensive). The problem with the theory is that Ana Walshe may have been secretly making moves to leave the marriage after taking a job in DC and preparing the DC home for her children to live in full time. In any case, Brian Walshe may have interpreted and reacted to cues that his wife wanted to or *could* leave and, being an obviously money-obsessed crook, may have begun to worry about the financial consequences. His wife’s murder may be partly an expression of what he felt about the idea. Some would argue that enforcing child support only increases the motive for spousal murder. But what if she could have escaped with the support of the state before he built up a head of steam about it, based on other controlling behaviors?

Or did Brian Walshe want to divorce his wife because he had her replacement lined up? Did he kill her in a fit of rage because she was onto him? It’s so far unknown if alleged killer Brian Walshe was so desperate for money because part of his high-spending lifestyle included hookers and/or side bets but, in my experience working in DV, most abusers cheat. In any event, I’ve been watching to see if the hookers and side pieces start cropping up in the Walshe story if just because perp cheating was involved in both cases that “Jennifer’s Law” in Connecticut was based on.

Here’s the relevant thing for CN: the patterns of sub-violent abusive behavior described in many coercive control statutes would be terribly familiar to any chump. I’m chewing on a theory that DV, in essence, may be largely if not definably based on abusers enforcing sexual double standards but it’s besides the point. The fact is many chumps– male and female– describe patterns of abuse that precisely define coercive control. Though outlawing adultery itself is too problematic to be legislatable in democratic societies, outlawing many the abusive behaviors that typically facilitate cheating might at last provide some justice and protections for chumps and their children.

It may be a while before legislators and the public come to understand what advocates on the ground know: that cheating is almost always an element in domestic abuse if not the central MO of abusers. One obstacle to a wider understanding of this is that abuse victims seeking justice and protection are typically discouraged from mentioning perpetrators’ cheating because of the tendency of bystanders and even those in helping professions to misinterpret (either willfully or out of ignorance) victims’ descriptions of infidelity as proof victims “fabricated” abuse out of “jealousy.” I’ve seen DAs drop cases based solely on the victim’s inclusion of infidelity in perfectly documented reports of felony battering. Consequently victims are advised to leave those elements out and, in turn, those aspects are less likely to end up in the literature on abuse. Another issue that lends to this misinterpretation of cheating within domestic abuse is that bystanders and less experienced helping professionals don’t understand why discovery of cheating is often the “last straw” that drives chronic abuse victims to finally make a run for it. But the answer for that is easy: victims will generally try to leave when the danger of staying exceeds the very considerable danger of trying to leave (70-fold increased risk of being killed by an abuser within two weeks of escape). And one signal that the danger of staying has ramped up is when victims sense they’ve lost the one remaining reassurance that their abusers might keep them alive– because the abuser still has sexual “use” for them. But when an abuser seems to be seeking to replace the victim, that one last shred of reassurance and window of safety disappear and the danger of staying starts to match or exceed the danger of leaving. Furthermore, even if the culture lags in understanding something fundamental about abuser psychology, victims may have the gut knowledge that most abusers have a sort of Louis XV “after me, the flood!” attitude towards partners. Relating to something called “masked dependency” in domestic abusers, even abusers who seem to have completely switched allegiances to new partners often act like dogs with two bones and can’t bear the idea that their former victims will go on to have fulfilling lives and relationships without them. This can explain why so many abusers/cheaters will relentlessly target their victims’ self esteem so that the abuser can reassure themselves that victims will be left too traumatized and broken to ever escape of their own volition or to move on in the case the victim is abandoned. Apparently some abusers don’t leave things to chance, require more reassurance of partners’ paralysis and will kill their partners. Most situations don’t turn lethal but will still involve degrees of scorched earth psychological abuse, coercion and control. The point being that even an abuser seeking to leave a partner is little reassurance that the abuser won’t kill and that money motives aren’t the only reason why.

There’s already a worldwide push to add coercive control legislation and I’m afraid if chumps don’t get directly involved in shaping the language of CC laws, the laws could end up overly broad and double-edged similar to dual arrest DV policies in some regions. Dual arrest laws have been criticized for allowing victims to be arrested and charged with assault (based on the word of batterers) when victims were merely trying to ward off blows and defend themselves. Similarly, laws defining coercive control have the potential to be unfairly double edged in the sense that, say, spying on partners’ phones or online activities– something mentioned in UK legislation– is a typical thing for chump to do to protect themselves from STDs or other dangers involved in cheating such as financial abuse. It’s also a natural gesture to find proof before making an accusation since cheaters/abusers lie and gaslight so much or may try to hide assets or take other punishing measures if they sense their victims are onto them (and some will kill). By rights there should be fine points and exceptions in the language of coercive control laws. Of course any abuser could argue that any such loophole applies to them by pretending their reasons for controlling and snooping partners’ phone use and online activities were based on suspicions of cheating but, in well-crafted laws based on overall abusive patterns, snooping would be only one of many coercive and controlling behaviors, not something taken on its own.

It wouldn’t be the worst thing if finely-tuned coercive control legislation raised cultural awareness for what constitutes coercive and controlling behavior and even betrayed partners were discouraged from going over the top and gonzo in their efforts to sleuth and prevent infidelity. The wiser thing is to get out. But to the extent that evidence of infidelity can be a tactical advantage for victims trying to protect themselves, escape and get fair settlements and support, the laws shouldn’t end up as traps for chumps’ understandable protective responses to signs of adultery and the patterns of abuse that typically come with adultery. I think chumps need to step into the ring on this.

My eldest daughter’s bio-dad decided to be a deadbeat who wouldn’t work, so I never got a dime from him. Being a single mom with no support of any kind left me vulnerable to the FW who came after him (FW had a decent job), so I do blame him to some extent. FW adopted my eldest after we married. The bio-dad signed away his rights because he didn’t give a shit and was glad to let somebody else take responsibility.

Deadbeat parents are child abusers. Neglect is abuse. They belong in prison. I am not in Massachusetts, but will send a donation to that wonderful organization, and for a nice touch of irony, I’ll put it on the credit card FW pays the bills for per our agreement. I hope they take Mastercard. 😁
Thankfully, the FW is too big a narcissist to want to be seen as deadbeat, so he pays whatever I want him to.

I recently found out that my cheater ex raided our kid’s college fund because, in his words to our child, “I had to pay child support to your mother.” He paid a paltry amount for 2 years while I was finishing up my advanced degree (that we had agreed as a married couple I would pursue) after receiving more than half of our assets in the divorce because I was tired of fighting and just kept making concessions. He paid this paltry amount while being gainfully employed as tenured high-level staff. During this time, he bought a giant house and went on numerous vacations. But yea, he “needed” to raid the kids college fund.

So now, I have a couple of years to figure out how to pay for said child’s college…because I know damn well he ain’t gonna contribute.

These people have no sense of shame. But, as it turns out, my teenager absolutely knows who’s there for her and who funds all of this stuff and who works long hard hours to do so…that’s me! We’re already talking about college costs and what I can pay and what she’ll need to contribute to. Her dad will have zero say in any of it. Honestly, I’d rather go into debt paying for every red cent then let him have a say or be able to try and hold a college degree over her head.