She Wins Her Custody Battle Thanks to Chump Nation
A member of Chump Nation writes in to say, thanks to your support, and hard-won wisdom, you helped her win her custody battle.
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Dear Chump Lady,
I am writing about Tuesdays and what we, as chumps, gain through this whole awful experience. I’ve been divorced from my ex for three years and am seven years post my final D-day. And yet, this entire last year I have spent in a legal battle with my ex as he tries to get more time with the kids, aka put on a good show for his new wife and her family.
It’s been exhausting.
He is an attorney and is ready to litigate everything. Since our original agreement, he has regularly threatened to take me to court, though this is the first time he has actually filed formally. This sounds like I haven’t gained much, and I won’t lie, it has been very, very costly, time intensive and emotionally draining.
But here is what I have gained. I recently settled his suit with an agreement that is extremely good for me and for the kids. He tried all of his usual bullying. And the manipulation and trying to tell me I should do things “for the kids.” He tried guilt. He rained down barrages of detailed arguments about minutiae. (All of this from someone who once professed to love me, no less.)
My attorney put heavy pressure on me to settle because he kept threatening to make me pay his legal fees and dramatically stating how ridiculous I was being or how my terrible offers were just beyond the pale.
And I DID NOT GIVE IN.
I am so incredibly proud of myself. I told my attorney (and honestly myself) that he is in it for the show — to make himself out to be the victim. He never actually wanted the time with the kids, he just wanted to harass me. He is bluffing and will never go to court and have his massage parlor activities publicly aired.
And I was right. He took my amazing settlement offer at the last minute. Chump Nation, you have educated me in how to read a fuckwit, and I saw through him and got what I wanted for me and for the kids.
And the manipulation? Water off a ducks back.
I learned to skip the accusation sentences and pull out only the useful information. I managed my exposure by not reading his written accusation or sitting in the room for his deposition. Friends and family buffered for me so I could maintain sanity. I do things like put a sticky note over his face on the screen when I have to be on an online call with him. He became a nothing to me. White noise. And I see all of the manipulation. It doesn’t mean it has no emotional impact, but I can spot manipulation a mile away.
This has been an unexpected and painful exercise in learning to trust myself and chart my own path. I bucked legal counsel because I knew who I was dealing with. And I was right. We were right. In the end, they just want to impression manage and play the victim without anyone knowing the truth. I’m feeling unexpectedly proud and have a new trust in my instincts thanks to the gauntlet my ex has required me to walk.
SecondSelf
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Dear SecondSelf,
I know I speak for all of Chump Nation when I say CONGRATS on winning your custody battle! Here’s to your new chapter in sane parenting!
You stood up the bully and he folded. Well done!
We don’t give legal advice here at CN (this caveat from Mr. CL, a lawyer), but we do give amazing support. All the newbie chumps get the benefit of our hard-won experience (and legal and therapy bills). The goal of this place is to shorten the learning curve and spare as much pain as possible for the next chump. And with this Tuesday post, SecondSelf, you’ve done that. Thank you for the inspiration.
Even if you win a custody battle, you still feel like you’ve been shoved head-first through a meat grinder. When you bring children into the world, you never imagine family court in your future.
CN, tell me what you learned about facing down FWs in court.
And if you’ve had a legal win too, please share it.
Happy Tuesday everyone! Kudos SecondSelf!
To anyone experiencing litigation abuse, please check out the resources at WomensLaw.org
Congratulations, Second Self! You handled the legal system like a champ, not a chump. Enjoy Tuesday. You earned it 🙂
It isn’t a court thing, but learning to say No. No is a perfectly acceptable answer to anything they ask or push.
I agree. The last time I had to say no to FW (issues regarding the sale of the family home) he started to ramp up the rage. I hung up the phone on him immediately before he could start in. He wanted me to sign a six month contract with a realtor he chose. I was not giving anyone (let alone somebody he chose) six months because she might fuck things up. FW thought I was being unreasonable and he did not want to compromise, but I was adamant. I had a suspicion the realtor did not know her business well, but we settled on giving her a chance for three months. Lo and behold, she fucked it up. She overpriced it and recommended an ugly, depressing paint color (which FW insisted was a great color) so the open house was a flop even though there was only one other house in that price range in the entire (very desirable) neighborhood and it was in worse shape. We should have had an offer immediately, as about a dozen buyers were at the open. FW has to suck on me being proven right yet again, which burns him no end every time. Poor FW. No wonder he had to cheat.
It’s all about them and how they can get the most advantage or attention from a given situation.
This!! For me, learning to be unshakeable in my conviction is the big gain. Being able to say No, firmly and confidently. It has been really hard to shake the self-doubt that all the gaslighting created, but this whole, awful legal process has been a huge boost to my confidence.
– SecondSelf
Oh yeah, because you know a tantrum will come with setting limits. Not fun, but necessary.
Yep, sitting with the discomfort while they accuse you of being all sorts of awful things, just for not giving into what they want. You just have to remind yourself that they are selfish pieces of crap that have shown through their actions, time and time again, that they have no idea what’s best for your kid, they only know what’s most convenient for themselves.
Congratulations SecondSelf!! This is HUGE! And your story helps so many!!
What I learned about facing FW in court… from the start, FW wouldn’t agree to anything … not even an emergency financial agreement so I could pay the bills and support our 9 year old son. So we had to go to court right away for Pendente Lite.
I was terrified. I had never been to court like that before. But I got counsel from my attorney to be brief and non-reactive (no matter what FW said) and from my therapist that told me to take my time and observe. And you know what I realized? I’m telling the TRUTH. I had nothing to fear. So I was calm and honest and looked his antagonistic lawyer right in the eye. And FW was FREAKING OUT… he mumbled and was backing away like he wanted to crawl out of the courtroom.
And I was awarded “more than maximum.”
It doesn’t always work that way. It really depends on the judge. But just remember — you are telling the truth. You will be ok. And it will strike fear in a FW in court.
Michelle, kudos to you! And your layer’s advice to wait a beat before responding is priceless: detach, consider, answer calmly. Took me years of therapy to learn, but it’s a winning combination guaranteed to make me not look like the raving lunatic I used to be.
*lawyer’s advice
“I got counsel from my attorney to be brief and non-reactive (no matter what FW said)….what I realized? I’m telling the TRUTH. I had nothing to fear. So I was calm and honest and looked his antagonistic lawyer right in the eye.”
Great advice. Years prior to divorce, I went through a different multi-year custody battle that was so contentious it was escalated from family court to district court with a Judge who handled murders and other crimes. For three days, the Judge stared at me. Stared. Even my attorney noticed and mentioned it the first day. She said he was watching my reactions. So I stayed calm and non-reactive, even when the other attorney, party and witnesses–including a second Parental Responsibility Evaluator he hired, and the PRE’s cronies– were telling outrageous lies and making wildly ludicrous claims.
Atr one point, they tried to show a video of me and child in an attempt to discredit me, but the court’s AV system and large screen wouldn’t work. My attorney was horrified when I spoke up and suggested to the judge that he play it on a laptop and I could explain what he was seeing, since the image was so small. I was able to give the facts and the context and explain what wasn’t visible. Without my suggestion to show it that way, they wouldn’t have been able to bring this video into evidence, but by doing so, I proved I had nothing to hide and was able to make strong points in my favor.
The Judge continued to focus on me throughout the trial. Whenever I looked in his direction, I could see him watching me. My attorney concurred that she noticed it too. It was awkward. Sometimes I looked him in the eye, other times I looked at whoever was testifying, and sometimes I just looked at my notes. I stayed outwardly calm, although I was churning inside.
In his 14-page ruling, the Judge noted that I was “consistent, credible and convincing,”and had proven that I always had the child’s best interest at heart, even to my own detriment. He also spent several pages shredding the opposition’s key witness (the second PRE) as a “hired gun” who ignored the evidence against his client,, the evidence FOR me, and fabricated claims against me.
Staying calm when you are falsely accused seems counter-intutive, but it apparently paid off.
BTW, I also won my custody case with FW, and now have full and sole custody. Both cases were extremely expenseve, but worth it.
Wow, Michelle and GoodFriend, you are MIGHTY!!! Congratulations to both of you.
My takeaway from having endured an abusive childhood followed by two bad marriages: Thankfully, I learned to keep a poker face (maybe with a faint smile), speak logically and coherently, and appear composed while my life was in utter turmoil. Still undergoing therapy, but I manage to appear put together on the outside.
Wow!!!! Your calm in the face of overwhelming litigation abuse is truly inspiring. Mighty!!!
Expensive.
I had to sue my ex, a judge, twice for child support. He was threatening to try to get more time with my daughter because guess what, that cuts the amount of child support he hast to pay. By the time I was able to get the money, and put it in a 529 plan for her college, it was enough that it later paid for Stanford . The icing on the cake was when her dad was yelling at her in college about some nonsense, and how he “paid for her college,” And her boyfriend turned to her and said “wasn’t it your mom‘s back child support that paid for your college?“ hahaha.
Second self, congratulations on the win! And thank you for expressing yourself so beautifully here and encouraging others!
I’ve heard the lawyers are reluctant to take cases against other lawyers. Finding one to take a case against a judge must havebeen really tough. And to have to sue him twice???
Love that daughter’s boyfriend called out FW for lying that he paid for her college. I hope they’re smart enought to realize that you would have had MORE money if FW hadn’t run up your legal fees.
Right? Points to that boyfriend. Sometimes it seems like the kids might be all right.
A judge not paying child support… That is awful. Is he crazy?
Clearwaters, some might say 😂 unfortunately, back in the day (this was 20 years ago), it was very hard to get child support from deadbeat dads.
My attorney quoted a study that only about half are actually receiving the court-ordered amount in a timely manner, and he said it’s about the same for alimony, if you get it. In my state, alimony is awarded in less than 10% of the cases.
It’s still hard. Ask me how I know.
He tried to hide money. Thanks to CN I quietly copied everything before he moved out. Big surprise in court. I can not thank CL enough for this blog, for the book, for the podcast.
document document document. Cheater was balking at dividing assets: he was poor. So I showed the credit card balances of holidays at spas, expensive (feminine) shoes and watches
Congrats!!! “he is in it for the show — to make himself out to be the victim” Exactly right.
When the abuser hooks a new Stepmom Appliance, that’s typically when he takes the Mother back to court.
my cheater tries to be a victim until today, 7 years divorced…
Brilliant news for SecondSelf!
I guess that my legal win came from making sure that I dotted the “I”s and crossed the “T”s and really understood our Divorce agreement. That way, when – and this was after our Divorce was settled, the Divorce Agreement signed and the Decree Absolute issued – Ex-Mrs LFTT tried to bully her way into the rental property that I lived in with our children “because she was entitled to take half of all of the white goods, anything that was hers and anything that her parents had paid for” I was able to shut her BS down.
I simply pointed out that, as per the Divorce agreement in which she had signed the contents of the property over to me, she had no entitlement to anything in the property and that she might want to get her solicitors to explain the Divorce Agreement to her. Her threats to take me to Court over this came to nothing; I suspect because her Solicitors knew that they would lose.
LFTT
SecondSelf, great news to begin my day with! Inspiring for other reasons too, came at the right time. Congratulations!
About cheaters not wanting to go to court and have their massage parlor activities publicly aired, this exact strategy worked for me too. Cheater even ended up paying 70% of my legal bills. He made the mistake of hiring the lawyer from his public office job thinking his bullying would work quickly. And that I still loved enough to keep quiet? Or didn’t know about all his garbage? I don’t care. This works with cheaters that have to save face is what I think.
THIS!!! This is why I still support ChumpLady, even though I am waaaay past my Tuesday and firmly ensconced in the Land of Meh. Thank you for sharing your victory with all of us, SecondSelf. Your victory is our victory! Love to all of ChumpNation as we ForgeOn! to new victories
It is the mark of a civilized person to turn back and help others across the bridge. You’re civilized.
Thank you kindly…..
Congrats! You’ve done us all proud and taken another step toward showing these fuckwits that we’re not going to fucking take it anymore!
Chump 1, FW 0
Yay!
One of the saddest days of my life, and also one of my proudest, is when my daughter said about her dad, Traitor Ex, “He wants his life to himself. He doesn’t have room in his life for a child. Clearly he didn’t want to live with a child.”
Saddest day because that is the last thing I ever wanted when we decided to have a baby, and my heart is broken about this. I did as much as possible to make sure our relationship was solid before making that decision. We had been together sixteen years, married for nine before I got pregnant. He was the baby cheerleader. I would never have guessed he was also a family annihilator.
Proudest day because this was an extremely astute observation on my daughter’s part with no negative influencing from me. I supported what she wanted to do. I got her her own therapist to work this out with. I confined any comments to facts. He needed no assistance from me showing her who he is.
He only saw her a few hours a week and never asked for more, and she knew it. His priority is the massage parlor worker he ditched us for, and she knows it. You can never unring that bell.
When a cheater makes requests to do things “for the kids”, show them the spreadsheet comparing the time, attention, and resources spent on the side pieces compared to the time, attention, and resources spent on the children.
Even so, no one who cares about a child destroys their family and kneecaps one of their parents.
To burn down the bird’s nest with the baby birds and one of the parents in it, and then claim to care about the baby birds is insane.
Congrats Second Self!
Chump nation helped me get through being depositioned by my ex’s lawyer. The ex was threatening to take me to court to get custody to be 50/50 the way he wanted it with our child having to swap houses every day (Mine Monday, his tuesday, mine Wednesday, etc) to fit his work schedule. All I got were threats from the ex and accusations that I was the one making the legal stuff difficult because I’d asked if he considered our son’s needs/schedule when making his plan (nope), and pointed out that swapping houses daily is NOT good for kid.
In the end, I was able to stay calm and answer questions factually while deposed. Due to how much the ex put me through, I was also able to give a credible timeline of what month/year his actions occurred. This included a bit of ongoing severe mental health issues he apparently omitted to tell his lawyer about. His lawyer thankfully saw the writing on the wall and got the ex to settle for a reasonable custody agreement after that.
I’ve had a few family court battles with X. The first I lost – I made the mistake of trusting the system was reasonable and no one could possibly believe his holier-than-thou act after learning the truth about his behavior. I learned my lesson. JUDGES DON’T CARE ABOUT INFIDELITY. The next time, with a new lawyer and less emotion, my son and I won big time. My son desperately wanted to attend a different high school than his father’s chosen Catholic school. Instead of “exposing” X’s not-so-Catholic behavior, we focused on the facts and the law. And when X started yammering on about his faith and his morals and how our son would become a godless heathen if he went to a secular school, the judge asked him if divorce and remarriage was allowed in the Catholic church. Lol. He also put in his decision “Mr. X should consider taking some responsibility for his actions.”
It was extremely satisfying to know someone had seen through the dirtbag.
Congraulations, SecondSelf! It must have been very difficult to deal not only with your FW, an atttorney, but also your own attorney: “My attorney put heavy pressure on me to settle … I bucked legal counsel because I knew who I was dealing with. And I was right.”
So many other Chumps know that thier FWs are seeking custody to avoid paying support, for image management, or to punish /control them. And since FWs often have bigger purses, it’s hard to fight them in court when you need the money for food and shelter.
Sticky notes over FW’s face were a great idea. My kiddo did that to his face with stickers on family photos, so I got the message and took them down.
I love the sticky note idea! Or maybe an Alfred E. Neuman sticker. What, me worry?
Congrats to OP… if there is a good fight to fight.. this is the one. As OP said… it’s brutal.. but we do it for the kids.
The one thing I learned .. ok apparently 2: Tell your lawyer EVERYthing. And for all that is holy… change them when needed.
Many years ago, with my first divorce and it involved our 2 kids 6 & 7. Everything was completely off and wrong and I didn’t know *what* was wrong but I knew I was drowning and had to get out. My moment of clarity was when he pressured/forced me to contact DHHS for food stamps bc his contributions to the family were dwindling with no explanations. After making up a story how he wasn’t in the picture… this wonderful lady just listened but she really, really heard me. She very quietly asked if I was being abused. He hadn’t outright hit me but there was soooo much abuse that I wasn’t educated about and hadn’t clocked. I paused and said that he hadn’t hit me. She quickly gave me the number for a support group and urgently urged me to go. I did. I didn’t get any DHHS help as was right but ironically I got EXACTLY what I needed.
I attended a few meetings on the side… realized this was a waking nightmare and made my plans incognito (he worked 2nd shift so I was able to do that). The first lawyer I got said I wouldn’t get anything but standard custody arrangements and I was absolutely sick to my stomach bc that was unacceptable. The problem was I didn’t have ANY proof other than one phone call to the police when he was stalking us outside our home late at night when he knew other family members weren’t home. On a side note I had called the police but hung up before they answered bc I didn’t think it amounted to anything. THEY called me back and when I tried to play it off as a mistake… they came right out and that’s how I had that single report.
Fast forward to Thanksgiving when my lawyer insisted I give them up for the whole holiday weekend. He was working on Friday and supposedly a “church friend”s’ teenage daughter would babysit. Thanksgiving night when my daughter told me they were going to work with said “Church friend” named “Linda” I lost my ever-loving mind bc she worked in an in/out patient drug rehab. I am not slamming that work.. been there done that.. but I wouldn’t take my own, much less anyone else’s, 6 & 7 year old there for the freeking day! Mind you I had an ex-parte order that this very lawyer got for me and he’s giving me this advice! Even tho he really didn’t know all the things.
After sitting in the police station until 2a I did get my kids back that night/morning. When we showed up at his door, him and his “church friend” were sleeping on the sofa bed and he was buckling up his pants… thankfully my sister pushed me through so I didn’t lose my mind in front of the LEOs… the week before he was begging me to take him back after my father had JUST PASSED AWAY unexpectedly.
I went to my weekly DV group 2 days later and they hooked me up with a new lawyer that my sister paid for thankfully. My first appointment, he first complimented me and I brushed it off… he taught me in that moment how to gracefully accept a compliment. Spent the next 15 minutes outlining the situation. Mind you he knew I got his number from the DV group.. he got a lot of clients that way and I now know why.
After that brief story… he pushed a full rectangle box of Kleenx across the desk my way… looked me in the eye and said “Now tell me what’s really going on. ALL of it”.
I spent 2 hours and the whole box of Kleenx telling him every ugly detail and suspicion.. everything from drug use to affairs with both genders (me and the kids had to be STD/HIV tested per lawyer and doctor.. thankfully all neg) .. I was so ashamed and it took alot for me to understand I wasn’t at fault. This lawyer thanked me for trusting him and that he’d work out a plan and he’d make sure I never had to worry about what the ex would be doing with my kids ever again.
I don’t know what this lawyer did… what evidence he gathered or what was said… but a week later he had my ex come in and have a conversation with the lawyer… alone. My ex dropped the suit and I got full legal and physical custody.
The ex eventually fled the state. He tried a handful of times to contact the kids but we (me and my family) blocked that as it seemed best to keep that chaos from them until they were adults and were more emotionally mature to handle his manipulations not to mention free to make their own choices which I would fully support. They also know we blocked that minimal contact and are grateful for it. I have always been as honest as possible given age.
A decade ago when the kids were in college (over 18) he got in touch with me due to being diagnosed with cancer and didn’t have much longer. He asked me to reach out to the kids and let them know. I did facilitate that as I am no longer in the position to regulate that contact. One child chose some contact while fully transparent that it was mostly to show him what he fucked up and missed out on… the other was in the middle of critical finals and chose not to have contact. I fully supported both equally as they are individuals and this was their choice/decision. He passed a few months later.
I think just like with therapists… we’re allowed to interview THEM… we’re allowed to change when the fit isn’t right.. and when it fits… tell them EVERYthing.
I just want to add that my life has been quite the journey and that wasn’t the only lesson I needed to learn. I continued to have abusive relationships due to an abusive childhood and ended up here with you ladies and gentlemen. Because of this group and some intensive therapy, I have learned the lesson. I am finally on my own for the first time in my life at 61. I escaped from a very dangerous man 2 1/2 years ago in large part because after a post I made in the FB private group, I was asked by the community simply and directly “Is this acceptable to you?”. I am now supporting the ex’s son’s GF exit.. that’s a whole nother story lol.
This group finally cemented to me I have agency and value and no longer have to put up or fix these shennanigans. The repeated stories that were so similar finally showed me it’s them.. not us. Thank you ALL for all that you do.
So mighty! I’m older too and can’t believe that I’ve finally figured out life. I was a brutally abused child and thought that the key to a good marriage was ignoring my own feelings and keeping up appearances. Then my marriage collapsed when my exdecided to reinvent himself in another state. What a relief though!
My attorney was a lot like yours, assuring me that he had already heard it all and that he needed to hear every dark corner and suspicion in order to properly represent me and to begin working on a trial strategy. He had me come in for what he called a “marital history” appointment, where I recited the whole history as he probed for the signs of trouble and my STBX’s motivations. That was way more intense than any therapy session I’ve ever had, but he assured me that he fully understood the situation and was prepared for whatever was ahead.
And then bit-by-bit, he moved it forward.
One time I was sitting across from him at his big conference table, and I said, “You know, you are scary good at what you do.” He said, “I know. Aren’t you glad I’m on your side?”
We settled in a dramatic flourish without a trial. He retired the day after the judge signed off.
Truly worth every penny I paid him.
Wow, you are mighty!
I can’t think of anything worse then leaving this world without my kids in my life because I was a piece of shit.
My own father, when he was on his way out from cancer, told me he didn’t know how anyone faced it without family. I get that family can be toxic so thats not what I mean….I mean no family because you’re a scumbag and ran them off.
That’s why upon hearing of a passing Jews will wish for the decreased person’s memory to be a blessing. I mean, what greater legacy can one leave then a blessed memory?
Your ex could have left this world with his children by his side. On some level he knew that or he wouldn’t have reached out.
Glad you got free and have your children with you!
You all are the best. Thank you so much for all the support. I really do rely on everyone here to help ground me in reality, in those times when co-parenting with a manipulator is crazy-making.
I’m so looking forward to putting the legal shenanigans behind me and refocusing on parenting how I want to parent and building my life without the Ex looming over us.
A great resource for dealing with court, law enforcement, and narcs is Donna Andersen at https://lovefraud.com/blog/ . I wish I found her before my divorce and custody battles, instead of afterwards when dealing with a family socipath.
Donna has several relevant webinars including “Surviving Court when You’re Traumatized.”Although her focus is sociopaths, her advice is relevant to most chumps, regardless of their FW’s mental status. Her webinars feature attorneys, police officers, psychologists and others to teach viewers how to file reports, handle courts, deal with exes, etc. She also has excellent free articles.
She introduced me to Legal Abuse Sybdrome, something I already knew from Real Life. Like Chump Lady, she shows you the scripts and playbook they use to harrass you.
SecondSelf has been divorced for three years and spent the past year in a custody battle. A ruling is not necessarily the end, as FWs like to threaten court and follow through if it suits their needs or narratives, particularly when they are narcissists.
Although it’s exhausting to continue to document details in real time and may seem pointless if you’ve reached an agreement or won your case, documentation may be essential down the line if FWs chose to re-litigate or make false accusations.
There’s a whole industry of psychologists who are guns for hire and will claim parental alienation in order to get custody for FWs. They are an actual network that make referrals to each other as additional “unbiased” outside experts for court cases, pulling in tens of thousands of dollars per case in fees, fees that the court may order you to share.
Big tip: When they go to court, expert witnesses have to prove their credentials, usually consisting of a CV (resume’) that lists their experience and professional publications. If your opponent’s expert offers “professional” publications as evidence of their expertise, research the articles. I did so and discovered that only ONE of a multitude of listed articles was legit, and that was decades earlier and completely unrelated, as a student co-author who was credited with his professor and about a dozen other students. Since I coudn’t find the other listed works, I contacted PubMed, the database for legitimate journals through the National Library of Medicine, and learned that the other publications he listed were either fabricated or self-published, and in no way legitimate research credentials. Here’s the webiste, which you can search by author name, You can call for help or verification that the citations don’t exist. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
That parental alienation garbage is so toxic. It has cost many loving parents their children and has even cost children their lives. Anyone who assesses “parental alienation” for a living is a quack and should be thrown in jail for child abuse. (If you can’t tell, I’ve had parental alienation accusations leveled at me when X realized the children preferred me to him.)
Yes, “in it for the show” with a side of “the world owes me.” Even his own attorney called my ex on that after some months, and then he went on rant fests with my attorney over “the worst client ever.”
But we got it settled in a flourish of drama. My attorney held the line and got me what I wanted. It was a reasonable settlement, ultimately. My STBX signed, but he was unhappy because he had been knocked down a notch. We fully expected an appeal, but it didn’t happen. Then my ex made the beginning of closeout a mess to “pay” me back, but he eventually ran out of issues to ping me on and supposedly found “love.” He leaves us alone.
I always tell locals going through these messes to hold a reasonable line. Getting yourself and your children set up for the future is worth finding and paying professionals who are fully on your side if you need them. Several locals I know went pro se and finally got full custody after some years. That’s a massive amount of work, but they did it. They are superheroes in my eyes.
Mine isn’t as awesome as SecondSelf’s, but when I divorced my kids father (he wasn’t a cheater, just a nasty abusive drunk…..hb #2 was the cheater) he threatened me with the “most horrible divorce ever” if I got a lawyer.
Not sure what he thought that would look like, he was active duty and they wouldn’t have allowed him to have custody even if he’d ever expressed one iota of interest in his kids lives. Bullies gonna bully I suppose.
I wished him good luck and then told him to fuck off. Then my lawyer and I offered him a very nice financial deal because I was studying a hard science and knew I’d be ok. His lawyer told him to take it before I changed my mind because a judge would never give him that good of a deal. He took it.
That was almost 20 years ago. I make well over 6 figures and he’s broke but managing with a long time live in gf. We get along pretty well even though we really only interact if our boys have sometimes going on, but they’re grown now so they have their own relationship with him.
I learned that bullies will often fold if you tell them to fuck right off and ignore them. They feed on reactions.
Congratulations, Second Self! You, quite simply, rock the entire house, garden, neighborhood, city, nation and pretty much galaxy actually. Thank you so, so much for sharing your triumph.
And CN — you also rock the heck out of this here solar system. Sometimes it feels like h. sapiens doesn’t have much going for it, but y’all demonstrate how untrue that is. Thank you.
Hats off to SecondSelf!! My heart goes out to those who’s FW got away with their BS. I am in a no fault very liberal pro Dad county/state. It was a 2 year battle for me. At first it was set at 50/50, then with patience and documentation(lots of it, felt like a full time job) my attorney and I got most. He has every other weekend. My motto, trust that they suck. It is exhausting, downright almost killed me. However, being raised by a narcissist and my therapist kept me going. I did not want any more exposure to crazy for my kid. She has a good relationship with him now, just enough time to be the “fun” parent.
Great job, Secondself!
Counsel forgets that this isn’t just all in a day’s work- this is our life we’re fighting for and our future that some twat is trying to steal from us.
I’m about to go undefended after months of bullshit and no paperwork that wasn’t lies.
He’s trying to wear me down and continue his abuse by looking like a poor timid forest creature to the court.
It’s not going to work- it’s killing me but I’ll see it through.
Not a lawyer, but my understanding is that in my state, attorneys have to formally notify the court and parties that they are withdrawing from the case, and you then tell the court if you have changed attorneys or are representing yourself knoiwn as aoppearing “pro se.”
Depending on your state, that may mean that HIS attorney will be ordered by the court to file all paperwork. It may also mean that the judge has to be more lenient in the court’s expectations of you.
If so, you may be able to present information your attorney might have disregarded, AND you can demonstrate that you are sane and sensible.
I think lovefraud, which I mentioned earlier, has info on representing yourself in court.
It’s scary to be up there on your own. If you can’t imagine Chump Nation backing you up, picture Tracy standing behind you!
Thank you so much- I will certainly be studying the resources on that link- thank you.
Way to be mighty!!!! What an inspiring story, thanks so much for sharing.
Awesome job Second Self! I’ve had to go back to court twice with my ex. Unfortunately, when I first split with the ex, I hadn’t found Chump Lady, and I was still giving my ex the benefit of the doubt, thinking he would “do the right thing” when it came to our daughter. So I ended up agreeing to 50/50 in mediation.
However, I’m glad I was able to have our divorce filed in the county I was living in (the county we had been in while still married) as ex had moved a county over when he moved back with his mom and also conveniently close to schmoopie and her family. It was an easy sell as my county was smaller with a shorter backlog for getting family cases reviewed, signed off, etc. It turns out, having “home court” advantage ended up being in my favor when we had to go back to court not long after the divorce was finalized. One item we couldn’t agree on was where daughter would start school. We were living 20 miles apart at that time. Covid hit, which delayed things, but we got a preliminary hearing right before the start of the school year. Judge issued a temporary order for daughter to start at the neighborhood school near me. It also helped that my (more expensive) attorney was much more well prepared for the brief argument he was allowed to present before the judge.
Before the final hearing months later, ex saw the writing on the wall and moved back to the city we had been in. I did have to push back against my legal counsel who just wanted to wrap up that “win” but I insisted we add language that spelled out the health & hygiene expectations that he was supposed to meet (yeah, he was that checked out, taking her to family parties with a fever, dressing her in clothes and shoes that were too small). The other attorney in the practice drafted some language I could live with to be added to the agreement. They advised it would still be hard to change things from the 50/50 we had initially agreed on, especially since ex was selling his new house to move closer to daughter’s school.
About a year later, even though I was paying child support (higher earner so even with 50/50 I had to pay him which was frustrating as he and schmoopie bought a house $200K more expensive than mine, much larger, yet I was writing him checks every month) he was refusing to reimburse me 50% of my childcare expenses that we had agreed upon in our original settlement. I recall our mediator going into great detail about that clause, why she felt it was important, and was something she preferred to put in her agreements for her clients. She wanted to make sure we both understood what that meant. This time I filed a Request For Order for Accounting pro se. I also wanted my child support payments reviewed since I suspected he was making more. He was using the same flakey, disorganized (but a good deal!) attorney as before. His responses were filed late and poorly written. Right before the second hearing I worked out a settlement where I would stop paying child support and he would no longer be responsible for reimbursing a portion of my childcare expenses and I accepted a lower payment for the back pay on the reimbursement that had accrued. Of course, it didn’t end there! Two, three months go by and FW’s bozo attorney still hadn’t written up and filed the stipulation! I emailed his attorney. I emailed FW. Eventually I got fed up and had the RFO put back on the calendar. Same day I get FW and his lawyer begging me not to do that. All they had to do was write up and sign the stipulation that we had agreed on! I told them no stipulation, no taking off the calendar. Guess what finally got written up and signed in a couple of days? These FWs and their BS excuses are exhausting!
Ex is still a checked-out ass-hat that misses half of daughter’s soccer games so he can play golf, and didn’t even realize she had a new inhaler that he needed to bring back when he dropped her off the other day. Whatever, our house is peaceful and joyful without him in it. And at least on my time, I get to parent the way I want to.
Our divorce was quick, simple, and in the fall of 2020, so I didn’t have to GO to court, but it still amuses me to remember — a week after D-day I had to see him in person to get HIS name off of MY business account, and I mentioned that “I made an appointment with a lawyer on Monday.” He actually got offended! 😂
Fercryingoutloud, I was a court reporter for years and reported hundreds of divorce depositions. I know how these can turn. OF COURSE I’M GETTING A LAWYER YOU DINGUS.
I guess he thought I’d let him loose with a DIY divorce so he could ride off into the sunset with his 20-year-old Schmoopie. (He was 48.) But he was never one to think things through.
👏👏👏 🍾🥂
I love these kind of stories.
Less than 24 hours after learning that my husband of 14 years had been having an affair while working on the road, he left with a packed bag and moved thousands of miles away, leaving me with two small babies in diapers in a home we didn’t own with no help. I scraped together what we could pack in a Pod and moved back to California to live in the spare room of my mom‘s house while I tried to figure out how I was going to do this on my own with two small babies. When I think back to those days I know without a shadow of of a doubt that I have PTSD. It was the most gutting and traumatizing time of my entire life.
I received wonderful help and support from members of my family and about a year and a half after moving in with my mom I rented a small house for me and the kids. Fast-forward a few years later, and I’m in the yard building them a play structure when someone comes up and serves me papers to appear in court for custody of the kids. He hadn’t visited them once in over 4 years, but suddenly he wanted custody.
It cost me almost $7,000 in attorneys fees. He didn’t even show up in court, he did it all over speakerphone. But God had my back in every possible way that day. My ex had hired a lawyer who was incompetent, actually eliciting laughter in the courtroom from his poor memory and general lack of knowledge. I had an amazing lawyer, who argued that in order for this man to even be considered for custody that he would need to go through extensive reparation therapy with the kids to make sure he is a trusted adult in their eyes before they get on a plane and go anywhere with him. The court agreed.
Since he had acted like a victim who was cruelly separated from his kids, I assumed he would come complete the therapy and then get awarded visitation. But he never did, and now it’s been 10 years and he still has never visited them once. It’s just like she said – it’s impression management. He never had any intention of taking custody of the kids. I believe he either wanted a reduced child support payment, which is what my lawyer thought, or he succumbed to pressure from his new wife and family to ‘go after the evil ex who was keeping his children from him’.
Stay strong, Chump Nation! My Tuesday has long since come and gone and the kids and I live in peace.
Wow. It takes guts to buck your attorney. I’m not sure I’d have been able to do it.
Torna Pittman, who is a coercive control expert, has just released a book about conversational control. I haven’t read it yet but assume it provides more detailed analysis of what’s on her website: https://www.talkingwise.com/conversational-control-explained#:~:text=Conversational%20Control%20is%20when%20one%20person%20ignores%20their%20partner's%20Conversational%20Rights.&text=%E2%80%8BTheir%20conversational%20process%20is,who%20wants%20an%20equal%20conversation.&text=They%20may%20pretend%20to%20have,is%20said%20for%20their%20benefit.
Sorry about long link. Torna picks up some of the subtler signs that permeate what can be covertly abusive relationships. No doubt the poster here experienced and witnessed it during the litigation process.
I noticed my son doing this with his sister, making her fetch him resources to support what she was saying (eg you need to go and get me a dictionary and show me the definition of x y z etc). What she was saying was so blatantly obviously correct he was just trolling. It was only a trivial debate but just the way he controlled the conversation was interesting to observe ( i interjected of course and said he could go and get the bloody dictionary himself).
SecondSelf:
BRAVO, you are MIGHTY! It’s so important to feel strong, and in your words, be unshakeable, as we deal with these abusive clowns. I suppose you couldn’t have asked for a better outcome, except perhaps for the Earth to open up under FW’s feet and have him be swallowed up, never to be heard from again! You outlawyered the lawyer!
By the time FW and I met as 19-year-old college sophomores, I’d been through the wringer as the unfortunate daughter of a very toxic, abusive and rageaholic mother (years later, I learned she was a FW, too). More out of self-preservation than anything else, I’d grown into a bold, sassy, independent and pretty direct person. I was, to use your word, unshakeable. FW said, “I love that you don’t take shit from anyone!”
But 40 years later, on that exhausting trudge through legal separation to divorce, I began seeing a brilliant therapist, “Tom”. When I first walked into his office, I was anything but unshakeable. In Tom’s words, I was a “colorless, one-dimensional cardboard cutout of someone who used to be a person”. My head was down, I was bent over under the mental and emotional weight of FW’s serial cheating and gaslighting, and I was in a perpetual state of anxiety. But Tom had been around the block and knew abuse when he saw it. As each week passed, he expertly guided me to the unsettling realization that I’d been slowly and methodically groomed by FW — Tom called it being “homogenized” — until I was a shell of my former self. Shut down, fearful and numbingly compliant. Exactly where FW wanted me to reside.
As I began to emerge from the fog, the spirit of that 19-year-old coed was jolted back to life. I woke up and decided the first person I wouldn’t take any shit from was FW himself. Apparently, he no longer loved that personality trait; I suddenly became “judgmental” and “intimidating”. I cancelled him as an authorized user on my credit cards and subscriptions; this left him with a single low-limit joint-name CC, just enough to keep the lights on, buy some groceries and pay rent on a shitty 1BR apartment. I removed his cell phone from my small business’ mobile plan; he had to start over with the carrier as a “new customer” and pay a $400 cash deposit before being reconnected. I changed my beneficiaries where permissable by law. I saw an attorney, voided our family trust, created a brand new estate plan, reassigned my powers of attorney, uninstalled FW as an officer in my company, and essentially, erased him. I took over the still-connected joint finances so he was unable to steal another penny of marital assets to fund his escapades. And I went strict No Contact where I remain to this day, making it impossible for FW to maintain his Good Guy optics; NC has gotten me through divorce court, 2 of our (3) children’s weddings, 3 military and professional promotions, 2 graduate school graduations, 4 grandchildren’s 1st birthday parties, and a funeral.
STAY UNSHAKEABLE!
Second self, what a beautiful but hard won story against a lawyer who was so low as to fight you for impression management with new wife. He wants to smell clean and show his good dad sparkle..who wants his kids…WOW!! Shark attack escape. For me, I did agree to mediation at the end . But I insisted on separate rooms so I did not have to look at bully at all…I could keep my perspective and focus. Like you with sticky notes. I applaud you. I did not have the most focused lawyer as she was dealing with her own huge cheater..but at the end, she did a Legally blonde move where she saved me with ger colored spread sheets that the older lawyers did not care to debate. I got what I wanted which was to get out with my retirement. I let everything else go. I did have a prenuptial that held 30 years later. Anyone who gets through this sausage machine has my deep respect. Thank you CL and Mr.CL lawyer advice and all of you in CN. No contact , divided places for mediation,and speaking through lawyers worked to wean m÷ off crazy .. I am forever grateful for your support!!