Need Advice on Ex-wifes?

Hi there-

While I can't give any advice, I wanted to write and give you kudos for stepping up to the plate to help these children. Go you!

Best wishes,
N.

well seems to me now that she has a bf he is more important the her children are. Which should never ever happen. I am sure that your hubby has told his ex that their children want to call you mom and she does not believe him (I had the same problem with my second hubby being called daddy by my oldest daughter). If she is not doing her parental part for these children then she should no be a parent. Go for full custody.

I would.and I did. My daughter is now 23 and we are great. Married to my gregory now almost 20 year and 2 more girls with him. Perfect everything!!

J.
www.noahbyjodi.com

I have been dealing with an ex-wife for 8 years now and going for custody is unfortunately not a road my husband wants to take. You wouldn't believe some of the things my my husband's ex-wife has done and the things that my stepson (now 9) has gone through, and he is very noticeably screwed up (socially and academically) as a result. We've even had to call DCFS (twice) for bruises on his body and we still couldn't get him away from her.
However, the best advice as far as the kids is to continue being consist on instilling your love, trust, support, and how things are in your household including discipline. Also, never, no matter what, talk about there mother in an ill way in front of them. Save those moments for when you go out for a drink with your girlfriend or something :) I know for me, there have been times where it has been very hard not to put my two cents in when my stepson asks me about why his mother does things.
One day when the kids are old enough to understand, they WILL understand and won't have to question where they stand with you guys and they will know that you HAVE done the very best you could for them and that they have always been very much loved.
I could go on forever on this, but I hope this little bit helps. Good Luck! Carie

M.,
Its a hard situation, but like the previous moms have said, you have to do what is best for the children.

My husband and I have been together for 11 years and there is almost always some issue with his ex. In some ways it was easier when my step daughter was little (she is 17 now) and in some ways its easier now.

You can't reason with his ex. You just can't. She may be nice to your face, but will talk all kinds of trash behind your back. Do what you need to do for the kids.

Keep telling the kids that you love them and that you are doing your best to make sure that they are safe. Let the courts handle the rest.

Best of Luck.
B.

Do you think your husband should talk to her about the new boyfriend and the hitting before you start the full custody process? See if there is any improvement in the situation first? A custody fight is a big deal and maybe the boyfriend will be a passing situation.

L

Think about the kids and stop worrying about what the ex-wife thinks. The most important thing here is the safety, health and emtotional well being of those kids. If she's stupid enough to be with an abusive man and let him hit her kids, then she deserves to lose custody. Again, don't even concern yourself with her. What sort of mother lets anyone touch her kids???? I'd give her a piece of my mind if I were you..but that's just me and I can't stand to see people neglect their kids in any way.

You and your new family are in a hard place. When I was in divorce court this year I watched a young woman go before the judge. She lost her son because her new boyfriend the pediphile was more important then her son. She would not leave him. She could only she her son under supervised conditions. It was awful to watch.

My children are my life. No one has a better relationship with me. They are both very close to me even more since I had a cancer scare. God gave these two people to me so I could help them become who they should be. I cannot imagine having two wonderful children that are not mine in this situation. I know it is tearing all of you appart.

Do you have a lawyer? It maybe hard to get the kids away from her. I would definately got in counseling for all of you. The change will be hard and stressful. Get a disinterested party to take pictures of injuries. Call the police when he hits the kids. Get DCFS involved to help you. Call a SAFE PLACE and other agencies to get help with what to do.

Remember you will be the bad guys no matter what. She will probably hate on one hane and like it on the other. NO win situation. Good luck!!

Even though your husbands ex wife is not a very good mother to the kids she still is there mother.
My husbands kids call me Mommy S.. If I were you I would go for full custody. It may be very costly but what kind of life will the kids have if all she wants to do is be with her boyfriend. Sound like you can give them all the love and wonderful memories of being a child. good luck

Hi M.,

I am going to deviate from what everyone else has said and give my 2 cents.

I don't think you should do the custody battle thing, the divorce has already emotionally scared the children, shouldn't that be enough? Children are interesting and they tend to tell the stories that will pit parents against one another or will break up the relationship that they they don't like. They also tend to feed off of what the adults around them are or aren't saying. Right now my brother is dealing with the ex of his fiance and the children make their dad seem like a "God", but he doesn't really do anything for them and he makes it seem as if its their mother's fault that he's not still with her instead of his own fault and choice. I'm not saying that your step children are lying, I am simply saying that all the facts should be weighed and give it some time. Don't rush into court for this battle, it will be the longest, hardest and most draining battle that you could imagine and if you have a new marriage, it could possibly destroy that by adding to much strain financially and emotionally. If the two of you live near the mother try to work out an arrangement where you all have the children more often, volunteer to "watch" them when she wants some "me time" to hang with her new boyfriend. And this bit of advice might seem strange, but don't stop the child-support payments or try to have them altered, that seems to make women like her more furious...one of my ex-boyfriends lost his son because he wanted to solidify the custody arrangement of his son and stop the child-support payments since he had physical custody, but it was obvious when he asked her to go to the court and have the child-support reduced and/or rescinded that she was only interested in the money and not really the welfare of the child. It may seem like a large sacrifice to make, but in the end what's more important the money or the sanity and safety of the children, your husband and yourself?

As for telling the children, we don't give our children credit for being as intelligent as they are. I am very honest with my daughter about how I feel about her father, I tell her that he loves her and made sure she did not absorb my feelings for him and I let him destroy himself in her eyes all on his own. She decided that she didn't want to see him anymore and expressed why just as clearly as you or I would and she was only 4 or 5 at the time. Sometimes protecting children from the truth actually scares them more than telling them the truth without including your personal feelings and there is a big difference.

I hope what I've said help, even if it's just an inch!

--K.
P.S. Whatever you do when/if you decide to actually take the matter to court, make sure that on the day that you go to court you and your husband have physical custody of the children. The courts tend to leave the children in their current location despite previous arrangements & IL is full of dead-beat dads so be prepared to fight hard to get them. And finally keeping the diary is a good idea, that's how my friend won her custody battle with her ex, it does weigh in much more than you think!

M.,
I am not strying to scare you but my husband and I did go for custody of his daughter and the state of IL court system is not father friendly - at all, no matter what the circumstances are. My step-daugther and her younger brother(different father) were being neglected and subjected to a lifestyle no child should ever have to go through. These kids were 3 and 7 and their mother was leaving them alone at night while she was out partying and that is only a very small part of it. Although we did gain custody, it took five years of intense, emotionally draining litigation including psychological evaluations on children and all parents, tens of thousands of dollars. I am not going to sugar coat it, as brutal as it was for us to go through all of this as the parents, the children suffered the most, and their life in the middle of the custody battle was a lifelong emotional scar that they will never forget. So please please really find it in your heart to think about the best interest of the children, that this is truly the best thing for these children. Is their mother really endangering them or is she just a pain in the but w/ issues of jealousy. The truth of the matter is that the custody thing is basically a he said/she said game of b.s. as most allegations don't hold up in the court of law unless you have concrete proof or eye witnesses. One of the first attorneys we hired told us that the only way a father could gain custody in IL is if we had pictures of the child being tortured, although he was exagerrating, it is not far from the truth. The main reason we did get custody in the end is that we had witnesses who testified to some extreme things they witnessed with the children (some so bad that my husband literally ran out of court and threw up)that they really made our case and she could not recover from the testimony and finally gave up after our attorney threatened to strip her of her parental rights all together. Had we not had witnesses, there is no way we would have won the case. In the end, we did gain custody, but we lost our daughter in the process, we encountered an entirely new set of problems with the transfer of custody. She has been in therapy for several years and has been hospitalized for depression, suicide attempts, and a dozen other disorders. It has been a living hell for this child and for us who out of the love for her and the hope for a good life for her, it didn't change things. We gave her a stable home with love and family and it didn't matter because in the end, a person's mother is their "mother" no matter what wrongs she may have done and after the custody and the following loss of child support, my daughter did not hear from her mother for years and it broke her heart and her spirit. In my heart of hearts, I thought if we could "save" her that we should so she could have a good life, and now I am second guessing that decision. The whole process is draining on a marriage and it takes years and you basically have no life during this period because it is tied up on this gut wrenching court outcome.

M.-

I went through the same situation- I have been married to my husband for 12 years now and the kids are still suffering the wrath of her! It was one of the most dificult situations to be in! Through it all though we learned that the most important thing is the happiness and the well being of the children. We are adults and we can defend ourselves and make sense of others who do not make much sense, but the children are the ones who end up suffering if we don't play our cards right. I never tried to be friends with her as a matter of fact wherever she is I make sure that I am not just avoid any confrontation! I try and tell myself that if the shoe were on the other foot maybe I too would act very territorial BUT OH MY GOODNESS this one is beyond territorial (a real nut job) My husband and I made a whole lot of sacrifices for the kids- just until they could make an adult decision themselves. We never talked badly about her and as a matter of fact when they talked badly of her we would correct them- I guess my long drawn out advice for you is to DO WHAT"S BEST FOR THE CHILDREN! Try not to scar their lives like my step childrens mother has done to them. My step children are in college and are still haunted by the mistakes that their mother has made-

My .50 cents

Good luck to you and remember the innocence of the children-

Jackie

M.-
You are trying to do what is best for the children and that is what is most important. You can't control how other people think or what they do. You will go crazy if you try. If their mother's boyfriend is hitting the children (or even just treating them badly), the children need to get out of that situtation. Just be sure not to say anything negative to the children (or around the children) about thier mother.

Keep the children's best intestest at the forefront and keep the faith.

Good luck!