problems seeing my daughter

[jimbo1986]

Hi all,

Up until the last 3 weeks I have been seeing my daughter every weekend collected her from school on a friday or my ex partners in the evening and kept her until sunday night.
If my ex ever had plans that involved our daughter I was reasonable and had her for lesser time so that her plans wasnt interrupted.

However, my ex has now stopped me seeing my daughter for no other reason than that she doesnt like the fact the my new partner is her neighbour who ive been seeing for quite some time (NOT behind my ex's back, I was single). Yes its arkward but my partner wont be living there for long and wont be next door to my ex.

I have attempted mediation requests with my ex to no array and requests have just been ignored. I have spoke to the mediators and apparently I have to have an hour meeting with them to be able to get my hands on said form to take her to court. Is this right?

Also, i have heard there is a new law coming in in Jan 2013 that means my ex can be put in prison if she refuses access to my daughter. What are the implications here. Does it still need to go to court and have it all agreed on times etc? Can anyone clarify whether this new law is actually true and what its called please.

Also is there any other way I can gain access fast to my daughter as its ripping me apart not seeing her. Also should I stop paying maintenance for my daughter until I am able to see her as its not my fault that I cant be there and dont see why i should support her so to speak when my ex is refusing me access. (that sounded awful what i just said) didnt mean it to come out the way it did. As far as i'm concerned my daughter can have as much as she wants/needs but I just dont like the idea handing money to my ex when shes the one stopping me seeing my daughter.

[leclerc]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

I was not aware of new legislation for January 2013 with regards to access since failure to follow a court instruction on contact could be seen as contempt of court.
A few questions: Does you current partner stay with you when contact takes place?
When is your partner moving away from your ex?

I know it is a complicated process with what you have written and the answer to the maintenance question is no.

Maintenance and contact are two separate issues. Once you stop maintenance then you are simply using the child as an economic weapon in her eyes or blackmail. Keep the maintenance but continue to see what conditions she would like when you see her. Do you have telephone contact at all with the child?

Does you ex have a new fella?

[jimbo1986]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

I guess your right with the contempt of court. But I believe that if this new legislation is true then its ment to cut wasted time in court and to stop the female from playing silly games when all its doing is destroying the childs life and messing with their little mind.

My partner has only ever been here once when contact has happened. But however, my daughter knows her extremely well as she knew her for a year as her neighbour before.
My partner will be moving away in January. Depending on her circumstances she may possibly be moving in with me temporarily.

Sorry i'm confused...do i still carry on paying maintenance?? Only reason I asked that is because a friend of mine went to court to gain access and the mother won and managed to deny access and in turn the court actually said that he is not to pay any more money as he has no responsibility in the childs upbringing and life.

No my ex wouldnt/wont answer any texts or calls at all. Thats when I applied to the mediators. Ive even tried offering to get my daughter a pay as you go phone so i can contact her directly rather than through my ex but the idea was snubbed by my ex.

And as for my ex having a new guy....who knows and to be quite frank couldnt give a toss. Just want to see my daughter.

[valeriej43]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

The new law says children of seperated parents to have legal rights to see mum AND DAD,google it, on parentdish

[Inca]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Umm,have you actually READ your posts?
Firstly it's not just FEMALES that stop absent parents seeing children..men have custody of kids too and can play nasty just as equally as women.
Secondly,,the bit about stopping maintenance DOES sound awful because it is a terrible thing to say,,paying towards your childs upkeep should not even be an issue.YOU helped create the child,supporting her financially is your DUTY as a parent wether you like her Mum or not,and I can assure you,from very recent experience,the Judge will not look kindly on you if you do.
You say she is using the child as a weapon,,yet you are prepared to use money as a weapon..2 wrongs don't make a right.
Legal Aid is being withdrawn for cases like this next year.
My advice to you is :- Follow the law,,get a solicitor,you will be asked to mediate via Cafcass,they will arrange a meeting between you and your ex with them present,,they will interview your child (if she is old enough),to ascertain her wishes. If your ex plays silly buggers and doesn't co operate that goes in your favour.They will check on your childs education (they see the child at school) You will have to attend a parenting course (lasts one day) then the court date is set,,Judge will read all the evidence and make a ruling.Be aware though,if you decide to play silly buggers re money or anything,they will come down just as hard on you as they will your ex.
Another point I picked up on,,you said your 'NEW' partner,,then said you had been together quite a while,,which is it? because the court will want to know.They will also ask your child if she likes the woman,,that can have a bearing on what type of access you are granted too.I should imagine the child has a strong opinion on this point,it must be very confusing for her.

Access/Custody battles are very easily sorted by the courts,,they work on the premise that,no matter what silly games and tit for tat games you and your ex play,the wishes of your daughter are the only issue they care about.
Sorry to sound harsh but I've been there,done that and I won a custody battle where the biological parents of my step children got refused access to them because they played stupid spiteful games and the Judge got fed up with them,I divorced their Dad and I got full custody.

[jimbo1986]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Hi Inca,

Yes your right both parents have responsibility but I'm struggling to be a parent when i'm not allowed anywhere near my daughter. I have attempted many times to make contact via phone calls texts and have already attempted mediation to no avail.
As for paying for my daughter as I mentioned I have no problem in paying for her. She can have as much as she needs and whatever she needs. Shes my daughter and as far as i'm concerned money is no objection when it comes to her. However, I dont see how I can be exoected to pay and support her when i'm being denied access to actually be a father. However, on the strength of what youve said i will ensure that maintenance continues. I would also like to add that i am still paying to clear down my ex's debts in a bid to help her out and make her life easier and more comfortable.

Well my daughter has known my partner as a friend for over a year now and absolutely loved playing with my partners 3 children as they were friends prior to all this. I have been seeing my partner for 8 months ish (not ages but we've known each other for longer). My daughter absolutely loves her and believe i've got a few pictures of my partner and daughter together playing. As for my daughter being interviewed....shes 5 in december so not sure whether she can be interviewed.

I am so desperate to see my daughter. Shes my world and feel lost at the moment without her. Everyday is a struggle at the moment not knowing what shes doing how shes getting on at school etc. And most of all not hearing her call me daddy.

[jimbo1986]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Can i also say that I dont resent my ex partner at all. I've done nothing but support her. Decorated and plastered her house from top to bottom. Paid to furnish it to give her and my daughter a good home. Covered bills for her. Gave her our nearly new car we brought paid the insurance for her for a while paid her bills carried on clearing debts amongst other things.

Even when she started seeing a new guy I sat and listened to her problems when he decided to screw her head up. I was ment to move out the area when we separated but at my ex's request I stayed local just in case there was any issues with our daughter god forbid anything happened. So ive done everything shes asked and more.

All that matters though is that i'm desparate to see my daughter and cant believe my ex has done this to me.

[Inca]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

I don't know the age criteria for Cafcass to interview kids,,my s/daughter is 13.

I fully understand your frustrations but you really need to get this sorted legally so she can't pull the rug from under you again.From what you have said it certainly seems like sour grapes.
Don't go along the lines of how much your daughter likes your new partner,Cafcass will establish that for themselves and you don't want to wind the ex up furthur.
I appreciate the money situation seems like a smack in the teeth but ,for now,suck it up,,Above all,you MUST go into court with 'clean hands',,do nothing that could bite you on the bum in the months to come.
Our issue lasted less than 6 months start to finish cos my partner played the game the way the legal system wanted it played,,at times it was bloody horrific but the end goal was worth it.
We now have as much phone contact as we like,,see her as much as we can,and she knows Daddy fought for her.
If possible,open a savings account for her,,just a few quid here and there,,that shows the powers that be that you are 'planning ahead'.
I wasn't trying to offend you earlier,,just wanted to shock you into NOT witholding money.

[jimbo1986]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Hi Inca,

Its ok i didnt take it offensively Ive not been here before so its all new to me and am learning as I go along but need to try and stay one step ahead. I'll keep on paying and yes it is a smack in the teeth especially after everything ive done to help my ex. Tried to be as amicable as possible even after she went through my emails and read all my personal info after we had split!
Do i need to call cafcas myself or is this all done via the court etc? I cant open her a savings account as I dont have her birth certificate to open one. I do however have my own savings account. Would that be passable if i added funds to it every month?

Just need this sorted asap as I amnow going to miss my daughters birthday next month and also christmas. I have a pile of presents here for her and cant do anything with them nor can I take her to see father christams!

Breaks my heart not seeing my little one. Especially when the last time I see her was when my ex was screaming in mine and my new partners faces calling us all sorts of names under the sun with my daughter in the car crying asking daddy to take her away from it all....then on top of that my ex then tried to run my new partner over WITH my daughter in the car!

[Inca]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Contact a solicitor as soon as you can.Start keeping a diary too.Our solicitor contacted Cafcass and started the ball rolling. Make sure you hammer home to the legal people that you are currently not seeing your child.
I see from your other threads that your g/f has kids and might be moving in with you,,this may not be a good idea until your access is re established as your ex will definitely drip venom in your childs ear re your g/f and the last thing you need is your child telling Cafcass that she is unhappy about your g/f and kids living with you. I know it seems like your life is not your own,,that your ex holds all the cards,,and sadly,till you get a judgement,she does,because she can bribe,co erce and encourage your daughter to say/do anything,especially cos shes only 5 ,bless her little heart.

[Kitiara]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Hi Jim,

My Partner and I are currently in a similar situation regarding his ex and his 9 year old Son, she has witheld access on 2 seperate occasions, once from Nov 2010 - April 2011 and again Sept 2011 - April 2012, we had to go to court for a Contact Order in April 2012 and now have access every other weekend and half of all holidays. Its not a pleasant process to have to undertake, but worth all the hassle once you know that no matter what, your ex can not refuse you access under any circumstances. It can take a while to actually get to court from making the initial application (and it's not cheap), but where access is being denied, they do try to speed things up. We made the application mid Feb and the hearing was on 4th April but we were warned it could take up to 6 months. Is there any danger that you ex could leave the country with your Daughter? If you have the slightest fear that this is a posibility and that she has the finances to do this you need to apply for a PSO (Prohibited Steps Order), which means she cannot take you Daughter out of the jurisdiction of England & Wales without your written consent. Do you have Parental Responsibility for your Daughter? If not, this is something you need to apply for, that way you can approach the school / doctor etc for information on your Daughter, so if there are any concerns at school (things like enforced seperation can create problems at school) the school can contact you, also for things like continued absence etc and you should also get a copy of her school report.

Regarding the fact that your ex doesn't like your new partner - his ex hates me, even though we were friends at first (I even helped her choose her wedding dress when she remarried). The courts will take this into consideration, but unless she has justified reasons (you new partner is violent towards your Daughter, takes drugs / drinks etc) just "not liking" doesn't cut it with a judge, my Partners ex was told at our last hearing in Sept (we are now going through a residency application) that "this lady is in your Son's life, he obviously doesn't have a problem with her and cares for her very much, so you need to accept it and get over it!" She then muttered something about "animosity" to which the Judge replied "if you dont want animosity - dont cause any!!". Unless she can prove that your Partner is a negative influence on you Daughter, then it is highly unlikely that a Judge will stipulate that your Partner is to have no contact with your Daughter and contact is to be with you alone. I suspect that your ex's anomosity to your new Partner is due to her Daughter's closeness to her and her feeling of being "replaced" as "Mummy".

CAFCASS will want to speak to your Daughter without you or your ex being present, it's all done very informally and just through general conversation pick up on what she wants, they do not bombard them with questions etc.

Remember, this is all for your Daughter, not point scoring with your ex, however much you want to "hit back", let any nastiness she creates, go over your head. Keep a record of any "incidents" and each time you try to establish any form of dialogue between you and your ex, this shows that you have done all that you can to resolve this amicably.

Good Luck hun, you will get there!! When your Daughter is older, she will understand that her Daddy thought she was special enough to go through all this just for her. She is lucky to have a Dad that so obviously cares, when there are many who would quite happily walk away.

Kit

[Inca]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

It's a shi tty time,,but keep your eye on the goal,,,seeing your little one. I personally despise parents who deny access,,be it Mum or Dad,no child ASKED to be born and they are not a possession,All your ex is doing is building up a huge crock of cr ap for herself when your daughter grows up,trust me,,kids are astute little feckkers,they see and hear a hell of a lot more than we give them credit for.
My Oh's ex declared in her defence that my s/daughter felt I had 'taken her daddy away',,and that she felt I didn't like her.(bear in mind my s/d was a totally spoilt brat at 8 when we met.

Today is my 50th birthday..and this is the txt I received from my 13yrold s/daughter :-
Happy Birthday Mummy
Thankyou for everything you do for me
I love you to the moon and back
Love from
C
and more kisses than i can be arsed to put on here lol.
So,,stick to your guns,do everything properly (even tho you want to kick her) and it will come good.

[leclerc]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

I don't know the age criteria for Cafcass to interview kids,,my s/daughter is 13.

I fully understand your frustrations but you really need to get this sorted legally so she can't pull the rug from under you again.From what you have said it certainly seems like sour grapes.
Don't go along the lines of how much your daughter likes your new partner,Cafcass will establish that for themselves and you don't want to wind the ex up furthur.
I appreciate the money situation seems like a smack in the teeth but ,for now,suck it up,,Above all,you MUST go into court with 'clean hands',,do nothing that could bite you on the bum in the months to come.
Our issue lasted less than 6 months start to finish cos my partner played the game the way the legal system wanted it played,,at times it was bloody horrific but the end goal was worth it.
We now have as much phone contact as we like,,see her as much as we can,and she knows Daddy fought for her.
If possible,open a savings account for her,,just a few quid here and there,,that shows the powers that be that you are 'planning ahead'.
I wasn't trying to offend you earlier,,just wanted to shock you into NOT witholding money.

Inca, strangely enough I do. The court can appoint a solicitor for the child, ie a Guardian ad litigem albeit, with the Gillick competency she could sack the solicitor and get a solicitor of her own if she hates that. A court would have to decide if a child of 13 years of age is competent to make her own decisions. Sorry spotted a topic that I am coherent in

[Inca]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Don't apologise ,leclerc,,I'm more than happy to stand corrected and I'm pleased that someone is au fait with the law to help the OP more than I can.I can only go on what happened to us and I'm certainly not so arrogant as to think my situation is relevant in this case.Thats the beauty of LB,what one person isn't sure on,,another pops up and knows the answers

[jimbo1986]

Re: problems seeing my daughter

Hi Jim,

My Partner and I are currently in a similar situation regarding his ex and his 9 year old Son, she has witheld access on 2 seperate occasions, once from Nov 2010 - April 2011 and again Sept 2011 - April 2012, we had to go to court for a Contact Order in April 2012 and now have access every other weekend and half of all holidays. Its not a pleasant process to have to undertake, but worth all the hassle once you know that no matter what, your ex can not refuse you access under any circumstances. It can take a while to actually get to court from making the initial application (and it's not cheap), but where access is being denied, they do try to speed things up. We made the application mid Feb and the hearing was on 4th April but we were warned it could take up to 6 months. Is there any danger that you ex could leave the country with your Daughter? If you have the slightest fear that this is a posibility and that she has the finances to do this you need to apply for a PSO (Prohibited Steps Order), which means she cannot take you Daughter out of the jurisdiction of England & Wales without your written consent. Do you have Parental Responsibility for your Daughter? If not, this is something you need to apply for, that way you can approach the school / doctor etc for information on your Daughter, so if there are any concerns at school (things like enforced seperation can create problems at school) the school can contact you, also for things like continued absence etc and you should also get a copy of her school report.

Regarding the fact that your ex doesn't like your new partner - his ex hates me, even though we were friends at first (I even helped her choose her wedding dress when she remarried). The courts will take this into consideration, but unless she has justified reasons (you new partner is violent towards your Daughter, takes drugs / drinks etc) just "not liking" doesn't cut it with a judge, my Partners ex was told at our last hearing in Sept (we are now going through a residency application) that "this lady is in your Son's life, he obviously doesn't have a problem with her and cares for her very much, so you need to accept it and get over it!" She then muttered something about "animosity" to which the Judge replied "if you dont want animosity - dont cause any!!". Unless she can prove that your Partner is a negative influence on you Daughter, then it is highly unlikely that a Judge will stipulate that your Partner is to have no contact with your Daughter and contact is to be with you alone. I suspect that your ex's anomosity to your new Partner is due to her Daughter's closeness to her and her feeling of being "replaced" as "Mummy".

CAFCASS will want to speak to your Daughter without you or your ex being present, it's all done very informally and just through general conversation pick up on what she wants, they do not bombard them with questions etc.

Remember, this is all for your Daughter, not point scoring with your ex, however much you want to "hit back", let any nastiness she creates, go over your head. Keep a record of any "incidents" and each time you try to establish any form of dialogue between you and your ex, this shows that you have done all that you can to resolve this amicably.

Good Luck hun, you will get there!! When your Daughter is older, she will understand that her Daddy thought she was special enough to go through all this just for her. She is lucky to have a Dad that so obviously cares, when there are many who would quite happily walk away.

Kit

Hi Kit,

I'm sorry to hear you are also going through it but am also taking comfort in the fact that its not just me. I haven't and will not bad mouth my ex as she is a brilliant mum (apart from when she kicked off in front of our daughter and tried to run my new partner over with my daughter in the car) but even then I didnt say a bad word. I kept quiet. I just dont understand how she can do this to my daughter as like you said my ex is treating her as a weapon and its not fair on the little one. My daughter had no idea and it kills me and upsets me massively to wonder what my poor daughter is thinking and that she might be wondering if daddy has abandoned her.

No i would be extremely doubtful that she would attempt to taker her out the country. Plus my new partner still lives next door to her and knows she still leaves for school in the mornings so i'm safe there.

As for parental responsibility if you mean is my name on the birth cert and that she was born after 2001 then yes I believe this gives you automatic parental responsibility doesnt it? If so then am I allowed to apply to the school for information on my daughter? I did consider doing this but didnt know whether it would cause problems with going to court etc and in keeping my nose clean.

Yes thats the only reason my ex has refused access...because she doesnt like who i'm with. Yes its not the most ideal scenario but its life. My daughter absolutely adores my partner and loves her 3 children massively. However, my ex has made a point of making sure she slips into her house without my daughter seeing my partner or her kids who is next door as i mentioned before. I dont think that my ex is worried about my new partner becoming my daughters 'mummy' so to speak as i'd never let that happen. As far as i'm concerned my ex will always be my daughters mum regardless....but yes however my daughter and partner are extremely close due to the relationship they built up before any of this all happened when everyone was just as neighbours/friends (god that sounds childish saying that so sorry).

And no this isnt about point scoring. This is about trying to get my ex to see that this is ruining our daughters life. Whether my ex hates me or not is another matter...its nothing to do with our daugher and its not fair ripping my daughter away from me when me and my little one had a massive bond.

Bottom line is is that I just want my daughter back. Like you said there are plenty that would walk away but not me. I need my daughter as much as she needs me. Not many men would admit this but i cry nearly every day at thoughts and fun times me and my daughter have had and breaks my heart that i've not heard her call me daddy for weeks and that if shes wondering where daddy is.
Just worries me as my mother made it extremely difficult for my dad when i was little and ended not being able to see him....although my dad has more than made up for it now! Have an amazing relationship with him.

Thank you everyone.