Daily physical contact with non custodial parent

[Megan James]

Jurisdiction

South Carolina

Recently a temporary custody order was put in place making me the primary custodial parent. During my custodial time my ex has been showing up on a daily to near daily basis in order to have physical contact with our child. My ex will show up to pick up and drop off for school, creating distress for our child who is brought to and picked up by a daytime nanny. Additionally, any activities I have planned such as visits to the zoo or museums and library events, my ex will show up at despite it being my parenting time. During these events my ex will dominate and try and maintain all of our child's focus. Of note is that the custody ruling was based on the fact that my ex lives several states away from me and when our child is in my ex's custody they return to the state my ex resides in. I feel as though my ex is interfering with my parenting time and causing distress that doesn't have to occur. Are my ex's actions appropriate or am I over reacting?

 

[Zigner]

How does your ex show up so often while living several states away?

What are the visitation orders?

Why do you allow this?

 

[Megan James]

How does your ex show up so often while living several states away?

What are the visitation orders?

Why do you allow this?

my ex has been staying in the local area "temporarily" during my 3 weeks custody hoping that doing this will change the custody order at our next court date in July. The orders are 3 weeks in my care, 1 week with my ex, with weekend visitation for my ex on the middle weekend of my custody and this continues on a 4 week rotating basis. We have equal say in parenting decisions but primary custodian has final say in disagreements. I have repeatedly asked my ex not to do this which she refuses to follow my request. I want to prevent as much trauma as possible for our child, so do not want to tear him from my ex's arms when the ex shows up. Additionally, my ex has made false accusations of abuse in the past and I am afraid to be close enough to my ex for any risk of being accused again. We don't have another court date to address this until July and on several occasions activities have ended prematurely due to my ex being there, which I then get berating emails regarding.

 

[Zigner]

How old is the child?

Are you also female? (This doesn't really matter, I was just curious based on your user name. Feel free to not answer.)

How is it that your ex finds out about all these activities?

You may need to wait until the July court date to address your concerns. If you have an attorney, ask your attorney about the possibility of getting into court earlier.

 

[zddoodah]

Are my ex's actions appropriate or am I over reacting?

No one who hasn't read the existing custody order can opine intelligently about this. Do you have an attorney? If not, it's probably time to retain one. If so, then you need to confer with him/her.

 

[Red Kayak]

Recently a temporary custody order was put in place making me the primary custodial parent.

1) Follow the order.
2) When the other party shows up during your parenting time, be civil, but not a doormat. You are allowed not to answer your door, for example.
3) Find a way to communicate that leaves the kid out of it, even if it's through an app. But preferably use whatever method(s) your local court prefers. Refuse to discuss custody issues in front of the child. Stick to methods where communication is documented and admissible to court.
4) If things head towards being volatile during an encounter, do not engage. No physical contact. Period. If you are hit, don't hit back or shove: call 911.
5) Document, document, document.

This is not an exhaustive list.

 

[Megan James]

How old is the child?

Are you also female? (This doesn't really matter, I was just curious based on your user name. Feel free to not answer.)

How is it that your ex finds out about all these activities?

You may need to wait until the July court date to address your concerns. If you have an attorney, ask your attorney about the possibility of getting into court earlier.

Our child is 2 and my ex knows about the events because they are on a shared family calendar. They are there because I have been repeatedly accused by my ex that I am attempting to block the relationship and block access to our child by not informing my ex of the activities they're involved in. Harassing type emails are sent to myself and my ex's lawyer by my ex, whenever the ex finds out about anything that was not on the calender, which then gets sent with a formal letter of complaint and accusations of alienating my ex from our child from my ex's attorney to my attorney. My attorney has suggested I ask my ex leave and if she doesn't, then my child and I should leave the event, as long as it's not school.

I am a man with regard to your question.

 

[Megan James]

No one who hasn't read the existing custody order can opine intelligently about this. Do you have an attorney? If not, it's probably time to retain one. If so, then you need to confer with him/her.

Thank you. Attorney's are involved. I guess it's more a question of am I overreacting to her interruptions or is this typically not considered interfering? We are following the standard Morris Guidelines outside of the custody time noted above.

 

[Megan James]

1) Follow the order.
2) When the other party shows up during your parenting time, be civil, but not a doormat. You are allowed not to answer your door, for example.
3) Find a way to communicate that leaves the kid out of it, even if it's through an app. But preferably use whatever method(s) your local court prefers. Refuse to discuss custody issues in front of the child. Stick to methods where communication is documented and admissible to court.
4) If things head towards being volatile during an encounter, do not engage. No physical contact. Period. If you are hit, don't hit back or shove: call 911.
5) Document, document, document.

This is not an exhaustive list.

Thanks.

I have been documenting each "event" she comes to and have copies of all emails including communicating with my attorney regarding harassing behaviors of my ex. I remain civil in the presence of our child and I believe it's civil in my email communications as well. Fortunately, it has not gotten volatile.

 

[Zigner]

If the "event" is at a public place, then the other parent is allowed to be there. It might be time to stop posting every move you make with the child to a shared calendar. If you take the child to the zoo, or the museum, or a ball game, why does it need to go on a shared calendar?

If you're talking about events such as participation in organized sports, or school-related activities, that's absolutely a different matter, but the child is 2. I can't think of any organized activities that a 2yo would be involved in except, maybe, tumbling or swimming classes. You have no obligation to inform the ex of every little thing you and kiddo do on your designated visitation/custody time (just as she has no obligation to do so for you on hers).

EDIT: You mentioned that kiddo goes to "school". I know of no actual school that a 2 year old goes to. Perhaps you meant daycare. Frankly, if mom is able to, then there's no reason why she shouldn't be there to pick up kiddo and take care of kiddo while you are unavailable.

 

[Red Kayak]

Our child is 2 and my ex knows about the events because they are on a shared family calendar. They are there because I have been repeatedly accused by my ex that I am attempting to block the relationship and block access to our child by not informing my ex of the activities they're involved in. Harassing type emails are sent to myself and my ex's lawyer by my ex, whenever the ex finds out about anything that was not on the calender, which then gets sent with a formal letter of complaint and accusations of alienating my ex from our child from my ex's attorney to my attorney. My attorney has suggested I ask my ex leave and if she doesn't, then my child and I should leave the event, as long as it's not school.

I am a man with regard to your question.

I guess you should be glad that the other parent is interested, but...
...there's another way to deal with it.

Unless it's a major event, just stop putting it on the calendar. Write a periodic "update" that includes 1) most recent milestones and mundane activities (after the fact) and 2) important items that a reasonable parent would like a heads up on, like doctors appointments, or, when they are older, sports events, dance recitals, concerts.

If she wants to take things before a judge, the judge will give weight to how reasonable she's being. If she's griping that you, on your own parenting time, took the kid to the park without her, she's going to look unreasonable. If the kid is critically ill and you don't inform her, that's another story. The more unreasonable and petty she is, the less credible. Be more credible than her.

 

[army judge]

Our child is 2 and my ex knows about the events because they are on a shared family calendar. They are there because I have been repeatedly accused by my ex that I am attempting to block the relationship and block access to our child by not informing my ex of the activities they're involved in. Harassing type emails are sent to myself and my ex's lawyer by my ex, whenever the ex finds out about anything that was not on the calender, which then gets sent with a formal letter of complaint and accusations of alienating my ex from our child from my ex's attorney to my attorney. My attorney has suggested I ask my ex leave and if she doesn't, then my child and I should leave the event, as long as it's not school.

I am a man with regard to your question.

Your lawyer gave you excellent advice.

Do as your lawyer advises, LEAVE immediately if the interloper appears.

If you're at school, don't argue, fuss, or fight.

Report his unwanted, uninvited carcass to a school authority figure.

School officials will have the critter removed, if necessary.

If the person has no desire to coparent, there's little need for you to try.

You might wish to ask your lawyer a question.

The critter resides in a state outside of SC.

What if the critter refused one day in the future to return the child?

What are your legal options?

It is better if your attorney answers that question for you.