OK, I had posted one other issue on here, but I have a 2 fold problem. My boyfriend (we have a child together and live together) has a son from a previous marriage. Currently we have 50/50 visitation with him spending 7 out of 14 days with us split week. We have B every single day that my boyfriend is off work. When he is in our care he is with us. He spends most of his time with his mother in daycare since she works. The current custody is joint physical custody with mailing address with that of the father. According to that he should be enrolled in school from our home. We had him evaluated for preschool and he qualified to start in the fall.
His ex has given up her crazy idea of moving to California with B so that they can live rent free with her father while she and her new husband go back to school. But she claims to be ready to fight tooth and nail for rights for B to go to school from her house. With my boyfriends work schedule, he would only see his son every other weekend if he lived in her home for school. But he has every Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday off work, as well as every other Saturday. He works nights, and would be home in time to wake B up and get him ready for school, and would be home to see him get off the bus and have dinner together each night before he left for work (Wed, Thurs, and Fri).
She is on a 2 year probation for suspected child abuse. I am not sure how that works, but there was an incident that involved the authorities and we were told that they did not find reasonable evidence to convict, but we have recently learned that she is on probation for the incident. We don't know if it is a legal "typical" probation, or if it is something just involving the DFS (SRS).
Our fear is that if she does get B going to school from her home and we only get to see him every other weekend, that after a few years a judge will then be able to side in her favor for going ahead and leaving the state with him since he wouldn't have as much of an established relationship with his father.
Funds are lacking, and we have come up with a plan for a revised visitation that is WAY more than fair, giving her 1/3 time visitation even while he is in school full time. We can't really afford an attorney, so we want to try to keep this as informal and friendly as possible, yet we want to do it legally.
I want to propose our schedule to his ex in a letter sent via email. I know that it isn't legal or binding, but it will at least get our ideas out there on the table for discussion. He is afraid that she will some how be able to use our plan against us if we discuss it with her and is afraid to even broach the subject. But preschool starts in 3.5 months, so time isn't really on our side.
What does anyone else think? Should we bite the bullet and take out a loan for lawyer $$$ or should we try and settle this outside of courts with as little hastle and $$$ wasted as possible.
His ex has given up her crazy idea of moving to California with B so that they can live rent free with her father while she and her new husband go back to school. But she claims to be ready to fight tooth and nail for rights for B to go to school from her house. With my boyfriends work schedule, he would only see his son every other weekend if he lived in her home for school. But he has every Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday off work, as well as every other Saturday. He works nights, and would be home in time to wake B up and get him ready for school, and would be home to see him get off the bus and have dinner together each night before he left for work (Wed, Thurs, and Fri).
She is on a 2 year probation for suspected child abuse. I am not sure how that works, but there was an incident that involved the authorities and we were told that they did not find reasonable evidence to convict, but we have recently learned that she is on probation for the incident. We don't know if it is a legal "typical" probation, or if it is something just involving the DFS (SRS).
Our fear is that if she does get B going to school from her home and we only get to see him every other weekend, that after a few years a judge will then be able to side in her favor for going ahead and leaving the state with him since he wouldn't have as much of an established relationship with his father.
Funds are lacking, and we have come up with a plan for a revised visitation that is WAY more than fair, giving her 1/3 time visitation even while he is in school full time. We can't really afford an attorney, so we want to try to keep this as informal and friendly as possible, yet we want to do it legally.
I want to propose our schedule to his ex in a letter sent via email. I know that it isn't legal or binding, but it will at least get our ideas out there on the table for discussion. He is afraid that she will some how be able to use our plan against us if we discuss it with her and is afraid to even broach the subject. But preschool starts in 3.5 months, so time isn't really on our side.
What does anyone else think? Should we bite the bullet and take out a loan for lawyer $$$ or should we try and settle this outside of courts with as little hastle and $$$ wasted as possible.