[Solved] Family court process

Hi Mojo

Sorry to keep asking so many questions

My ex has emailed me tonight to say she cannot find any additional nights in the remainder of the year for me to have. I currently have 152. This is ludicrous as there are still gaps in the summer and October half term where I would not see my children for over a week. She is totally controlling and causing me massive mental stress as a result

2020 as I mentioned before had been proposed and that is gives me 3 nights on average though clearly that is going to be counted night by night and should I miss one for any reason she’ll be back into the CMS

This isn’t coparenting but nothing I read suggests the court will tackle this controlling behaviour??

Hi Harry,

compared to me your getting a lot more contact! if you want to take this to court, you have to be very specific about why your taking that route and what you want. could state you have restricted contact during school holidays and ask for more contact. are you getting the kids for half the school holidays? if not, then thats probably a good starting point. if you do take court route, then better to not mention money and CMS. keep that to the bottom of the list. once you get an order stating exactly what number of days/weeks you get contact, then you can phone up CMS about it. you will have to weigh up the pros and cons e.g. is it worth going to court and spending a lot of money, if its just to get 1 or 2 days of additional contact. i just spent 1 night with the kids after nearly 2 weeks waiting.

Have you brought the gaps to her attention Harry? Let her know that it’s not acceptable to have weeks where you don’t have the children, consistency is as much for the children’s sake as anything else.

Maybe you should tell her that if she won’t agree to a consistent 3 day weekly schedule, you will have to consider going to court for an order to have it defined, and if you do that, you will be asking for a shared care arrangement, which will state that the children live with you both.

I think it might be worth considering mediation... she might realise you’re not going to be fobbed off anymore.

Leaving it to her whim is just causing you so much stress, you may find that taking some kind of action will help you feel better... it’s about taking some control back.

Just to update....

Ex sent me through calendars with shared care for this year and next which clearly showed the 3 day per week average pattern

I uploaded them to the CMS and having spoken to a case manager on Friday they have agreed with me

Interesting comment from case worker is they look at what the shared care is reasonably expected to be and expect a change in pattern to be for 12 weeks before they amend their calculations. If they publicised this more it would stop people counting nights and create much more give and take with shared parenting arrangements.

good news. yep CMS seem strict with all this. i told them about my court order that says i will get full, every other weekend with the kids, from end of july. they told me they can't do anything now and i will need to phone back as soon as the full weekends start.