Now he may move out of state to keep his job with Boeing, technically may be considered off site with paycheck coming from facility in another state, but 10 yr old son has only ever lived in Maryland near my family. 10 yr old son loves both Mom and Dad. Older son is in fact in a college dorm in PA and will be closer to Dad than Mom if Dad is transferred. 18 year old son said he thought it would be better for me to have custody, but I know he is dependent on Dad for college, and although he is aware of the affair and a little troubled by his fathers’ recent behavior and aware his father wasn’t so nice to me, and knows his father has been away a lot and coming home with empty beer bottles in the trunk of his car and hes seen him drunk at a gig his band played at I do not expect him to say he was a bad father. Father mopes around and for six months spends much less time with his younger son than he used to, possibly to make younger son want him more. This was extreme the last two weekends spending up to 20 hrs of my sons waking hours unavailable to him. Dad still lives in house and won’t leave – saying he wants custody, an days he will say I’ve abused him verbally and emotionally for years, and he will make me pay for the divorce and he will get the house. Boeing would buy the house if it would not sell at the price we paid for it in 2003. If he is transferred back to Philadelphia he could temporarily live with family. He now denies the once admitted affair and takes the fifth. He falsly claimed in response to interogatorries my son is very AFRAID of me. I make about $62,000 and get paid for 32 hrs per week but have to work 40 hrs to get it, would probably work 50 hrs to get paid for 40 hrs but they have no openings for a 40 hr. position. I have no company paid benefits but due to physical job needing four limbs – not allowed to work with cane, crutch or arm cast for instance – I must now buy expensive disability insurance so I can afford shelter if I sprain an ankle, and I’ll pay about five times the cost of the full time employees for health care because they have no full time openings. In my profession, anything higher paid would be longer hours, evening, weekend or holidays, and likely unethical practices in an unstable work environment – for instance the home health company I worked for previously shifted my territory to another county and then closed the office covering the county I was hired to work in placing me too far away from my son’s school. The nursing home I worked at previously- has changed contracted rehab companies a few times since I worked there as have other nursing homes in the area. In the previous hospital I worked at I was already at the maximum pay I could make with no raises given to anyone who made what I made, and published salary ranges show I was at the max for other hospitals as well. He gets approx. $30,000 in free health care for him and the kids (one son in college)and other benefits that will not affect child support, and makes &103,000.00 a yr. and is guaranteed a raise each yr. The scouting community see him as a great contributor and he said they will be his character witnesses. He alienated me and thwarted my participation in scouts (remember his scouting mistress), but I was involved in piano, taekwondo, and went on field trips, did school parties but not the same ongoing working relationships with other parents that scouts involve. Often the same parents aren’t at each party or field trip for instance. I was very involved with my children, but due to my husbands’ extreme social schedule, his need to leave the house at 4:45 AM to see his mistress but telling me he had to get to work early,and my work schedule where I went in later so as to avoid too much AM childcare with husband more often than me picking them up for about 3 and a half of the last 10 and a half years. (relatively recently just not the last 6 months) The problem is this did not ever involve the same kind of cooperative parental participation or parental involvement that scouts does and the socializing that planning for camps and camping for a week with the same adults you see week after week does. Therefore, I do not have as many nonfamily member character witnesses he does. He is relying heavily on scouts, his steady higher paying job (I had changed mine for the children over the years as we moved or their school schedule changed etc. but have been in the same job for 3 yrs now), and seems to believe his charity work (primarily performing in a band for contributions only he says at private parties and churches and county fair) Meanwhile I am afraid to go to the gym because he is claiming I am selfish although 2008 was the first time I ever joined a gym and did not go more than 20 times and now I cannot go because he is away so much I have to be with my son – there is no way I have had time to do charity work because he is too busy socializing, going to band practice 2 times a week and band gigs sometimes two times a weekend, and scout meetings that he goes alone to without my son and visits to the mistress 5 or more times a week, and sponaneous trips out of the house to mysterious places, including parks.

We live in Maryland. Will they likely give him sole custody based on what I have said the following: 1) My son is a boy that is the only child at home and getting older – 11 yrs I believe by the time the divorce is final. 2)He has a higher paying job. 3)He has been involved in scouts and I’m sure will have many scout leaders say what a great Dad he is. 4)He he has helped my brother-in-law with Christmas in April where homes are fixed up for others. 5)If I work full time I will actually have to work more hours (He can even leave work in the middle of the day for afternoon delight and then return to work – as a P.I. has caught him leaving the mistresses home a couple of times – but did not stay to see her leave or capture PDA so it might not be legal proof.)

Do I have any hope? In the absence of proof that my husband is doing drugs I don’t think I would get sole custody, and the P.I. said even if he filmed him taking something from someone, it would not prove what he took or handed off and the police would never get there in time, and could not search without a warrant…. And homosexual sex is not adultury in Maryland, and even prostitution that is hidden from the child does not mean the child would be taken away. The lawyer said the court ordered drug tests don’t work because the people have enough warning to clear the drugs from their system – they are not random apparently.

Will the fact that he may need to move to keep his job lead the courts to give him, with the higher paying job and health care, sole custody, or shared physical custody with an arrangement that allowed him to take my son from state?

I’m sorry this was so long. Any suggestions are appreciated?

Every state has its own rules concerning moveaways. Your son should ask an attorney. And yes, she probably did it so she could have all the control because of the jealousy issue.

On another note…I am glad to find this site! If anyone wants advice or wants to ask questions about divorce/custody, please ask. MY ex tried to move away and I won custody! Now she lives 1000 miles away (not far enough) and I get to walk my son to school every day!

David, I would like to compare notes with you sometime on being a single dad! It is difficult, but not as hard as people would think listening to all the single moms whine all the time.

mike

During his marriage, his wife was jealous of everything that he did, including having fun with his kids. She would physically attack him because he had to work and could not be there much so that he could support them as well as pay child support for a child she had with someone else and support a child that he had before he married, so that is six people. She would not work on his day off where he would have watched the children. My son loves the boys and he works and works to pay the support for them.

Much more, but to get to the point, She has just recently been beaten up by the man that she had babysit the boys and he is in jail. She has moved to Victorville with the boys suddenly which is more than 100 miles away from their father. My son works all night on Fridays which would mean driving 100 miles on no sleep, picking up the boys, travelling back 100 miles, having them for the night in the shared housing he has with friends, and starting off on the trip back to Victorville again so he can get them back in time, then travelling back 100 miles. The kids would be sitting forever in the car and basically the whole weekend would be travelling with a dad operating on no sleep.

They love their dad and look forward to seeing him. The ex-wife and kids just moved and already my son has missed the visitation. She is supposed to meet him half-way, but her car has been towed due to her not making the payments.

I am positive that she moved far because of her jealousy and is punishing my son because he could not deal with her anymore and finally left after she smashed his daughters school picture because he visited her at Christmas. This after years of abuse. There was no reason for her to move so far. There is no family there and she is not going there for employment.

My question is – Can she move 100 miles away from the father making it impossible for him to be involved in their lives? This is in the same state. Is it just when the ex moves to another state that they need the courts permission or is it when the distance is too far with no real reason for moving there. She said it was cheaper.

My son does not own a home and I live in a senior apartment complex so unless there is a way, they, for now, will have to stay with their mother and she is not likely to give them up easily even though they know she abused my son and was beaten up by this man. Incidentally, she has visited this man in jail who will be out in May or sooner, so I am concerned that he will move to Victorville. He has used the belt on my grandchildren and the mother made scratch marks down one of the kids faces. My son reported this and she was visited by child services.

Do you know, though, all I can do is worry. What else can be done. Any suggestions would be appreciated.