To not go to court?

[Eyeofthelamp]

NC as very outing. Apologies for the length.

My ‘lovely’ exh has filed an enforcement order with the courts as he says I breached our child arrangement order. In a nutshell, I took our DC out for a meal for DS’s significant birthday, the day before his actual birthday, as he had his EOW contact with exh on his actual birthday and I wouldn’t be seeing him. I then dropped DC off with exh 1hr 20mins later than his usual contact start time.

Exh originally agreed to this plan verbally on the phone, however on the day of the meal he sent an email stating that unless I agreed an earlier collection time for my DC on a specific date for an event that exh had tickets for, then the meal couldn’t go ahead and he would collect DC as usual. I had already explained many times that until I got my DS’s timetable for his new school, that I couldn’t 100% agree this. I had no problem with an earlier pick up in principle, I just needed to see the timetable. This wasn’t good enough for exh.

On the day of the meal I ignored exh’s blackmailing emails and took the DC out as they had been looking forward to it. Despite previously agreeing this and knowing our plans, exh still came up our home at the usual time to collect DC. Obviously we weren’t in. DC saw this on our doorbell app and it made us all very uncomfortable and spoilt the atmosphere of the meal. Afterwards I dropped DC off with a very angry exh.

Following this I had a threatening solicitors letter stating that I had breached the arrangements order. Exh now denies he had agreed to the meal and as it was in a telephone call, I have no proof. Before my solicitor had time to respond to the letter, I received a court date for an enforcement hearing. My exh’s solicitor statement is basically asking court to punish me for the breach with community service.

I am due in court in just over a week. So far I have spent over £2500 on solicitor fees trying to defend myself. Whilst I am aware that I technically did breach the order, this was agreed in advance with exh and was only 1hr and 20 mins for DS’s significant birthday. I have never stopped my exh having contact with DC and have been incredibly flexible with contact over the years. This is my first ‘breach’ in 7 years.

My AIBU is, I am currently almost 8 months pregnant in a high risk pregnancy. I feel exhausted, stressed and unwell and the thought of having to attend court is making me very ill. Mentally, I’m a complete mess because of all this. My DH is away on a training course that can’t be moved on my court date, so I have literally no support on the day. Wibu to just not go to court? I feel absolutely broken by all this and can’t cope right now.

For background, exh and I have been divorced for 7 years after he cheated with OW. I was left to raise our 3 DC on my own. They have always seen exh and I have always facilitated contact. Exh is incredibly controlling around DC and everything has to be his way or no way. I have never argued this to keep the peace for DC. The child arrangement order is very biased towards him as when it was made 7 years ago, I couldn’t afford a solicitor and exh had hired an incredibly expensive and aggressive law firm to deal with it on his behalf.

Ask the court for an adjournment, explaining why (brief not the full story above). Don't just not turn up.

I asked for the previously due to not having any childcare with DH being away. It was refused.

How old is your DC?

Just not showing up means that your ex's version will be uncontested.

There's not much a judge can do in that situation but accept it. He'll have evidence of your ex's version of events and no evidence to contradict it or of your version of events.
It's not in your interest to put your head in the sand on this one and not just show up

This.

I wouldn't not turn up.

It's not fair at all and your ex sounds horrible but I think not turning up won't help at all and probably make things worse.

You really need to go.
If you don't, they may adjourn, for more information but probably not.

Can you ask for a remote hearing?

Could you ask for a medical note to request an adjournment until after baby born? The health of you and your baby would hopefully be more of a concern to a court than childcare.

You need to turn up for court otherwise it will be an advantage to your ex. However, I would bring something from a medical professional stating your pregnancy is high risk and that you need to manage your stress etc. Your solicitor will advise you best.
Depending on age of your DC the original child arrangement orders may no longer be enforceable really.
When I was pregnant with second. My ex started acting up and threatening all sorts. I sought advice from a solicitor who told me that it’s so common for Ex’s to escalate when there is a pregnancy or wedding.

You need to turn up or you’ll lose by default. However I can’t see the judge sending you for community service because you were an hour late!

@BlackeyedSusan my DS who’s birthday it was is 16yrs. Younger DS is 11yrs.

I’d go and breakdown in court, save all your emotions for them to show the judge what a petty wanker your ex is and the stress he’s putting you through

Oh my goodness just seen their ages! He’s even more pathetic and how horrid for your ds on his birthday.
this is good though as I would of thought a judge would listen to your children at their age?

Just feign illness on the day. He has it in for you as your pregnant and he hates that. Horrible bastard that he is. Just look after yourself and your unborn baby and kids and don’t let him upset you.

Coming up to the age where he can just refuse to go then and have his views taken into account.

At those ages I would think court would take account of them wanting to mark birthday with both parents and 1.5 hours is hardly withholding contact. If he keeps this up all he will do is push his ds away as soon with 16 year old no court in the land will be able to get him to see his df if he doesn't want to

Not to drip feed but DS16 has SEN. His birthday is a massive deal for him and he’d been planning where to go for his birthday meal for months. He’d even been texting exh to say how excited he was about going.

I’m being punished for doing something nice for our DS for his birthday. It was an hour. I don’t understand why exh is putting me through this.

All I can do right now is cry. I honestly can’t deal with this.

You're free to not turn up but it will almost certainly result in you losing.

You won't get community service on the strength of being 1h20m late, once. That's a ridiculous threat. The worst that could happen is that the judge amends the conditions of the contact order so that your ex has more time or even gets full custody. But that's highly unlikely for one minor breach like this.

The reason I think you should go is that if your ex reckons he can get you a community service sentence he has other ammunition to use against you - real or made up. If you don't go, you won't have a chance to reject this.

Honestly, if your one failure is being 1h20m late, once, and you tell the court that you informed your ex by phone (and he agreed), the judge will be pretty exasperated and throw the case out as a typical "she said, he said" waste of time as regularly happens between exes.

Technically, OP there was a breach of the order because it’s your word against his.
However, you have a couple things going for you, the age of your eldest child plus there have been no issues over the last 7 years so they is no pattern of messing around with contact for your Ex to use against you.

Take screenshots of your DS’s messages to his father.

Go to court and show them the messages. Tell them what you’ve said here about the agreement and your reason for not 100% agreeing to his request.

Going forward do nothing verbally. Everything by text or email.

he’s an absolute prick.

You’ve written well in your post. Write everything down. Key points - you haven’t breached order in 7 years. You have been flexible when required. It was 16 yr olds birthday day after and he wanted to do this with you as he was celebrating actual day with dad. It was an 1 hr 20. Ex agreed (telephone call x date) x was fully aware of plans - have copies of texts from son. He deliberately went out of way to upset son. Son is 16 and entitled to have wishes taken into account.
Maybe time to look at order again as don is 16.

Voted yanbu in that your ex is a controlling prick and he's wasting the court's time. But I do think you need to go, unless you can get a remote hearing or an adjournment. You need the opportunity to get your side across.
Fwiw court/cafcass took my kids' views into account and they were much younger than yours at the time.
Stay strong. Your ex is trying to use the court to get at you, it's no coincidence that it is happening during your pregnancy. You should also let court know he was playing tit for tat with an arrangement he wanted you to be flexible with, as court won't look kindly on that.

You need to turn up at court. Does the court order state a handover time? As ds is 16 the judge may well decide your ex is being ridiculous as your ds is old enough to decide for himself what he would like to do on his birthday. Keep a copy of any messages etc showing ds excitement. Unfortunately if the court order states a time you have breached the court order but I wouldn’t expect a judge to be overly concerned given its was your ds who wanted the meal.

Well, sounds like going forward you will no longer be able to facilitate your ex's need to change contact times. He'll just have to ask someone to babysit his children until collection time on the date he has that event. What a dick. Go to court. Keep your head high. Ignore him.

At 16 your son is easily old enough to decide his own contact with his father and I wouldn't be surprised if the judge says so.

A friend of mine got a threatening letter from her ex's solicitor about contact with their two sons. The older son, who was about 12, replied saying neither of them wanted time with their dad because he was always drunk and didn't cook for them. They never got bothered again.

You need to turn up.

I can’t believe a court would care about this. If I were the judge (I’m not a judge but I’m a lawyer in another field - but don’t take this as legal advice, as it’s not my field) Id be more concerned by your ex’s behaviour in being completely inflexible, and going to court over trivialities.

I’m divorced and if I went to court every time exh pissed about with timings (not saying you pissed about but even if you did) I’d never be away from the place.