Can one parent get all weekends?

[divorcingdad212312]

Hi,

I have just divorced my wife. We have one 6 year old son.

I would like to request first that you read my post with an open mind and assume that I am telling the truth here and not exaggerating my ex wife's lack of parenting skills. Please also consider what advice you would give if the genders in my story were reversed. I understand that some ex husbands do criticise their ex wives unfairly, however please take what I have written below at face value.

For various reasons we have currently a status quo that our son stays with me Sundays to Fridays and goes to my ex wife Friday afternoons to Sunday afternoons. This means that I am doing the whole school run and she is just doing the weekends.

I would like to arrange some weekend time for various reasons. I would like to organise playdates, and do reading and homework with him, since he is very behind in schoolwork.

His mother tends to keep in indoors watching TV all weekend and does not engage with him. She does no homework, or reading, and doesn't take him to the park or to playdates. She doesn't even talk to him and gives him irregular meals. The only times he's gone out of the house have been to get McDonalds. Sometimes he has been looked after by relatives for the day instead of by her. I collect him on Sundays full of energy having been cooped up and ignored for 48 hours.

I am increasingly worried because our son is very far behind in reading, social skills and other areas. I am doing as much reading and studying as I can during the week, as well as some extracurricular activities. However this isn't enough time to close the developmental gap between him and his peers.

I have texted my ex wife to request for one weekend in four in exchange for every Wednesday afternoon, but she has rejected this request.

The problem is that although my ex wife does not seem to want to look after our son, I think she can exert a degree of control over me in this way.

My solicitor has explained that drugs, sexual abuse or violence would be the main reasons why I would be able to reduce my wife's time with our son, and her current parenting style, although damaging, wouldn't meet the threshold.

Has anybody had a similar scenario? I imagine there may be a few cases with the genders reversed. How did you sort it out? Negotiating directly with the ex? Solicitor's letter? Or did you have to go to court?

My understanding is that a court would always give each parent some weekend downtime, but my solicitor is cautious about going to court as I already have the majority of the time, and my ex wife may try to get more time with our son.

It sounds very challenging and you have my sympathy.

Are you certain that the account you're getting of your son's weekends is accurate? Many a child has exaggerated, or even invented, the negative actions of one party when speaking to another.

How old is the child?
What happens in school holidays.

Can you push a bit at the current timings, e.g. take him for some kind of physical activity, run around in the park or a sports class, on Fridays before dropping him at his mum's? And pick him up a bit earlier on Sundays to do the same? It doesn't solve your weekend problem but it would counter a little bit the sitting inside all weekend pattern.

Could you offer her extra money if she allows you to swap weekends for school nights. Phrase it that you will give extra money to cover getting him to schools/ uniform etc. If she’s only interested in herself maybe that’s the way to go.

@divorcingdad212312

I have child benefit in my name. No child arrangements order.

Solicitor said that mediation could be risky because it would give her a forum to state that she doesn't agree with the status quo, and try to become the primary parent instead of me.

She does sporadically give him to me at last minute when he gets in the way of her social life. However when I request weekends that's when she resists. She has a tendency to do the opposite of what she perceives I am asking of her.

I think I will try a couple of solicitor's letters but not sure what next. I don't see mediation working. I'm prepared to spend whatever is necessary to achieve this, even going to court - however the solicitor has advised that court is very risky and should be avoided at all costs as @greendiva said.

Try telling her some Friday "I'm quite busy this weekend, so I'll only be available in an emergency", then see if she somehow has something come up where you need to take your son. If it works.... Do it once a month 🤷‍♀️

@Jobsharenightmare Your stepsister sounds quite similar to my ex wife. The lack of stimulation was always a problem, and once my son started school the teachers began to suspect that he wasn't being stimulated at home. Can I ask why her ex-partner didn't end up with majority care of their son under the circumstances? Did he try for it? Or did he not want it?

@ThirtyCharacterUsernamesOnly30 The current status quo has been in place for only 6 months. So maybe I need to wait until we have a year or more before rocking the boat? However the solicitor has advised to sort out a better status quo including weekend time sooner rather than later, as status quos are hard to overturn. Solicitor advised me to discuss directly with ex, however she's refusing to engage at all on this topic - so next step is probably the solicitor writing to her.

I think you need to separate two possible scenarios/requests in your head:

1. Weekends.
   You and your son want to spend weekends together (i.e. every other weekend). This is a fair request but you can't reasonably expect just to get more time with the child whilst your ex will get less. You'd have to review the whole arrangement and you'd mostly likely end up with roughly 50/50 split as the most fair outcome.

2. Child's welfare.
   You are concerned about the child's welfare and want to reduce contact between mum and child. It's not really about weekends as such but about child's well being and development. This request is only fair if (and this a big IF) there is proof of neglectful parenting, or alternatively there is acceptance by your ex that she is struggling. Even if contact will be reduced on this basis, it can always be reviewed again in the future - for example after your ex completes parenting courses, counselling etc etc. Again, realistically the most likely outcome of this dispute will be roughly 50/50 split because you've not really offered any convincing evidence of extreme neglect.

I don't see how you can win this and not make it worse, sorry. I'd try to get the most of what you have which already is most days. Can you swap your working days and work on weekends to free up more time and energy during the week for parenting?

Is she paying child maintenance?

I would not recommend asking for child maintenance if you can afford to do without, as this may prompt your ex to try and reduce the amount of time your child lives with you.

The family court is the worst experience I've ever had to endure. The children become pawns caught up in adult affairs, open to manipulation.

Only engage with the courts it if absolutely necessary.

You are fortunate that your child lives with you most of the time. This is enough to rebalance the lack of care your child experiences when with your ex.

Speak to the school about how they can help develop an intervention to help your child, with your support.

I honestly think you should leave it. It may backfire on you completely and she may get awarded 50/50. I can appreciate its hard not having any down time but the quickest way the court would probably resolve this is by awarding shared care and then you both get weekends. At your own risk, but I'd leave it.

Can I ask how your son came to be so behind in his school work and social skills? If the current situation has only been for 6 months then is it a recent development, or are there wider issues that were in play prior to this arrangement? I think whether I would go for mediation or not really depends on this and whether it’s an exacerbated deterioration of an existing situation with your son, or a completely new situation.

@libertyfarmboots In my opinion, the reason is for the speech delay is that my ex wife during the years as a stay at home mum, until he was 3.5 years old) was completely disengaged. She never went to parent meetups, or took him to the playground, or on playdates or to children's parties. But more seriously, I think that she didn't talk to him or play with him. I would come home from work and immediately take him out to the playground as often as I could, or even come home to do these things during my lunchbreak. I tried to give as much support as I could but I also had to work full time. At various points I worked remotely for about 6 months at a time, and I saw my ex wife routinely get out of bed at 11 after he had been up for a while playing downstairs unsupervised. Then my ex wife would make herself a coffee and ignore him completely.

By the time he started going to nursery, I thought my ex wife would become more engaged, but she actually started going out like a teenager with her friends (quite possibly other men) regularly on nearly every weekday evening and at weekends, and doing even less with him. I became exhausted through working full time and then being the sole carer of my son during the evenings. So it may appear that she was depressed, and a lot of people suggest this to me, but I don't think a mum with PND goes out partying in the evenings!

This was all exacerbated by the pandemic (since schools were closed and he didn't get the stimulation he would have received in school), and the result is that my son has received less attention than he should have done by his age. In retrospect I should have divorced her when he was a toddler, however when he was about 4 I went to a solicitor for an hour's advice, and was told that I would not be the primary carer since I work full time and she doesn't, so divorce seemed like an even worse scenario. In the worst case, I would have had to move out to a flat and keep paying the mortgage on the family home, and see my son a few days a month. The problem is in my eyes that family law works on the assumption that if one spouse isn't working, they are contributing in some other way such as being a childcare provider, which is probably true 99% of the time but does not fit my scenario at all!

Regarding the risk of my request for weekend time backfiring, I am not sure what to do in terms of strategy. I live 2 minute's walk from my son's current school, and my ex wife is over an hour away. So realistically whatever I do, in order to get more days with him than she currently has, she would need to move house or change his school. She can't change the school without my permission. So so far in one sense I am relatively lucky, and probably can't lose the majority care that I have, but still the weekends are vital for catching up.

All solicitors I have talked to have advised me that things like mediation and court also could be risky because if I bring up her neglect, she will make up stuff about me. Nobody will know who to believe.

While we were still married, on a typical day during the lockdowns, either my ex wife wasn't at home at all (completely ignoring the lockdown, she would go and disappear for days at a time), or she would be around but not get up until after midday. She did no homeschooling and didn't even log onto the remote lessons. I couldn't do much as I was working during the daytime, although I was at home. Fortunately I have managed to get my son out of this environment but still there are lasting effects of this disruption and neglect. It's crazy that his education was so disrupted when he was in a household with only one working parent.

So one mediator told me that, since I am alleging neglect, my case would also be unsuitable for mediation.

The courts do recognise that each parent needs weekend and holiday time with their DC & vice versa.

I don't think you can end up worse off going to court.

Say your ex gets majority then she would have to move and weekdays he would be in school you would get a couple of week day overnights and EOW and 50% of holidays. If his attendance dropped school would be on it.

If 50:50 were awarded it would still have to be part weekday and part weekend and part holidays.

You really have nothing to lose as at the moment you get zero weekends together and are dealing with a barrage of abuse and changing arrangements with her.

You would be emotionally and mentally less strained by biting the bullet and going to court if she refuses mediation.

You could put in writing 3 different scenarios and ask which she would prefer or her suggestion.

Make him remaining at his current school non-negotiable and her having every weekend non-negotiable.

Assuming nothing reasonable is suggested then go to court. If a reasonable one is made then get it made into a court ordered arrangement so everyone knows where they stand.

How does your ex get your son at weekends?
Do you have any evidence of the neglect?

I would be far less concerned about your ex swapping 2 nights weekends for 2 school nights because your DS will actually be in school for most of the time and you can hope she uses after school care. TBH after school most DC just need to chill so that isn't as bad as him spending 2 full days sat doing literally nothing.

As I said the school will pick up if she is constantly late picking him up, taking him in, unacceptably dirty or neglected.

Your DS needs the opportunity to spend time with both sides of extended family which again happens at weekends.

You need to bite the bullet and do this before the current pattern is even more entrenched than it is.

Instead of focusing on the contact, days, could you go to mediation over your son’s need to have exercise and educational support, as he gets older, and come up with a plan for this. Could it involve him attending a club or tutoring on the weekend that you both agree? Could you pay for it if your ex takes him? Then if it doesn’t happen maybe you can arrange that you take him so she doesn’t lose face.

@divorcingdad212312 I totally get where you're coming from but I think ultimately your suggestions can be interpreted as "I'm a better parent than she is therefore the child has to be with me all of the time". It doesn't work that way. Giving you a slightly extreme example, I know a divorced couple where one of them went to jail and was still seeing children regularly after, and the other person couldn't do anything about it.

Can you be more clever / subtle / considerate about the whole thing and get what you want without being confrontational and starting a war? Maybe arrange some activities for the weekend and see if you can change the situation that way? Say you'd like to go to the cinema for example to see your son's favourite movie. Can you pick him up at ABC hour, and say you'll drop him off straight after at XYZ hour. You can't do cinemas and stuff during the week surely so it's a reasonable request. Don't argue if you get a no, but try again in 2 weeks time, and then keep trying after that. When she stops seeing you as a threat she might see the positive side to it.

The first thing I want to say is that if your child is at school all day, and getting reading etc with you in the evenings, I don’t think that weekends in front of the TV are enough to explain them being behind developmentally. Is there something else to explain this such as SEN or psychological impact of their relationship with their mother? Have you discussed this with the school at all?

Secondly, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for you to seek every other weekend with your child, not for the purposes of studying etc, but so that you can enjoy leisure time together.

Sorry, just caught up with your updates, and see your explanations. I think you need some input from professionals before you start the court route: start with the school.

Thanks. @aLittleL1fe I tried subtle suggestions but she dismisses them out of hand, preferring to keep him indoors all weekend than to allow me to take him to extracurriculars, family events, parties, etc.

I allowed this status quo to persist for about 6 months without rocking the boat, as I was worried my ex would try to get him living full time with her, but now I am relatively safe from that happening as I've been in control of the schooling for 6 months and she would need a very strong case to overturn that.

I am thinking probably the next step is either to ask for 1 weekend/month via a solicitor, or ask directly for 2 and possibly compromise on 1. It sounds like her misconduct can't be used directly - there's the concept of a "good enough parent" and unfortunately with the little evidence I have she would probably meet that threshold.

But I think that her bad parenting can be used indirectly. She is very scared of going to court or even of being contacted by a solicitor, as she would have to explain her comings and goings and disappearances during lockdown, etc. So I am hoping that she will back down when contacted by a solicitor. It's frustrating though, as 1 weekend/month doesn't sound like enough.

Do you think it's best to ask first for 1 weekend and later try to move up to 2, or go in high and ask for 2 straight away? I am wondering if 1 weekend/month can be achieved via solicitor's letter, and after 6 months I could use mediation or something to step it up to 2 weekends/month.

Hi OP

I would think you need to wait one year before you rock the boat. A year as status quo would be less likely to be challenged than 6 months.

In the meantime make sure you document every day (yes!) that he’s with you, and all the things you with / for him, such as GP etc, school stuff.
List them for yourself and take photos.

@Bonheurdupasse Thanks for the tip, that was my thinking too, but my solicitor said that in fact it's best to try to establish the status quo you want as soon as possible, as status quos are hard to change. So I'm wondering if I've left it a bit late.