Wants full custody

[HelpmeLee2012]

Please help advice needed new to all this!
I have a 4 yr old boy and my Xp has told me today that he is going for full custody, he threatens me with it All the time, but last night had a full blown fight all because he was meant to pick him up at 7:30pm and when he got here I asked him to give him something to eat as he had been asleep at since 5pm I let him sleep as I knew it was going to be a long night for my son! So my xp picked him at 8:30 and brought him back at 9 saying I'm not taking a stArving Child as it will be 10 before we get home I said just grab him a sasuageroll or something on the way or next time to collected at a better time as my son is in bed asleep at 7. He went crazy and stormed off! Will he get custody there's a lot more to it he doesn't work and if he does it's only for max 5 months before he sacked pays very little child support if and when he feels like it! He has money always has different cars and motorbikes and always smokes weed he is never regular in my sons life it seems to be he wants his son around when he has a new girlfriend so he can look like the perfect family man! The way he behaves I know he wouldn't get full custody because he doesn't actually care about my son just uses him For attention and to make him look good but what I'm worried about is he knows how to play the system he gets everything and works for nothing he is such a good manipulator he fools everyone everyone he knows thinks he's the perfect guy until they get to know him, I fell pregnant with my son after only weeks being with him and was under his spell he had another son with another woman and he would say how she would stop him seeing his son when now I know the truth he has seen that little boy 3 times since I have known him and he has had plenty of chances! But he does live about 150 miles away. I split with him after non stop lies and abuse from him, and it feels like I've now become the horror story ex he told me about with his previous child's parent! After all this I have never stopped him seeing his child he does that himself when he has nothing to gain from spending time with our son! I CAN NOT AFFORD A LAWYER and not sure how he can either when last night he said he couldn't afford a sausage roll but like I said he knows how to play the system and not sure why he wants full custody when he can go six month without seeing his son and only lived around the corner sorry to go on but my heads a mess and my son is my everything couldn't imagine only seeing him at weekends

Just tell him you will await correspondence form his solicitor. . Keep all nasty texts and log all calls and detail them in a diary.

And I wouldn't be getting your court outfit sorted just yet if he won't even buy a sausage roll!
Don't let him bully you.

These are vile threats to intimidate you. He doesn't want to you after your DS he just want you to jump to his tune.

You have been primary carer for 4 years that counts for an awful lot... he would be expected to increase contact, move to be near you and so on - it isn't going to happen it is.

You need to detach from your ex, block his phone etc. Send him an email or letter saying that you will make DS available for contact on x y z - days and times. He won't bother to turn up most of the time will he?

If he can't afford a sausage roll then he can't afford a lawyer can he?

I really wouldn't worry. The most that a good dad can get is 50/50.( assuming that the mum is good too) You'd only stop being the resident parent if you were a drug addict or something and couldn't take care of him. For 50/50 , your ex would have to move 150 miles so that he could do half of the school pickups and dropoffs. A man who can't afford a sausage roll is highly unlikely to afford moving and half of the real financial cost of raising a child.

He's clearly trying to piss you off and it's highly unlikely he'd see a solicitor and pay money just to be told that he won't get full custody. Has he been watching Jeremy Kyle? A lot of dads threaten to go for full custody as a way of annoying their ex.

He brings him back cos he's hungry and he's too tight to buy him a sausage roll yet he wants full custody? I'd laugh in his face, he's trying to frighten you. There's a cheaters script on mumsnet somewhere, someone really should write the abusers script. "Im going for full custody and you'll never see your children again" will be one of the first lines on there.

Problem is he knows how to play the legal system, he constantly deliberately has accident and claims compensation and gets big payouts up to £8k that I know of since my son was born, in that time he's given me £600 from one of those payouts but bear in mind he owes me around £1500 from when we were together. I'm worried that he might just lie to solicitors and make it difficult. I'm sure he has money right now but he won't spend it unless he wants to. He constantly claims to have nothing pays minimal child support, at best £7.50 a week although this was as and when he felt like it. Recently he started offering £20 a week at Christmas time gave me it twice and then nothing for last 6-7 weeks. yet can buy cars regularly and his new gf a motorbike for Christmas etc. I'm just concerned he's got the solicitor fees squirrelled away and I cannot afford one myself

He may get a solicitor but CAFCASS will get involved, they will look at how your DS has been cared for to date - at most he would get 50:50 and would likely have to relocate to enable that once he is at school!

The legal system is not that easy to manipulate.

Maybe he has, but so what? What you're missing is that he doesn't really want to be saddled with sole residency of a child, and the costs and responsibility involved in that. He's just saying that to try and control you.

My fuckwit ex took my DD, and refused to return her. The police wouldn't help, and in those days he had access to full legal aid. As soon as he realised it wasn't having he desired effect on me (it nearly bloody killed me, but I knew his game and was a good actress) he returned her. Took less than a week!

To lose the status as resident parent, you'd have to be a terrible parent on the lines of raising your son in a home that's a brothel or so high that you can't parent him. If he wants to see his son more, he'd be forced to make huge changes to his life like moving closer so he can do the school run (obviously can't from 150 miles away) and probably changing his job.
Keep a log of the contact he has and the contact that was agreed to. Turning up an hour late and dropping him back home after 30 minutes is not resident parent material.