Access to son for dad

[Laurenx1x1]

Can I have some advice please ?

Thank you if you read this !!

My eldest (is 6) has not seen his real dad for 2.5 years and before this it was very on and off visits.. and knows him as ‘the dad that doesn’t see me’ my husband has been step dad since he was 1 years old and always called him daddy.

I won’t go into detail but the dad has done many things over the years towards me, my husband and his son.. we tried alsorts.. agreement ourselves, mediation twice and contact centre visits which fizzled out when Covid hit.. anyway he’s been to see a solicitor and they have referred us to mediation again, I am seeking some advice soon to see if I should try mediation again to see if his intentions have changed or he can take me to court ? I ideally do not want to drag my son through the court system and to see if dad has changed.. I have a few issues I don’t know how to handle though…

firstly- my son calls step dad ‘daddy’ he has done since he was able to talk.. the bio dad doesn’t agree with this and never has which I understand to an extent but this is through his own actions and not being around and my son knew no different.. I have always told our son about his bio dad and never hid this from him. He just presumes he has two daddy’s but calls bio dad ‘the dad who doesn’t see me’ how do I handle this ? If he gets contact with his dad what do I do here ? he won’t change what he calls his step dad he’s done it for five years.. bio dad is going to need to understand this ? Do we just go with having two daddy’s I don’t know ?

My son uses his step dads surname at school, he got so upset that his mummy , ‘daddy’ and brother all had our surname and his was different.. he started telling the school he wanted our surname and cried at school when they said no.. so the school raised a meeting and we all decided for my sons best interests to change his surname at school only. since this he has been happy but always said to him he has his dads name and he says he’s fine with that.. am I meant to tell ‘dad’ of this change or not? He won’t ever pick him up from school he lives too far away but I know he will lose his head over this and won’t see the situation through his sons eyes just ours..

‘Dad’ is a very manipulative person and we haven’t ever seen eye to eye he thinks I took his son from him and we brainwash him he won’t accept responsibility for any of his previous actions at all.

Even if we agree to see his son, our son is going to be extremely nervous which means I’m gonna have to hang around until he’s comfortable.. ’dad’ doesn’t work, doesn’t have a car and has debt with Csa also.. so not sure how he’s gonna ‘see his son’ baring in mind we live an hour away.. so lots of things to think about but I am stressing about the surname situation knowing how he’s spoken to me in the past over more minor situations..

Any advice appreciated 🤍

You may be breaking a court order by letting your dc be known by a different surname. I have a live with order and that stipulates I cannot let my dc be known by another name.

As he hasn't seen his dc for so long definitely push for supervised in a contact centre.

Hi, we don’t have a court order
he is just ‘known as’ at school only and we had a meeting to discuss. As long as he uses it as known as at school and in child’s best interests it was ok?

I think supervised also, unsure how to handle issues above though

Does your son want to see him?

You won't be dragging your son through court. He might need to speak to someone to talk through his feelings but he'll have no awareness of the court proceedings.

I'd go to mediation and suggest a contact centre again. He could also write your son a letter to apologise for being absent.

He needs to be the one to make the effort here. He needs to have your sons best interests at the forefront, even if that's upsetting for him.

Your ex will have to accept that your son calls his step-dad ‘dad’ and wishes to have his step-dad’s surname. While your ex has the right to go for visitation, all decisions should be made in the best interests of the child, so that’s your answer. Simply state ‘it was in my DS’s best interests to agree to what he requested’. And repeat this when required, over and over if necessary.

There’s no need for you to be worried because you’ve done what was reasonable in the circumstances. His father doesn’t pay CS and stopped visitation. So you had to get on with things and make decisions.

Your ex’s response to this is up to him. If he displays anger during mediation, you can use this to ask for supervised visitation. Also ask for short visits - 1 hour maybe - and at infrequent intervals - maybe every 2 weeks - to let your son get to know his biological dad.

Stress that your son has been let down by his dad before (when he stopped visitation) so you want to go very slowly this time.

Your ex can’t enforce what your DS calls him or what he calls your DH, or the surname at school. He will have to state how he’ll travel to the visitation centre.

Remember you’re the one who has cared for your son all these years so you’ve nothing to be worried about. It’s your ex who will have to do the explaining.

You dont need a court order about surname. My son has been my surname since 2 weeks after he was born everywhere other than his passport he is known by mine everywhere drs etc

I assume that was the name he was registered under. To legally change the surname you’ll need either consent from the other parent with PR, or a court order. Schools will sometimes use “known as” but this is open to challenge.

It’s fine to use the Name at school, I just filled in a school form and it asked for my sons “preferred name” my oldest has a double barrelled surname and Scholl habe always been Fine Just using mine

@GoodChat @Honeysuckle16 thank you for the detailed reply.

my son says he doesn’t want to see him but I know this would probably change if he had my confidence to help build their relationship. Over the years I have ‘caved in’ and let him see his son even though he has done some awful things and let his son down on numerous occasions.

he has never bought him anything, has 4k in debt with Csa, lied to me constantly and took his son to the pub at every Opportunity.. I don’t trust a word he says so it’s a hard situation he has a lot to build on..

your reply has really helped my view on this. I’m sat here thinking I’ve done something wrong and need a way to explain why my son calls step dad his dad and wants his surname. I only ever do what is right by my son and so does step dad. We have never not mentioned his real dad he is very much aware.

i do think a contact centre is the only way they will be able to build on anything and fortnightly is also good idea.. we did this before.

thank you guys x

In my school we would not change a surname, or indeed a forename, unless it was a legal change. Especially for such a young child. To be honest, most of the children who are in KS1 don’t know their surnames anyway!

He only has his surname on his books, peg and register. Everything else is his original surname, it eased his anxiety about his surname and is happy now but he can always decide to revert back if he wanted

Laurenx1x1, thanks for your response. You’re obviously a very kind and thoughtful person and, like a lot of kind people, feel guilt at anything you might be criticised for.

You’ve done a great job raising your children and making good decisions for them, without any support, financial or otherwise from your ex.

Please remember you’ve got nothing to apologise for, and nothing to explain either. Your ex has a choice of being apologetic or of doing the opposite and being aggressive, blaming everyone but himself and looking to pick fights with you.

That’s his choice but it doesn’t need to change your behaviour. You can be the confident, competent parent who knows she’s done the right thing.

I believe that sometimes mediation is seen to be inappropriate if there has been a history of domestic violence. You’d have to speak to the mediator or a solicitor about this.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/489125/family-mediation-leaflet-press.pdf

Best wishes.

If your son has called step dad daddy, since he was able to talk then I'm sorry but that's come from you. Your child did not know to do that on his own. I don't think it's right that a child is encouraged to call someone else dad.
Regarding the surname, presumably you made a choice to change your name knowing your son was the only one in the family with a different name, did you not think ahead to problems that might arise from that?

I'm not going to deny the dad is a dick, and a lot of support is going to be needed for your son, especially if he dips in and out of his life. I do however think your wrong on both points regarding the names, and I can totally understand why the dad would be upset when he finds out.

Well then maybe the dad should have not kept letting his son down and let contact drift. This is on him.

@purpleboy i don’t agree With you. This isn’t on me, when he started to call ‘step dad’ his daddy we continuously told him his step dads name to revert the situation… his real dad then was in and out of his life and the only consistent male role model was step dad. He also has a younger brother who calls step dad his daddy so they both say it… I have tried everything to defend ‘bio dad’ and it isn’t my fault he’s a waste of space and can’t put his son first. You’re telling me when I got married I shouldn’t have taken my husbands name ? That’s not for you to have a judgment on. We changed his known as name at school because of how much he wanted to be the same so I did what i was able too for him..

How did your son even know to call step dad "dad" it's modeled and learnt behavior which has obviously come from you.
If your son decided now to call him dad I think that's different and not at all unexpected considering how absent his real father has been, but at 1-2 years old no he didn't just decide to do that himself.

And yes when you got married you should have given a little thought to how that was going to play out when your son was the only one in the family with that name.
I double barreled my name so my DD1 wasn't the only one with that name, it felt even more important when we had DD2 so DD1 didn't feel left out.

You would have to do mediation (unless exempt) - if it's unsuitable / you cannot agree you are signed off by the mediator and then dad can take you to court.

Courts will instruct cafcass to do a safeguarding call where they speak to you & dad about any issues you may have about contact / safety etc - they then report this to the judge; the judge can then request a cafcass section 7 report - they will speak to you & dad & child to get their views and make recommendations for contact and how it should look.
(Have a look in the cafcass website)

Is dad on child's birth certificate?

Child maintenance won't be looked at by family court and more often than not they don't like it even being mentioned (I've been through it and was advised to keep this separate as that is what cms is for)

Known as name at school isn't the same as changing his name legally- although cafcass might have something to say on it when they approach the school

Purpleboy, it’s going a bit far to criticise a parent who has cared for their child while the father has been absent or disruptively stepping in and out of the child’s life. Plus no CM. If this father objects to any aspect of his son’s life, he needs to be present when decisions are being made.

@purpleboy even if I kept my surname it was still different to his surname as he had his dads name ? So that doesn’t even make sense 🤣

when he bio dad was in and out and in and out he called him daddy, when bio dad then Vanished he resorted to calling step dad daddy and we repeatedly told him the correct name and term but he knew no different, his brother came along and they both went with daddy.. you accusations and irrelevant nor helpful.

I double barreled my daughters surname (her dads) and my new husbands so she wasn't in the situation your son is in now, I don't want her fathers name he was as useless as your sons dad but I certainly wasn't going to leave her as the only family member with a separate name, and that is legally her name.

There are separate issues at play, you said yourself you're worried how he will react to the name changes, that's because you know deep down it is hurtful. He is also a shit dad I'm certainly not disputing that, I just personally feel this is more about what you want not necessarily what your son would have chosen if he had been given free choice.

Also apologies if you think I'm trying to have a go, that's not my intention, I just think your sons dad is going to kick up a fuss about the names and your reasonings (to me) are a bit weak. If he is as manipulative as you say (not doubting you at all btw) then he will find a way to make you the bad guy for doing this behind his back, if it goes to court it might go against you.

@purpleboy i get your reasons behind what your saying and of course they will be hurtful. It would be weird if I didn’t think they would be hurtful but he wasn’t the best dad but that isn’t why I allowed my 6 year old to change his surname.. it came out of no where he started using step dads surname on pictures he drew at school and work he was doing so the school raised it. We sat and spoke about it, I even let it play out for ages to see if it was a ‘phase’ but he would cry most days at it. The dad hasn’t been around for nearly 3 years I’ve not heard a thing. So in my eyes he wasn’t in the picture. My son knows his name is the bio dads name he just didn’t want to be called it at school. He knows if his mind ever changed he can revert this back again. I asked people for advice on what to do in this situation? Not to be critical of my decisions or compare them to your own.. I did right by my child at the time with what he wanted when he expressed his emotions. I have many reasons but I won’t sit on here and explain every bad event that has happened with the bio dad. I know loads of kids who have also changed their surnames to step parents when the bio parents aren’t around. I don’t think this is as huge as it needs to be. I just wanted advice

@onedone

thank you for explaining I’m not sure if we have too much complex history for mediation to work but I’m sure my solicitor can help us make that decision.

he is on the birth cert yes

it was simple at the time he was starting a new school and the forms said ‘known as’ so we had a meeting and decided known as name to be step parent surname same as ‘mum, brother and step dad’ his bio dad hasn’t been around for a long time and I wanted him to feel part of us which is why he was so upset

Fair enough, apologies again. I truly didn't mean to upset you. I can see how my words were hurtful.

I've no doubt you have done best by your son and you're happy with your reasoning so you will be able to articulate that and the wishes of your son.

Easy for me to say but try not to overthink what may or may not happen. He sounds so shit that he probably won't continue to stay in your sons life anyway, it's just another means of control over you. Although that brings with it it's own set of problems.

I wish you the best of luck navigating this.