applying for residence order and parental responsibility for me (stepmum) - mother going nuts!

[ladydeedy]

hello
sigh.. sorry, another post (have only just come across this site in the last few days and cant seem to stay away right now!).
Anyway... DH and I are applying for a residence order for his son who has come to live with us and wants to stay (and we want him to stay too!). All happy there. He is 14 and very clear that he doesnt want to go back and live with his mum.
We are making a joint application so that I would also have parental responsibility. This is because DH often abroad for work and it means that practical stuff for son can be dealt with by me if necessary, e.g. signing school/medical forms, without me having to find the mother and get her to sign.
So we thought it would all be a matter of course but...
the mother now going apopleptic with rage saying she doesnt give a f*ck that he lives with us but that she absolutely wont allow ME to have any "legal rights" over the son and will fight tooth and nail as she "doesnt trust me".
Not quite sure how I feel about that, given that I have been his stepmother for years and we have a great relationship! Also if she is happy for me to care for him, then why the big issue over any parental responsibility?
I guess this means she will contest. I dont have a problem with that personally but think this may cause anxiety to the son who may have to go through interviews etc with cafcass as a result.
In addition I'm thinking... any lawyer would ask questions about why she is so adamant and would advise her to forget about it? She basically chucked him out and took his key off him - I'm not sure her view about parental responsibility would really holds much value in the eyes of the court? (although of course she is still his mother).
any thoughts or advice out there? Anyone else been through this? and if so, my sympathies!!

Gosh, patronise people why doncha....

No wonder the mum seems to be reacting negatively to you.

Your last post was just about the smuggest thing I have ever come across on MN.

Yes we do understand -we are not stupid and try to give you advice all the way along, some of the advice you like and some of the advice you don't like and some of the advice you simply took and made a silly point - unfortunatley life is not good when you only eat one fruit, you need a selction of furit to get the most out of them.

Plenty of people have given you a hard time because of the way you come across - on more than one occasion this has been told to you - you choice to ignore it and simple decide that these people are hostile - no we are telling you what you need to know as this isn't real life where your friend nodds her head in agreement and thinks gosh you are over stepping the mark a bit

We have tryed to help you see from other points of view - you take those points of view and say oh you have your own unsolved issues

no we don't - we are trying to give you advice form our own pasts and the experiance we have gained form those pasts - that may help your dss future and yours as a family.

i have two lovely daughters and have good relationships with them both, I enjoy them living with me and the people they are becoming.

To be left a note on the kitchen table on Sunday night - thanking me for all the effort I have put into hleping my eldest daughter 1 last week and that she aprecaited she hasn't always been easy to live with but does love me and thinks I am great - no I don't have unresloved issue.

i have leanrt from my experiances

the best step mum that I see is my dd's brothers mum - she may not legally be their step mum anymore but they still refer to her as that and the relationship has stayed the test of time

Seriously? You assume that people who don't agree with you or criticise you must have 'unresolved issues' or 'don't understand'?!

How hilarious! If you go though life with that attitude then the way you've come across on this thread makes a lot of sense.

Our solicitor advised me that it is advisable for step parents to have PR. She used the example (very small chance of it happening but..) if me, DP and DSD were in car accident and DP was unable to give medical consent on DSD then we would have to wait for her mum to get to the hospital to give consent.

I agree with ladydeedy, it is a comman thing to be done, and it is advisable.

Go into any emergencey unit and ask if the consultant or any junior doctor waits for consent in an emergency situation - you will find a differnet answer to the solicitor

There would be nothing but to tell the nurses the situation and let them assist you in seeing your dss - they would know how and when to sort things out - it isn't uncommon for parents divorced and step parents to not get on

it is best to say something as this then lets the nurses know to keep you apart and do this for tranquility for the patient and other patienst around

if she was out of order the nurses would soon tell her - it isn't the time or place to have a fight and medical staff told my ex to buttin it and exactly that - he shut right up there and then - and that was just A&E - no suprise then he wasn't called again, to be fair he didn't call me when dd1 broke her wrist (dd1 has broken a few things as a bit clumsy, fell off a curb and borke her leg) but as far as I am concerned one of us is there with her and as long as she isn't in a RTA or at deaths door, then one of us can deal with it..no need for both of us to sit there waiting. I am talking about a 13-16 year old.

We do talk, but only when we need to talk as both dd's are important.
I don't listen to tails of woe, I used to and then realised that although the story may be true...it was really being layed on and a bit woefull - so do I really have to listen to this a few times and a scowl - if it is really important then fine but if not don't tell tales - and they stopped..

Evidently some of you didnt like what I wrote earlier.
I'll repeat what someone said on here earlier "if you post on a public forum you don't get to pick who gives you their opinion".
Contrary to comments which said I have dismissed what some people have said because I "dont like it" - in fact I have very much enjoyed reading others' differing opinions. It is clear that this is a very emotive topic and one which has provoked a few extreme and emotional reactions from some individuals.

There you go again.

If someone is not with you they are having an 'extreme and emotional reaction', have an 'unresolved issue', 'didn't like' what you wrote earlier, 'very hostile', 'jumping to conclusions', 'simply don't understand the issue' -- and that's just from this page.

You are coming across as a human tank.

If someone shows up in an emergency room bleeding and unconscious from an accident, do the surgeons wait until the patient is able to give consent before treatment?

Even in the case of your DSS needing an emergency appendectomy or with a broken leg, I would sincerely hope that your main focus would be the child himself in that situation and not the complicated antagonisms among the 'adults' involved here.

What is to be gained in the case of a medical emergency from a situation where the mum and you are fighting about treatment options or visitation (which I have every confidence would happen given your demeanour on this thread and your description of the mother's personality) with you and your PRs and the mother and her identical rights battling it out from the pov of your respective prerogatives, neither one willing to give an inch? If the mother tried to give her son any kind of grief while he was hospitalised for any reason and she visited, she would be turfed out or told to behave herself by the staff.

The child has a father, who is capable of being contacted no matter where he goes, since we now live in the age of mobile phones, in case of emergency.

The only guaranteed result of persisting with the joint residency order (and not confining it to the child's father, with him then according you legal in loco parentis rights) is continued antagonism between you and the mother, and this is 100% guaranteed to work against the best interests of the child. This mother has already shown that she is willing and able to take out her feelings on her child, and yet by raising the stakes involved, you are contemplating raising the heat of the proceedings considerably. I think you are locked into a conflict with the mother here, from which I fear you will not back down due to extreme stubbornness and pigheadedness, with the potential for enormous collateral damage to the child and his relationship with his mother.

When you can focus in such a blinkered fashion on your rights, a list of PRs on a piece of paper, you can't blame anyone else for focusing on those rights too. You have caused this situation to develop by your insistence on the joint residency, and the child you profess to care so much about has already been wounded by the consequent flak from his mother. You know what this woman is capable of, yet you are going to keep on provoking her? Is your aim here the complete severing of the child's ties to her? He expressed his deep emotional reaction after the last episode with her because he cares about his relationship with his mother no matter how she treats him.

Well mathanxiety you are entitled to your opinion, as always. Thanks for sharing.

Well, it has been pretty clear to me that some posters are mixing up ladydeedy's situation with something in their own life. I think "unresolved issues" probably describes it pretty well. It's one of the most irritating aspects of this kind of forum.

Ladydeedy, I think your "mistake" on this thread has been to respond calmly and not react to the hostility that has been directed at you. It's more than I would have done, I think.

Thanks, you're more than welcome, and good luck with the bulldozing. Let us know how it all turns out.

For what it's worth, I don't think the OP needs PR. In a medical emergency surely common sense would dictate how the situation was handled, and for anything else, I don't think legalities are necessary. But I don't think the OP deserved to be flamed like this!

Ladydeedy -- why post a question if you're just going to be snippy when people respond?

You are entitled to choose to interpret my various responses as "snippy" of course. Whatever that means.

It means that you line up posters in two camps (very childishly) and tell those who are in the 'against Ladydeedy' camp (i.e. those who have any opinion contrary to yours) that they have 'an 'extreme and emotional reaction', have an 'unresolved issue', 'didn't like' what you wrote, are 'very hostile', are 'jumping to conclusions', or 'simply don't understand the issue' and then thank them for 'sharing'.

There's also an element of sarcasm to 'snippy', as in 'thanks for sharing'.

People who have been in the stepmum's shoes can see the stepmum's pov just as those who are the mum can see the mum's. Neither party has a monopoly on objectivity. Objectivity doesn't necessarily mean 'agreeing with Ladydeedy and cheering her on', despite your high opinion of you attitude and motivation here.

Ladydeedy, I too am a stepmum and it is a thankless job (at least in my case). Dh's ex would threaten to send the kids to live with us all the time. We would have been delighted, but knew that she would have changed her mind 10 min later and that could only be bad for the children. (In this respect, I completely understand your concern about your dh's ex's ability to "reclaim" her ds). I finally came up with a good, workable response. Dh would say to her that we would be delighted to take dss or dsd to live with us if she would go to her lawyer and draw up an agreement that he/she would be coming to us for a minimum of one school year. She never actually intended for them to come to us, so never went on any further with her "threats."
However, having said all of the above, I would never have asked for PR for my stepkids, even if they had come to live with us. It would have been too agitating to dh's ex and as a result, too agitating to her children. Because no matter how awful a mother she was, and no matter how much her children complained about her, they still needed her love and approval. Along these same lines, I have to give the example of dh who describes being beaten up so badly by his father on multiple occasions that he was hospitalized. Yet when he was sent away into care, he set a record for running away more times than any other child, and each time the place he was heading for was the home with his father (and mother who didn't protect him). The conclusion is, that although your dss' mother may not be parenting him as well as you, and although he is saying that he hates her, the truth will be much deeper and more complicated than that. And the best thing you can do is not make things more emotionally complicated for your dss and asking for PR (even if it's the sensible thing to do) will clearly agitate his mum and inevitably stir things emotionally for him. You seem very intelligent and competent and I would suggest that you figure out a better, more clever way of getting the ability to care for him appropriately, that doesn't agitate his mother.
Sorry for the long post, but it's just not as simple as you or I or any stepmum would like it to be.

SofiaAmes, fabulous post. It should always be about what's best for the child rather than what's best for ANY of the adults involved.

And fwiw, if my exh was to remarry I'd hope it would be to someone with your outlook rather than someone who wanted to score points over me.

Not that this will happen, he's gay and my dc's are all adults now anyway

Sofia -- I agree with your post too.

i live with my partner and his two children from a previous relationship and our daughter. the children live with us permanently.
As my partner works full time and i work in a school, I am at home more often than he is, i deal with all the school messages, doctors appointments, dentist appointment, parents evenings because i am the only one who can easily be available for these things. the children do not see their mum and haven't done so since she failed to attend court when the residence order was going through, but i know she would contest me having parental responsibility. one of the children is being seen for behavioural issues and even though i look after him all the time I am not supposed to be involved as i dont have PR, whereas his mum has to be informed of everything! i think that unless you are in a situation where you look after someone elses children and then get told you are not 'qualified' to be involved because of PR then you cant understand the importance of PR to unmarried step parents.

Its very easy to get wound up by the ex especially when all sorts of personal stuff is thrown you way but in the long run your SS feelings must come first the ones he tells you about and the ones he doesn't base you decisions around LOVE and i think you will find you will gain more restect from him and as for his mum you dont need her opinion of you so don't vale it and i really know its ealier said than done but if she takes a chip at you Take it for your SS sake she wont keep doing it if she sees she isn't getting at you. I feel a lot for your SS as he is going through a very influential time in his life. How do you see him growing up? What will he think and feel about things in the future how will he look back at things.
dont argue for arguments sake if you base decisions in love a STILL HAVE to fight for rights for the real benifit of your SS then Love can't be fought.

just to close this off, the ex didnt turn up in court. judge said that there must be mediation between both parents or no order would be granted. DH said no way, there's nothing to mediate about. So the application has been dropped. We've informed school, applied for child benefit, maintenance payments stop immediately, informed doc and dentist, etc. EXW insisted SS come and remove all belongings from her house, which he has done, and she said she "might" decide to see him again sometime in the winter... when/if she feels like it. The good thing is he is so very much happier and settled and looking forward to going back to school. Hurrah.