thorny financial issue!!!

[silkcushion]

Dh and I have been married 2 years. Dd is 12 weeks old. Dsc are 13 and 12 and live with his exw 80 miles away.

Have just worked out what maintenance should be on csa website - £320. We are paying £580.

Exw has a very small mortgage, she got everything when they divorced 9 years ago. She also has parents who give her a fortune. She moved a new boyfriend in last August (who does not work from what we can see).

The maintenance is just for the children as the exw always worked full time. She, dh and myself all earn about the same amount of money. When we married Dh insisted that we bought a huge house so we could have our own family but also his kids could have room each.

We have a 6 bedroom house and a £215k mortgage. She has a 4 bed house with a £60k mortgage. I have to return to work this week as we can't afford for my salary to drop to SMP. Nursery is going to cost about £650 per month (which we don't really have tbh).

I think dh should negotiate the payments to exw down - maybe to £450 per month (halfway). This would allow us to help with nursery costs and perhaps have a second dc (we both want one but can't afford it).

DH says he can't reduce payments as exw would tell his children he was refusing to pay for them and might stop access. I am very pissed off with this. They have several foreign holidays per year - we have none. dsc are spoilt rotten - playstations, trampolines, sky in their bedrooms. if i felt they needed the money i wouldn't suggest a reduction.

how do i handle this? i feel like dh is putting his stroppy exw before our family.

No it's not. It would be the same if there were further siblings with the first family and there were finite funds, belts would have to get tightened. That's it.

Forgive me for asking Quattro, but your neither a stepmother nor have you been a stepchild, why are you always on the step-parenting threads? Are you envisaging problems in your marriage? Not getting at you, just curious. I sense a lot of anxiety in your posts.

I'm a god parent to a step child. We are very close and I have tried to include him as much as possible. The family background is not happy - his stepfather is not kind or gentle with him, and yes I am very anxious about him, actually.

I do try to be objective as possible, I have to say. My approach is very child-centred. It has been one of the big challenges of my life supporting my godson (who stays with us for long stretches at a time) whilst not interfering or seeming in anyway judgemental of a particularly unpleasant relationship.

I can understand your protectiveness towards this child, it's always deeply saddening when a child is mistreated, but please understand that a) we're not all wicked stepmothers out to feed our stepchildren poison apples and b) nothing is ever as clear cut as it seems. I was a stepchild before I became a stepmother, but, believe me, I was enormously unprepared for the difficulties involved.

Every situation is different, there are often charged emotions, there can be a lot of injustice and frequently a huge amount of frustration. We all try to do the best we can and where there are new families involved, we try to protect our children in the same way the first wife protects hers, yet we often get slated for it. It is frustrating when we try to be fair to everyone yet we get criticised as being mean, money-grabbing or neglectful, when it is often far from the truth, or even just a reaction from being at the end of one's very long tether.

The worst thing about the domestic situation that my godson suffers (and he is a clever and sensitive boy) is that his stepfather frequently tells him that he regrets ever "taking him on".

God he is awful.

But we're not all like that, his situation is actually much rarer than you think. What does his mother say/do?

His mother is not economically independent, and puts up with some quite strange behaviour, not wanting to antagonise the second husband. My godson stays in his room all the time so as not to cause offence. In fairness he would probably spend a reasonable proportion of time there anyway, but he does try to stay out of the way.

She is one of my best friends but has the most appalling taste in men. Her son's father (her exhusband) pays the bare minimum of support, and mostly doesn't bother with that, pleading poverty. University lecturers don't get paid a lot yadda yadda yadda.

So my godson is being let down left right and centre, and you know what, he absolutely doesn't deserve it.

I think that's really sad that his mother won't stand up for him, more so than the stepfather being mean. Poor thing probably feels he can't trust anyone. That's really hard for a child.

In all the scenarios I have personally witnessed, it's the first set of children who suffer, financially, emotionally etc

Until I read Silver's posts, that is. So I feel I've learned a lot from this thread.

Quattro I am very sorry to hear about your poor stepson - what a terrible situation.

Please let me assure not all fathers are like his and certainly not all step parents are like the idiot your friend has married. I hope he finds some happiness wehn he stays with you.

This is a topic quite close to my heart, as I am a second wife about to have my first child...

My feeling is this: Agreed payment to an XW (whether by CSA, CO or mutual consent) should not be adjusted JUST because of a second child. If the overall level of money my husband earns was reduced, then, of course, we might have to go back to court but while he earns the same then I don't think my child should impact my step children's lives with their mother.

My reason for this is, if she had another child I WOULD NOT TOLERATE her coming on for more money.... Any children she subsequently have are her problem. Any children her XH subsequently has are ours. End of.
of course, the extras my step children get while they are with their father and I might be reduced, and it will obviously have other effects (we won't be taking long haul holidays for a few years!!!!) but the ramifications of my child, I believe, are with in household.

One thing I do STRONGLY believe in though, is that money I earn should be totally and absolutely separate and I should not be forced to declare it, just as she doesn't have to declare her wages to us. I am happy to work to fund my child. I am not happy to work to fund hers to the deteriment of my own...

Someone, wisely, said that all sitations are different and that's true - this is just my opinion.

Out of curiosity - it's pretty obvious that the payments calculated by the CSA (even for a high-earning father) are nowhere near enough to cover the actual costs of rearing children/paying the household bills. So what happens in the case where the mother doesn't work or doesn't earn a huge salary - does the government have to top this up in the form of benefits?

To Quattro:

If you had 2 children, and they were accustomed to having 4 holidays, big presents, and then you had a 3rd child (accidentally or deliberate) would you disadvantage the 3rd because the first two were used to a lifestyle, or would you adjust to make it equal. Why should the second family kids be disadvantaged - why not equal?

And where XPs demand to have majority of access they shouldn't be allowed to demand the full amount IMO (special circumstances excluded).

I have a friend that is refused any access to his kids, and the Xw emotionally blackmails the kids into not seeing/talking to him. He desperately wants to be in their life. He still pays for the house, and at least the CSA amount, because they are his kids - voluntary. She can't be bothered working and wants more money. (He doesn't want to take his kids through the courts)

Divorce is tricky enough as it is, and there is just too many extreme positions afterwards - where XPs refuse to pay, or XPs want to punish the other by demanding everything or XPs. Or new Partners wanting to take all.

Quattro - Sorry about your godson... I grew up with a vile and abusive step father and can really empathise. It sounds like you're a really great god mother and friend though...

FWIW - I think than any father who walks away from any child financially and/or emotionally deserves to be shot. DP and I both had fathers who paid the absolute minimum in maintenance payments (mine was £7 per week despite my dad earning circa £60k oer annum). We both therefore are determined that dsd's mum will never have the opportunity to complain about maintenance payments and therefore pay well over the CSA amount (which for the record, in most cases, I believe to be a bit on the stingy side)

We had our dd 9 months ago and money has been tighter but we are not in a position where we need to consider reducing payments. We also try to ensure that both our dd and dsd are treated the same. I have very strong memories of opening xmas pressies from my dad and step mum worth about £20 whilst my two half brothers had hundreds of pounds worth. Does a lot for a girl's self esteem !

Anyway - I digress (sorry).. I still maintain that children should be treated equally and if a position arose where we were struggling to meet the financial needs of my dd or any future children whilst dsd had everything, then I really don't believe its unreasonable to consider re-negotiating the terms of the maintenance.

All step mums are not evil personified (apart from mine - who could have given Cinderella's sm a run for her money )

It goes without saying - for me anyway - that dh should always support his daughter financially. However, I agree that reducing excessive payments isn't unreasonable. Being able to afford to give your children less could happen to any family if the breadwinner were, say, made redundant or other siblings were born.

What I think is more important is the quality of the contact an absent parent has with their child, rather than the amount of money they can give the parent with care.

I really hope that when dsd grows up she doesn't look back and see dh in terms of a wallet and what he could and couldn't afford to pay for. I hope she will appreciate the effort he put into making sure he saw her regularly, stayed a full part of her life (going to sports days and parents evenings), the fact that he never missed a weekly phone call to her (all he is allowed) and never missed a contact. I hope she will think "my Dad is great" because of the things they did together (trips to the park, rock pooling, tickling, games of monopoly), and because he was just always there for her. That doesn't cost anything.

And when I see dsd and dd together, I think given the choice of having a little sister or expensive toys, daytrips and holidays abroad I think little sister would win hands down every time. It's not all about money.

It seems to me that silkcushion's DH is not 'reneging on his agreement' If I have read correctly, the amount paid increased when the ex moved away from the area, and silkcushion's DH agreed to pay more for extra childcare. Now the childcare is no longer necessary, why shouldn't the extra payment cease? Or is it only the ex-wife who's allowed to change the arrangement?

The point about the quality of the contact is all-important.

The strand of argument coming from the second wives is that their children should be treated equally with the first. This is why they bring in all the arguments about the first family's quality of life.

The strand of argument I hear from my first wife friends is a story of feckless behaviour, erratic payments, and uncertainty.

See, my take is that the first set of children should have as little disruption and as much continuity as possible. So if a father agrees to pay a certain amount, then this should be binding, leaving the first family able to move forward with certainty.

The way that the fathers (and I take the point about increasing demands from the exwives, but that's less common) see this as an overhead that can be negotiated down is entirely unfair on those first children and puts immense pressure on sometimes very hurt first wives.

Say a father on an average income marries someone new and has 3 children, leaves the second wife, moves onto a third and has another 3 children. His circumstances are now severely reduced. Why should the financially prudent and careful first wife and children suffer from his feckless behaviour?

The point made earlier on in the thread about the state picking up the cost is well-made too.

well put surfer mum
Quattro, sorry to hear your godchild is having these problems at his home

Quattro I totally agree that quality of access is very important. In recent years dsc have been given lots and lots of money by their maternal grandparents (who they rarely see) - they have everything they ask for. However, what they really want is time and attention from their mum.

She has a newish bf, so every weekend his kids visit and dsc have to share their bedrooms. Dsd in particular hates this and feels like her space has been invaded. She has desperately needed a haircut since last summer, mum hasn't got time to take her. Also mum and let her experiment with hair dye when she was 10, so for 2 years she has had hair that is mousy, ginger and blonde (growing it out). Last weekend I dyed it back to brown for her - she was so grateful - mum didn't have time.

Dss has special educational needs. Was in a special school when he lived up here. Had to go to mainstream when she moved to Devon. He has struggled like hell and is now only a bit behind average. But he still feels crap for being behind in English. I spent hours with him over xmas helping. When dh dropped him home he told his mum what we'd done, she was very cross, he told her she didn't have time to help so he didn't see why I couldn't.

It isn't always true that first wives are the helpless victims. I admit it must be very difficult being a single parent (hope I don't ever have to do it) but there are plenty of crap parents that have full custody. Dsd also let slip that mum let her and friend have 2 bottles of smirnoff ice each on her 12th birthday sleepover! The reality is that dads have the financial responsibility, reduced contact cos mum wants to move away and persue her new life and no say in the way their children are brought up. It's difficult for dads too.

I acknowledge the point about step-parenting being different and demanding in practice, a practice I know nothing about.

But what you've written about is sharing financial responsibility. That's fair when it is shared. But when one parent constantly reduces their share, then how please are both parents taking financial responsibility?

The CSA minimums are not substantial, and do not represent an adequate cost of maintaining half (if you will) a child.

I think that a lot of the problems with maintenance payments is that they are worked out on a formula basis (no idea what the CSA formula is, as dh's agreement is by coourt order), and thre is no one formula that fits all situations, just as there is no one way that is right to bring up children.

Formulas do not allow for emotions, be they motivated by spite or envy.

I wholeheartedly agree that fathers should maintain their children. I also agree that whatever agreement is in place should not necessarily by adjusted just because another child is born (although I reserve judgement on this, because as has already been pointed out, if another child is born within a family then expenses just get adjsted. They just do.), but where situations change (and this is something that happens as childrne grow up anyway) then renegotiations (either up or down) should be possible.

We could "afford" dd1 when we chose to have her (in the sense that we had no need to even think about changing payments to dh's ex).

Fast forward 3 years, and dd1 needs therapy (she is autistic). This is, obviously a situation that you do not "foresee". If, god forbid, anyhting should ever happen to dss or dsd and they need expensive therapies and occupational therapy to enable them to live a useful and functioning life, then yes, dh's ex would ask for extra contributions. we would, of course be more than willing to pay whatever we could afford (and then a bit more) to ensure that.

We have not even bothered to ask whether dh's ex would consider a reduction in maintenance (which she certainly does not spend on the children, we ended up buying dss 3 pairs of shoes last year (on 3 occasions) as he was going through the teenage growth spurt and was not able to even get his feet into his shoes yet his mother had not bought him any) as we know what her answer would be, and that saddens me.

Yes, she has a piece of paper which says she is entitled to this amoutn of money.

No, it isn't her problem that dd1 is autistic. (dd1 is, however dss and dsd'd sibling)

But I know full well that if the situation were reversed, and it was my ex dh who had had a child who so badly needed help, I wouln't be able to live with myself if I carried on reagrdless, so that my children didn't suffer the horrors of having a holiday less here and there, at the expense of another child's actual enjoyment of simple life (going to the playground, for example, or being able to ask for a drink when thirsty)

sorry for the mammoth post, but I have hopefully shown that it isn't always black and white, and that (the point I started from) it is impossible to calculate these things by simple formula.

Is anyone talking here about constantly reducing payments? If so I've missed it. We're talking here about someone who is willing to support their child, but needs to adjust payments because circumstances have changed.

There's a big difference between that and the absent parents who pay the bare minimum and wriggle out of any further responsibility.

I've only read the OP and skimmed the thread but goodness, I don't agree with you at all.

I get more maintenance than your dh pays his ex wife for one child. (£600 a month). This was agreed voluntarily with no csa involvement. Ex dh has always paid it. Quite right too.

I would point out that your dh's ex w has presumably had to deal with illness, covering school holidays, (as you agree) and, quite frankly, £580 doesn't REMOTELY begin to cover the amount she's probably lost in earnings/promotion etc. She also has to deal with the day to day everything. It costs a lot more than that to feed, house, clothe, educate etc 2 children.

Your mortgage is fairly small and yes, you have to go back to work but so does his ex so what's the problem.?

Good posts from Quattrocento on this thread, I agree with them. I bet the ex w does go mad, I would too in her position.

You are being very unreasonable. I have a second child with dh#2 and guess what? We pay nursery fees. Did I got and ask ex dh to increase his contribution because MY costs have gone up? Er, no, because that wouldn't be reasonable.

And why would you object to THREE pairs of shoes? I bet over the years that's a drop in the ocean as far as shoes are concerne dfor 2 children.