I know how you feel!! BM wants DF to pay for half if not more of everything but doesnt want to give him any time and in fact has been keeping them from us (we took her to court for being in contempt and 5 days later she keept them from us again so we go to court again in a few weeks). In the decree we have now BM and DF are suspossed to split half of all extra activities (music sports etc...) but she wont pay her half so we have to either pay for it all, plus CS or take the activity away from teh kids, so needless to say we end up paying for it all so the kids so suffer anymore then they have to, but at the same time we are lied to about when activities are so we dont get to watch, which pisses me off more then I can ever express. Anyway sorry about the rambleing but yes BF has every right to ask for joint legal and physical custody tell him to fight for it bc my BF gave in bc we were so tired of dealing with BM bs. Good LUck!!

Don't let him fall into the "paying half of extras" trap. It's an evil-minded ploy invented by less-than-scrupulous BM's who want to squeeze every last dime they can out of their ex-husbands! DON'T DO IT! Child support is CHILD SUPPORT. There's no such thing as "extras." Whatever the child needs or wants is paid for by the child support. The only "extras" anyone should agree to paying are half of uninsured medical expenses. Everything else should be paid for with the child support. If it is an expense incurred by or for THE CHILD, then it should be paid for with THE CHILD SUPPORT.

Where I live, there seems to be a trend towards equal time with both parents. My BS10 has several friends who have recently-divorced parents and they are all - we're talking five kids in his class alone - on a 50/50 or week on/week off schedule. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect joint physical and legal custody, although it may be unreasonable to do 50/50 placement, considering the distance. Just don't let him get sucked into "extras." That child support payment should be finite. It shouldn't ebb and flow. You don't ever want to put yourself in the position of having to pay hundreds or even thousands of bucks for something the other parent signed the kid up for without your input.

♥ Georgia, the un-stepmom ♥

"Good men don't just happen. They have to be created by us women." (from ROSEANNE)

I would love the slap my stupid DH silly for ever starting with the extras crap.

My favorite BM lines are" CS is for paying my mortgage" or her latest " I don't ask you for much" BS! I asked DH when she was going to pay me for 1/2 of SS 10's glasses that we paid for this month. She makes more than us together & then gets DH's 1/3 so to hear her whine about money sickens me.

She should have no money worries at all. Her mortgage is less than ours because she got the martital home & DH paid too much for our house because he bought when the market was high. Her vehicle was paid off before they divorced. She dresses like a man & doesn't get her hair done or wear make up so what she is spending her money on is unknown to me... it sure isn't the kids.

She nails us with extras constantly & is stupid. If I had not thrown a fit the moron would have spent $300.00 on 1 pair of eye glasses for a 10 year old with a weak RX. $85 for 2 pairs, thank you very much evil cheap step mom... and they are nice looking glasses & have the springy bows. She wanted transition lenses or the kind with clip on sunglasses. So necessary when reading the board at school you know.

Don't set precedences that you are going to pay for later.

So my money is all that I have to contribute to the upbringing of my children?

My husband had this same argument a hundred times over with BM.

No, it is not too much to ask to co-parent your own child for half the time. Who is to say that one parent "deserves" to parent a child more frequently than the other? It is a ridiculous trend that stems back to the days when women weren't as capable of obtaining employment like men and were viewed as the caretakers of the children. Well...not anymore.

Feminists have fought for women's rights and equality. So why can't that overflow into the family court system? Let's start giving BMs "equal" rights to the kids not favoring ones.....

"For every ailment under the sun....There is a remedy, or there is none;
If there be one, try to find it; If there be none, never mind it." ~ W.W. Bartley

In our case, each parent is responsible for paying for the activities that they sign SS up for, but both parties must agree to the activity, in advance, in order for us to have to take him to something she signed him up for or for her to have to bring him to something we signed him up for. Otherwise, SS misses out on the activities.

Be careful how you get this worked out. FH just got nailed to the wall in court because he "agreed" to pay for an activity before checking their parenting plan and calendar. When he realized that the activity fell on her time (which she was supposed to pay for in its entirety), he refused referencing their court agreement.

Well, she took him to court over it and the judge ruled in her favor. Judge stated that he wasn't allowed to "change his mind" and despite the court order stating that she was to pay for activities falling on only her parenting time, FH is now paying retroactively for an activity he never agreed to.