SHOW ME THE MONEY
Paula finalized her divorce from the father of her daughters through mediation in late 2014. They agreed to equal time with their daughters and essentially no child support. The mediator stipulated that Chris pay $50 per month and Paula told me that she would return the money to him. I do not know if she actually did this. Paula was also granted primary care status.
Fast forward to May 2015: Paula returns home from Wisconsin and her attitude towards me has dramatically changed for the worst at the same time she is hiding and lying about a "platonic" relationship with a married man while omitting the part about him being married. For nearly two weeks after returning home, Paula either ignored me or was dishonest and cruel towards me when we did communicate. She eventually pushed me out of the house under the pretext of needing a break from our relationship.
On my first night out of the house, Paula texts to ask if I'm going to pay her child support. She did not ask for child support in her divorce settlement, but she needs me to pay her child support while we are on a "break"? I already suspected as much, but this was a clear sign that the break was intended to be permanent.
For the first two weeks after I left the house, I had days and Paula had nights and we rotated weekends. Despite this arrangement, I still had more overnights during those first two weeks. My lawyer advised me to ask for some weekday overnights on a permanent basis because the lack of such it would hurt me in court if things progressed to that point. Paula agreed to give me Tuesday and Thursday nights and we operated under an equal overnights schedule from early June through to early October when the temporary order was handed down.
After leaving the house, Paula would assert authority over Parker and repeatedly threaten to pursue legal action when I did not agree to her demands. I did nothing more than keep my agreed to time with my son. I eventually sued to protect myself. I only wanted 50-50 everything. Basically, I wanted the same deal Chris got except I wanted shared care rather than give her primary care status. There is no reason I should get less than shared care. Unfortunately, I had no idea that the family court system was preparing to bend me over.
The judge issued his ruling in early October. He took away my Thursday nights and ordered me to pay Paula $375 per month in child support. He offered no explanation for favoring her and he wrote that it "appears that Paula has had more overnights" without any evidence to support his false conclusion.
Paula falsely claimed in her affidavit that she had had all overnights while I shared that we operated under an equal overnights schedule. Besides that, I had actually had Parker for thirty plus more overnights since leaving Belle Plaine. It is rather ridiculous that a judge can take time away from any parent based on a false assumption with no supporting evidence and order them to pay child support.
I suspect the logic behind ordering me to pay child support after taking time away from me is that Paula is now burdened with the added cost of being responsible for Parker for more overnights moving forward. Despite the schedule handed down in the temporary order, Parker actually spent more hours at my home compared to Paula's assuming both of us kept all of our time granted to us under the order.
Every two weeks, Paula had 9 of 14 overnights and I had 12 of 14 days. If overnights are worth 16 hours and days are worth 8 hours, Parker is at my home for 176 hours every two weeks compared to 160 hours at her home. The idea that she has a greater financial burden due to more overnights is false. Far too much value is placed on overnights compared to actual time. If Parker sleeps eight hours every night, he is sleeping 72 of her 160 hours. How much does it cost to take care of a child for 88 hours? The $375 I was ordered to pay in child support is just my share. Is that half of what it costs? Are Parker's expenses as much as $750 per month? If so, I still have those same expenses during my time which includes more overall and non-sleeping hours, but I am expected to pay the same bills minus $375 every month. The only thing Paula paid for that I did not is the additional cost of adding Parker to her medical insurance through work or the National Guard. I doubt that it adds up to $375.
At the time of the ruling, Paula made $41,500 from her jobs at Frontier and the National Guard. I made $34,944. Therefore, Paula already makes nearly $7K more than me before child support. At $375 per month for 12 months, Paula receives $4500 in child support per year which is $4500 less for me to cover my bills even though Parker actually spends more hours at my home under the temporary ruling. After child support is added to or deducted from our salaries, Paula makes $46000 per year while I now make $30,444. Basically, Paula has nearly $16K more to work with to pay her bills because she was awarded the "burden" of more overnights despite fewer hours of actual responsibility.
As our case continued towards trial, the temporary ruling gave Paula a significant financial advantage moving forward and all of the negotiating leverage. As it is, there were 20 months from the time I first started paying child support in November 2015 until our trial date in June 2017. Based on our salaries at the time of the temporary ruling plus child support, Paula made at least $76,667 over 20 months compared to the $50,740 I made. I had paid her $7500 in child support for child that spent more hours at my home even if she had kept all of the time awarded to her under the temporary ruling
176 hours out of 336 every two weeks is 52.4% of all hours. From the time I left Belle Plaine until May 18, 2017 (731 days) when I turned in the records I kept to my attorney to use at trial, Parker was at my home at least 63.9% of all hours. I had a 387 to 344 advantage in actual overnights. If I use the 12 out of 14 days standard under the temporary ruling for calculating day hours without determining how many more of her weekend days I actually had and add those results to the overnight hours, Parker was at home my for at least 11,208 hours compared to 6336 hours at her home over 731 days. That is the equivalent of 203 more days spent at my home compared to her home over a two year period. Yet, I paid her $7500 in child support over 20 months for 36% of the responsibility while she was already making $7K more per year.
At trial, the judge met with our lawyers in chambers for 90 minutes and told my attorney that he was not inclined to grant me additional overnights because I worked second shift. Since I was not in the room, I have no idea if my lawyer bothered to tell him that I had more actual overnights over the previous two years and I could move to a first shift position in a timely manner if necessary. Ultimately, I was forced to accept to Paula's settlement offer which at least granted me a path to equal overnights on paper, something she had denied me for two years, once I moved to first shift. Until then, Paula still had 9 of 14 overnights and I could have him on Wednesday nights I did not work. Of course, my child support increased to $395 which I paid no matter how many Wednesdays I claimed or how many fewer hours Paula was actually responsible for Parker.
In two years, I went from no debt to 30K in debt simply fighting for a 50-50 stake in my son's life which I was denied by his mother for no fair reason and by two judges who could not be bothered by facts and evidence. I have spent the past ten years between 20K and 30K in debt. In 2021, I filed for a reduction in child support as I was entitled to under the original settlement but I never received it. My attorney dropped the pursuit of a reduction in favor of pursuing a new settlement because he misunderstood my interest in the latter idea if I was unhappy with the reduction for permission to pursue a new settlement only. I did not even realize this happened until two years later.
The day before a hearing about reduction in child support, which I believed what related to my original action, my lawyer told me that Paula and her attorney agreed to our offer of $334 even though I was not a party to any negotiation and I would not have bothered to pursue a reduction in child support if I was only going to get about a $60 discount. By this time, my retainer, which I borrowed from a relative, was nearly gone and there was no way I could afford to go forward with a trial unless I chose to represent myself. I did go forward with the pre-trial mediation where I asked for the same things I asked for from the beginning: 50-50 everything, shared care, no child support for either side, and split all other costs. Paula denied me again but unlike the weak excuses she had offered before, she offered none this time. Afterwards, I let my lawyer go and ultimately dropped the case.
In 2022, it became more difficult to keep up with paying my debts plus my regular expenses. As a result, I fell behind on child support payments for the first time in seven years. I planned to catch up in January 2023 when I received my federal tax return but, as luck would have it, my return was stolen by an identity thief that had hacked my TaxSlayer account. Admittedly, I gave up on paying child support in order to pay for everything else. I fell behind a year before Paula presumably pursued the matter with the CSRU. CRSU informed me that my wages would be garnished and that I was about $9K behind in child support payments which is actually about two years behind. I had paid Paula directly for a year in the amount of $4690. Paula told me that she was informed that she could sign a letter of a satisfaction with the court giving me credit for those payments. This, as far as I am concerned, is a her conceding that I paid her. She knew about the letter of satisfaction and told me about it. There is no other context that makes sense.
8 months later, she had still not filed a letter of satisfaction. Once again, I asked for the letter. This time she denied that she conceded I paid her and asked for proof. I sent her copies of money orders and bank statements. Nearly 7 months later, she has still not provided a letter of satisfaction. I have a text from her where, after being asked about it again, she tells me she has not had the time to go to the courthouse.
During the past nine years, I have paid Paula over $40K in child support for a child that has spent greater than a year more in real time at my home while she has made equal or greater money. The low end salary for her current job which I believe she has had for at least three years is approximately $50K. If accurate, that is considerably more than I make. I continue to pay her nearly $4800 in child support each year even though I have equal visitation. Between her salary and child support, she possibly makes close to $20K more than I do. Her refusal to take me off of child support and give me credit for money already paid is financial abuse. She did not do this to Chris (nor should she have) and she never had a reason beyond pure vindictiveness to do this to me.
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