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Hi
me and my ex-wife split up in august 2008, contact with my daughter stopped about 8 weeks later. On my solicitors advice, I applied for mediation which she agreed to at first, then after the initial meeting she cancelled the next 7 face to face meetings citing different excuses each time. After the last cancellation, I applied to the courts via my solicitors for a contact order to be put in place. Eventually the court date was set for June 2009, at which my ex relented slightly and initially agreed to supervised contact by herself and the ex-mother in law. A final court order was put in place in November of 2009 granting contact every Tuesday after school till 6pm and every other Saturday from 6pm until Sunday 6pm (due to the hours I was contracted to work).
Contact has continued since then, however, several problems have arisen. During hand-overs my ex is abusive and argumentative, looking for the slightest thing to start an argument, also her partner is abusive and threatening (always in front of my daughter). She also has taken a dislike to my partner of 12 months and her son who is 2, who she regularly complains about.
In January i asked my solicitors what would happen if i was to change jobs, and was advised that the court order was supposed to be flexible in this circumstance, and that both myself and my ex should come to an agreement. Now the time has come and I have changed my job, which means that instead of having Tuesdays off and working Saturdays, i now work Monday to Friday, which means that i can no longer have contact on a Tuesday after school.
I wrote a letter to my ex informing her of this, and offering a solution that I have contact from Friday 6pm until Sunday 6pm alternating weekends instead. This Tuesday after contact with my daughter, I received an abusive phone call from my ex stating that she was not allowing the contact to change and that I have to take the court order into my new employers and have them offer me hours to suit, and that if i didn't maintain the original contact order (IE Tuesdays from school till 6pm) then she would cut contact completely. I told her that she could not do that as I had already sought my solicitors advice and told her what they had said. That was when she started screaming down the phone at me, calling me all the names under the sun and then hung up. I spoke to my solicitors the next day, and they advised me to wait until my next contact day to see if she followed up on her threat as there wasnt much they could do until then.
Well, to cut a long story short, Today I was supposed to pick my daughter up at 6pm, I arrived at her home as per arrangements, no-1 was in. Tried the house phone......no answer. Waited 10 mins outside, then my ex's parter turned up, so rang the house phone again. When he answered I asked where my daughter was and he said he didn't know where she was.
So now I am left in a sort of limbo waiting to speak to my solicitors on Monday morning, But if there is any advice anyone can give me I would be grateful.
Thanks
ANdy
At this stage, your solicitor will give you the best advice on how to proceed, but I'd say it's going to involve you going back to mediation, or to court for the contact order to be varied - the court will not expect your employers to work around contact as that is unrealistic, and would almost certainly say that your ex is being unreasonable with her demands.
I would also suggest you explore any options available for a neutral party to help in the handover (local contact centres would be ideal if the times are suitable) so that you don't have to have face to face contact with your ex or her partner, and would also be a witness if there was any problem - if you can sort this out, it would be worth getting this added to the court order.
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