Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
My question involves paternity law for the State of: Louisiana
I am a disabled college student and single father of a five month old. I support myself and my daughter on $726 per month remaining after my $100 child support for sons I am never allowed to see is taken out.
Recently, after my daughter's mother left and fled the state to avoid paying child support, an ex contacted me. She has a child for whom paternity was a question in the past, as she was married at the time, she slept with us both, and she told us both we're the father. I had ended up out of contact with her because she was emotionally abusive in the extreme.
She came on very sweet and apologetic, and showed me that the other man had tested negative for paternity. I wanted to do the right thing, and can't afford the cost of a DNA test, so I simply signed an acknowledgement of paternity. My reasoning was that the boy deserves a father figure, and if rumors of other men being involved were false (as rumors often are) then I should step up anyway.
The agreement then was that she would be moving in, so there was no need for child support. Currently, there is an open case with her ex-husband because he has been too irresponsible to file a disavowal. I have researched this and hinted to them both regarding what to ask attorneys about to correct everything if I'm the child's father since the beginning, and in fact used to get screamed at for it as she saw my attempts to correct the question as denial of the child.
Following the acknowledgement, she told me she will not help take care of my daughter if in a stepmother role, will not allow me to go to college if she lives with me, and she has repeated to me every single day that I am in love with my ex. She has done this in an accusatory manner, maliciously, and against my continual protest and begging her to stop. When she said, today, that she will not be a mother to my daughter and will not allow me to recover from my disabilities, I ended the relationship.
She then revealed that she plans to attempt to make me liable for the thousands of dollars in back-owed child support that the other man is in court over constantly. Again, I support myself and my daughter on $726 per month. She supports herself and the son in question here on $1200 per month.
I am afraid. Terrified. When I was first judged for child support for my sons, I at that time had yet to face my disabilities. I was homeless, jobless, and they still expected me to pay $300 per month. It took four years and the assistance of a state senator to have that corrected. I am absolutely terrified that my road to recovery will be ended, my daughter and I will end up homeless, and my life will be destroyed by this malicious woman, and I have no idea what to do about it.
It has been over one year since the DNA test was filed, which was fishy to me at the time because searching Google for the address on the document showed it to be an address for a weight loss clinic. Yet the courts seem to accept it, so maybe that is Google's mistake. It was within a year of the DNA test when I signed the acknowledgement, by a few days. I don't know if it was within a year of that time that the request to change the birth certificate was filed thereafter. A social worker has claimed that the other man must still sign a disavowal, which still must have happened within that one year window. He has claimed all along that he will do so, but still has failed to.
I want to do the right thing, but I feel that the only reason she came into my life was to try and punish me for our not working out before. Upon breaking up, she informed me that she will be moving across the state, hundreds of miles away, and that she will have the court order me to visit. She claims to want me in the boy's life and slanders me for the times I have not been, but she blocks all contact and makes it impossible to actually be in his life.
I don't know what to do. With my past experience, I don't trust the state to be reasonable with any support order. I can not afford to pay the debt that the other man racked up while both of them refused to properly address these issues and I was locked out of the process by law. It will do immeasurable damage and create hardship for life if I am expected to.
To make matters worse, I have suspicions that she neglects him. When he was a few months old, he had a stroke and there was some concern she may have injured him. But nothing came of any investigation into it. Now, he is a year behind in development, does not talk much, does not eat solid food, and has not progressed normally with skills. She claims it is due to the stroke, but every time he has ever visited with me he has picked up new words and skills like a normal child his age, no difficulty. He has started to try solid food since he has been in my company, and he has learned to climb stairs, jump, and much more. This sudden progress occurs when he visits relatives as well, but when he goes home to her he regresses again. Meanwhile, logging into Steam shows that just about every hour of every day, she is playing a video game.
I need to know what steps to take to protect myself and my daughter from malicious judgement, and I need to know whether I should or could step up to have her investigated for child neglect. This is frightening to me because she has threatened to help my ex take custody of our daughter even though my daughter's mother has no job, never has held one longer than two weeks, and has lived her entire adult life mooching off of others and running from her children. The boy's mother is extremely adept at misrepresenting the characters of other and manipulating people for sympathy. There is no doubt in my mind that her talk about my ex has been intended to start fights so she could misrepresent and slander me. She has even turned my family against me in the past without their ever discussing the matters with me. I fear she may be clinically sociopathic.
To make matters EVEN worse, she claims that she just wants support for the boy, but there is a snag with that. I have shown her mathematically that if I am hit for child support with income this low, then it can make me homeless and drive me out of college at worst and lead to late fees and interest at best. Either way, it would result in LESS support for him than if I could do it voluntarily when bigger payments come in such as refunds from the college. Done through the state, money that could go to him will be lost in fees and interest, and my recovery and eventual higher income could be made impossible. She does not care, which leads me to believe this is vindictive in nature and has nothing to do with the best interest of the child.
Where do I even begin?
Re: Trying to Do Right, Getting Screwed Left and Right
You should have begun years ago by not having children you cannot afford with whack jobs. Now that you have children, you need to find a way to support them. College is not a right. Supporting your children is a mandate. As you do not take responsibility for your own actions, nothing anyone says will ultimately help you.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
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Quoting
beset
She came on very sweet and apologetic, and showed me that the other man had tested negative for paternity.
You mean, her husband? Was she still married at the time the baby was born? What does the divorce judgment say about paternity?
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Quoting beset
Currently, there is an open case with her ex-husband because he has been too irresponsible to file a disavowal.
Should we infer from that, that the divorce judgment states that the child is the issue of the marriage, and that the husband is responsible to pay child support? Tell us about the open case. What sort of case are we talking about? It it simply child support enforcement, or has the husband brought a post-divorce action to try to disestablish paternity?
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Quoting beset
Following the acknowledgement, she told me she will not help take care of my daughter if in a stepmother role, will not allow me to go to college if she lives with me, and she has repeated to me every single day that I am in love with my ex.
Sometimes the scales are slow to fall off of our eyes.
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Quoting beset
She then revealed that she plans to attempt to make me liable for the thousands of dollars in back-owed child support that the other man is in court over constantly.
You're either the father or... not. If the person presently paying support manages to get his paternity disestablished, and yours is subsequently established, and you don't have custody, you get to support your child.
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Quoting beset
Again, I support myself and my daughter on $726 per month. She supports herself and the son in question here on $1200 per month.
Translation: Neither of you can afford to have kids.
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Quoting beset
I am absolutely terrified that my road to recovery will be ended, my daughter and I will end up homeless, and my life will be destroyed by this malicious woman, and I have no idea what to do about it.
You need to take responsibility for your choices, here. You had an affair with a married woman. You know how babies are made, and she didn't make the baby all by herself.
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Quoting beset
It has been over one year since the DNA test was filed.... A social worker has claimed that the other man must still sign a disavowal, which still must have happened within that one year window.
If the issue of paternity is presently being litigated between the mother and her ex-husband, the litigation will eventually be resolved. When that happens, either the husband will continue to be the child's father and the person obligated to pay support, or he won't and we're back to the question of your paternity.
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Quoting beset
She claims to want me in the boy's life and slanders me for the times I have not been, but she blocks all contact and makes it impossible to actually be in his life.
If you want to be the child's father and pay child support, assuming the present litigation overcomes the presumption of paternity from marriage and the husband's paternity is disestablished, you will have that opportunity. If you become the child's undisputed legal father, you will be able to petition for visitation and even custody.
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Quoting beset
To make matters worse, I have suspicions that she neglects him.
If and when you're able to do so, you can think about petitioning for custody.
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Quoting beset
Meanwhile, logging into Steam shows that just about every hour of every day, she is playing a video game.
So I guess she sees you there, as well?
I don't know anything about your disability or income, so I'm not in a position to comment on your "math". However, it's not unreasonable for the custodial parent or the state to ask that you help support your own child.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
I don't know if I was clear in my post. Perhaps I tried to cover too much at once. I want to do the right thing, so I don't need to be lectured nor do I need hostility. My "math" is arithmetic. I'll include it here. Considering that my return to college is to build on three years of mathematics and physics, your quotation marks feel rather hostile. That stings. My apologies if pointing it out is rude.
$726 per month
$175 lot rent
$275 lights + gas (one goes up, the other goes down, this is their combined average)
$43 internet (necessary with my conditions)
$64 phone (necessary for child care; doctor appointments, etc)
Essentials total: 428
Remaining: 168
$20 formula, three per month
$20 baby cereal, three per month
$40 diapers, two per month
$10 wipes, two per month
Baby essentials: $90
Remaining: $78
$20 transportation (bus pass) per month
$25 toiletries (soap, shampoo, razors, shaving cream, toilet paper) per month
$20 household (laundry soap, dish soap, miscellaneous) per month
Total supplies: $65
Remaining: $13
That $13 is always gone to an unforeseen expense. This month, teething rings. Last month, some clothes for my baby girl from the thrift shop. When I have such an expense and it exceeds this, I go without something to make it happen for my little one.
When I had nothing at all -- I was homeless, unemployed, and in therapy, I was expected to pay $300 per month. It's not whether I help support him that is my concern. It's that people look down on fathers who are poor and are merciless to us. Note how your own post began in a friendly tone and by the end you were lecturing me. I know that I am deep in poverty, and I have pushed myself to be able to get back into college to overcome medical conditions and become a better provider. Before my daughter came along, I ate a single meal every other day to afford getting my student loans out of default. Chiding me won't do anything to change the current situation.
The thing is, I don't see how it is just to take from a child who has so little to give to a child whose mother is not struggling at all. As for Steam, I can log in any random moment through the day and it is guaranteed that my friends list will show that she is playing a video game. Yes, I play video games on Steam for recreation because once in a while when I'm lucky and there is both a sale and money left over, I can grab one for five bucks. That's cheap recreation for the sake of my mental health. That doesn't mean that I too can be found logged into a game any arbitrary hour of the day. My daughter keeps me too busy, and when she takes a nap I have other obligations. You don't have to actively be goofing off to go to Start -> Steam -> Friends and glance. It takes five seconds.
I don't think it's unreasonable for the state to ask me to help, if they are reasonable about it. I begin my first semester back in college in the Fall. If the support order comes after my return from financial aid comes in, then the crisis will be averted. However, I am on Social Security Disability Insurance. If the order comes before that point, my daughter and I can end up homeless so that a woman who buys three AAA title games a month at full price -- who has that much disposable income -- can have even more. That is unreasonable. One child should not have to suffer for the benefit of another child who is not suffering. That is amoral.
Furthermore, in the long run it will drastically lessen the support he receives if I am pigeonholed into homelessness. How can one become a better provider, especially with odds stacked like this, when everything that happens makes it harder under the color of being expected to do exactly what isn't allowed? It's a catch-22 and a life sentence to moral inferiority.
As for being able to afford a child, I didn't plan for my life to be this way but "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" are not rights contingent on any arbitrary balance in a bank account. I don't know if you have ever been this poor, but when you are, it makes you an outcast among people who are not. This pushes you to be among people who always have been and likely always will be this poor because they don't do anything to overcome it. In such circumstances, social pressures differ. Walk a mile in my shoes.
I hope I don't sound too snarky. I'm just scared to death and really want to avoid being browbeaten right now.
edit:
To answer your other questions, her now-ex husband was ordered to pay child support. She didn't have an affair with me. I don't do that. Period. They had been separated for two years, but neither could afford an attorney. You can't expect that their lives would simply pause until they could.
He has not paid. At all. He's constantly in and out of jail. He has not filed a disavowal, and by the letter of the law without that the state can't change anything. I've read it myself.
http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=109112
http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=109134
http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=109090
http://www.legis.state.la.us/lss/lss.asp?doc=109232
However, that doesn't mean the judge won't rule otherwise anyways and I'm not sure I would want him to. As I keep repeating, I WANT to do the right thing! My fear arises from her intent to be malicious, the fact that I'm SO close to being on the road out of morbid poverty, I am responsible for my daughter whom I have custody of, I have no family, no friends willing to help (you have a kid, friends vanish), Support Enforcement won't let me file for child support even though my daughter's mother ran out on us and fled the state (clearly abandoning her), and my past experience with Support Enforcement is that they do not obey the law when they make determinations.
It's worth emphasizing this point. As desperately as I could use child support from my daughter's mother, I think my gender gets in the way. They expect me to cough up $3500 to $6000 for a court-ordered statement of custody when my baby's mother not only ran out on us but even fled the state and avoids employment to hide from the potential responsibility. For every woman I've ever known, order of custody or not, it was automatic. They were told they had no choice and the state would file for them. Me? They won't allow me to file at all. The only difference is gender.
Were my daughter's mother racking her brain like I am about how to do the right thing, then I wouldn't have to. It would likely balance out. Can you understand why I feel a little bit helpless in this circumstance? I need guidance. If I have to, I'll print legal forms, and sell my blood's plasma to afford getting them notarized so I can represent myself. If I fail now, I fail my daughter and the boy in question. I am desperate for guidance.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
In a nutshell, the courts generally don't care about your expenditures.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
Lets start with these wastes of money. I assume you are attributing your cable tv as phone service. Contrary to your belief, you do not NEED internet, phone and cable. Further, if you were really concerned, you can get a free gov't sponsored phone. I just saved you over $1200 a year. I won't charge you, just use the money to support your children. It is a bit late to consider doing the right thing, birth control and restraint come to mind. Now you must do the thing you are ordered by the courts to do.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
So basically, they'll destroy one family to help another.
How just of them.
- - - Updated - - -
I didn't say I can't afford child support. I said if it is reasonable, I will find a way. I said that my experience is that it is often unreasonable. My experience is that they will break the law in determination to make it unreasonable.
Interesting how you have this opinion of me for begging for guidance to do the right thing, but you have nothing to say about the woman who abandoned our daughter, bailing on her responsibilities.
Any chance you could tell me what lawfirm you work for, so I can make sure to never give you any business? Thanks for the "help". Why don't our society just start executing fathers? It's the next logical step. The forum name should be changed to "expertcondescension". One day when my baby girl asks why we can't eat, I'll take her to the library and show this to her.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
Who's "they"? You made your own bed, so to speak.
Nobody did anything to you that, at the time, you weren't very happy to have done.
If you have custody of your child, you are free to seek child support from the child's mother. Even if she whines that you're ruining her life.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
1. They could determine support IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAW. They don't. When they break the law this time, how do I correct it?
"They" would be the court and Support Enforcement. "They" hit me for $300 when my income was zero and I was starving to death. Literally. I ended up in the hospital for malnutrition. "They" hit her ex-husband for $250 per month when he was in the same boat. If "they" do that this time, they won't just be hurting me. I wouldn't complain about that. I'd just quietly starve to death if I have no choice. "They" will be hurting a five month old baby by breaking the law this time. How can I stop that from happening again?
2. I AM facing my responsibilities. It just might be a little bit easier to do that if the LAW is obeyed, and it might be helpful if what is expected of me is actually POSSIBLE, don't you think?
3. I'm not worried about my daughter's mother whining. They won't ALLOW ME to file.
4. Did you even read my post?
5. I'm sure you've had sex before too. I was told by her DOCTOR that she's sterile. Guess not. Save the lecturing PLEASE. It does not help.
6. I "made my bed" so to speak? You mean, I had sex. Explain how that means my daughter doesn't deserve to have a roof over her head, and explain why it is even necessary to browbeat me that way when I have repeated over and over again that I want to do the right thing.
edit: I'm starting to get the impression that you are not attorneys.
edit2: In fact, attorneys can comprehend English, and this is obviously a troll board looking for easy bait. I'll seek help elsewhere.
Re: Responsibility for Child Support After Falsely Acknowledging Paternity
1. There is no law that says a judge cannot order a person on SSI to pay child support. The law says he cannot attach the SSI. He can still find and jail the obligor for contempt.
2. As you come here looking for a way out of the little responsibility you have.
3. See 2. You made your bed. Get a vasectomy. You are certainly healthy enough to procreate and attend college.
4. Yep, that is why you are no better or worse than every other deadbeat who has children they cannot afford.
5. She is not your problem, you have the pecker. See 2.