Absent Father Wants Custody, Child Has Health Concerns

My son is 2.5 years old, we live in North Carolina. His father and I were never married, never lived together. Since birth my son has resided with me.

The first 2 months of my sons life, his father visited every other week for a few hours. From there, it went to once a month. Then he started visiting once every other month. August of 2006 he visited for the last time. He has not called us since then, I've received two emails from him since and in neither one did he ask to see his son.

A year later, to the week, I get served papers that he's filed for custody. He's claiming they had a close and loving relationship up until last summer, but then I, without just cause, denied him access to his child. We have a Temporary Custody Hearing in a week. I'm completely baffled, as I never denied him access. I have my phone records as well as our email communication showing that he hasn't contacted us. The sad part is, he lives 100 miles away and drove down here to retain a lawyer and file this, but didn't bother to try to see his son... I'm also baffled, because when he did visit those few times, he spent all of his time on his cell phone or even sleeping (yes, he came to my house to visit his child and went to sleep on the couch...).

Not only does my son have no idea who his father is and is dealing with seperation anxiety, he also has a health condition that his father is ignorant to. He has multiple severe food allergies that are life threatening. He has no idea how to handle the allergies and I doubt he could even name half of what he's allergic to. Placing the child into his care would put the child's life in great danger as he has gone into shock before from exposure (before he was diagnosed), placing him with someone for a lengthy period of time where they're required to feed him but have no education on how to do that could be fatal. I'm desperately afraid for my child's life!!!

I can't afford an attorney, the only attorney who can take my case needs 2500 by Tuesday and I don't have it. legal aid won't take the case, every other lawyer I've contacted cant even get me in for a consultation until after the hearing. We live in a small town, and his father retained one of the best lawyers in the area.

The lawyer I did see said that first and foremost, I need to submit an answer. I asked him how, and he said "Pay for a lawyer". UGH. What do I do? I need to convey that this child's life is at risk until his father become familiar with it and that the things that he's alleging are false. I'm running out of time...

Is there any reason that you couldn't list the allergies and instructions on feeding? At some point your child will be in day care or school and you will have to instruct these care givers on your sons condition...Why not the child's father?

If it were a mere one allergy, yes I could instruct him, but it's complicated and not something you can just write down and show him and him be able to handle it. He goes into shock from consumption of eggs and peanuts, and also reacts badly to soy, wheat, milk, oat, and corn. Some of the reactions are contact reactions, so just merely touching it causes reaction. Like oat, the first time I put a lotion on him that contained oat he started screaming and his skin turned red and was on fire and he blistered. And he reacted playing with play-doh, play-doh contains wheat. He also can't touch certain crayons or paints.

It's not cut and dry, it would take me hours to convey everything he cant have or touch and to retain all of that information at once? Impossible! Everything he eats has to be made from scratch and his father has never cooked a meal in his life (he's a TV Dinner/fast food guy). I'd have to teach him to cook his food.

He's not in daycare because of his allergies, and when he does go it won't be for lengthy periods of time. He'll be in school for one meal, which I'll have to pack because schools can't accommodate all of these allergies. Unless you've dealt with allergies before (especially life threatening), it's not that easy to understand. You have to deal with cross contamination issues, cant use products that were manufactured on equipment that manufactures products that he's allergic to. Feeding him is a full time job, and I got these allergies one-by-one and had to try to eliminate them. He'd be getting them all at once to learn.

And it's not like I can just give him a list of 'safe foods', because there isn't ever a definite safe food. Companies are constantly changing ingredients, so you have to check every time. Just because those crackers were safe last week doesn't mean he can have them today.

It's a process that has to be learned and can't be learned overnight.

Couldn't you prepare the food and send it along with your child? Just until Dad has learned how to do it himself?

Thats not the point, the point is he is asking for custody of this child.... he wants custody of a child he can't take care of, if he got custody I'd still be the one taking care of him! How is that in the best interest of the child, to send him with a person he doesn't know for a long period of time and that can't feed him, when he knows me and has lived with me his entire life thus far, and I can feed him safely?!

I'm not saying his father can't have him ever, I'm saying before he goes anywhere with him he needs to be educated to take care of the child. Yeah, I could cook a weeks worth of food so the man doesn't have to feed the child since he doesn't know how to, but thats like saying "Yeah the father doesn't know how to change diapers so go we'll send someone along to change the diapers for him". He needs how to darn change diapers before taking that child anywhere.

makes perfect sense, give up custody to a person my son doesn't know that has shown no interest in him for 2.5 years, whom as it stands can't feed him safely to keep him alive, just because I could cook food and send it along.

You are free to try to convince the court that you, and only you, can care for the child. I will caution you that it probably won't be the first time the judge has heard a parent claim that there is a medical reason to deny visitation, coupled with the assertion that it's too burdensome to teach the other parent about the child's medical needs. That's not a particularly uncommon argument raised by parents trying to obstruct the other parent's access, so have your evidence ready to prove that you're not like the others. I would strongly suggest getting help from a lawyer.

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Quoting kharizzmatik

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I'm not saying his father can't have him ever, I'm saying before he goes anywhere with him he needs to be educated to take care of the child. Yeah, I could cook a weeks worth of food so the man doesn't have to feed the child since he doesn't know how to, but thats like saying "Yeah the father doesn't know how to change diapers so go we'll send someone along to change the diapers for him". He needs how to darn change diapers before taking that child anywhere.

makes perfect sense, give up custody to a person my son doesn't know that has shown no interest in him for 2.5 years, whom as it stands can't feed him safely to keep him alive, just because I could cook food and send it along.

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Has the father requested VISITATION, or is there a prior visitation order?

Visitation and custody are not the same thing. You have every right to defend against a custody change. You also have the right to ask the court to order a set visitation schedule. If you show the court medical documents proving the child's problems, you also have the right to ask that the visits be supervised for short term until the father talks to the Dr to learn how to care properly for his child. Once the father learns how, then visits can be unsupervised.

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Quoting Xena

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Has the father requested VISITATION, or is there a prior visitation order?

Visitation and custody are not the same thing. You have every right to defend against a custody change. You also have the right to ask the court to order a set visitation schedule. If you show the court medical documents proving the child's problems, you also have the right to ask that the visits be supervised for short term until the father talks to the Dr to learn how to care properly for his child. Once the father learns how, then visits can be unsupervised.

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Thats exactly what I want, I get the feeling people are thinking I don't want him to have visitation but thats not the case at all. I don't want him to have CUSTODY. He's never had court ordered visitation, it was always just between us and then he slowly faded out not to be heard from again for a year when he files for a temporary custody order. I want the visitations to start off supervised so he can learn how to properly care for his child before taking him off on his own and for days at a time. Ya know? I've always wanted him to be in his sons life, he's the one that was always "busy" and the one who disappeared for an entire year. My son needs a father, but he needs to be safe at the same time. His father needs to meet his doctors and learn to care for him and give the child time to adjust to him for his emotional health (I'm not talking years, but c'mon you can come over to my house and take the time to learn and visit his doctors and then gradually take him by yourself for a few hours so he gets used to you a few times....) but his father wants to walk out of the courtroom, take the child, and immediately leave. Thats the reason I posted, I'm not trying to keep him away from his father. I'm looking out for my sons welfare, if he walks out of the courtroom with my son and leaves with him, his life would seriously be in danger. I know he will learn the allergies and thats what I want, but its nothing something I can write down and tell him in 10 minutes on the way out. And since I can't afford an attorney and am running out of time, I have no idea what I'm doing. A lawyer told me to "submit an answer" but I don't know how the heck to do that.

I had a good reply. Seems it dissappeared

HI

The first thing you need to do is write a Responsive Declaration. You can get the forms for that at your courthouse.

Then after you have written it, you need to file it by a certain date that your court has set, and serve it on the other party's lawyer.

Your Responsive Declaration should set out the facts:

1. You were never married to the child's father. You are by default the custodial parent and request the court to make an order that the default custody arrangement be made permanent.

2. The child's father has or has not paid child support. If not, ask for guideline child support, health insurance coverage & 1/2 out of pocket medical expenses (co-pay, prescriptions for example), and 1/2 child care costs. [These are reasonable requests].

3. The child has severe and life threatening medical conditions which require careful supervision. The father has not been involved in the child's life since August 2006 and has no knowledge of the condition nor how to deal with it.

4. Attach a proposed parenting timeshare agreement (father has supervised visitation until he shows that he can handle the medical issues; unsupervised Saturdays until child is comfortable with visiting father; then every other weekend with father). If father has any drug/alcohol issues the supervised visitation should be overseen by a professional with father paying the fee. State reasonable times for the visitation time such as Saturday morning at 9 AM until Sat evening at 7:30 PM. This cuts down on people being late for pickup or in returning children.

5. Travel expenses should be shared 50/50. He picks up at the beginning of the visitation period, you pick up at the end.

6. Child cannot be transferred across state lines. Whichever parent has custody must give an itinerary and contact info should they take the child out of the residential city of the parent (like vacation, day trip to grandparents, etc)

There's probably other things that would be helpful to have in a parenting agreement, but these are a good start.

HTH

Bird Brain