My question involves a child custody case from the State of: Washington
Hi, I have a four year old daughter with my ex whom I was with for just under five years. I will try to make this short but i am attempting to figure out the right steps to take in restricting visitation because I believe my daughters father to be unstable and possibly a danger to her.
Over the past five years we have had many domestic violence incidents where police have been called. My ex attempted suicide four times in the last five years. being hospitalized three times and sent to the mental health clinic (required) twice. He has been in and out of my daughters life since she was born. she has always lived with me and i have been her sole provider since birth minus a few boxes of diapers here and there with some clothing that his parents bought for her and the little support he provided in the few times we have lived together. he attempted suicide once while she was in his care, luckily at daycare at the time of the incident. this i didn't find out about until the most recent attempt when i was called from work to go to the hospital because he refused to see anyone but me even though we were separated. i ended up with a protection order against him due to him threatening to kill me. i broke that protection order about two months ago in attempts to get visitation for my daughter whom he hadn't seen in four months even though i spoke with his parents multiple times to try and set something up. i wanted things to be civil and was attempting to get a parenting plan done yet again. this will be the fourth time we have filled one out. however every time we get one filled out something happens that basically cancels it out before it is filed, such as relocation or he changes his mind or we have gotten back together. I gave him all that he wanted. the visitation he wanted was every other weekend, as well as giving him the holidays he wanted. I did this simply to get it done and over with. I truly want my daughter to see and have a relationship with her father. However I feel that he doesn't have any priority of wanting to be involved in her life. every time we get something set up for visitation he will see her long enough to get her into a routine, like three or four weeks and then disappears out of her life for weeks or months at a time. always having a "good reason" to do so. however from my point of view i don't believe there is ever a "good" reason to leave your child's life.
He cancelled his last visitation saying he didn't have money to meet at our half way point and therefore couldn't pick her up, he called last minute to tell me this. This was on a Friday. he then called on Sunday saying he got into some trouble with the local gang and was in fear for his life therefore he was moving to the state of Virginia to reside with his mother for months possibly a year at the least. He is a chronic liar and therefore i have no idea if i should believe him or not however calling to confirm with his aunt whom he previously resided with and she confirmed he did in fact relocate across the country. He has been living off family members almost anytime he has not lived with me. Cannot hold down a job for very long. Is back on drugs and party's constantly. This includes marujuana and cocaine. He is also off the medication prescribed to him by the mental health of Washington. I believe that he is highly unstable and is negatively affecting my daughter mentally and emotionally by constantly coming in and out of her life as well as putting her in harms way by being involved with gang affiliated friends and being on or around drugs. he also does not have a working vehicle. I believe it to be in my daughters best interests to restrict visitation until he is stable or possibly take sole custody. the issue is i am not sure if i am justified and i don't know how to go about the process.

