My question involves a child custody case from the State of: Georgia
Hello,
I had two boys with my girlfriend and we were together for five years. I'm on their birth certificate and have established legitimization.
When the boys were 2 and 3 I was offered a job in PA. The mom left and took the boys (not by force), and I quickly moved back down to GA and got another job and made another home for them.
The mother is still living with her parents after over a year, and has been working the entire time. She jumped into a new relationship 3 months after she moved back down here. I was never ok with my kids being introduced to someone so new so quickly, but it went on for sometime even after I voiced my concerns.
About 10 months after she left, she wanted to come back and poured out all the details about the boyfriend. His car had just been repossessed 3 days earlier, he is currently in therapy, and had a substance abuse problem. We decided to think it over for a week and she reached the conclusion that she did not want to try and make it work again. This was a pretty amicable conversation but I made it clear that our boys can definitely not be around him.
Tensions grew high as our boys started talking about seeing him again, and we kept getting into arguments over it. So much so, that one day when she came to pick up the kids her phone started ringing and it was her boyfriend... I picked up the phone and before I knew what hit me she was grabbing at the phone and basically clinging on to me like a koala bear grasping a tree. I gave her the phone back immediately, told her to leave without our kids as both boys were visibly hysterical. She would not leave and kept screaming, and our kids just covered up their ears, and screamed with tears streaming down their faces.
I took her by both shoulders and walked her backwards out of the apartment, the kids were upset that their mother was forced out of the house so I let her back in and she took the kids and left.
Ever since then she has been making very exaggerated claims about the incident. A couple months passed and everything went back to normal, she would come inside and get the kids ready, or I would go inside her parents house and help pack their things when it was my turn to have them. But 2 days before I was served my papers she said she was uncomfortable picking up the kids by herself and she was bringing someone with her. (I had no idea what she was talking about as I had no idea that she was suing for full custody). She came with the boyfriends mom to pick up our kids...later that day I was served the papers and it all made sense.
I know GA usually favors the mom, but I made a home for them. I always paid for their health insurance, diapers, and wipes. I paid her money while I was still in PA and she had the kids by herself. But she is not back to normal yet, and I educated myself on divorce as well as divorce with children. I sincerely don't want to turn my kids over to the realm of the accidental. I sent her a list of mediators waay before she sued for custody but she declined.
Her lawyer strongly advised her to go to mediation, but we will both have our attorneys.
What is the way to proceed if mediation does not work out? The lawyers are so expensive that it would undo everything in the meantime and create a serious cash flow problem. I THINK she is living in her boyfriend's basement and i'm not sure a guardian ad litum will be made aware of this.
What is the best way to proceed?

