My question involves a child custody case from the State of: TN
A petition was served on my daughters mother for a custody change in September of this year. She had 30 days to respond of which she called my attorney the last day (30th day) to see if she could speak to my attorney in hopes that she could respond to the petition herself as she doesn't have money for an attorney. My attorney filed a motion for default and a court date was set for Nov. 13th. We attended court of which she told the judge she had attained a lawyer and she didn't know why he was not there to represent her. The judge asked her if she called him and she replied yes with no answer. The judge asked her if she paid to retain him as her attorney and her rely was yes. The judge granted her 30 more days to respond to the petition with her attorney.
We are now 2 weeks into her 30 days of which her time will be up on Dec. 13.What is going to happen after her time is up? I realize my attorney is going to file another motion for default but how is this going to reflect on me in getting a custody change of my daughter to live with me as opposed to the mother?
Just a little background of why I retained an attorney to pursue the change....The mother is seperated from her husband since June. She has lived with 6 different men, she has 3 other children. Her grandmother called and said her water and lights got turned off b/c she had not paid the bill. She will not work. My daughter had the opportunity to attend preschool and because she is not stable, the school was unable to contact her. The last immunizations she has had was in 2006 and she is 5 years old. My daughter was removed from her pediatrician's office as a patient due to her mother making appt's and not showing for the appt. I have a certified letter from the doctor stating this. My daughter is bounced around from her great grandmothers house, her aunts house, her pawpaws house. I have my daughters medical records of which multiple times, it is documented that the mother calls in concerned about our daughter's illness and when the nurse tells her to bring her in, she replies to the nurse that she doesn't have any money, and will call back.
I pay child support to her, I send her clothes for my daughter, and I supply her with new shoes when needed. The latest is that she is living with her father in a two bedroom house of which the mother and 3 of the children are in one room and she wasn't able to buy my daughters medicine a few weeks back because she had to give her boyfriend money so he could pay his boss to be able to continue working.
Thank you for your help

