When a child declines a visit...

[WhoWeAre]

I am 2.5 years post decree. Bad divorce and ex is still bitter and communication is email only. 4 kids 7-13

I get EOW and one night a week. 2 weeks ago I had half my weekend (Ex got the other half for mothers day). Fun day, but nothing stands out as particularly bad. Following weeknight visit 13yo says he cannot be there because he has a big homework assignment. I tell him to bring it, he says it is too much stuff, and he does not come. Next weeks visit he calls and says he is sick and cannot come. I ask when he can make up the time and he says he is too busy. My next weekend he calls 1.5 hours before the exchange and says he is not coming. I ask why. He repeats that he is not coming and then hangs up. He will not return email or phone messages and e has not returned messages except to tell me that he has never wanted to be at my house and she is tired of fighting with him about it. (this was a shock to me... I thought things were okay between us.) Tonight is my night, and I got an email this morning that just says that he will not be coming to my house.

I called his counselor who says he does not know what is up but will have son give me reason for behavior when he sees him in 2 weeks.

Waiting for a call back from lawyer.

Meanwhile it is more than 2 weeks with no substantive contact with this son. Suggestions? What am I overlooking? My heart is just about broken in 2 right now.

[jumbledone]

Sounds like you're handling it right. I don't see a whole lot you can do, except wait for counselor to chat him up.

Maybe one thing you can try to do is check in with x, and see if she's amenable to you trying to get some make-up time, just him and you. Make plans to take him somewhere he likes to go, and just spend time with him by himself.

[dobradavid]

Deeper teenager issues aside, your ex "being tired of fighting about it" is not a valid reason. Your time with your children is not voluntary on their part or your ex's - that is what the court order/divorce decree is for.

Too, part of life is sometimes doing things you don't always want to do. Time your S13 learned that.

I am 2.5 years post decree. Bad divorce and ex is still bitter and communication is email only. 4 kids 7-13

I get EOW and one night a week. 2 weeks ago I had half my weekend (Ex got the other half for mothers day). Fun day, but nothing stands out as particularly bad. Following weeknight visit 13yo says he cannot be there because he has a big homework assignment. I tell him to bring it, he says it is too much stuff, and he does not come. Next weeks visit he calls and says he is sick and cannot come. I ask when he can make up the time and he says he is too busy. My next weekend he calls 1.5 hours before the exchange and says he is not coming. I ask why. He repeats that he is not coming and then hangs up. He will not return email or phone messages and e has not returned messages except to tell me that he has never wanted to be at my house and she is tired of fighting with him about it. (this was a shock to me... I thought things were okay between us.) Tonight is my night, and I got an email this morning that just says that he will not be coming to my house.

I called his counselor who says he does not know what is up but will have son give me reason for behavior when he sees him in 2 weeks.

Waiting for a call back from lawyer.

Meanwhile it is more than 2 weeks with no substantive contact with this son. Suggestions? What am I overlooking? My heart is just about broken in 2 right now.

[secondhalf]

The one thing that I see is that your communication concerning < parenting time > is between the 13.5 yo and you rather than between you and your NJ ex; effectively putting the kid in the middle of < parenting time >, IMO. I would suggest contacting you ex NJ and tell her that it is her responsiblity to ensure that child shows up at your place at the prescribed time. If the child was 16 I might have other suggestions (i.e. not much you can really do with forcing a mobile student to show up). But at 13.5......

[Thoughts?]

To Secondhalf's comment, you need to produce a very specific, but professional & business like, letter to ex requesting and politely insisting up on her work with you to encourage the son to stay in contact.

It is difficult to prove alienation when it is subtle, but you at a minimum need to maintain her accountability for facilitating your access to the child. If she continues to balk, you want to show continued attempts to work with both of them.

How good is your relationship with the counselor, and did you both have input on his or her selection?

[Trevor]

How have you documented the missed time? You need to show up, not be dissuaded by a phone call, so there's a record of your attempts to exercise your parenting time.

[Thoughts?]

+1. Continuing to show up is key both to letting the son know you still care, even if he is acting like a dick, and to have a case if your ex isn't encouraging him to see you.

And going on record with ex that you (respectfully) insist on her cooperation is also key.

[Transcended]

Your parenting time is in decree and is not optional. It benefits not only you but your child.

Definitely sounds like parental alienation at work. Show up even when told not to and bring certified copy of your decree. If child still refuses and your NJ is not helping, you can contact authorities and let them handle it. It sounds extreme but at best your child concedes and goes with you and likely will end up having a good time, at worst authorities refuse to intervene but at least you did all you could and there was a record of it.

You set a bad precedent in your child's mind when they know all they need to do is call you and tell you not to show up. Sort of like a child saying they refuse to go to school.

[cswc]

You said you had four kids and the oldest is refusing to go. So, you are taking the other three on your parenting time? That means oldest gets to stay home with mom alone. Oldest kids have responsibilities for younger siblings. Not being around the younger 3 might be undivided attention from mom or a break from feeling like he has to watch over the others. Could be that NJ is getting involved with someone and he doesn't want that so he stays home so she has to cancel her plans. Maybe he worries that mom is so very lonely without the kids he has to stay home to keep her company - being the man of the house and all. Is there a girl in the neighborhood that caught his eye and being with you cuts into girl time? Or, he could be influenced by some PAS going on. There are a lot of reasons he might not want to come to your house (and you don't have to accept those reasons) which have nothing to do with you. You've asked and he's refusing to tell you why. I can't think of any "why" that will make you feel okay with not seeing your kid. At first, there were excuses. Now it's just "not coming tonight". He's being empowered to make parenting decisions at the age of 13. Shut it down.

While you've been understanding that he had a school project and wasn't feeling well, it's not optional to cancel any more. It's time he rejoined the family. Tell him that the next family time is _____day and you expect him to be ready to go swimming, beat you at basketball, grill burgers or whatever you guys normally do. If you need to explore the why, do it while he's at your house and you can have a one on one talk about it.

Meanwhile, see what your lawyer says about sending NJ a letter about interfering with parenting time and her responsbility to see that the custody agreement is honored.

[WhoWeAre]

Here is my update.

To date I have still not seen son. I have seen the other three at the scheduled time. Each time before I am to see them s13.5 sends an email that says he is not coming.

ex does not respond to email on the subject. I have sent 2 emails to this point short and professional, just asking her to tell me what is going on and to encourage him to reach out.

On the first missed weekend I called the local pd and asked them to accompany me. My luck was they sent a bitter single mother cop who lit into me for calling her out and told me it was up to me or the court to solve this. Exnj loved watching that dressing down.

Spoke to the counselor (I did not help pick the guy, but I do not have any objections to him either.) who encouraged me not to file in court etc and that he would speak to S first. After a week of phone tag I have the result of that meeting. He says S is being a teen, establishing his own boundaries and wants to do teen stuff. Counselor says this is age appropriate and that this would be happening even if we lived together. He asked me again not to do anything and let the kid work it out for himself and come around when he is ready. He said "Your son still loves you, but being with you is just not a priority for him right now." He also says there is no major trauma keeping him away (I had thought he might have been failing his grade for example, and not wanting to tell me.)

I know there is a little chica that he likes and she likes him in his mothers neighborhood. Counselor says if I force the issue he will only resent me.

Should I be getting the lawyer involved? I had initially asked him to stand down at the request of the counselor. The counselor says there is no projected end date and that it is appropriate developmentally blah blah blah. If I go to court and he does not want to be at my place will it have wheels? I know he is old enough to be heard in the court in my state for physical placement.