Went to court two weeks ago and got temp. sole custody while my H got visitation time on Tues. and Saturdays. For the last two weeks he has either switched a day, time, been late picking up our son that daycare called me and now this saturday he wants to go hunting. He asked me if I could keep our son and I said okay and when he is done he would finish up his visitation. I have been more than accomodating and I put my foot down today when I talked to him because he wanted to make up the time. I said he is forfeiting his time going hunting. I want to adhere as much as possible to the court order. He then got all rude and ignorant. He said that he will take our son and so I asked who would watch our son since I have a right to know. He said not to worry about it and pretty much insinuated that his girlfriend would watch my son.

First all, I called my lawyer she isn't in. Legally, he is responsible for his son. If anything happens to him while he is in the woods, my son is with a babysitter. A friend of mine said that in her divorce cree that if the non-custodial parent is not able to watch the child that the custodial parent will be given 1st option to retain the child. Visitation is for my son to be with his father, not be babysat by whomever. I rather keep my son and have his father pick him up after hunting. I am sick of changing my schedule around to accomodate his needs. Anyone have any advice?

I've posted this story in other threads but it's relevent here as well. My first divorce involved a custody battle in which I was given interim custody (while court was still proceeding) and XH had visitation for 2 hours every Sunday. It was supposed to take place at his brother's house, in the presence of his brother (supervised). The first week went ok. The next week, I arrived with DS and XH's brother was not home. I waited until he returned. The next week when I arrived to pick up DS, NOBODY was home. Turns out XH decided he didn't like supervised visitation and took DS somewhere (I will never know where) for his 2 hour visitation and then returned (late). When we went back to court, the judge was FURIOUS.

Now to back track a little, in the beginning I had the sense that the judge was siding a little for XH. I did go in with my parents and the fancy lawyer they paid for while he had legal aid and I was asking for sole custody and supervised visitation so quite a bit. I certainly looked like a rich, spoiled, bitter b**** and I sense that's exactly what the judge saw. But at the second court appearance when the judge heard about XH's antics over the visitation, he quickly changed and ordered that the visitation be supervised by Children's Aid, which happened to be in a city 45 km away. Too bad, so sad for XH. He went to one of these visitations. The second one he was a no-show. CA said that they were too busy to hold the time slot for him and since he didn't show, his spot was given to someone else. So there was no more visitation again. The next court date turned out to be the last where the judge basically said that XH obviously can't follow a simple instruction and is showing no respect for the court and gave me sole custody and XH no visitation whatsoever unless by the good of my heart I should grant him some - under conditions which I was free to specify on my own.

So the morale of the story - let him change his schedule and disrespect the court order. If the judge sees what a disrespectful PIA he is, it can only work in your favour. Be patient and hang in there. It's a hard road but it will be worth it.

You've described the "Right of First Refusal". Please buy the book "Mom's House/Dad's House" if you don't already have it. It has great ideas.

I hope you've been documenting when he's seen and not seen your son on his time.
Look up the definition of ROFR, and type it out in a letter to X saying:
ROFR is standard in every (ok most) custody agreements, and separations. If you are unable to care for son, then I will care for him on Sat. XX, xxxx when you have told me you will go hunting.

Although there is no stipulation in our agreement to make up time that you've chosen not to utilize, I will try to work with you to ensure that you maintain a relationship with son. (whether you feel like it or not, take the high road and know that many people will never "make up" time.)