Hello! I'm in a more interesting situation as I'm not married yet, but my fiance has had a child with another woman while we have been together for almost 10 years.

The facts are: OW does not want Fiance to be involved in OC's life, and Fiance wants to stay with me and agrees that NC with OW/OC is best. OW asked that Fiance pay her a "fair amount" outside of child support courts. Once Fiance has the means to pay her a "fair amount", I want him to take a private DNA test first before paying her anything. He is not on any legal document binding him to the OC as of this moment. OC was conceived in Texas, Fiance and I plan to move to California.

What can I do to ensure that we pay the least amt of money to the OW? Fiance is on track to earn a very high amount of money in 3-4 years once training is done.

I'd like to preface this with the fact that I don't see having children as a way to "get back" or a "tool to use" to get back at OW/OC. Fiance and I have always wanted children together, and we will have them when we are ready and love them fully. I want to protect their best interests. If I truly just wanted to have children to "get back" at them, I would've gone off birth control months ago and started this process now.

My thoughts are:
1. Get a pre-nup detailing a large percentage of alimony and "child support" be paid to me if we divorce/legally separate
1a. I'm fully aware you can't put child support in a pre-nup, but I'm sure a judge will not bat an eye if paying parent wants to give more child support as agreed upon in pre-nup?
2. Get married, have kids
3. Get a legal separation, and with that, alimony and child-support court enforced
4. Place money back into an account our family can use.

This would prevent OW from taking a large amount of money from MY family and OUR children if she ever decided to come after us for court-ordered child support.

Can anyone else advise/let me know of anything else I'm not considering to ensure financial stability for my future children?

Welcome to MB.

Could you clarify: in what sense is she an "OW"?

I don't just mean because you are not married. I'm asking whether he had this child with her while he was with you.

Yes, we've been together for a long time, this OC was born was he was with me.

Thanks for your reply.

I'm not trying to drive you away (please stay and discuss), but I would point out that this "Pregnancy/Child" forum exists to help married couples deal with horror created when a spouse has an affair and a child is born from that affair. Because this site is dedicated to preserving and rebuilding the marriage for those couples who want to do that, Dr Harley recommends that the married couple, if they want to stay together, go to extraordinary lengths not to see the child (and, of course, OW) - EVER. He recommends that, if the husband has had the affair, he ends all contact with OW - moving away from the area or leaving his job if necessary - and does not acknowledge the child. He should never admit paternity of the child. If he has already done so (by telling people that he is the father, for example), he should stop doing so, and should not support the child unless he is served with a court-order to take a DNA test. Not all judges in all states of your country would order such a test; they are not keen to see women trying to wreck a marriage with allegations such as this.

If the court-ordered test shows that he is the father, he should pay what the judge (and only the judge) stipulates, and should still never see the child or its mother. This advice is given in order to protect his marriage and protect the wife (and children of the marriage) whom he so badly betrayed. Alongside this no contact, he should use Dr Harley's standard advice designed to rebuild the marriage.

However, when infidelity takes place when a couple is not married, and especially when a child has been conceived, the advice would be for the betrayed partner to walk away. Your fiancé could in fact try to be a father to this child (if he is sure it is his) and marry OW.

From our point of view, as posters to this forum, we are less interested in giving financial advice than in relationship advice. Your financial questions could easily be answered by a lawyer who, of course, has expertise in your state.

But financial advice isn't, in essence, what Marriage Builders is about. It's about marriage and relationships, and we would advise you to walk away.

I realise that I did not acknowledge your saying that he has agreed to NC with this child.

Has that been true completely? Has he ever been in its presence? Does he see it for parental visits? Was he at the birth?

He must be in contact with this woman at present, because her demands about child support are getting through to him somehow. If you were to try real NC, all avenues between them must be severed and blocked, and you must have a way of ensuring that this maintains.

If has never had contact with the child, and if, as you say, you plan to move far away, you could just do that and ensure that he does not acknowledge the child in any way. You could wait to see whether this woman does in fact get a court order for a DNA test. If she doesn't, or one is not granted, then it would be possible for him to go NC with her and the child. Your future marriage would stand a chance under those conditions - if you really want to marry a man who did this to you in the first place.

If she gets a court order and he is required to pay, your future marriage could only work if he never sees the child and you do, in fact, stay more than 1000 miles away from OW.

The problem is that this woman is trying to keep him in her and her child's life. If he has contact with the child, it won't be long before their relationship resumes (if it ever stopped) and your marriage breaks down.

If you take this approach, the question of how to pay the least money for the child is rendered redundant. Your fiancé would pay nothing for the child unless court-ordered to do so, and when he does, it will be the amount that the judge decrees.

Thank you for getting back to me! I should've been more clear when I wrote this all out.

Walking away is questionable, as the OW is not exactly someone my Fiance would marry period. There is no potential for a marriage there. There is also the fact that I brought this up to him regarding the OC, would he rather be in the OC's life? and he has expressed that he wants to have me in his life more than the OC.

He has only ever seen the OC once, when he discussed what the OW's intentions were with the OC. No parental visits, was not at the birth, doesn't even know when OC was born. I am also sure that there is no more contact.

Ideally, I'd love it if a judge did not agree to a court ordered paternity test, but I just want to have the best solution possible. I agree with the fact that he will pay nothing for the child until court-ordered, but I am trying to make it so that the amount the judge decrees is the minimum possible. However, you are right, this is a marriage forum, not a legal/financial forum! I will take this question to a lawyer. Thank you!

But he wanted OW in his life to some extent. He cannot claim that he would never go near her, because he already did.

Why are you going through with this?

SugarCane, my decision to stay or go is not up for debate. I am looking for financial/legal help and saw some previous threads on here that offered that. I appreciate your insight regarding marital advice, but that is not what I am here for. Thank you.

You don't need to "debate" your decision if you don't want to, but can you simply explain it?

You are weighing up your as yet un-conceived children against this already existing child. You've been with this man for 10 years - and engaged for how long? - and he has done this to you. You're still not married, and he has a child with someone else. You are starting your marriage under deeply unfavourable conditions. You don't want to "debate" that fact, but it doesn't become untrue by virtue of the fact that you will not talk about it.

Anyway, I'll leave you with this. We use Dr Harley's advice when we try to help people who post here.

Please read this article: What to do with the child of an affair? Towards the end of it, Dr Harley writes:

"...when there are no children in the marriage. In that case, the marriage itself must be seen as more valuable for its own sake than the welfare of the child. Many couples without children have made that decision, and have agreed to have no contact with the child of the affair.

But many others have decided that the child is more important than the marriage, and have divorced to give the unfaithful husband a chance to be a father to his child. If the mother of the child is unmarried, and is willing to marry the child's father, the child has a chance to be raised by its biological parents with all of the advantages it offers.

When the other woman is unwilling to marry the unfaithful husband, many unfaithful fathers without other children are unwilling to forgo contact with his child. And that eventually leads to divorce for most couples. As difficult as it is to imagine, if a marriage is to thrive, a husband should have no contact with the child of his affair."