My life over the last 4 months has been like a mystery novel, although truth is stranger than fiction.

I married 16 years, 2 kids, stay at home dad for many of these years.
Wife not happy being married, to me anyway.
4 months ago I took my kids to school, and then went to pick them up after school, and they were gone, wife had taken them, I was served restraining order, getting me out of the house, with no place to go, no contact with kids for 18 days (18 days too many), I had a restraining order hearing 1 week after being served, I was not prepared, wife was, she claimed she had been the victim of domestic abuse ( we did have a love/hate relationship, hers seemed to turn more to the hate side ), she brought up things that happened 17 years ago, things that have become greatly exaggerated, things that never happened.
Judged upheld modified r/o, nothing really different on it, I agreed to it to see the kids.
1 week after this I find out real reason of r/o,
she had been seeing someone at her work all along,
things started to make sense ( family pictures on the walls were covered up, no pictures of me around, wife had been telling people she was going thru a divorce when in fact we were still together, she was mentally divorcing me though)
Since then new guy has been at/around my house/kids a lot of the time, I can't even go into my own neighborhood, am told I can go to schools only for special events, see my kids only 1 time a week and everyother weekend.
So my wife gave me this shovel so to speak, with the r/o, basically I've been digging my own hole.
Supposidly violated the r/o, by calling her from the wrong phone basically, ( I was supposed to call her only from my work, which is about 30 miles from where I live, I was on the phone with her, and we got disconnected, so I called back, and she filed a police report, I was arrested in front of my 2 kids, taken to jail, I then had to resign from my work, because of the arrest)

So that is where I am now, no job, poss jail sentence in future, ( but I am in good spirits believe it or not )...........

So I have provided this much of a story so far...... any budding authors want to take a shot at finishing this for me, Happy Ending preferred.

Welcome to MB's!

There will be posters coming your way!

I am still digesting your post, what has happened to you which altered your life "over night".

I'll follow your story.....knowledge is power. Take what works from this forum and throw out the rest.

Gayle

P.S. Seek legal advice immediately! VERY, VERY IMPORTANT!

Thank God I don't have kids right now. One day, I was going through the trash (snooping) and found some notes from a meeting my then-wife had had with an attorney. The notes outlined a plan to do this in this order:
1. Encourage me to move out of the house.
2. File against me for desertion AFTER I had moved into an apartment.
3. Go to the apartment with lawyer and claim anything I had taken with me as "joint" marital assets. Claim my paycheck as well.
4. This would make me angry.
5. File a TRO based on my anger. File claim on my paycheck, because by now, her lawyer figured I would have directed it to another account.
6. Force me into a position where I had no life, leaving me with no option but to default all car, house, credit card payments, etc.
7. As soon as I did this, they'd file for abandonment.
... in this way, and because involuntary dv in Maryland takes 24+ months, my wife would have a free house to live in with no expenses. I'd have to go to court to get my paycheck, and any contact I'd make with her would result in my being hit with an RO and jail confinement.

This plan seems like the skeaziest thing I could have ever possibly imagined. But, I guess in nasty divorces, it's pretty common. I was able to short circuit this whole thing and manipulate my wife into firing this lawyer. You m'friend, have not. You've been trapped in this game that some lawyers and bitter x's play. The next thing they'll do is use all of this as proof that a) you don't deserve even joint custody of the children, b) her taking the kids was justified, and c) you need to pay more child support because of your instable nature.

On the flip side, my x has no idea how close I came to kicking off a plan to forcibly drive her into bankrupcy. I'm very glad I didn't have to because we finally reached a settlement on Valentine's. But, had things not reached that by the 21st, I had instructed my lawyer to start doing some things that even my lawyer was kind of repelled by and didn't really want to do.

The point is... divorce brings out the worst in people. Your x's lawyer was counting on a knee-jerk reaction on your part. It is absolutely crucial that you...
- RESTRAIN whatever your gut reaction is.
- Get a lawyer ASAP.
- Get your job back. I can't believe you'd lose your job over this. What kind of employer do you have? Satan? I'm sure if you explain what happened... if not, get a new job ASAP. Until you are gainfully employed, your x will use that as justification for her keeping the kids... all the while your CS payments are adding up because you haven't filed for a reduction/postponement based on your being fired.
- Don't say you were fired. Say you quit. Respect yourself.
- Courts hear about this RO crap happening all of the time. Ride it out. Obviously you have some strange history going on or else calling from your non-work phone wouldn't have been noted in your RO. Whatever behaviors and history you have there... YOU REALLY SHOULD LOOK AT YOURSELF AND STOP IT NOW.
- Child support and x-spousal relations is not a good place to experiment with the "letter" of the law. Be polite to the judge, work out your story, don't get emotional, and be prepared for the next steps in your wife's actions to stay utterly ridiculous.
- Once you get out, make sure that you have an alibi for a while. Don't call her. Work on getting your kids back through a lawyer. Make sure you have a friend/witness with you whenever you interact in any way with/near your x.

Good luck,
Eric

Rufus,
Sorry to hear of your situation. Like Lyxa said in finding the notes from the discussion with the attorney..I found those same notes on my wife's nightstand. I came home at lunch and done some snooping and what a discovery. All of the pressure from her to make me pay child support, alimony, her have total custody, and the R/O that she had taken out on me made sense after that. Attorneys' are cut-throat..and I am glad of that in one sense that mine got the r/o removed. He was almost jailed for contempt of court in the process but got it removed. One thing that I did while she had the r/o against me was the fact that she kept calling me over and over. I never answered her. One evening late, she come barging in the garage and right into the living room (she was staying at her father's at the time). I immediately called 911 and told them that she had taken the r/o out against me and she would not leave. You should have seen the look on her face. The police showed up and made her leave. Another thing that my attorney reccomended that REALLY has helped me was keeping a small pocket sized tape recorder with me while things were and could be a mess. One time she threatened to take out another r/o one me from the kids for no reason at all...she said that she would tell them that i was abusive..total lie and she laughed about it while saying it. However..it was recorded and she still does not know it today.

Best of Luck,
Karl

<small>[ May 14, 2003, 08:49 AM: Message edited by: KarlM ]</small>

Yeah, I kept a digital recorder in my pocket as well... just in case things got really nasty and a witness wasn't around. Hit a button and you get a recording of everything said. Mine said some of the same things, except my favorite which was:

"I have hated you since the day we first started dating. I must've been a f*****ing moron to marry you!!! I wish you were dead you $&$@&&#!!! Just wait, one of these days you're going to slip and I'll have you institutionalized or arrested. You think they'd believe you over a woman??? Huh do you Mr. Hotshot???"

I keep that one too. Be careful though... in most states, marital conversations are considered confidential in a court and recording violates wiretap laws. My state is that way. But, I had to weigh the factors... I'd rather be on trial for a wiretap violation... than for doing what my x was threatening... to beat herself up while I was gone or having a seizure (I'm epileptic) and say I had done it to her.

ragamuffin,
You can follow my story thru the names of rufustfirefly, also I started posting back on January 24th when this all transpired,
look under the name robert or robertc,

Emotionally I'm doing great, I know my kids love me and they know I love them.....