I'm not sure you remember my situation, but I found out in November about my H's 5 year old daughter by OW. I hadn't known anything about the affair, but at the time one of my friends had told me she saw them dancing together at a bar. My H told me it was innocent, there were lots of people and everyone was dancing. I didn't like it, but I accepted it for that. Dumb, I know....<p>Anyway, I wanted to share with you how we resolved the CS issue (which is how I found out). Since I knew the OW I personally went to her and asked her to consider settling out of court to protect our four children. The fact that she had not asked for anything for five years was out of respect for our family. Anyway, we sat down with our lawyer and worked out a plan that used the figures my H would have to pay me for CS (it still came to almost $600 a month considering 6 months of back CS).<p>After praying about it for two weeks, I felt strongly about approaching her again and explained our financial situation and asked if there was any way she could consider taking $100 less each month. She agreed right away!!! I was shocked but realized that God really is faithful!<p>She also told me that visitation was not an issue with her (it had been to that point--she wanted my H fully involved in the OC's life), she has since realized it wouldn't be fair to our M at this point! Another blessing!!!!<p>Our lawyer worked the agreement so that only initials and SSN's appear on the document. The judge signed it with only us present in the law library and it was sealed. It will not be public knowledge, nor will it go through the actual court clerks!!! Blessings again!!<p>Anyway, I know that most OW's are probably not as easy to deal with as ours has been, but I wanted you to know that there is hope and that by asking God's direction, He may lead you in a way you never expected!!<p>With our first check I also wrote a letter to the OW explaining our position on no contact and told her that I would continue to lift her and the OC up in prayer daily for forgiveness and healing in her life.<p>This has been the easy part for me, I guess I'm pretty pragmatic in that as long as I have something that I think I can do to make a difference I'm doing okay. It's the personal pain and bewilderment that get me down.<p>I am confident that God will restore our M. It has been a great one through all these years, now I just need to get past the fact that all during that time my H was being deceitful and leading a second life!!!<p>Prayers for all of you...each of our situations are so alike, yet so different. Lean on God to help you know what needs to be done.

Hello,
I am glad everything work out for you. I was just wondering how you went about getting cs done privately? If I remember right it was in the process of going to court.<p>Dawn

Yay!!! Another success story. We also have not had to go to court. We are going through our lawyers and having a judge sign off. It has also worked through lots of prayer. I am so glad that some of us can work things out easily. It is a breath of fresh air.

The way we avoided the court was by working with the OW and our lawyer BEFORE the court date. By getting everything taken care of before that, CS Enforcement was willing to drop their case as long as the OW was satisfied. <p>It was such a relief to get it taken care of without any public scrutiny!!!<p>It all depends on the relationship with the OW. In my case the A had happened six years previously and I was able to distance myself from that part of it in order to work the agreement with her. I don't think I could have faced her if the A was recent or ongoing.

Bumping up..."success story" worth reading!

m-mom,
that's a great story and also a story of successful prayer and God! I love those!!! [img]images/icons/smile.gif" border="0[/img]
Thanks for sharing,
J
(another sucess story)

MM, does your H visit the child, or did he give up visitation rights?<p>HbH

My H had visited the OC 2-3 times a year in the past, just stopping by for 15 minutes or so. She is 5 but does not know that he is her father. Right now he has put all visits on hold until we decide together what we are going to do. I have asked the OW to please respect our decision while we heal our M, and then we will work out the other. We have four children of our own and they do not know about this situation yet either, so we are praying for wisdom and guidance for the whole thing!