My husband has been going through a very rough custody battle. 2 1/2 years ago his ex wife moved his 2 children to Colorado (we live in Ohio). Of course the judge here let her and the kids go. One year later they moved to California. Her husband was stationed in the military in CO and then discharged, so they moved to his home state of CA. We tried to fight for the kids, but we lost, again. Recently, we found that her and her husband filed for a dissolution. We also found out that she has sinced moved into an apartment. She has not notified us about any of this... oh the power of the internet! One of the main purposes for them moving to CA was because they had a 4 bedroom house to live in. Well, she has NOT told us about the dissolution or the move. Could there possibly be a change of circumstances? We feel that the kids have been moved 4 times in 3 years, and if they filed for divorce, there is not a stable family. Someone help!! We miss these kids so much! We feel that she has moved to CA purposely to keep my husband out of the childrens' lives'. If they were going to divorce, why wouldn't she move back here? Her WHOLE family lives here. She has NO FAMILY in CA. Any suggestions would help! Thanks

She sounds like a btich.

Yeah, you could try again.

Why doesn't your husband have at least visitation rights??

Look in the dictionary under ***** and you will see her picture! My husband has visitation rights; every summer, thanksgiving, spring break, and everyother Christmas. Oh yeah, we can also fly to CA, rent a car and get a hotel room and pay for meals and expenses during the kids 3 or 4 day weekends from school. But that's not enough. It was hard enough only seeing them everyother weekend when they did live in Ohio. This has devastated our entire family. Before they moved to CO, she put a restraining order on my husband so he couldn't see his kids. A month after it was lifted they took off to CO before the judge decided they could go. She got married, She enrolled them in school. So of course since the kids had already adjusted, it was okay. They were well adjusted before they went! Now the kids are so confused. I want to go to court, but we don't want to waste our time and money. Nothing has ever gone our way at court! We have 2 kids together here that miss their brother and sister so much!

In Australia the Family Law Act is obviously different than in the US - though each state over there seems to have different laws - but one thing which I think is the same the world over is that it is always the children who suffer the most in any battle in Court over them. The money and energy it will take to fight to improve what contact your husband may possibly get, will take a lot away from the quality of life your family has so - either way your children miss out.
I would encourage you to encourage your husband to keep sending child focused letters, cards and include photos and maybe also your chidren to write to their brother and sister too - kids grow up really quickly and eventually will be able to decide for themselves - over here Courts listen to children and what they want and then determine what they see as being in the child/rens best interests
Good luck

Of course I could tell you nightmare about court cases where the women would get back with some man a day or two before court to make a show and then dump him the next week. Yep really happened I was involved in that case.

I can tell you about a women who was gettting paid to sleep with men bringing them home to the trailer she lived in next to a XXX movie place and the judge let her keep the kids even though the man had a big three bedroom home, steady second marriage of over 5 years.

Almost anything is grouds to re-file. Often one part or the other refile about every 3 years for either more child support or custody, so going back to court every 2 to 3 years is a normal situation.

But under today's laws, a single person even has legal rights to adopt, so just being single is not a reason for her not to be the custodial parent, you are only going to try to show you can provide a better home.
How old are the kids, at some point they get to fairly well decide or at least have some say.

The children are 11 and 8. The 11 year old has gotten so bad that she has told my husband to forget about them and to "move on". She has told him that she hated him, she took her step father to a father daughter dance, and told my husband she didn't want her real dad to go. The 8 year old tells us how badly he wants to live with us. He wants to be with his dad and brothers. But we know that he is too young to decide for himself.

I understand that being single won't really change anything. BUT, we do think that her not being married (they only live in CA because that is where her husband is from), them moving so many different times, not telling us about moves, no family in CA... we think all this is vital. His ex has now put these children through 2 fathers (they call their step-father "dad"), 4 different homes. She has even told the kids that it is my husbands fault that they are missing stuff because the "have" to come to Ohio. How hard would it be to have to courts do a mental evaluation on her? She had a gastric bypass surgery right before they divorced, and my husband says she is a completely different person now.

I could go on forever with this! Does anyone know about any other cases that involved ANY of what I'm talking about?

I have been in a similar situation - in my first marriage - but as it turned out I should not have believed everything I was being told about the ex - wife - it was easy to believe at the time, she was always so angry and hostile when I saw her - she had a number of different relationships and moved away from her family and all supports as well. I am now a lot more understanding of her and what she was going through.
It's not easy getting married to someone who is a non - resident parent of children and does not have a reasonable relationship with the mother of the children - I feel sorry for the children

What made you understand her? Maybe I'm missing something! I feel sorry for the children too! I would love to see them have a good relationship with both parents. It is just unfair that she had to move these kids away from their father. I would have NO problem with his ex, if she moved back to Ohio with the kids.

When she first moved, it seems it was because her husband was in the military. That's a real and viable reason for a move. Unless the custody arrangement required permission to move out of state (and most states make exceptions for the military), she didn't do anything wrong. My children were transferred from state to state to foreign country to state and they turned out all right.

It is an unfortunate fact of life that sometimes ex-spouses move out of state. Yes it makes it harder and more expensive for your husband to see his children. On the good side, in about a year, your husband can take her to court and have the judge ask the children where they would prefer to lve.

In the meantime, what specifically can you say that the children's mother is doing that is damaging to the children?

She is alienating them from their father. What could be more harmful. She has taught them that it is okay to lie, she has threatened them that if they tell us something there will be consequences, she has emotionally damaged them where they cannot tell us or her how they trully feel. I guess no one sees it but us. No one goes through what my husband goes through. She has manipulated the system, falsely accusing my husband of rape, burning the kids with lighters, she even told her 5 year old that the scar she has from a gastric bypass surgery was from my husband stabbing her. The kids don't know what's right or wrong and what is a lie or the truth. She is a liar! I just wish the courts would see it!

During the marriage was he sharing the child care duties 50/50?