Ok here is my issue,

My girlfreind 17 lives with her mom and sister(14), Sarah (girlfreind) does not enjoy any part of visiting her father at all, she is OK with visiting him on her own terms but her mother and father recently divorced and made a joint custody agreement that the 2 girls would visit their father everyother weekend, not what girls wanted, so sarah is currently miserable and her mom keeps making her go to her fathers because he tells them he will not pay child support if they do not come see him... can he do that? My family has seen 3 divorces and as far as I know that is not possible... so here I am stuck with my friend in the middle of this "fight of wills" where her mom will just about believe anything and her father is pushing his kids to the brink of hatred toward him... now in the divorces I have seen and heard in NJ a child age 16 can usually decide whether to visit the other parent, is this possible for a 17 yr old to decide whether she wants to visit every weekend? And is it at all possible for her father to pull child support for "revenge" of her not visiting?


Respectfuly yours,
Upset boyfreind

You aren't going to like this part of my response but while you are attempting to help your girlfriend getting involved in this situation other than as a supportive "friend" is going to get you more involved than you want to be. You are most definitely not part of any of this.

However, to answer your question - support and visitation are two different things. One does not hinge on the other.

As far as visiting with her father - as long as your girlfriend lives under her mother's roof her mother gets to call the shots. I would guess that the mother does not want to be seen as a factor in the daughter possibly not seeing her father.

As far as "Sarah" not enjoying her visits with her father and only wanting to visit on her terms until she is of legal age (which very well might be 18) someone else will make this decision for her.

Perhaps she can talk to both of her parents. Perhaps she cannot.

At any rate - what is the difficulty with visiting her father?

She can't talk to her father because he is, anti social to everyone to say the least he can't hold a conversation for more than a minute, and she can't talk to her mom because she's afraid and never stood up for what she wants reli.

As far as visiting her father the problem is he takes them to his house and has a deadbolt key lock on doors so they can't go out for fresh air wihtout asking and they sit in the house from 6pm Friday night to noon Sunday with absolutely no interaction with him watso ever he goes to his office and sits on comp the ENTIRE TIME! Except for the occasional outing where he takes them to the same pizza place EVERY TIME! Nomatter what the occasion, for instance tomm they have to have brunch with him and he wants to take them to the pizza place... on thanksgiving... the man is out of his mind. He only wants visitation so every other weekend he can say to his Ex HAHA here looky here I have them this weekend!