My daughter is 8 yrs old. The father now deceased went 8 years without seeing his daughter because he was running to keep from paying child support. May of this year he came back around (8 yrs later) I let him see her and he still didn't see her like he should have. 2 months later he was killed. Now his parents are trying to get visitation of my daughter and they have NEVER been in her life. The last time they saw here was when she was 3 months old. The only reason they are interested in her now is because their only son is dead. Are they allowed to do this? They haven't been in her life all this time and I don't see the point of starting now. My daughter doesn't ask about them or anything and if you were to put them in the same room she would have no idea who they were. As far as I'm concerned they are strangers and now they want to come in after all this time and disrupt her life. They hadn't been there for 8 years now they are taking me to court for visitation. I do not want them to have it. I live in Va and they live in TX. Thanks for any help.

I think that it is your decision... If you don't want them to be in your daughters life.. then they shouldn't be even if they want to be. If your daughters dad was still alive then he would have the choice if they were aloud to see her or not. You are the only parent alive so you should have the choice if they can see her or not... ESPECIALLY because they have never wanted anything to do with her all of these years

Hi thanks for answering. But Legaly can they be granted visitation if I object to it ? I received a summons to go to court about this next month.

Yes, of course they can get a court order ( if your state allows grandparents rights) and most likely it will be a lot more than they would do if you would have merely allowed them to visit in your home.

So don't mean wrong, but they are the grandparens and the child should know about them and be able to see them, There may be reasons for so long they were not part of the child's life, but again, you are forcing them to go to court, since you would not allowed some level of visit.

So they will now force visits in court.

You should have worked out something with them before it came to this

Yes the reasons they were not apart of my daughters life because they were helping hide their grown son. They took care of him so he didn't have to get a job to pay for his child support which he was over $10,000 in the rears. So then they couldn't come and ask for visitation because they would have been forced to give up information on the location of their son and he would have been put in jail. Now that he's dead now all of a sudden 8 yrs later they are interested. It's wrong to me to have to put her through all of this.

It may be wrong to you to put her through this... but she is their flesh and blood also (unless your ex was adopted of course). She is the only thing of their son they have left to hold on to.

She is 8 now, and doesn't understand, but when she is older she will want to know about her father, her grandparents, etc. By withholding her from them, and visa versa, this could come to bite you in the you know what in the future.

No, it's not right that they hid him so that he didn't have to pay... but in essence you are doing the same to them by not allowing them to get to know what may be the only thing left of their son.

Put yourself in their position for a moment... What if your daughter who is grown and has children passes and her husband or ex husband does not allow you to see your grandchild/grandchildren. Wouldn't you be hurt?

My advice, save yourself a lot of court battle, a lot of legal expense,

So they allowed their son to live with them, it was there son, what were they to do, kick him out ? Well I guess we would have advised them to, but few actually will.

Since they have filed this in court, it means your state will allow grandparents rights, so basically all they have to do is prove they are the grandparents, and if you can not prove they are a threat to the child, all of the child support issues, all of the past of your ex husband will not even most likely be presented in court.

So it will almost 100 percent to be to your benefit to make some deal with them before you go to court, that way you can still control things,
If not, it is likel they will get overnight visits and more.

The father is dead, let the grandparent get to know your child. In the long run, it will be better if they have a connection to their own blood, as I'm sure you did. You need to bury the hatchet, and think of the child's best interests here. Why make her suffer for adult folly? Talk to them, and save yourself a court appearance. And speaking as a grandparent myself, a visit to see grandparents is hardly a disruption. Was it for you?

Contest whatever motions they may have filed. Some states recognize Grandparent's rights and some don't. The fact that they've had minimal contact with her up until now isn't going to totally bode in their favor. Ultimately it'll be up to the judge who'll (hopefully!) base his/her decision on the laws of the state of Virginia. Because they're in Texas and there's 2 different states involved, that complicates things more as well (for them, more so than you.)

My opinion is if they hid him out they are just as trashy as he was. My grand parents/his siblings did the same.. When my youngest sister turned into an adult they came out of the woodwork with love.
I breathe, smile, eat, drink, laugh,cry, work and am a pretty normal human all with out their help. Of course I was with my fathers famliy until they divorced when I was 7, so from 7 on I was invisible. It is actually better for her since she has never had to put up with their pretend love... hopefully she'll have less emotional baggage to carry around with her/less money spent on shrinks. I hope you live in a state that does not recognize grandparents rights... more than likely they are full of it and will drop it, it sounds as though they are not fighters anyway. I would at least consult an attorney and get his take on the situation.

Hi I know I'm late to responded on this. I actually forget about this post until I did a search on Google. tess5162 is a username I use often and it brought up every site I've been to. (kinda scary) well to update everyone on this. This proves my point that the paternal grandfather was taking me to court and did not even show up. For someone who claimed they wanted to see his granddaughter so bad obviously had better things to do. I sat in court for 5 long hours and he never showed. Come to find out he called to have it moved to another date. We finally got out other court date a couple of months later that he DID show up. If he didn't it would have been dismissed. I hired a lawyer which cost me $1500 but it was worth every penny. Originally I thought he was only taking me to court for VISITATION but he had the nerve to be asking for JOINT CUSTODY. Are you kidding me? He, nor the biological family have never supported her financially or any other way for that matter. Long story short, The judge heard my side and his side and denied him visitiation AND joint custody. The judge was basically like he has the NERVE to come into his court asking for this. The judge saw it my way and I'm glad its FINALLY over! Thanks to all that responded. To anyone else concerned about this in order for a grandparent to have rights they must PROVE that the parent is unfit and it would harm the child to NOT have them in her life. SO I'm happy, my daughter is happy. She is now 9. When/If she asks about them later I will not hide anything from her. She will be old enough to know the truth. IF I told her the truth she wouldn't want anything to do w/ them at all so its best just keeping things like they are. :p

Grandparents have no legal right to see their grandchildren. It is your choice. Granted they can always get a lawyer but generally speaking the judge in the case will take into account that they just want to see her for selfish reason's not for her betterment.

Exactly! :)

Grandparents have no say in anything. As bad as it sounds, they really don't. I am near that situation but my daughter father is in prison for 30 years and his mom tried. Grandparents have no say in it. The only thing that I can say may make it hard is the fact of the father being deceased. I think over all it will be your call. Best of luck!

They shouldn't have any say in anything unless they had an active role in her life (like my mother) if my mom and I had a falling out there is no way I would take my child out of her life because she has ALWAYS been there for her. No one in his family participated in helping me times when I really could have used the help. They weren't interested when there son was alive so don't have any interest now that he's dead. I didn't see any of them forking over any money to help support her. My daughter is in gifted classes, makes straight A's and is a great girl! She got that way because of me. I am a single mom raising a 9 yr old and Ive been doing it by myself. NO financial support or anything else for that matter from ANYONE in their family. Well the decision has already been made and the judge saw it my way so I'm fine now.

Not to judge anyone, but as a grandparent, I think its sad that a way can't be found for blood to know blood. Its so sad, when we hold yesterdays grudges and mistakes against others and it effects our kids. I just can't imagine that kind of world where I could never be with my grands, nor my kids ever not bringing them around, and yes I have made some lulu's in my time. Guess I should just be thankful for my blessings and go hug my grandkids tightly. HMMMM, my kids too, for that matter.