Child support
My daughter's dad isn't paying child support but he gets her every Sunday for 8 hours and 2 weekends a month from Friday 7 pm to Sunday 4 pm. I need extra assistance. I'm already behind on bills and I pay for everything since my daughter lives with me. We've done a DNA test and he knows he's the dad. He wants joint custody and when I asked if he was going to pay child support, he said the courts wouldn't give me child support just because I asked for it. We don't get along and he's extremely nasty towards me. He snapped at me after his mother was extremely disrespectful towards me (she demanded that I get a DNA test on our first meeting) and he's thrown my trauma in my face as a reason why he won't let me meet his mother.
During my daughters first year, he gave me money when I asked. I only asked for $150 every 2 weeks totaling $300 a month. He stopped doing that after her firat birthday. I've asked for money from him and he's told me that he doesn't have it because he's paying his son's tuition for college. His mother is also paying his rent while he pays his son's tuition. I feel toyed with. I'm at the point where I want to hear a judge tell me that he can't financially help me. However, I like my freedom from him. He isn't on her birth certificate and has no rights. I allow him to have time with our child for many reasons. My daughter can bond with her family, I get a well-needed break, and I hoped to have a decent co-parenting relationship with him. I know i sound extremely controlling but dealing with him is hell. Still, I'm drowning and I need help. I don't mind working and grinding for what my daughter needs as well as what I need, however, I didn't make this beautiful baby girl on my own. Any advice? I feel her dad will try any and everything to get out of paying child support like weaponizing my mental health as he's done many times before.
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The best decision is to file with the courts to establish child support and custody rights for both of you. The courts will establish a detailed parenting plan that both of you must follow, unless modified by a judge. In the parenting plan, you can say that you don’t want any contact outside of information regarding your daughter and no negative interactions. The courts will take into account where the child lives amongst many other things to calculate child support.
I don’t advise you to sever the relationship with him because that is considered parent alienation and he can use that to go through the courts and get legal custody. It won’t matter that he’s not on the birth certificate because he can file to establish paternity and gain parental rights.
I don't plan to sever the relationship with him. I do want our daughter to have him in her life. I just want the interactions to be more pleasant and for him to pull his weight on parenting and finances.
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