it is my husband’s custodial weekend yet his ex-wife has apparently signed up and paid for his child for an out of town activity which we just found out about. Husband had no knowledge of the details of the activity and ex wife is now saying she will pick up child at school this Friday and take him and pick him up Sunday and return him to her home, though it is still our custodial time until Monday a.m. Husband has e-mailed her 2x objecting to this. He and his ex-wife share joint custody of the child. We have not had this sort of issue before. We had plans this weekend and the child has an out of town team sporting even and has expressed his desire to us to attend that. What can we do?
If there is a court order or agreement showing joint custody, and it is the father’s custodial weekend, then the mother can not make other arrangements unless the father agrees to the change. Unfortunately there is little that he can do immediately if the child is physically with her but if they show up at the school at the same time, have a copy of the agreement or order. The no advanced notice and the child having a prior commitment (activity) will not look good if the matter has to be taken back to court. It’s just plain rude to put the child in the middle of this. The child should never be put in the middle.
He should let her know that he will be picking the child up at the usual time and that the plan she arranged will need to be rescheduled. Sending an e-mail objecting is one thing but allowing it to happen is another. He should tell her NO and let that be the end of the discussion. Just say no. It’s his weekend, it’s the child’s time and the child has another commitment. If that doesn’t work and she is still insistant maybe arrange to try to pick the child up a little earlier from school…that’s ugly I know and would probably really make the mother angry if she went to pick him up and he was already gone…
Maybe the attorney has another suggestion…
part of her e-mail was that she has also scheduled a dr’s appt for that day, again, not telling us what time, and said she will be picking him up from school to take him to that and then on to the weekend retreat activity.
You may pick the child up from school for your weekend so long as you do not believe this will cause a confrontation in front of the child.