hello, my name is Ely and live in North Carolina. I am recently divorced and have two beautiful daughters and a step-child from this past marrige that I have raised as my own since she was one year old and now is ten. My ex and I have not had any custody papers filled but for the past year and a half I have had a set schedule with my daughters and they have become acoustomed to it. Their is an issue of chld support court hearing next moth. My ex now want to change our verbal visitation agreement so that she gets more money out of me. but the thing is that I also do take my step-daughter with me everytime I take my own 2 daughters and have never asked her for a penny. she dosent drive the 100 miles per day of visit to either dropped the girls of or pick them up. I hate to hurt my step daughters feeling by not taking her with me when I have my girls but if my schedule changes, financialy I won't be abel to afford her coming with me scince she is the oldest of my 3 daughters doen't me playing such a large part of her life have any pull on dicisions made. :o

[QUOTE=elydelariva]hello, my name is Ely and live in North Carolina. I am recently divorced and have two beautiful daughters and a step-child from this past marrige that I have raised as my own since she was one year old and now is ten. My ex and I have not had any custody papers filled but for the past year and a half I have had a set schedule with my daughters and they have become acoustomed to it. Their is an issue of chld support court hearing next moth. My ex now want to change our verbal visitation agreement so that she gets more money out of me. but the thing is that I also do take my step-daughter with me everytime I take my own 2 daughters and have never asked her for a penny. she dosent drive the 100 miles per day of visit to either dropped the girls of or pick them up. I hate to hurt my step daughters feeling by not taking her with me when I have my girls but if my schedule changes, financialy I won't be abel to afford her coming with me scince she is the oldest of my 3 daughters doen't me playing such a large part of her life have any pull on dicisions made.

[QUOTE=elydelariva]hello, my name is Ely and live in North Carolina. I am recently divorced and have two beautiful daughters and a step-child from this past marrige that I have raised as my own since she was one year old and now is ten. My ex and I have not had any custody papers filled but for the past year and a half I have had a set schedule with my daughters and they have become acoustomed to it. Their is an issue of chld support court hearing next moth. My ex now want to change our verbal visitation agreement so that she gets more money out of me. but the thing is that I also do take my step-daughter with me everytime I take my own 2 daughters and have never asked her for a penny. she dosent drive the 100 miles per day of visit to either dropped the girls of or pick them up. I hate to hurt my step daughters feeling by not taking her with me when I have my girls but if my schedule changes, financialy I won't be abel to afford her coming with me scince she is the oldest of my 3 daughters doen't me playing such a large part of her life have any pull on dicisions made.

I am a little confused by your post. First, visitation and child support are two separate issues. You say that your ex is wanting to change your verbal visitation agreemetn to get more money out of you. Visitation changing has nothing to do with child support unless you are splitting custody (you have the kids 50% of the time). So I'm not sure how she thinks she will get more money by changing the visitation. Can you clarify?

Then - I am not sure why you won't "be able to afford her coming with" you. I really, really hate to see any parent (step parent, bio parent) say they can't take visitation due to money. How would you feel if your parent said "I can't visit you because you cost too much money"? It's horrible. But I am curious as to why you think this. If you already take 2 daughters, why would 1 additional daughter make a dent in cost? You are driving to the house anyway, so where is the extra costs?

You need to contest the modification on the grounds that there is no changed circumstance and also because you have increased visitation costs due to fuel costs and you are not seeking an adjustment for that, so see no reason for a change. I do not think you would get credit for takign the child that is not yours unless the mother gave you a break for that and the court agreed to that. I hope the parents can work this out.