i just got married and my husband has temporary custody of his two little boys ages 3-4. His ex-wife was proven by social services neglecting her children. Also the hospital called social services cause of the open soars on the youngest and bruising on his body. They have snuck out of the house in the middle of winter with no clothes on. On several occasions they have got into her car. They would come over dirty and their hair cut off from baird trimmers. Along with other things. We took her to court to get full custody and she didnt have a lawyer. So he told her to get one. She again came in court with no lawyer, judge said she would have to represent herself next time. Not only doesnt she work, she has lived in 3 different places. Now i believe she is living with her boyfriends relatives? She had amitted to doing drugs 2 weeks prior to the last court hearing and the judge told her to get herself together and then when she is ready to get her children back make an appeal???????????? There is alot more to the story. She is not helping at all with the children and she only is allowed 1 visit a weekend for a few hours at her mothers house. She cant even make that? When she does make it she is late, and she cusses dad out in front of the children while he is getting them in their car seats, asking them who they want to live with and calling dad deadbeat. The kids are already confused with whats going on then they have to deal with mom not showing up and cussing dad. What are we doing wrong that we are unable to get these children sole custody? Please help :confused:

NOthing, but given the kids' ages it is not likely you will ever get sole custody so long as there is hope of the mother getting her act together since younger kids need more maternal impact and even a few hours a week is better than none. The situation is bad, but not sure it is that bad at this point. Consult a local attorney to further discuss.

To add 'sole' custody isn't what many people think it is. It doesn't give total control to a parent or prevent them from having to inform the other parent of things in the child's life or the other parent having visitation. Basically it means that CP must consult NCP and get input on decisions but the CP has the last say on the decision.

We just wants whats best for the children. I just dont see how a judge can let a mother have custody of her kids when she just dropped them off with dad and said i cant take care of them you take them. It was almost 3 months before the boy even got to talk or see mom. Said she was busy? I thought the law for children was whoever was in the best interest. She moved away from everything. Anyways we have a new problem. She has an account from when they were married and she wouldnt let him take his name off the account. Now the account is -123 and they froze my account so we have no access to the money to provide for the children or the family and there is nothing we can do at this time but wait. I am not saying by any means that the children shouldnt see their mother, but they shouldnt grow up in that kind of living... drugs, drinking, abuse, moving house to house. Like i said there is a whole lot more to the story. Its just hard seeing them wait for mom and not come for them.... We are going to start counsling. Thanks for your responses.

It sounds like she hardly shows up for visitation anyway - sometimes it is better to go with the flow, meaning that if you don't try and contact her and don't chastize her for not seeing them, you'll get your wish of having her out of thier life because she'll come around less and less. Sometimes a mother will fight for her kids simply because she doesn't want to look bad. If you don't tell her she's bad, she won't try to fight you for them (she'll have some sort of justification that she's come up with for why she isn't seeing them).

In my experience, the kids have to be almost dead before a judge will take custody away from the mother. Like elklaw said, any chance of the mother getting her act together is what the court wants.