Nice!... Demeaning and abusive...WTF!

She is not going to contribute anything, and I don't think she has much...Isn't she the one with different boyfriends come and go, more kids, does she pay CS to you, does she even have a job? She could just honestly answer she has no money or she does not give a damn about her child's education. "demeaning and abusive" LOL it make me laugh

I'm laughing too!

You are so abusive because you want SD to GO to college! How dare you NotMartha!!

I was 'harassing' last week when I asked and I quote 'will you be taking DD for the weekend I offered you to make up for when you cancelled?'

I'm seriously waiting for my temporary order that says 'BM is harassing in emails and is asked to stop communication in this manner' bahahaha bring it fool!

Oh JNM, how dare you?!? BM is already so hard done by, and you just keep pushing don't you??

LOL ;-)

I can not believe it was mentioned to bm to help fund her biological child's college education!!! I mean how could you make such demands from her??? Didn't you know that after giving birth all the hard work is over. From then on you sit back and relax while someone else does the rest. And you don't have to contribute a penny! LOL

Sounds like my stepkids bm! She couldn't pay child support or take care of my stepkids but then she went and "accidently" got pregnant 4 more times....which resulted in 3 actual children! If we asked her for anything over the years we got the sob story too! Like we are supposed to feel bad for her that she went and had more kids when she knew she couldn't afford them!

LMAO~ That's how they think.... they reinterpret what hear & turn it into what they think, because that's how it makes them feel. Of course she hasn't given college for her daughter a thought, let alone how it would get paid for. So now you are hounding her & being demanding for even mentioning it. She feels harassed and abused.

SD's BM... back when she yelled at DH that he isn't SD's father. Well, BM's BF was standing there & I smugly said, "well maybe YOU should think about getting a DNA test too!" and BM looked appalled. A few months later, it turned into "those horrible things that your wife said about my baby". To this day, I've never said a word about her baby. I feel quite sorry for the little guy. He's gonna have a hard life.

It is funny. but it's equally sad.

BM never contributed to SD's education even though she is wealthy (her parents left her over a 1mil inheritance).

SO paid for school all 4 years and SD worked helping with the cost of living, BM never contributed.

SO dared to ask her once if she could contribute small amount towards last semester of SD's college, and BM sent angry emails and called screaming leaving messages

"How dare you ask for money! if you can afford cleaning lady you can pay for SD's school without my contribution". LOL

I guess some women believe it's a man's job to pay for everything & their job is done when they give birth.

Some women.. Not all.

It just kills me how people think ...

I will never understand how a woman could give birth and then sit and watch as another woman raises her child. Momma claws come out on me.. I probably work harder to prove that I CAN do it without help rather than just expect that BD and new wife no matter how much money they have will do it for me. Argh

Try not to be so hard on BM. I had a similar situation. My ex wanted me to pay for my kids college, was furious I wouldn't, and took me to court. Here is why I would not:

1. I did not have any money. I lived on the poverty line for many years. Got very little child support, no help with day care, and sent my children to mostly private schools. There was simply no money.
2. I had moved closer to the city so that my children would have a choice of colleges they could commute to at a much lower cost.
3. Helped my children get scholarships. The oldest got many offers (and the second one would have too). One was a full four year scholarship at the University of Illinois for both room and board. Another was a full four year scholarship at the University of Texas for both room and board, and a $5,000/semester stipend. Due to my ex's meddling she turned both of these down.
4. I thought she was crazy to pay for an education when she was offered one for free, especially since she wanted to go to graduate/medical school.
5. Outside of the free offers, I have a real problem paying these colleges money for religious reasons. I wanted her to attend a Catholic college approved by the Magesterium. But I really wanted her to take the freebies.

You don't really know what is going on here. I raised her from the time she was too, and when she was off the charts academically everyone else wanted to claim credit and make me look bad. My ex knew his kids from his second marriage wouldn't do this well and he sabatoged his own kids. My ex made it look like this too.

It is understandable if a parent cannot afford to pay for something, but that's why she could say "let's discuss it, I am currently struggling, I can't afford it, see what options we have" but she called them "abusive and demeaning". That's bizarre

And totally different.. I agree PO1
Chicago you're points are valid and UT is extremely hard to get in to. I would probably have done the same thing. These two situations are different.

My point is that you are only hearing one side. There may be quite a few gaps in the conversation, like from a to z. This is exactly how my ex explained it to anyone who would listen. It wasn't true and he used it to help alienate my kids. And if this is what they are doing shame on them and it is abusive. To the kids.

Our situation is quite a bit different. We are custodial, BM pays next to nothing in support and has never contributed a dime past that. She lives well above the poverty line and just returned from her 4th trip to Hawaii is as many years. (PS - I've never been there, too busy raising her child)

SD is planning to attend 1 if not 2 years of community college before switching to a university as she's not academically minded, has no idea what she wants to do, and realizes how expensive a university is. We've applauded and supported this idea as we'd prefer not to spend money on something she won't work for or appreciate. BM told DH she doesn't think SD will go to any college at all, but then told SD the comm. college idea was horrible and she should do 4 years at a university. Obviously, 4 years BM has no intention of helping to fund, yet she can poo poo the cost saving idea SD has.

Funny side note. We've also asked if BM was planning to contribute to car insurance costs for SD once she is able to drive. She responded no, that's our responsibility and perhaps SD should get a job to help with the cost. Yet on SD's 16th b-day she posted on her Facebook page how releaved she was SD wasn't driving yet so she didn't have car/insurance costs. Amusing the involved, caring parent she portrays herself to be and the parent she really is.

wonderinchicago, justnomarta has been posting her for a long time and we know all details of their family arrangement, you might not be familiar with it.

In any case asking noncustodial and not involved deadbeat exspouse if they would like to contribute to their kids, is not abusive.

Well ok, my bad. If that's the case it sounds like the BM is alienating you. Be careful. You're lucky she won't pay for anything because that will make it next to impossible for her to alienate the daughter. Make sure you try to explain to your step-daughter, as objectively as possible what is going on. For example, you might say to her: I just want to let you know what is going on. We asked if your mother would be willing to help with college, she declined and then she encouraged you to attend a four year university hoping that this would cause trouble between us. This was after she said she didn't believe you would be going to any college at all.

Tell her everything that is going on. She needs to understand that her mother is trying to manipulate her, because she is. Get professional help with this if you need to.

SD's mom trying to manipulate her is nothing new - she's been doing it since we got custody 11 years ago. SD has been able to see it for a few years now, so fortunately it usually backfires on BM. Once SD started coming to us with the discovery her mom was full of it we started to tell her things as they really were - not with our opinion of the situation, just matter of factly what the truth was. SD gets it - even expects it now.

How sad is that?

WonderinginChi-town, it's really not any of my business, but what you stated perked my curiosity. --" I did not have any money. I lived on the poverty line for many years. Got very little child support, no help with day care, and sent my children to mostly private schools. There was simply no money."--

I'm going to assume living on the poverty line that your kids got tuition waivers and/or heavy aid assistance in fees (which is not my point nor do I have an issue with that). To have gotten all the way and on into the full scholarship offers received, these kids had to of had high achiever mode grades, abilities and attitude (yay, kids and yay, mom for installing the importance of education!)...but is that why the ex squealed? Did he desire an even better opportunity at a certain school for the kids? I don't understand why he took you to court...you obviously had done well on providing the basis for these kids to be able to obtain and achieve into career adults (with no help from him I might add). Was he offering to help finance different schools? Was there a education agreement in your divorce/custody that he felt you were not honoring? In other words, what the heck was his problem and what leg did he think he had to stand on in a courtroom?

I got no assistance with anything. Paid full ticket tuition on school and day care. We only had minimal health insurance because Dad kept dropping insurance, so I basically paid for all out of pocket medical (which was virtually 100%). Thank God, my kids were pretty healthy and did not need braces or have a lot of cavities either. I did not stress the importance of education at all. I stressed the importance of God, and being the best where God put you at that moment (e.g. you are a son/daughter, brother/sister, and student - strive to be the best at those things that you can be). I helped my children very little in school and let them experience failure, frustration, and humiliation when they messed up. I taught them personal responsibility. My biggest priority as far as the divorce was concerned was to keep their life as peaceful, tranquil, and happy as possible. Those are things money can't buy.

I was averaging $25,000/year (sometimes as much as $32,000, sometimes as little as $18,000/year) with $500/month in child support for three children. I was self-employed so my tax rate was higher. My mortgage, taxes, and utilities ran about $1,200/month. We didn't go out to eat, go to the movies, or anything. I would sell my children's clothes to a resale shop and purchase new ones with the money. Anything we weren't using got sold in a garage sale or through the newspaper. My children were completely unaware (and don't believe it to this day) that we were living on the poverty line.

In our agreement I had sole-custody and as far as college went it was whoever could afford what for college. My job gave my daughter a $2,500/year scholarship for being a National Merit Scholar. Legally I wouldn't have been responsible for anything.

As far as my ex goes, he brought me back to court for everything. Taking my son to Little League (but he wouldn't), insisting my children not attend Catholic church, etc... Anything and everything he could think of. At one point over the course of two years, I was averaging court 3 times a month. My ex is a malignant narsicist sociopath. He said that my daughter should get to go to whatever school she wanted to, blah, blah, blah... Because she earned it with the grades. Forget about the debt that she had to take out etc... Forget about being a parent and looking out for the kids long term well-being (e.g. being saddled with $50,000+ debt after graduation). He just did it to undermine our relationship, alienate me from the children, seek revenge, sabatoge and destroy the children. He didn't want the kids to turn out better than the his kids from his second marriage, because it would prove him to be the liar he was. He was always asking the kids who they though was 'cooler', got my kids to smoke pot, and got my son hooked on porn. My kids hung around with good kids, were respectful, got good grades, were not behavior problems. The bad influence in my kids life was their father. The court case went no where. I just didn't go and nothing happened. Everyone hated him through the years, judges, my lawyer, and even other lawyers would come up to me. He had no leg to stand on. He's a jerk, what can I say.

wow

hard to imagine how one could pay private school tuition and day care on that little money a month. if you made 25K how could you put kids though private school with no assistance? I know how much private school costs.

I also lived on that salary for awhile and certainly lived more than modestly, but sure there was no money left to pay private school tuition. what type of private school was that?

That's partly why I had made the assumption I did about assistance, PO1. We'll have to let Wondering answer how she did it, but when I wrote I had forgotten she was talking catholic. Depending on which schools and the church/members many of the catholic private schools are not that bad in fees....though true poverty line and three children, no matter how frugle one may be, would not cover living expenses (rent, food, utilities, medical extras and private school for a family of four)without some type of assistance.

Church based privates can run assorted fees, discounts for multi children, sponsership ect. Non-catholic privates in Chi-town (again depending on child's age, area, school, programs ect) would run a family 6 to 12 thousand a year for one child and some elite even more. It's why I was curious with 'poverty line' in her statements. PL 2011 currently for a family of 4 is 22,350...in 2000 it was 17,050.

It's really neither here nor there though, sounds like her ex is a major jerk. All the times and cost he ran her into court would have went a long way in paying for his children's education fees had he really been THAT concerned over his children going to a certain school. If the guy had banked just his court/lawyer fees and/or invested that money over the years, his kids might not be faced with having to choose between a couple scholarship offers or being 'saddled' with student loans.

But again, that's really not the point either. What's with these mom/dads that think they should have all kinds of say, yet do nothing over the years to assist there kids except send a bit of court ordered CS? Attitudes of 'I paid my CS therefore I supported my kids' annoys the &ell out of me.

I initially sent my kids to Catholic elementry school, which I think the most I ever paid was $350/month, when all three kids were going. Day care cost anywhere between $500 - $750/month. The most I usually spent on tuition and daycare put together was $1,000/month. I had my kids in part-time day care, but there is a premium to that (they don't charge you full time, but don't allocate it out either). I was self employed for about 8 years and worked out of my home. During this time I finished my degree. About 4 years into it, I ended up having another baby. Around this time I also brought my ex back to court for more child support and money. I won. And when that baby was about 2 years old I started selling real estate part time. After 1 year I started making some money selling real estate. I also got some money from the baby's father. When the baby was 4 years old I got a regular job with benefits, which is how my daughter ended up with the scholarship. However, that first four years we made ends meet. I don't know how, but we did. I had no debt other than my home mortgage. I paid all my bills. Like I said we bought nothing, although my kids always had Christmas, birthday, and little Easter presents. Later when I sent my kids to private High School the cost was anywhere from $5,000 to $13,000/per year. I did have 1/2 price tuition before I re-married (half-price tuition was $5,000 for one kid). I did have a better job at that time, was making twice as much money and getting twice the child support.