I'm not trying to sound like an ass since I am the single mother who calls the Dad each week to confirm he will pick his daughter up and she will never know that I calll and remind him every week. I can see the other side of this also though. I see all these people taking about dead beat dads and maybe, just maybe it is more like this.

A one night stand between 2 people who never wanted children, but slept together without protection. She gets pregnant and either finds out to late to abort or chose to keep the baby. The one thing we know is the guy is honorable enought to pay child support every month, and does not know what he is missing out on.

Not to sound fairy tailish, but the guy probably has no clue what he is missing out on given the fact that the child is too young to travel alone and he probably has no desire to see the mom. It is more likely it does not occur to him that his daughter is missing him.

Sometimes people don't become parents until they meet the child.

I agree - fathers won't necessarily feel like parents if they haven't met their children or got to know them at a deep level.

You're right too in that sometimes it's a case of the fathers having such a bad relationship with the mother that they'll avoid the child if it means they don't have to deal with the nightmare of being around the mother.

Let's just say mothers and fathers can both get it wrong :)

My son's dad simply grew up separate from his own father so he thinks that's normal and doesn't understand that time apart often creates emotional distance. That doesn't make him a bad person - but it is hard for my son to understand. I accpet that I can't change how my boy's dad thinks - that would require me to change his past. I can only be there for my boy and hoppe that one day they'll have a good relationship.

The kindest thing we can do with other parents is not judge them or guess at their situations, as every circumstance is different. :)

My personal bias here - the only case I know like this the reason the child has no contact with the father is because the mother refuses to allow it. She has caller ID and won't pick up the phone if it is him, she returns his Christmas / Birthday cards unopened, etc etc etc. By by damn if he changes jobs she is down at the courthouse that day demanding that his wages be garnished. When he lost his job she was having his unemployment garnished.

I keep telling him he can demand rights but between his depression and her threats, he never does.

So yeah, both dads and moms can be the injured party or the injuring party.

I don't know. Most non-custodial parents pay child support through a check. Unless you were a deadbeat and the state intervened and started dinging your paycheck, it's rare to have it automatically deposited.

Different states have different procedures. My state demands automatic payment through payroll garansheement and even congenial parents who have shared custody are garansheed if there is a diference in wages and a payment is involved.

I do payroll. Child support payments as an automatic deduction from an employee's paycheck is very common. The deduction use to be sent as a check to the county, now they go to the state, which requires us to direct deposit the payment directly to a state account.

Demanding rights is expensive. VERY expensive. Especially if your unemployment check is being garnished.

IncogNeato:

I don't know. Most non-custodial parents pay child support through a check. Unless you were a deadbeat and the state intervened and started dinging your paycheck, it's rare to have it automatically deposited.

Maybe he missed a few payments when he was in between jobs. Or maybe he tried to demand his rights by refusing to pay until she allowed him to see his kid. I know a guy who tried that.....his wages are now garnished also. If only the courts were as zealous in their enforcement of visitation rights as they are with enforcement of child support payments.

Fathers give up their rights the moment the mother decides the pool boy might be a better lay. They give up their rights, but not their responsibilities.

I understand your point, but unless the father is being denied visitation by the mother there is no excuse for not keeping up at least some contact with the child. Even if the father doesn't care about what he is missing, he is a human being and therefore capable of empathy, so he is capable of realizing that the child will care about what he or she is missing.

Pogue Mahone:

Demanding rights is expensive. VERY expensive. Especially if your unemployment check is being garnished.

It certainly can be, but to be fair society is getting better about getting resources to these dads. In the case I was talking about, his girlfriend found a place that would pay for the legal stuff if he would agree to attend parenting classes weekly for some period of time. He said he couldn't because he had to work, ok. Then he lost his job and I pointed out the silver lining that hey! now you have time for those classes. He had another excuse. That is why I think its really depression / learned helplessness in his case.

I agree that society doesn't tend to favor dads but Progue, when you only have a hammer everything starts to look like a nail.

IncogNeato:

I don't know. Most non-custodial parents pay child support through a check. Unless you were a deadbeat and the state intervened and started dinging your paycheck, it's rare to have it automatically deposited.

Pennsylvania requires paycheck deduction. I wouldn't be surprised if it is becoming the national standard, as well.

It's a federal mandate that child support payments are done through wage garnishment and it's carried out by each individual state. If there is an order for support, there is an automatic order for wage garnishment. Gone are the days of people writing checks to their former spouses, and if you know someone who is doing that, I guarantee you they have an informal order between themselves.

It's also not within a parent's right to refuse child support. The law mandates that it's a child's right to be supported by both their parents and they don't grant the right to one parent to refuse it. If you don't want or need the money, you are supposed to be putting it into a savings account for the child. You couldn't refuse it even if you wanted to. You can waive spousal support but not child support.

I have to agree with Pogue. It's a complete bug up my ass how the DA will haunt a man (or a woman) for child support by taking away their licenses, cleaning out their bank accounts, etc., yet they will not lift a finger to help a man (or a woman) whose former spouse thwarts visitation with their children.

SusanM:

Then he lost his job and I pointed out the silver lining that hey! now you have time for those classes. He had another excuse.

There are exceptions, but in general, people find the time and money to do what they really want to do.

I know people who are always complaining that they are about to have their water or phone or whatever cut off, but they find hundreds and even thousands for their hobbies. I know others who say they don't have a moment to spare for this task or the other (including vacations wth their kids), but always seem to find time for their boyfriends/girlfriends or whatever their thing seems to be.

I don't argue that someone should drag a child through months of litigation because the other parent is unpleasant to the ex, but otherwise a good parent to the child; but if the other parent is actually a bad parent, and the non-custodial parent genuinely cares about the kid, they do everything they can to find the time and the money.

mermaid33:

Gone are the days of people writing checks to their former spouses, and if you know someone who is doing that, I guarantee you they have an informal order between themselves.

Maybe so. Most of my friends no longer have minor children. However, this is Texas, where child support, back taxes, and maybe student loans are the only thing the employer can deduct. Last I'd heard though, only if the non-custodial parent fell way behind on support did the courts order the employer to garnish wages.

Sure Incog, assuming a completely healthy person. A diabetic cannot make enough insulin if he really really tries. And somebody who is struggling with mental health issues are not going to be making the best decisions, even if he really really tries.

In both cases, it is on them to seek the proper health care and keep up with the regiment. But the problem with mental health is, what do you do with people who are unhealthy enough that they need health care in order to make good decisions - but cannot make the proper decision to get care without getting the care first? You certainly cannot force them unless they are an immediate danger to self or others. So massive numbers of people every year destroy their lives and the lives of others, which could be fixed if there was just some way out of that catch-22.

Of course, maybe those are the exceptions that you were talking about. But when it comes to the mentally ill, I think they are really the rule rather than the exception.