2010-09-06T23:38:45Z http://blog.forgottenparent.org/comments/atom.aspx Quick Blogcast tag:blog.forgottenparent.org,2007-03-23:298117 David 2007-03-23T22:51:34Z 2007-03-23T22:51:34Z Child Support in America.<br /> <br /> <br />It started with a brief unpleasant exchange between myself and my ex wife. I was asking to see my son and told her that I have been taking care of my responsibilities in regards to child support so perhaps she could actually cut me some slack. I was hoping that she would lighten up a bit and, while we still hate each other, be a little more pleasant in regards to visitation. She tells me that my child support payments are “sketchy” at best and hung up on me. It took a little while to move past the general feeling of disgust and anger to actually hear what she said. “Sketchy”? What the expletive deleted is that about? In compliance with federal law, my child support payments come directly out of my checks. I get paid twice a month, and out of my less than fifteen hundred dollars per check, four hundred and eighty-seven dollars and fifty cents is garnished from each check. I love that word “garnished”. As far as I am concerned what they take is the meat, the parsley garnish is what I get. But he is my son and I do not regret nor deny his right to be supported by the people who love him, and I do love my son. So where does “sketchy” come in?<br /> <br />My ex wife lives in New Jersey, I live in New York. The company I work for is in California. The child support order is in New Jersey. Since I live in Brooklyn, the enforcement, and garnishment order originates in New York. When I began working for this company last August, I called my case worker (actually a probation officer) in New Jersey and told her where I worked and gave her the name of the human resources person in my company who takes care of payroll. My first check dated August 31st had no deduction, as I was in California training for my position, I thought that that was kind of them and went to a concert in San Francisco with and old friend, and bought his five year old daughter a princess doll. She is quite the little princess. The deductions began on my September 15th check. As my ex and I have as little to do with each other as possible I thought that that was that. You know, one less thing…<br /> <br />My son is actually my ex wife’s son from a former marriage and has been calling me dad since he was four. As his biological father has never had much to do with him, I actually went to court to assert my rights as his father and to gain the right to continue to see him and ended up with full joint custody. The original custody case was in Pennsylvania where we were living at the time I was unceremoniously thrown out of my house in favor of a sixty-five year old rich dude who my ex seem to think was the answer to our financial difficulties . After she lost the custody battle and the boyfriend, she moved to New Jersey. After a brief reconciliation, where we moved back in together, she again threw me out, this time for a forty-five year old man who lives with his mother (I call him disposable income man), and started the custody battle again, this time in New Jersey. As I am n tag:blog.forgottenparent.org,2007-02-01:241407 chris 2007-02-01T19:11:01Z 2007-02-01T19:11:01Z i have gone years with out seeing my kids. the office of recovery services has lost over 20.000 of my child support. and for the past 5 years, have not been able to figure it out. the stat of Utah discriminates against non-custodial parent.