Family Forum / Marriage / Divorce / August 2005

Any medical+dental expenses not covered by insurance should be
shared by the parents, either 50-50 or by the ratio of their incomes.
The other stuff is what C/S is for, but some CP's find that their ex's
are such whack-jobs that they front this stuff for the kid anyway.
=R=

Its called Child Support, not Wife Support. Stick to your guns and pay what
you are ordered to. Some states have an age-adjustment, however, that should
have been taken into account at the time the agreement was drawn up,
assuming you have one. Do I pay for things I dont have to? Yes, but i do
that for my kids, not at the beckoning of the ex. If this is new and it
sounds like it is, the first year or three are a power struggle. It will
improve.

chaz

*ALL* of that stuff should be covered in your support payments, except
maybe the dental/medical if that was made a separate item in your
decree. You don't have any obligation to your ex to go above and
beyond the support payments for stuff like this.

That being said, you still may want to look at some of these items and
decide for yourself if these are things that you want to pay for your
kids, not because you are obligated to pay them as support, but
because they might be good things for your kids and you might want the
kids to have them. But think of doing it for your kids, not for your
ex.

BP

Yeah, they should be covered.  It should have been worked out that way.
If your ex doesn't know how to manage money, that shouldn't be at your expense
(anymore).  
Unfortunately, that's too many should's.  Make sure the kids are getting what
they need.  I'd like to say that if she's unable to manage a reasonable budget
she shouldn't be trying to raise the kids, but i know that's unrealistic to
say.

Before I answer your question...

You are now experiencing the great privilege of being a regular part of
your child's life... the divorce punishment through extra day-to-day
expenses. You see... if you lived on the moon and sent regular support
payments (whether court ordered, agreed to or whatever), you would
probably never see that extra day-to-day expense and be richer for it.
But, the more involved you are, the more you get burned. Nice system,
eh.

Now, before everyone starts into how nice it is that he is part of the
child's life, etc... blah blah blah... get over it. S/He's being
screwed.

Child support is a crock. If the ex wants me for spousal support,
lifestyle support, household support, i-want-to-screw-my-ex-over
support. Fine. Let me fight that battle. But child support... no way.
Split all costs by percentage of income.

Okay... so to answer your question. No. Don't pay. Fight and fight hard.
S/He gets support. That's what is it for... for cryin' out loud.

Just to let you know... I live in Canada. Which has a marvelous
percentage of MY income system (the ex's wealth not a factor). I have
the child (as determined by my peers) to be 39.36%. So I get no break in
support. But I get the lion's share of daycare and pre-school costs,
almost all day-to-day costs, lessons, clothes, books, toys, DVD's,
etc... because I have NO say where that support goes and NO way to make
the ex give me anything that is our child's. So everything is bought by
me, or at least bought twice (by me). Friends don't beleive how bad the
systems is. Family don't believe the system lack of accountability. I
mean, the system has the word "child" in Child Support. It MUST be for
the child... right? How can you not support your CHILD! ..right??

um.. right...

Yeah... the moon is looking pretty good.

H.

P.S. I just recently posted this to the alt.child-support as someone
there had the same question.