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Let me start by saying that this is probably one of the hardest things I have ever had to type. I have had to put my pride aside and just tell it like it is. Mac is still on the fence about doing this but I assured him that it is ok. All of you are our friends and there will be no judgment passed. I mean we all need help from time to time. Right?
As most of you know Mac divorced Jeanne almost 5 years ago and since that time we have been in and out of court fighting never ending battles regarding child support and more importantly parental alienation by the custodial parent. There has been show cause hearings, contempt of court hearings, numerous complaints filed against his ex-wife and even a domestic battery case down in West Virginia in May 2015 when she assaulted me in a restaurant in front of the kids on a Sunday morning. Currently she is serving a 2 year probation diversion sentence and has a no contact order that will be expiring on May 27, 2018. All of this has taken time to fight but more than time it has taken money, money we didn’t have to spare. Especially after child support is taken out of his check it leaves us with a little over $200 a week from Mac’s income to live off of. What does the court say? They say adjust your lifestyle. Ok, so get a second job you’d think. Except the court can take that income too, and the income from your third job, and your fourth job, and your fifth, etc…it never ends! You've heard stories about dads who lose everything because of child support and divorce well we're the ones! Those ads are true! You pretty much lose your house or business because of divorce and child support. We are weeks away from foreclosure and days away from repossession of my car. We have my income and we try really hard. We’ve cut out all the extras. He’s working his butt off at Real Estate and I am sure one of these days it will all pay off but until then we need help. Your help, please.
We had hired an attorney. One who promised results. We paid him a pretty darned good retainer too. One that was not easy for us to spare. I mean it was almost 3 months house payment for us. It may not seem like a lot to some but for us it was huge. Huge! Anyway, he came out of the gate like gangbusters. Had a couple of fairly good results then fizzled. Two weeks ago we received a letter from him stating that he was considering our file closed and he could no longer help us and we would be receiving his final bill in the mail! We were shocked. We thought how could he do this to us? We are coming up on an important visit. One that will not happen unless he orchestrates it. What are we going to do? I have called friends and asked for referrals to attorneys that they think might be able to help. We have found some good ones. A couple, as a matter of fact, but we need a $3,000 retainer and we don’t have it. This is when I graciously ask for your help. We feel backed into a corner. We can’t fight the parental alienation without the help of an experienced attorney. We need to repair the damage that Mac’s ex-wife is doing to his kids. He speaks to them five minutes every Sunday if he is lucky. He sees them two weeks out of the year if he is lucky, when the custody agreement states a six week summer visit! This needs to change and the only way this will happen is if we can hire someone to help. She is poisoning their minds. She has ignored all orders for counseling. She has ignored all orders to facilitate positive phone calls on Sunday evenings. She has ignored all orders to not interfere with his visits. It needs to stop and the relationship with their dad needs to be repaired.
Your help will mean the world to us. It is not like me to reach out and ask for help. Not only will you be helping Mac and I hire an attorney but you will be helping his kids rebuild their relationship with their dad.
Love to all,
Stacie & Mac
As most of you know Mac divorced Jeanne almost 5 years ago and since that time we have been in and out of court fighting never ending battles regarding child support and more importantly parental alienation by the custodial parent. There has been show cause hearings, contempt of court hearings, numerous complaints filed against his ex-wife and even a domestic battery case down in West Virginia in May 2015 when she assaulted me in a restaurant in front of the kids on a Sunday morning. Currently she is serving a 2 year probation diversion sentence and has a no contact order that will be expiring on May 27, 2018. All of this has taken time to fight but more than time it has taken money, money we didn’t have to spare. Especially after child support is taken out of his check it leaves us with a little over $200 a week from Mac’s income to live off of. What does the court say? They say adjust your lifestyle. Ok, so get a second job you’d think. Except the court can take that income too, and the income from your third job, and your fourth job, and your fifth, etc…it never ends! You've heard stories about dads who lose everything because of child support and divorce well we're the ones! Those ads are true! You pretty much lose your house or business because of divorce and child support. We are weeks away from foreclosure and days away from repossession of my car. We have my income and we try really hard. We’ve cut out all the extras. He’s working his butt off at Real Estate and I am sure one of these days it will all pay off but until then we need help. Your help, please.
We had hired an attorney. One who promised results. We paid him a pretty darned good retainer too. One that was not easy for us to spare. I mean it was almost 3 months house payment for us. It may not seem like a lot to some but for us it was huge. Huge! Anyway, he came out of the gate like gangbusters. Had a couple of fairly good results then fizzled. Two weeks ago we received a letter from him stating that he was considering our file closed and he could no longer help us and we would be receiving his final bill in the mail! We were shocked. We thought how could he do this to us? We are coming up on an important visit. One that will not happen unless he orchestrates it. What are we going to do? I have called friends and asked for referrals to attorneys that they think might be able to help. We have found some good ones. A couple, as a matter of fact, but we need a $3,000 retainer and we don’t have it. This is when I graciously ask for your help. We feel backed into a corner. We can’t fight the parental alienation without the help of an experienced attorney. We need to repair the damage that Mac’s ex-wife is doing to his kids. He speaks to them five minutes every Sunday if he is lucky. He sees them two weeks out of the year if he is lucky, when the custody agreement states a six week summer visit! This needs to change and the only way this will happen is if we can hire someone to help. She is poisoning their minds. She has ignored all orders for counseling. She has ignored all orders to facilitate positive phone calls on Sunday evenings. She has ignored all orders to not interfere with his visits. It needs to stop and the relationship with their dad needs to be repaired.
Your help will mean the world to us. It is not like me to reach out and ask for help. Not only will you be helping Mac and I hire an attorney but you will be helping his kids rebuild their relationship with their dad.
Love to all,
Stacie & Mac
Organizer
Stacie Lynn Arnold
Organizer
Monroe, MI
