Meeting with the district attorney

[Californiablonde]

I just received a voicemail from difficult child's school principal this morning. difficult child and I are to attend a meeting with the district attorney regarding her attendance. The meeting is mandatory and if we don't attend they may take custody of difficult child and charge me with fines. So now it's getting serious. The message says the meeting is this Thursday on December 1st. They repeated that date several times on the answering machine. I am confused. December 1st is long passed and that date was on a Saturday. So I put in a phone call to the attendance office to ask when I am supposed to meet. They gave me a number to the woman in charge and she isn't in the office so I need to call back later. Now I'm really starting to worry. I have no idea what they are going to say in the meeting and what they are threatening me with. My only hope is that this will be difficult child's wake up call and she will finally realize the seriousness of all this. All the threating letters haven't been enough to wake her up so maybe meeting with an attorney will do it. Please pray it does. I am very anxious now.

 

[DaisyFace]

Incorrect automated messages are absolutely infuriating!

I hope you can get to the bottom of this and find out what is actually happening...

 

[dstc_99]

Dang! I would be frustrated too. It's bad enough to deal with a difficult child but then having someone threatening you. ARGH! Good luck but I wouldn't count on the lawyer intimidating her.

 

[Californiablonde]

I just talked to the lady in charge. The meeting is tomorrow! Ugh. I am leaving work early for a psychiatrist appointment. Thank God the meeting is a couple of hours after my doctor's appointment. I really couldn't afford to cancel psychiatrist. Now today I go and see my new therapist for the very first time. I am going to have plenty to talk about with him. Geesh.

 

[InsaneCdn]

Include your X... at least inform.

 

[Californiablonde]

I'm afraid to tell him cause he keeps up with telling me he is taking the kids away from me. I will go to the meeting first and see what they have to say. He wasn't invited and I prefer to do this on my own for now.

 

[dstc_99]

Are you sure your mom wont inform him? If it is a possibility I would inform him instead of letting her back door you.

Honestly it is as much his problem as yours. He has not been supportive and didn't believe there was an issue. Let him see exactly what you are facing because he has allowed your daughter to continue this way and refused to believe you.

JMHO but hiding it from him got you where you are. Try putting it in his face and making him deal with the constant disruptions to your life and home. It wont all seem so rosy once he has to jump through some hoops too.

 

[Californiablonde]

I am going to tell my mom not to inform him. If I tell her not to, she will respect my wishes. I have some good reasons for not wanting to inform him at this time. I don't want to go into it all now. But I do have my very own valid reasons. I know I keep threatening to have difficult child move in with her dad. I really don't want to do that because her stepmom treats her so mean. Down right vicious. I was thinking that if she doesn't straighten up her act, I could ask my mom to take her in. She listens to my mom. Respects the hell out of her where as with me she does not. I will pay my mom a small amount of child support if needed. As long as difficult child is staying with grandparents, I can still collect child support from my kids' dad for easy child. I really need child support in order to pay for his daycare. All I gotta do is get my mom to agree, which may be tough. She already raised my niece and nephew as teenagers. But she would make the most sense. She would be able to monitor difficult child's school progress and attend all IEPs whereas her father is unwilling. It's just a thought I'm tossing around in my head.

 

[susiestar]

I know you rarely like what I have to say, but on this I am going to say it anyway.

You are WRONG not to tell her father. This goes beyond custody issues. You can do JAIL TIME for this. You can do up to one YEAR in jail and face fines of up to $25,000.

Her father NEEDS to know the full extent of the problem. Half of this problem is because she uses the custody issue against you and you allow it. I don't CARE what kind of a jerk he is. Maybe she NEEDS more of someone being a jerk or mean to her to get her to do what is needed. Yes, that IS harsh. It also is what it is.

As far as her living iwth your mom, I seriously doubt her dad will agree and you NEED him to agree. The more you hide from him, the less he has to deal with and the more that he can use against you. Not only are you allowing him to not see the full range of her problems/challenges, you are setting up a very negative relationship between them. Yes, he probably has done his share to contribute and I am sure the stepmom isn't so fun to be around either. BUT the more you HIDE from him and hide the problems from him, and the mroe you support her view that dad is 'awful', the more you create a very bad dynamic between them. in my opinion if she is old enough to refuse school, she is old enough to tell her dad about it and to face him and the judge in court.

I think you need to realize that right now, if he does not get notified about this very very serious meeting, you could lose custody with-o him doing any filing at all. I seriously doubt the courts would just remove one child or that it would be possible to get them back in the near future, if at all. Not only will you not get child support, you also will have to PAY child support. The judge CAN remove the children based on this attendance issue. You kids could even end up in foster care esp if you give the impression that their dad isn't interested. Not wth Gma, foster care. Where MANY children are abused in every way. Would that be preferable to facing up to your ex with all you have hidden?

I can honestly tell you that if my niece was treated this way by her mother, we would ALL be pushing for a change in custody, not just my gfgbro. And I would support him, even with all the things that have gone between us. Because he would (and does) get his daughter to school every day, and do all he can to be a good dad. My exsil doesn't like what he does, but he doesn't liek what she does either. in my opinion you are handing your ex full custody and child support on a platter by not including him. Yet if you notify him (and can prove that you did) and he doesn't show up, it is one more mark to your benefit. Espw ith as serious as this is, not showing up would tell the court a LOT, but not being told tells them just as much about YOU. And it says worse about YOU.

To be frank, given your DUI and other recent problems, you need to do all you can to please the court. Right now things don't look very good from the outside and a big part is that you have kept ex in the dark. If he truly ignores thing or won't show up, then you have NOTHING to lose by notifying him, and everything to gain.

I hope your therapist can help you see this from the court's and school's and DA's point of view.

 

[Californiablonde]

Just texted him. Now you can't say I didn't tell him.

 

[InsaneCdn]

Way to go.
He can't blame you for short notice, either.

 

[Marcie Mac]

Ca laws are really strict when it comes to missing school
As of the new year, California parents face prosecution, fines up to $2,000, and even jail time if they don’t make sure their kids attend school regularly. The new state law took effect on January 1 and was signed into law last September by former Gov Arnold Schwarzenegger.
It’s a strict law, which holds three designations for kids who chronically miss school. A truant is any student who is 30 or more minutes late to class on more than three school days, a chronic truant any student who misses more than 10 percent of school days without a valid excuse. A habitual truant is a truant who continues to miss class even after school officials attempt to reach out to the student. Parents of kids who are chronically truant can be found guilty of a misdemeanor and face a series of fines and punishments, starting with a $100 fine for the first conviction and ending with a year of incarceration and up to $2000 for parents of chronic truants.
It would potentially affect many parents in California, where the truancy rate is 24 percent, according to Californai’s Department of Education. Prior to the new state law, parents could be cited and fined but never faced jail time. The apparent goal is to threaten parents with prosecution so they go after their kids to make sure they’re in school. The initiative’s champion, California’s new attorney general, Kamala Harris, tested the law out in San Francisco and said that it was responsible for cutting truancy rates in the city by 32 percent.
Harris addressed the issue in her inaugural speech yesterday:

We know chronic truancy leads to dropping out, which dramatically increases the odds that a young person will become either a perpetrator or a victim of crime. Folks, it is time to get serious about the problem of chronic truancy in California. Last year we had 600,000 truant students in our elementary schools alone, which roughly matches the number of inmates in our state prisons. Is it a coincidence? Of course not.
And as unacceptable as this problem is - I know we can fix it. In San Francisco, we threatened the parents of truants with prosecution, and truancy dropped 32 percent. So, we are putting parents on notice. If you fail in your responsibility to your kids, we are going to work to make sure you face the full force and consequences of the law.
This work to combat truancy is part of the broader oath that I swore today and the oath upheld every day by the men and women of the the Attorney General’s office.

One of my friends had the school threaten him with jail time as his kids were always late to school - not their fault as they are easy child's, but his wife who couldn't be bothered getting them up and out on time, or just didn't bother sending them at all. I can't believe your school district doesn't send someone over to your house if you call them and tell them you are having a problem getting her up. I have so been there done that with mine, and started nagging and yelling a whole two hours before he had to get up and go, or dousing him with water, or just dragging his sorry behind out of bed.

Good luck with your meeting tomorrow

Marcie
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[Bunny]

I think you did the right thing by telling your X about the meeting. This is something that he needs to know about.

I know this is something that you don't want to hear, but maybe difficult child needs to live with her dad for a while. First of all, I don't think he really wants her to live with him, anyway. He knows is a button to push for you and he uses it any time he wants to upset you or get a rise out of you. His wife doens't like your kids and he wouls probably rather have a happy new wife to live with than a difficult child. It would give him a chance to see what living full time with her at this time in her life is really like. Maybe she will behave well at first, but after a while she'll get comfortable and will go back to her difficult child ways and then he will see it for himself. It's not as easy as he seems to think that it is.

Good luck at the meeting today. Let us know how it goes. Will you X go?

 

[garrison]

In Michigan support wouldn't end. Even if you have 50/50 parenting time (or one parent has one child and the other parent has the other child). If your ex makes more money than you He would still have to pay. Check into that where you are.
I don't know you, but from what I read, I think maybe it would be a good idea for dad to step up and take difficult child for a year. If you cant control her (not your fault. We all "get" this), maybe he can. It seems like maybe you are doing her a disservice by not trying this. If it really sucks for difficult child then you can use it later. (Knock it off or I'm sending you to dads! LOL) It will also give your ex a big wake up call. Which would be good for you, and good for difficult child. She would then have 2 parents on the same page. That sounds a lot better than what she has now.
About him threatening you to take the kids, it's all talk. He has you scared and is being a bully. I say call his bluff. (another benifit of difficult child living with him for a while.) Next time he says you aren't parenting difficult child right, tell him "you've got the talking part done. Lets see you do better." If he does do better then it's great for difficult child and that is the goal. If he doesn't, you get to remind him of it when he's being a jerk.
BUT, make sure there is a time limit on it so difficult child doesn't think she has control. This would also force the ex to stick it out even when things got bad.
I wish you the best. This is such a hard thing to deal with. (())

 

[buddy]

Good for you, and the issues with him are scary but you really have your back against a wall, no good would come out of not telling him. I am sure that is very scary though.

Where are you with getting an educational advocate? This is an emergency and it does tie into her special services. Your mom is NOT an advocate and does not know all of the laws, she has not been effective to this point so it is really important to get someone with an organization (law firm or educational advocacy etc) to back them up. Private support is just not the same, doesn't carry the weight you need for your difficult child.

Call the disability law center for your state and talk to the educational advocates if they have a separate dept for that. (we do in our state)... the emphasis here needs to be on meeting her educational needs and this setting has never seemed appropriate to you so that could be a huge first step along with adding special education transportation which would mean she could have door to door bussing, not going to a general bus stop...the bus would show up and she would need to get on)....

Just a thought.

 

[greenrene]

Chiming in - please let us know how it went, been thinking of you today...

 

[Californiablonde]

Thanks I will let you know tomorrow how it went. So far I've managed to remain calm throughout the day. I'm sure as it gets later and later my anxiety will start to rise. Hopefully not too much.

 

[DDD]

Fingers crossed that the outcome is positive for difficult child and for you. DDD

 

[Californiablonde]

Okay now I'm starting to freak out. My mom called the school psychiatric to talk to her about today's meeting. There will be no representatives from the school there. It is now completely out of the school's hands. DA has taken over and that's the way it's going to stay. And we are going to be required to have doctor's notes to clear her absences till she graduates! I think that's BS. If she cleans up her act I think they should give her another chance by next year. But nope, she ruined it. It's till she graduates so it's going to be three and a half years of hell. I am getting more anxious by the minute!

 

[InsaneCdn]

No it isn't. You're over-reacting.
Doctors notes to cover absenses?
Sure... and milk that one for all it is worth.
Get the doctors on-side to push the point that the current placement is detrimental to her mental health... and they can give you a letter that excuses ALL absenses until they come up with a better placement, as agreed to by you and the doctor.