He is suing an unwed mother for custody of a child that he abandoned.

[wireknot]

Spoken by someone paying child support?

Where is the constructive advice here? It reads like judgment and condemnment.

Unfortunately, only time will tell what type of father this man will be, you certainly can't prevent him from making an effort to be one. As for your concerns about your grandchild's emotional development, you may have to put faith in professionals if your concerns are that great. And then there would be documentation. Take your cues from your grandchild but be careful not to read into anything. As hard as it is to deal with this situation, it is all too easy to read signs the way we want them to read. Continue to develop a strong relationship with your granddaughter, she needs love and support which in turn, develops into trust. She is young but as she grows older she will know who she can trust, based on the foundation you set now. It is hard to let go on those weekends, advise your daughter to stay strong and most importantly, stay consistent when her daughter returns home. Routine will become so important. Good luck.

ouch,,
,,,seems that we on the same road.

The child therapist gave us similar advice. He said that a small percentage of children react adversley to visitation without regard to attitiude of others.
Still puts a stake in my to hear her tell my wife that she does not love her on return from visitation.
My wife cares for her while my daughter is at work. They're buddys.

thank you for your kind words

 

[imwhchu]

Aaaand what about you, Speller? Where is your constructive legal advice? Just hugs and flowers and pop-psych?

Next!

Likewise, you know nothing of me. It was simply a question, my apologies if I struck a nerve. My apologies to you also Stealth2, I didn't realize this entire forum was strictly for those of you who had sound legal advice. I am on a similar road but I see now, support is not warranted. I will take my hugs and flowers and misspelled words elsewhere. Thanks for setting me straight.

Moving on...

 

[Silverplum]

Likewise, you know nothing of me. It was simply a question, my apologies if I struck a nerve. My apologies to you also Stealth2, I didn't realize this entire forum was strictly for those of you who had sound legal advice. I am on a similar road but I see now, support is not warranted. I will take my hugs and flowers and misspelled words elsewhere. Thanks for setting me straight.

Moving on...

Bye-bye now!

 

[stealth2]

I didn't realize this entire forum was strictly for those of you who had sound legal advice.

Uuuuhhh.... it's a LEGAL advice site, right? Not Oprah, or Dear Abby, or Dr Phil. Right? So it's pretty reasonable to assume that it's for LEGAL advice. Sound legal advice is certainly better than "pulled out of my rear" legal advice, wouldn't you say?

 

[Silverplum]

I don't think Dr. Phil likes passive-aggressives. Maybe The Cult Of Oprah would welcome him/her with open arms?

 

[nextwife]

I did not imply that the father should not have visitation.
Your slant on “his attempts of responsible fatherhood” is not correct. He refused the opportunity to sign an affidavit of paternity and called only to maintain a relation with my daughter; not establish one with his.

Excuse me, but after ALL the zillion posts here from men who were lied to aboout being the daddy, only to find out after years of paying CS that a DIFFERENT guy was dad, I'd consider any single guy who didn't wait for a paternity test BEFORE assuming paternity to be incredibly naive.

The woman can know 100% if the child is hers. If this were YOUR SON, not daughter who was involved, you might also have urged caution before assuming responsibility for what could be another man's child. HE CAN"T be as certain as she can that this is his child.

Stop dwelling upon a very rational decision to hold off on committing to paternity. That has nothing to do with NOW. It is good common sense to not accept paternity until proven the father. If you'd read all the many, many posts from men, and even woman, you'd likely understand why a man SHOULD wait before signing the BC. "Oh, well, I THOUGHT it was HIS child."

 

[wireknot]

Excuse me, but after ALL the zillion posts here from men who were lied to aboout being the daddy, only to find out after years of paying CS that a DIFFERENT guy was dad, I'd consider any single guy who didn't wait for a paternity test BEFORE assuming paternity to be incredibly naive.

The woman can know 100% if the child is hers. If this were YOUR SON, not daughter who was involved, you might also have urged caution before assuming responsibility for what could be another man's child. HE CAN"T be as certain as she can that this is his child.

Stop dwelling upon a very rational decision to hold off on committing to paternity. That has nothing to do with NOW. It is good common sense to not accept paternity until proven the father. If you'd read all the many, many posts from men, and even woman, you'd likely understand why a man SHOULD wait before signing the BC. "Oh, well, I THOUGHT it was HIS child."

Please don't take offense, but you are confused and a little off track.
First you inferred that he was trying to be a responsible father. Now you say that it is good common sense not to accept a father's responsibilities, but never asked if he denied being the father.
What is your advise and what does it have to do with the question in my original post?

 

[LdiJ]

Or maybe outgrowing the need for three hours in the middle of the day. I have to be honest - I would be somewhat concerned if my 3yo was sleeping 14 hours a day.

I have to say that its really very child specific. I was frustrated because my daughter's nanny put her down for naps (or rather encouraged her to nap with quiet time) and then I wouldn't be able to get her to sleep before 11 PM....however...sometimes if she didn't have a nap she would fall asleep during dinner and be out for the count.........She was three/four at the time.

I also have a few friends whose 3/4 year olds still needed a nap or they were horribly cranky (overtired) in the evenings.

I have other friends whose kids most definitely didn't need a nap anymore at 3/4.

As a result I don't think we can make judgements about the naps.

As far as the rest is concerned....yes, its highly likely that dad will get joint legal custody...and will get overnights sooner rather than later.

 

[Smarty Panties]

I don't know.. I have a toddler who turns 3 this month. She doesn't and hasn't taken naps during the day for quite some time. She refuses and she runs 90mph all day long. Once she goes to sleep at night she does sleep about 10 - 11 hours straight. I'd agree, you probably have to judge child by child but still...14 hours a day or a 3 hour nap seems excessive and worrisome for a kid that age.

 

[LdiJ]

I don't know.. I have a toddler who turns 3 this month. She doesn't and hasn't taken naps during the day for quite some time. She refuses and she runs 90mph all day long. Once she goes to sleep at night she does sleep about 10 - 11 hours straight. I'd agree, you probably have to judge child by child but still...14 hours a day or a 3 hour nap seems excessive and worrisome for a kid that age.

For your child it would be...but if you had experience with other children who honestly needed that much sleep it wouldn't seem unusual to you...just different from your own child.

I honestly don't find it worrisome...on the max end of the scale for how much sleep a child might need, but not worrisome.

I did know a child who slept even more than this one....it bothered the HECK out of me for the longest time...but she was one of the happiest and healthiest kids I ever knew....she just had a body clock that more or less shut down when it got dark outside....it was really wierd...in the winter she would fall asleep at 4 in the afternoon and sleep through the night until the sun came up the next day. In the summer...she would be up until 9 at night and wake up with the dawn...go figure.

When she got older she needed/wanted less sleep...but even today, as a teen, she STILL sleeps much longer in the winter time than in the summer time.

 

[haiku]

the length of time a kid sleeps and whether or not dad is in tune to that, and who really knows, should not be an issue barring dad from visitation. its definitely grasping at straws.

my kid sleeps 12 hours a day every day, for optimum "kid performance" I swear she has a precision clock, if she does not get it at night she will add it up in a nap during the day. shes 7 now, and has done it since she was born-she was a great baby, LOL not many sleepless nights for me.

 

[LdiJ]

the length of time a kid sleeps and whether or not dad is in tune to that, and who really knows, should not be an issue barring dad from visitation. its definitely grasping at straws.

my kid sleeps 12 hours a day every day, for optimum "kid performance" I swear she has a precision clock, if she does not get it at night she will add it up in a nap during the day. shes 7 now, and has done it since she was born-she was a great baby, LOL not many sleepless nights for me.

I agree that it has nothing to do with dad's visitation....I only jumped on that part of the discussion because it seemed to become what I thought was an unnecessary focus for criticism.

Just to "share"...when my daughter was born I breastfeed. For the first month of her life I had to feed her every two hours, without fail, 24 hours a day. I had to choose between sleeping, eating, or showering (or some combo) between each feeding...because each feeding took 1/2 an hour. Finally, in desperation I took her to the doctor....turns out my milk wasn't good and she wasn't getting proper nurishment....she had lost almost an ENTIRE pound. The doctor immediately had me feed her a bottle of formula in the office...she promptly went to sleep and slept for 13 hours! She was as exhausted as I was.

From that point on she slept 12 hours every night too....of course it took me more than a week to adjust to that...I kept waking up to check on her...LOL.