Should a woman give up custody of her child?

[fatfrog543]

We lived through this personally. The mother had two other kids already when she had her youngest, he was 4 at the time of our custody battle.

It all started when the mom finally got a job but it was as a waitress so she sent her youngest to live with my husband (the dad) and me every weekend, which is when she could make the most money. Then it turned into Thursday-Monday. Then it turned into Thursday-Tuesday. On her days off she spent them shopping and catching up with friends, and ultimetly the children suffered. She sent her middle child to live with his dad, and kept the only girl at the house, she was 11 and mostly took care of herself.

This went on for several months, and all the while we payed her child support. One of her days we begged her to take him to the doctor, his cold was getting so much worse! She refused to take him, she said it was just a cold and he was doing fine on the Nyquil (yes she gave the 4 year old Nyquil). She refused to give us the insurance information so we could take him, finally we paid $200 out of pocket to the doctor and CVS. It turned out that he did have walking pnemonia and pink eye both of which you need real medicine for.

She seemed to need someone to watch her other 2 kids more and more, which we did for a bit, a few times it turned into over night, but some days we had plans and couldn't she got really upset and told us we couldn't see the 4 year old if we didn't take the other 2....I call that blackmail. I urged my husband to seek custody.

When school started she had moved 2 times in 6 months and wasn't set up for the bus route and had to drive the 3 kids to school....in one school year her kids were late over 150 times each!!!

By the time we got to court and we had proof that she didn't make her son's health or school a priority, and we had a bunch of other instances where she put herself first and not the child...well, we didn't even have to go in front of the judge, she gave up custody.

It was obvious that our household is where this child was going to be treated like the wonderful little person he is, and made a top priority in our lives, as children should be. We tried to be as nice as possible and recomended she have every other week in the summer, not just 2 weeks, and gave her extended vacation time. But everyone involved knew that while she loved her little boy in her own way, the best thing for him was to let him go. She didn't even realize how bad of a mom she was being, not having had a good mom herself. she thought she was doing okay, but having it all broken down for her on how she has failed this child.....she simply gave up.

So, should a woman give up custody of her child.....if that is what the child needs in order to have a better life, a more fulfilling life, a life where he feels special and wanted..... then YES she should give up her child in a heartbeat.