High conflict child custody disputes show their ugly faces all to often in my world. Seldom does a day go by that our office phones or email accounts are at peace. Men and women, fathers and mothers, grandparents, lovers, and others overwhelmed with horrific emotional pain and unnecessary legal debacles reach out for help thousands of miles away or from just down the street. A last resort. Lost. Confused. Sometimes suicidal. Stretched to limits no human should endure. Many, returning veterans. Veterans who offered life and limb to protect the United States of America, their home, and our legislative, legal, and social systems that would in turn, without mercy, absent compassion, often devoid or reason, and infected with irrational obfuscations, deny them the love of their children and their children the love of their parents, most often a loving father. Amongst this obtuse system of family destruction comes sometimes something sane, like the heart felt and incredibly well reasoned plea below by one sane Dani P. Were she here I would warmly hug her near breathless. How is it that the “System” we entrust to help us through tough times; to protect our children, and keep us safe does just the opposite? Is it really all about the money? All about radical feminist ideology and the disenfranchisement of man? Really? Or, is it just human nature? Or, more succinctly, nature versus nurture. Sanity versus insanity. No matter. We need more Dani P.’s and less “System”. Thank you Dani P. For those of you interested in the full context of my comment see the discussion at http://ncfm.org/2012/07/news/child-custody/u-s-combat-vet-attacked-by-anti-family-judge/#comment-62911

Harry Crouch

President

So after much thought – and reading all these hateful things I finally want to say something.

Just to say who I am before I am attacked and accused of being someone I am not; I am not hiding my identity, I don’t care who knows who I am. My name is Danielle and I have been dating Casey for over a year now. However I am not biased against Nikki, and I refuse to say anything ugly or hateful because it’s not my place and that’s not what I am here for. Before you all assume that Casey has left out his past, he has not he has been upfront and honest with all that has happened, but I am not one to judge either of them.

Bringing both Nikki & Casey’s mistakes to light will not make anything better for the girls. I truly believe that Nikki is a wonderful mother, but I also KNOW that Casey is an amazing father. I have seen him with them. He glows when he is with his daughters like I have never seen, and I have been there the last two times he has seen them in September 2011 and March 2012. Yes, that is the last time he saw them, 7 months ago. He sets a great example to his girls, and his son, whom he has 50% custody with. Nikki and Casey may have had a bad past, bad relationship, fights, and arguments but I know from spending enough time with them that he refuses to allow his son Preston to see any anything that might slightly be considered fighting or arguing. He will NOT subject him to that.

However Nikki and Casey are different people NOW than they were when they were together. But that’s not what this is about; this is about Kapri and Kennedi! To say that a child is better off without their father is just down right disgusting. I would never keep my children from their father no matter how angry I was. When you take away 2 of the 3 things Casey lives for, being his children Preston, Kapri and Kennedi, EXPECT a fight! He wanted nothing more to make that relationship work, and it didn’t. Have any of you all had Casey call you at 3am in tears because he misses his daughters and he can’t sleep, time and time again. This awful man that you all are bashing does have a heart. He would have given the world to Nikki and loved her deeply, a love so deep one day I might have. He wanted nothing more than to be a family and show his girls an example of love – but it didn’t work out that way- regardless of whose “fault”, No finger pointing, we are not in high school. It takes two to make a relationship work and both of them weren’t able to- bottom line.

It also takes two to be parents; parents meaning a MOTHER and FATHER. To make things worse, he not only lost hope of a family with Nikki, and his daughters, he lost contact with his daughters entirely. And if any of you for a moment would not fight like a pit bull and make all attempts to fight to get them- you are lying. So maybe his approach isn’t the best? It’s not our place to decide, but I also know that Nikki’s approach, by not allowing any communication doesn’t help either.

All we see is Casey on here responding and defending himself tooth and nail, while Nikki sits back with her daughters at the end of every day and tucks them into bed. She has her daughters, why should she fight? He doesn’t even have the opportunity to tell him he loves them or see their beautiful faces, so he is going to battle until he gets to have some sort of relationship with them at all. However it doesn’t have to be that way.

Casey and Nikki have both been through traumatic experiences which have created this obvious trust issues. Of course they are having a difficult time coming together for the children, I am confident there is a lot of hurt, anger, and hate. All outside opinions and influences don’t help! Nikki and Casey need to come together in mediation and just figure all this out. Don’t tell me this isn’t possible because this is what it resorted to when I went through the same custody situation.

Not only will there be no outside influences the mediator is not for or against either side. They are merely there to help two people who can’t communicate come to a reasonable agreement. They don’t even have to be in the same room, not only is this smart, financially it cost way less than paying thousands of dollars to lawyers and court fees. All this money that could be going to the children. We know that Nikki has legal aide/assistance so money is not an issue for her, but this money could be going towards the children that is wasted on countless hours of court fees, and lawyer fees. It could be going to the flights, hotel, car rental, and visits with Casey’s daughters in Michigan.

As far as the “support” goes financially, I bet it is hard to go off x amount of dollars a month…I am quite certain that child support alone is not enough support for Nikki to survive and support two children, but that’s not what it meant for, it is support, not an income, and it does not replace having to work. Casey no longer has to support Nikki as a stay at home mom.

I am a mother who did not ask for child support, and agreed to 50/50 custody. This made me work harder to get on my feet knowing there was no safety net beneath me. It also is because both of us are just as deserving of our children as the other, and it’s not fair to take that away from their father. A judge told me to quit going to college, get a job, find a home and figure it out. Mind you this was after my ex-husband had taken every source of money I had away from me, and I started with NOTHING. I found a job, moved out within 45 days and graduated college months later. All while juggling school, kids, and a part time job. It is possible.

We mothers cannot play the victim in failed relationships. All of these people on here are making her look like a victim and Casey the bad guy. Neither one of them are victims or the bad guy. I wanted nothing more than to stay at home and take care of my children but that was not an option. We mothers/fathers have the ability to make something of ourselves regardless of our past and we have the ability to show our children that we are mature enough to put our differences with our children’s fathers/mothers, and let them have a relationship with them. It is NOT easy to do, but it is crucial for the children, for the mother and father to communicate. Kids thrive off seeing their parents communicate.

People change and people learn, we all do. Who are you people on here commenting to say that someone can’t? It is not up to you to decide and dictate what kind of person Casey and Nikki are. That’s Gods job.

All of you on here should be praying to God and lifting all the parties involved (Casey, Nikki, Kapri, Kennedi and Preston the brother who NEVER gets to see his sisters) and everyone else that is affected. This situation affects more than just the children.

Let’s get our focus off what “he said” or “she said” and just PRAY. Pray that two young, hurt, scared, confused parents can come together and co-parent with their children best interest at heart. We all know that Casey and Nikki both have the kids best interest at heart but we all need to pray that God can translate this with their actions.

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Child custody and the sound of reason.

Child custody and the sound of reason.

Child custody and the sound of reason.

Can you hear it!

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