Currently I am seeking to have custody of my daughter Mon-Thu and my wife Fri-Sun. Whether my wife agrees to this or not is another matter. I proposed the idea and my wife seems to resist. I hope we don’t have to fight in court over this. Right now my wife has my daughter and I miss my her terribly. I miss the moment when my wife drives her home and I go out and pick her up from the car seat and she would smiles at me.
My job, my family and my friends and basically my hometown is a little more than an hour away where my house is right now. I have been driving this far to work for a few years and my desire is to move back here to be closer to my family, job and perhaps getting away from my wife. If I live in my hometown, I get out of work at 4:00 and have a lot of time with my baby. I can take her to swimming lessons and other fun activities.
I have another option that I am thinking about. If I win main custody, I can buy my wife out of the house and stay close to her and her family. I would drop my daughter off at grandma’s house in the morning [or school when she is older]. My wife would stop by her mom house to be with her for about two hours before I pick her up for the day. My wife then can have her for the weekend. This way she will see both of us on most days.
Do you have any suggestion? I realize that it will be up to me but I am so confused. I really want to live close to my family and support system. My fear is that by staying too close to my wife I may come back to her. Also, with living too far from work and driving 2.5 hours a day. I don’t have much time to spend with my daughter anyway.
I told my wife that if our daughter stays with me on Monday to Thursday in my hometown. I will set up cameras on our big screen TVs so she and my daughter can have face time on those days. I think this will help all of us and hopefully reduce my wife’s resistant to letting me have my daughter from Mon – Thu. I have found a wonderful and inexpensive church based preschool program for kids 2 to 6 for my daughter. Hopefully I can enroll her here. We are buddhist but I am open to the idea of my daughter being exposed to the church’s teachings.
http://www.stwilfridschurch.org/#/preschool/our-program
many thanks for your advice.