'My ex went to prison and now my toxic ex-MIL is suing me for grandparent visitation.' UPDATED

"X-MIL requesting a crazy amount of grandparent visitation... How to move forward?"

My ex-MIL has taken me to court for grandparent visitation. Background: my ex was incarcerated in October and since then I have allowed visitation (around 1-2x/month), included his side of the family in their school activities/extracurriculars, and sent pictures/updates.

I also set boundaries at this time (no involving children in his case or discussing his case with them, no taking them to prison, etc). Grandma decided to break some of those boundaries so I started to limit when/where she could visit.

Anyways ... all that wasn't good enough, so grandma requested every other weekend (dads schedule), holidays, vacation time, and daily phone calls. We went to court and the judge pretty much said it's not grandmas job to step into dad's shoes, and it looks like mom (me) was already allowing visitation so they're going to have an uphill battle in her courtroom.

Judge requested we go to mediation then we would return to court later this year. Now their attorney has sent me a letter asking for grandma to have every Sunday from 9-5.

I don't agree with any weekend visitation time because she is trying to take the kids to visit dad in prison and I am concerned about her communication with the kids (talking bad about me, asking them to "delete messages don't show your mom", putting them in the middle of conflict) - my oldest told me they no longer answer her calls because they are tired of grandma putting them in the middle of this.

I was previously offering visits during the week (dinner dates, go to the mall, etc) but she was declining my offers. At this point, I don't feel comfortable offering ANY visits until there is a court order / stipulations around communication, prison visitation, etc. BUT... do I need to respond to their attorney?

Also, my plan is to try and be fair here but also protect my children: offer limited monthly visitation (1-2 dinner dates/month no overnights + some holiday time), offer to update them on events/extend invite to school activities, put boundaries around communication, no prison visits, no putting children in middle of conflict...

Also I would like to keep my parental decision making rights that if grandma or her family continue to break these stipulations then I can cease at anytime without filing a modification. Does this seem fair, considering the circumstances? I can't find any information on what a grandparent visitation schedule would look like.

Or do I ask the judge to throw this out completely because I was previously offering visits and grandma is clearly a toxic nutcase? Thank you for reading and any advice.

RELEVANT COMMENTS:

gingerdaisy03: Keep offering the weekday visits. Offer dinner dates with you and the kids, park visits ect. Save all text offers/declinings of visits. Then you can say "over x time I offered x amount of visit opportunities doing x activities which she declined" it will go a long way.

Have your kids screenshot all those messages and send them to you, add a passcode to their phone so gma cant delete them. If gma says nasty things, have your daughter write it down.. IN HER OWN WORDS.

They may or may not consider it but if you present it in the Parental Alienation light, they probably will. You can also probably contact the prison and state that if she arrives for a visit with the children she is to be denied as she did not get permission to bring the children from their legal guardian and your children are not to be allowed entry into the facility.

OP: Yes, I've saved everything and it was in my response to her RFO - I have screen shots of all the messages, just waiting on next court date to present it to judge. I feel like I'm currently in this weird time of being in between court dates and don't really know which direction to go in.

I don't want to seem that I am unwilling to offer any visitation, but at the same time I'm highly concerned with grandmas behavior and I don't want the court to say "well, you still allowed visits even with your concerns, too bad...". I do like the idea of a dinner date or park visit that might be a good compromise.

gingerdaisy03: Oh, all those visits will need to be surpervised. Use the texts as reasoning. "I allowed supervised visits only as she was discussing inappropriate subjects with my minor children. They dont need details of their fathers incarceration.

I also wanted to make sure she was no longer trying to alienate me as a parent by talking badly about me to my children or taking my kids places Ive specifically said they are not to be. All of which she has done before supply accumulated evidence Im trying to ensure she has a relationship with her grandkids but my priority is my childrens wellbeing.

Taking my children places Ive said not to, exposing my children to a prison, speaking ill of their parents and asking them to lie to their mother makes it very hard to trust her with my childrens safety and mental/emotional wellbeing" also get your kids into a therapist. If gmas screwing with them the therapist may be able to back you up if she hears the kids say directly they shes speaking badly, they're uncomfortable.

OP: I like this. Do I write this back to their atty so they can have visits before the next court date? "Hi, I received your letter requesting xyz, but I will only agree to abc due to lmnop"

Also, my kids are 10 & 15... maybe they can go to dinner like you suggested and I'll be in the next booth over or they can go the mall and I just follow them around (I will feel totally stalker-ish) - but I will provide transportation. Yes, kids have been in therapy since incarceration :)

crestedgeckovivi: I think you need to just ask your children if they would like to even visit with grandma? If they don't then simply offer supervised visits of your choice. (cause bring up that the children have mentioned grandma keep going against yours and the childrens wishs/ creating drama etc.).

That way you seem like you are being civil toward her but she is the one who doesn't seem to want to compromise and keeps breaking the boundaries.

OP: My kids and I have had open conversations about what they would like visitation to look like. They are both very much "well, we'd like to see our family sometimes but we don't want to go over there every other weekend, we don't want to go there for every holiday because we want to spend time with you and our other grandparents, and we are tired of them putting us in the middle of this"...

So now it's my job to navigate that and try to find a reasonable solution.That's why I was offering limited visitation, updates, and have always been civil with her.

voyracious: No one seems to have addressed the part where you seem resistant to following the judge's advice and try to work it out with the MIL, by which I mean respond to the attorney. Tell the attorney what you've written here - that you don't want her to take them to see their father (which is your right) so any unsupervised time on weekends is off the table.

Don't talk to ex-MIL, just negotiate through her attorney and see how it goes. I am a lawyer, but not yours, and the judge wants to see you being as reasonable as you have been. Don't give in, and just make a good faith offer. Dinner once a month and the occasional family holiday is probably sufficient for a grandma.

OP: Oh no, not resistant to judge's advice, which was "go to mediation and try to work it out with grandma" - I'm open to mediation and am hoping to come to a reasonable agreement on this so we don't need some long drawn out thing - but when the attorney sends me a letter and I am unrepresented, I just don't know what to do. Which is why I am here asking for advice :)

Definitely want to seem reasonable - I will see what I can work out with atty. Thank you!

Three months later, she shared this update:

We went to mediation and did not agree. Grandma went from asking for every other weekend to asking for every Sunday from 7am-7pm and says that if that's too early, she would pick up my kids Saturday so they would spend the night....Of course, I said absolutely not happening.

I received a letter from their attorney telling me to bring my children to court because the "mediator communicated to him that they could interview the children" - I ignored the request.

I submitted a supplemental declaration with exhibits about my concerns with grandmas behaviors - grandma submitted a response full on bashing me including false accusations. Honestly floored their attorney let that get sent out.

When we went back to court, the attorney came up to me in the hallway to "explain how court orders work" (lol) - told me that a standard order includes language about no derogatory comments about the other party (yes, I know...)

He asked for me to send the kids to grandmas for Thanksgiving - I said no, they saw them last year for Thanksgiving and even in custody orders between parents, one parent typically does not get every holiday every year. Then he threatened me with minors council and the judge would order my children to come to court. (Spoiler - she denied his request)

Anyways, the judge seemed very much on my side and did not agree with grandmas behavior. Agreed with my boundaries I set from the beginning and was pleased that one of them included for them to also not talk bad about the children's father.

Overall, I have been reasonable. Judge commented that she feels most of this could be resolved if the petitioner would have reasonable expectations and requests for visitation.

Well their attorney asks for an evidentiary hearing... Judge looked annoyed. But from what I understand, if you request it you pretty much get it unless the court can find good cause to deny the request. Phew, OK sorry - that's the update so far. I am prepping for an evidentiary hearing.