u/Gullible_Rich_7156

Saw the Dave Matthews Tribute Band at a small outdoor venue (town park near Philly area) with my GF, brother (Xennials) and sister in law (Millennial)-parking was located in an adjacent field which we scoped out on Google Maps ahead of time. We arrived, brought a small folding table, camp chairs, Bluetooth speaker, cooler, and a bunch of snacks. Sat around listening to Dave, having drinks and enjoying good food for about an hour and a half before heading inside. 25+ years ago we would arrive at Giants Stadium/Camden Waterfront/PNC Arts Center no later than 12:00 Noon and bring grills, lawn games, kegs, etc…obviously this was toned down quite a bit but we were literally the only ones tailgating-we seemed to also be getting confused looks from people just parking and walking in…LOL One other couple sat on the tailgate of their truck and had a drink. We had a blast at the show and all remarked that we were proud of ourselves for doing it up right.

Divorced parent of three children here. We have joint legal custody and a very high-conflict co-parenting situation. I previously asked the family court to create a mechanism for the kids to receive therapy when one parent withholds consent. The request was denied without prejudice pending mediation. Mediation later failed and there was still no agreement.

Since then, my concerns have increased. My oldest (14) has become heavily involved in parental disputes and recently described feeling that when I refuse her mother’s demands, she suffers the consequences. She has also expressed feeling responsible for her younger siblings and has become increasingly distressed and hostile around the two-household dynamic.

My youngest has had behavioral/social-regulation concerns raised at school. Both her mother and I have previously discussed those concerns in the past but she then filed a motion, alleging an MSA violation because I contacted the school inquiring about possible behavioral plans. Most recently the my ex told me that the child’s doctor had suggested possible play therapy if the issues continued-we’re still waiting on the final order regarding her motion, but thus far the judge has indicated that he is not entertaining her accusations.

The middle child is outwardly doing well, but is living in the same high-conflict environment and tends not to openly express difficult feelings.
I’m not seeking a custody change, sanctions, or a therapist to “take my side.” What I want is for all three children to have an initial evaluation with a neutral licensed mental-health professional, with ongoing therapy only if clinically recommended.

For anyone who has dealt with this in family court: Were you successful in getting therapy/evaluations ordered over the other parent’s objection? What evidence seemed to matter most to the judge? Did the court order an evaluation first, ongoing therapy, or some kind of neutral provider-selection process?

I’d especially appreciate experiences from parents in joint-legal-custody situations where the real obstacle was simply that the parents could not agree.

We’re seeing the Dave Matthews Tribute band with a Phish tribute band opener for an outdoor show. Just curious about the venue-tailgating friendly, etc…? We’re staying at the Inn at Villanova afterward because we live about an hour and a half away.

I’ve seen these guys a few times but never for an outdoor show. The height of my DMB fandom was about 1995-2005 (high school/college). Growing up in NJ these were the concerts that I experienced every summer at Giants Stadium, MSG, the Camden Waterfront and Garden State/PNC Bank Arts Center-tailgating all day before the show, etc…looking forward to the Phish cover band opener too.

I’ve been looking to do a 36 x 26 (I’m a little tight on space otherwise I’d go 40 x 30) with three 9 x 8 doors on the long wall and a man door on one of the gable end walls. Nothing crazy. The proposed site is a gravel parking area with an old 16 x 32 barn next to it. The barn will be demoed and the old timbers will be salvaged and reused/sold. It has a rubble stone foundation and crude concrete slab-basically just cement with aggregate poured 2-3” thick. After demo of the wood structure I’ll use the old foundation material as fill and then bring in crushed concrete for final compaction and leveling.

The old barn had a new 60A service and an inlet plug for a portable generator run to it about five years ago when I did the electric for my hot tub as it’s not far away. I’ll just pull out the panel and set it aside and have the electric stubbed up in the appropriate place for the new building. From there I’m hoping to just have a steel building company come in and do the slab/put up a relatively simple shell that I can slowly customize inside at my own pace. I’m not opposed to subbing out the slab myself to a local contractor either but my FB is crammed with companies who do concrete as well.

We’re famous! Now maybe when asked where I live and I say “Bethlehem” people won’t then ask “Pennsylvania?” On second thought, probably not. However this does explain why when I talked to other people around the state yesterday they all seemed to think it was a pretty ho-hum summer thunderstorm. Our lane is washed out in a few places, we got a few inches of water in the basement, but on the bright side our pond, which had been down about a foot, is now full.

Right now my GF is a therapist/behaviorist who provides behavioral services to children primarily on the Autism spectrum but to neurotypical children as well. She does direct instruction and also has therapists who work for her as 1099 contractors. She has always worked with families who pay privately but wants to branch out into taking insurance as well.

She has already begun getting all of the paperwork started with authorizations, etc…but her primary worry is the potential lag of insurance company payments while she is left needing to pay the therapists out weekly. She needs some kind of bridge loan or short term financing to close the gap until she’s capitalized enough to absorb the delay in payments. She is going to continue with her private pay clients as well which will help.

She has built an extensive client base over the last 20 years and been very successful but has never borrowed a dime and is completely unfamiliar with business lending. I would imagine however that once she has contracts in hand from the insurance company that say X student is approved for Y hours per week at Z per hour that she could use that in the application process? I’ve been a W2 employee my entire career so I’m just spitballing trying to help her.

I’m looking for practical advice from people who have actually been through this.

Brief background:

My ex filed a post-judgment motion seeking various custody and parenting modifications and also sought counsel fees against me. I filed a cross-motion seeking clearer boundaries and communication rules because the ambiguity in our MSA has been the source of constant conflict.
The judge denied most of both parties’ requested relief without prejudice, ordered mediation, and indicated we were free to work things out ourselves. Mediation completely failed. My ex presented herself as the flexible parent while portraying me as rigid. I argued that the real problem isn’t flexibility—it’s that she routinely makes unilateral decisions affecting my parenting time, communicates through the children, and the MSA leaves too many gray areas.

We’re now heading to a case management conference. Based on conversations with my attorney, I expect the likely outcome to be that the judge essentially leaves the existing order in place, awards no counsel fees, and everyone walks away having spent enormous amounts of time and money with nothing meaningfully resolved. My concern is that this experience won’t discourage future litigation. If anything, I worry it simply becomes the cost of doing business. That brings me to my real question. I’m seriously considering representing myself the next time this happens.

To be clear, I’m not saying people should start out pro se. If I had unlimited resources, I’d continue retaining counsel. The problem is that I don’t.
I simply cannot sustain repeated post-judgment motions every year or two while paying an attorney each time. At some point I’d be liquidating investments, delaying retirement, and lowering the quality of life I’ve built for myself and my children simply to finance ongoing litigation.
To add to the frustration, I already paid my ex over $110,000 in cash as part of our divorce settlement, and I’m currently paying $1,250 per month in alimony, which in a very real sense also helps fund her ability to retain counsel against me.

So my questions are:

If you eventually went pro se after initially retaining counsel, what pushed you to make that decision?

What were the biggest mistakes you made?

What would you have done differently to prepare?

Did representing yourself actually reduce the financial pressure, or did it simply create different problems?

Are there things I should be doing now while I still have counsel that will make future self-representation more realistic?

I’m interested in hearing from people who have actually lived this, not just general opinions about whether lawyers are worthwhile. My issue isn’t whether attorneys provide value—it’s that repeated litigation simply isn’t financially sustainable forever.

I’m building a motorized beach/surf fishing wagon from a Razor 24V electric quad and I’d like to ditch the heavy, slow charging, short life lead acid battery for an 8ah Kobalt battery. I already have a ton of Kobalt tools and I often bring my inflator, lights, and Bluetooth radio to the beach as well. I found a $20 adapter online that has 12 gauge leads so it will be easy to splice into the Razor wiring harness, but bouncing things off of ChatGPT, it advised me to check if there was a “high current pin” that I’d need to access in order to utilize the full power of the battery. Just curious if others have run into this.