u/Hungry-Exam-3437

My fiancé has a 3 year old daughter. He has 50/50 custody of her and has for some time now. There is currently no court ordered agreement. He made a parenting plan back in March and tried to get his daughter’s mom to look at it so that they could work out exactly what they wanted to do and then file it. She would never give feedback to it and would just say she “doesn’t agree to it”. We finally decided that he would just file a motion independently this week and it would have to be worked out from there. He hasn’t mentioned this to her yet because of the drama it will cause. In strange timing she just told him that she would be moving in with her boyfriend on July 1st. The only issue we have with this is that they are moving to the next county over. The house is only about 25 minutes away, but the school in that county is about 50 minutes to an hour away depending on traffic. The child’s mom has just assumed that she will go to school in the school district that she is moving to and we are just going to have to figure out the driving or take less time with her. Obviously we don’t want this to happen especially because he has had 50/50 custody and it’s been working fine. The parenting plan he is about to file has a relocation clause that states that if either parent moves out of the county or state, the non-relocating parent will not lose parenting time and that the child must attend school in the original school district. I know this is standard but we are just afraid that it won’t be approved because obviously her mom isn’t going to agree to this. What are the chances that the judge will agree to this clause?

My fiancé has a 3 year old daughter. He has 50/50 custody of her and has for some time now. There is currently no court ordered agreement. He made a parenting plan back in March and tried to get his daughter’s mom to look at it so that they could work out exactly what they wanted to do and then file it. She would never give feedback to it and would just say she “doesn’t agree to it”. We finally decided that he would just file a motion independently this week and it would have to be worked out from there. He hasn’t mentioned this to her yet because of the drama it will cause. In strange timing she just told him that she would be moving in with her boyfriend on July 1st. The only issue we have with this is that they are moving to the next county over. The house is only about 25 minutes away, but the school in that county is about 50 minutes to an hour away depending on traffic. The child’s mom has just assumed that she will go to school in the school district that she is moving to and we are just going to have to figure out the driving or take less time with her. Obviously we don’t want this to happen especially because he has had 50/50 custody and it’s been working fine. The parenting plan he is about to file has a relocation clause that states that if either parent moves out of the county or state, the non-relocating parent will not loose parenting time and that the child must attend school in the original school district. I know this is standard but we are just afraid that it won’t be approved because obviously her mom isn’t going to agree to this. What are the chances that the judge will agree to this clause?

I’m 21 and finishing nursing school. My fiancé is 32 and has a 3 year old daughter. Before anyone says it: we are not breaking up, so please don’t suggest that. We are happy together and I’m genuinely just looking for outside perspectives from people who may have been in similar situations.

We are planning to get married and actively trying for a baby together. The issue is that neither of us wants to stay where we currently live forever. It’s a very small area with limited opportunities, especially career-wise. We’ve talked many times about moving after I finish school, but every place we’re interested in would require moving out of state.

The obvious complication is his daughter. He currently has 50/50 custody and he would never willingly give that up. He’s even said before that if we moved, he’d want to try to bring her with us. But realistically, I don’t see how that would happen without hurting her relationship with her mom and siblings, and neither of us wants that. There’s already a very high-conflict coparenting situation, but regardless of how the adults feel about each other, we would never want to do something harmful to her.

At the same time, I can’t ignore the fact that I sometimes feel stuck. None of my immediate family lives here, and his family doesn’t either. I sometimes feel like my entire future is being decided by circumstances that existed long before I came into the picture. I’ve talked to him about this before, and he’s told me not to limit myself because of decisions he made before we met, and that if I wanted to move, he would “figure it out.” But I could never ask him to move away from his daughter, and I also don’t realistically see a situation where taking her with us would happen.

I guess I’m asking: has anyone actually navigated this successfully? How do you balance building your own future while also respecting the reality of a child and custody situation? Is there a compromise here that I’m not seeing?