Next came a wave of affidavits where she, her parents, and other family of hers, made untruthful statements about me doing everything wrong and her doing everything right. I have no idea whether they laughed harder when they wrote them or I did when I read them. But this, and similarly untruthful testimony, was to be the basis of what the court used to make decisions. One of her affidavits actually "proved" that I was no good because, she said, I had accused her of lying to me about the paternity of our youngest child.

Soon afterwards, I got a call from my attorney stating that she was claiming I was not the biological father of the child who had been the basis of our marriage. This was five months into the divorce, and after she claimed under oath (again) that the child was mine. She had already told the child. To my dismay, a paternity test revealed that she was not lying about this. Shockingly, I learned that this worked to her great advantage in the custody dispute, which is obviously why she revealed the information. I began to worry that I would never see my daughter (yes, I still call her that) again. I was relieved when I found out that as long as I paid the child support, I could continue to see the child and be her father. Although it seemed like ransom money, I loved my daughter too much to let her go, and be without my badly needed influence.

She testified under oath, twice, that her and the biological father discussed the situation, and decided that since I had more money, they would have me think I was the father. Doesn't that make it a "conspiracy to commit fraud", on top of the fraud itself? Not in America, it's rewarded, at the victim's expense.

Of course none of this, nor testimony from unbiased witnesses against her, was adequate to prove her an unfit mother. The custody evaluator used bogus and misinterpreted information to justify her recommendation that the mother should have custody, despite having knowledge that she and her family were lying. This, to my knowledge, leaves a father (but not a mother) essentially no chance of gaining custody.

She was rewarded with custody, over $100,000.00 in settlement, over $1,000.00 per month in child support, and $500.00 per month in alimony. Despite my approaching $30,000.00 in legal fees of my own, I was also ordered to pay over forty percent of her attorney fees. I was ordered to drive roughly 22 hours per month to see the children, while she was to drive 6 hours per month. This is despite the fact that I work full time, she does not work, and she is essentially retired by my past and future income. I was also ordered to provide health insurance and pay 90% of the uncovered medical expenses. Instead of retiring at age 50, as we had planned, I will work until I die, and be penniless long beforehand.