Daddy Nobucks: When Involuntary Fathers Are Forced to Foot The Bill
14 years ago my wife of a year and a half died of a congenital heart condition. Needless to say I was distraught and an emotional mess for a bit. A few months after that happened I got a call from an “old girlfriend”. I confided to her the recent tragedy. LSS after several long phone conversations I went to her city to spend a weekend. Looking for some affection and familiarity I ended up in bed with her. In the midst of the deal I managed to gasp “is it safe?” to which she replied yes “I’m on the pill”. The relationship didn’t last more than a few weeks. I met my wife of 13 happy years shortly after that relationship ended. You guessed it, I got the call from old girlfriend 3 months later. Having no intention of marrying her nor ever indicating such I asked her if she wanted to have the child anyway and put it up for adoption. Clearly this was not her plan. So I’ve been paying child support for 13 years now. It’s as much as the mortgage on our house. But I was stupid and weak and I look at the monthly support payments as a reminder of the cost of actions based on emotion and thoughtlessness. My wife and I live in a smaller house than we could afford without the CS payments but other than that I have no emotional scars and the “mistake” only costs me money. The other individual has to live daily with her actions.
I failed to note that it came out during the paternity action that she had planned my visit to coencide with her ovulation and intended all along to get pregnant. I was one of several “targets” she had had sex with over a one week period of time.
Bottom line, I’m a lawyer and know full well the lack of justice in the laws and our legal system. I’m sure that the child support statutes could be different and more fair. I know through experience the current laws award a windfall to the unscupulous in the name of the children. But I don’t know how you would fix that without damaging the truley deserving or needy. Was I pissed off at the idea of paying out $180,000 to a whore? You bet. But I made my bed and I’ll teach my kids to be smarter.
