Chance meeting with my son

Saw my son, he''s only 5 with a member of his maternal family, and not with his mom in the street. I saw my son and instinctively waved and blew some kisses. He happily acknowledged back with a wave and smile. I couldn''t just keep walking along so I walked up to him to say hello. Unfortunately the family member swore at me and said that my contact order only met every other weekend and mid week tea time and that was not then so I had no right to speak to my son. This was in a public place with people around. I walked away feeling rather bad and my son looked shocked. Got a letter from ex''s solicitors saying keep away ! How does one deal with such situations? My son was not even with his mom at the time and surely I should be able to say hello to my son. I have more right, if it''s a question of rights! than my son''s family member as I''m his father with parental responsibilities. Heart breaking . . .

omg...I am afraid I can''t help on the legal side but I really really feel for you and your son...I cannot imagine that anybody could react in such horrible way....

You should take legal advice....I know the law can be/appear unfair but surely there are limits...

Take care

((()))
Cx

Oh thanks for your compassion - common sense tells me that I have every right to say hello to my son on the street when passing by. The reason why I let it go was if I stayed further there would have been further aggravation. My son would have suffered more. Because the family member cannot love my son as I do that is why he behaved in that way just to score a point that when I''m not with my son as per court order contact, then somehow he as a family member, given permission to take my son out by my son''s mother, would somehow have more rights than me! In fact the only right I should be talking about is the right my son has to greet me, say hello, on a chance meeting like this in a public place. I feel so depressed about this. How many times can one just keep running to legal services and courts to cover for all eventualities. . . Not good!

Unfortunately common sense has nothing to do with it and you have no rights as a father.

You need to be very careful that you don''t breach a court order; numerous parents have ended up in trouble over this and even in prison. Consider Vicky Haigh who is currently serving 3 years for saying hello to her child at a chance meeting in a petrol station forecourt.

It isn''t fair and it isn''t right, but it is the way the law works.

Ok this is like a complete revelation to me. I had no idea what the contact order and the law meant. Does it mean that outside the contact order, I have no right to greet my son? A hello or a wave - meaning a brief contact lasting seconds, in public, in full view of everyone.

Surely a father with parental responsibility, that it is against the law for me to exchange a hello with my son ?

There are some, and I''m not referring to my self, who would go to prison to protect this principle.

I think I should learn from this experience that ex''s and in this case the ex''s family members use their primary residence of children to inflict as much emotional harm on the other parent. Any one beleive in the hereafter as we may only see true justice and rewards then.

To overcome my upset, I have developed a mechanism where I just block out those horrible feelings and smile - I only have to wait a few days then my sons will be with me overnight, and all this will just be another event to forget.

Just make sure your son knows daddy isn''t angry with him. It''s all about you and him - ***** anyone else!

I have the confidence and peace of mind that this would not disturb my relationship with my sons. Daddy is never angry with his sons. I gave up my career, my family, my friends and moved 250 miles just to be near them and to be part of my sons'' lives - my relationship doesn''t depend on chance meetings -