I would be very interested in telling my story.
For years I really wanted to connect with other women (and yes, men) in my
situation and one of the things I really wanted to hear was a success
story. Unfortunately, you don’t hear about that very often.

I know that deadbeat parents are often held accountable, but it seems
that all you hear are the bitter stories from parents who haven’t yet collected.
When you search for help on the internet, the sites you often find are either states
enforcement sites or the dubious agencies that want a substantial portion of the
collected support. When you talk to lawyers about helping you, and I know
this from personal experience, they direct you back to the state’s enforcement agency.

State enforcement agencies are staffed by wonderful, smart, hardworking people who
are grossly underpaid and terribly overworked. There is a mountain of red-tape that
they need to cut through to accomplish anything and when your ex is in another state,
you fall subject to their collection efforts (which is not always as aggressive as your state
may be). MA CSE DOR did a wonderful job in the end, but it was largely due to my
diligence and efforts.

I want to get the message out there to other parents in my situation that
1) you cannot give up 2) you cannot expect or rely on anyone to do it all for
you 3) you need to be the “squeaky wheel” and stay on top of your case.
When I say not relying on anyone I mean that there is a lot you can do to
support your own case and move it along. There is so much information out
on the internet available for free or inexpensively when you learn where
to look. None of the books out there ever mention any of this. They talk
about the forms you can fill out for the courts, they talk of the agencies
and what they can do to help, but there is not much about finding
information for yourself. The agencies have so many cases they don’t have
time to do the research and I would love to see that information out
there. The only book that I found to be of any assistance was your book, “Deadbeats”.
I found it to be exceptionally helpful. With the information I learned I was able
to do things such as a deed search. It not only gave me deeds, it gave me a wealth of
information about my ex – every time he refinanced his mortgage, every
time he registered a business name, his marriage license, liens, etc. I also
went to the court website in his home town and found information on other
lawsuits he was involved in. Using some of this information I was able to
research his companies (self-employed) and I even paid for and got credit
reports of his company and had Dun and Bradstreet reports on his company.
When I found out he was involved with a lawsuit that was covered by
business news, I contacted the reporter for more information. As you said to
do in the book, all of this was turned over to the CSE in MA and they used it
to show he was hiding assets and eventually issued an arrest warrant that the
TX Sheriff enforced. It was a beautiful day, but a lot of hard work on my part
over many years. Of course, I had to exhaust every legal civil action first before
they’d go after criminal non-support charges, but that’s my point – it might have
even been longer had I not done much of the legwork myself. Plus, my ex is a
bit of a con-artist and very smooth and polished and I’ve literally seen him
tell a judge he forgot his tax return and the judge gave him a continuance
of 90 days and of course he didn’t come back to MA after that! It was
hard going up against such charisma.

Well, I just spent the morning paying old bills that have been piling up.
The one I most regret is the hockey bill from the last year my son played
2 years ago. He was a really great skater and could play forward and
defense equally well. My ex was supposed to pay half and didn’t pay the last year
and I just could scrap up the money and we couldn’t go back. It’s nice to
finally be out of the hole, but those are years with my son I’ll never get
back. If there is anything I can do to help someone like me, I want to do
it. I know this rambled on a bit and I apologize. It feels so good to
get it all out. Please use whatever part of my story you want for your
newsletter and please send me a copy. Keep up the good work that you’re
doing. Parents like us need parents like you!

Yours,
Kim