What to Do About the Holidays and My 13 Year Old Son??

I think you need to talk to your son's father and then your son and get everyone on the same page.

The matters you're discussing with your son - and that your son and his father are having conversations about - are not the business of a 13 year old. Shame on both of you for the fact that he is even aware of taxes involving him, really. For that, you need to apologize, and it sounds like his father needs to apologize to him too.

Unless your divorce decree or custody/support agreements say otherwise, you are actually not entitled to claim your son as a dependent on your taxes because you do not provide for more than 50% of his support. So if that's a legitimate question in this situation, you were wrong to claim him and if you did claim him, whatever difference it made in your taxes is owed to his father. You're lucky his father didn't claim him and then have you audited. He doesn't owe you any of the deduction he claims for his son if he provides more than 50% of his support. All that said, it's not something your son should even be aware of. It makes your son seem like property.

Regarding holidays...do whatever your parenting plan stipulates. If this isn't spelled out in your parenting plan, it's high time that it is. If your plan states that you have him on Thanksgiving, then you do, end of story.

Your ex is wrong to blame the fact that they didn't travel to see his grandmother on lack on money. If that were an issue, he should have brought it up to you.

At the end of the day, you're both being petty. Sort this out AS ADULTS, follow your divorce decree or whatever was decided by court if you were never married, and jointly apologize to your son and inform him - together - of what the holiday plan is.

Yuck, I remember this type of conversation with my dad.. He was always trying to "fill us in" on what a lousy mom we had and how she was living such a glamorous life, while the rest of us were slogging through.

Eventually after years of never discussing this "grown up stuff "with me. my mom sat down and explained what was really going on and how the Divorce was settled and all of the obligations.

She also made it clear the way the judge made it clear to my parents.

He told them, This is not exact but covers it.. Children will always be your priority. Their health and happiness comes before anything else, but like many families, there is only so much money to split, so no one is going to end up in better financial situation than anyone else.

My mom then explained how much she made and how much my father made. How the deductions on Taxes was made each year.. their retirement, the whole thing.

She explained one of us was on my dads insurance the other on hers.

She explained the child support and how it was spent monthly. She showed me the bills, everything..

At 13 I was old enough to then understand that all of us were on a tight budget. There was no hidden pot of gold and my mother and my father were both working really hard just to make ends meet.

This did not stress me out, it enlightened me so that I knew that when my father made snide comments about my mom or about our lives, I could inform him, HE was the one with the extra money and since he was remarried to a woman that did not have children, he actually had it easier than we did since my mom was not remarried.

There is nothing wrong with telling your son you miss him, when he is not with you. That holidays are made special because he is around and that money is tight for everyone.

I also really encourage you and your son to go to family counseling. That is what finally taught all of us how to speak with each other without accusing each other of all of this junk. The Therapist was very honest with me and my sister that our mom and our dad were doing the best they could for us, and we had a right to ask questions from them about ANYTHING.

She also told us that our parents divorce was theirs not ours, we were not the reason, so when they were arguing or disagreeing, we did not have anything to do with that stuff.

You talk to his father. Your son can offer input, but letting the kids take lead of the adults' schedule leads to unnecessary consternation. They can't see the big picture. Keep these kinds of discussions between adults and not your son. It never went well when my sks were the middleman.

If your son is having a tough time grieving the lost of his grandmother and is latching onto something silly like the taxes, then suggest to your ex that the boy might need to see a grief counselor. At 13, he should have input in visitation but again not dictate the visitation. Kids live for the moment. Right now he is grieving and angry. Do not let this become the status quo.

Don't let him associate your relationship with him with finances. Let him know whether you split taxes or pay child support or not or whatever, he should not want to spend time with you according to whether you fulfill some sort of financial requirement. There may be one day you lose your job and can't pay anything. Do you want him to think because you won't have any money you can no longer be his mother?

Try to have something planned on the side anyway, just in case he changes his mind at the last minute. Have an activity set aside - ballgame, movie, new video game or book he might like. And have a chicken or small turkey already defrosted and all the ingredients for one or two side dishes which you can fix in a pinch.

This is the exact reason there should be Parenting Plans, Custody and Child Support LEGAL documents in place. I'm assuming your documents don't specify who can claim him in what years? The parenting plan would also specify which parent has him on what holiday. It's not "whenever you would like". Clearly both of you are allowing your son to decide what he wants to do and although he is older, it is causing problems for you since he doens't want to see you. He should have NO idea what is happening with the taxes. If you do have a Parenting Plan (visitation) in place, then I would start to enforce it. If you don't, I would go down to the county courthouse and file for one. That way neither one of you, nor your son, can make their own rules up. Good luck.

Your son sounds upset that he didn't see his grandmother before she died.
His Dad didn't take him and the excuse Dad gave displaced the blame onto you - which was a pretty sucky thing to do.
How you and Dad manage the money between you should be between YOU and DAD and Dad shouldn't be bad mouthing about you to your son.
Using his mothers passing away as a way to drive a wedge between you and your son is just such a rotten thing to do.

So - what to do about the holidays?
Stick with your usual plans.
Your son is grieving - he'll be mad and sad - it's ok.
He might take some of that out on you.
Listen to him and let him vent.
Try not to take what ever he says too personally.
Tell him you understand that his Dad is grieving too and although he's handling it the best he can he still shouldn't be discussing the details of the finances with him (your son).

First off, stop discussing taxes and financial issues with your 13 year old son. Both you and your ex need to stop doing that. This poor kid is already dealing with a messy life going back and forth between mom and dad. Do you think he likes that? Probably not. But then to throw your issues with his dad in the mix? He doesn't need to know that.
Don't ever belittle his dad in front of him or make rude and hateful comments about his dad in front of him, just because you guys couldn't stay together doesn't mean you have the right to bash his father.
If this were me, i would simply tell him "listen sweetie, i would love to have you over for some part of Thanksgiving and Christmas if you would like to make time for me" and leave it at that. If he refuses he is probably mad at you. Offer to take his Christmas presents over to his dad's house if he doesn't want to come over. Sounds like you and the ex have created one heck of a mess! Time to clean it up and make it right with your son!
Good luck!

I like what Ally G said esp about having something for dinner set aside &
ready in case he decides to come by.
And have a fun activity planned that HE would enjoy.

Also, don't discuss your financial problems with him (He is still a kid & needs to have a safety net. You provide this by not discussing money
issues.) AND don't bad mouth his dad to him. You can think it but never say it.

There is nothing you can do other than wait until your son gets over it.

If you made a promise and then went back on it, then yes, you are in the wrong. Why would you have made that promise knowing that he has never offered to split the return with you in the past.

I venture to say you made the promise so you could get your ex to give you the tax break knowing full well you did not intend to split the cash. Yes, that's wrong.

So basically the Dad said that they couldn't make the trip to see his dying mother in Oct. because you didn't give him half our your tax return in May? What a cope out! How unfair to you and your son.

I am sorry that your son didn't get to say goodbye to his grandmother. Maybe you could take him to visit the grave at some point.

As for the future taxes, talk to your lawyer. As someone mentioned, you should be able to claim him every other year.

Swallow the lump in your throat and just say, okay. He will get over his loss and his anger in a few months.

Just a footnote : In a lot of states you can claim a child that doesn't live with you and you are paying child support for- every other year on your federal taxes depending on what the agreement is/was on your divorce decree or arranged in court per the approval of a Judge. There is no agreement to divide anything with anyone in most cases unless you do that on a personal level. But, shame on parents who involve their kids in the financial issues , of any kind. It's not their place to know your business and they don't need to worry/stress about those kinds of things. Don't make promises you don't intend to keep ,it avoids issues that shouldn't have to happen- and you don't look like the bad guy. As far as your son, I'd have a talk with his dad first and then talk to him together for one conversation and then don't involve him again from both perspectives (yours & dads). It wasn't your responsibility to manage his Dad's money as far as saving to take a trip whenever and for whatever reason. I'd also stress that loving and wanting to spend time together should be based on your love for each other not the status of anyone's wallet. Your son will eventually get over this ,let him know you can sympathize with him about not getting to see grandma before she passed. Dad should have made it a higher priority if he knew his son wished to see her. Give this time,....... C. S.

You goofed. Your ex used that. It actually might have been a hinderence in getting the money together to go see his grandmother. That was your son's priority and now there is no remedy for it. He is left with pain and anger and grief.
It would be great to find some grief counseling for him. There are big churches that offer it for free. Call around.
All you can do is hope he forgives you, soon. Do not try to justify yourself to him.

In the future, don't discuss your finances with your son, when they involve your ex.

"I'm sorry honey, it's not appropriate to discuss your father's and my finances with you. Neither he nor I should ever do it. There are no villains here, and you will understand more when you are older. In the meantime, the story is not as simple as 'mom is withholding dad's money', but if that's the way you are choosing to see it there's nothing I can do. I love you, and I'm sad that you don't want to visit me, but I can't force you. When you mature and learn that things are not black and white, I can't wait for your visit. Until then, just know that I am always here for you."

Or something like that. You can't force a 13 year old to visit you, and you can't badmouth his father, so you are stuck waiting it out. The less you bug him about this decision, the more likely it is that he will want to see you sooner.

Talking to dad is not a bad idea, either.

Your son will come around. But you're stuck being the bad guy for now, I guess.

Good luck.

In all honesty you shouldn't claim your son at all, if you don't have full custody then his dad should always get to claim him. That's of course just my opinion.

If you are supposed to pay child support and do then you have met your obligation. If dad is blaming you for him not being able to provide extra's for his child then that's just too bad for him.

Tell your son that you have an obligation to pay child support each month and that you have always paid that. That money is supposed to be used to pay for the extra's. Turn in back on dad. He's supposed to use all that money to provide things for him.

Then tell him that your tax refund is your own money that you paid in extra. In the future you might want to lower the amount you have held out so you can truthfully show him that you had to pay in. Then dad can't ever throw that in your face. Just lower it a tiny bit so you won't have to pay in too much.