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Hi everyone. I am wondering if anyone has tried to dissolute your adoption after divorce, when you and your ex-spouse adopted your children during the marriage, and then he/she keeps the kids. Can you dissolute the adoption? Do you continue paying child support after the dissolution? How do you do it? Very, very complicated, long story here. Even mental health professionals have trouble grasping the story the first time, or the second time, so I am leaving it out for now. All I can say is that this is an impossible situation that I must consider dissolution. Your info or story will be greatly appreciated!
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Unless your former spouse has a new spouse who is willing to adopt the kids, you cannot simply dissolve an adoption. You can choose not to be a part of your children's lives, but you are still responsible for them. Custody, support, etc would be decided by the judge during the divorce/ custody proceedings, and you do need to follow that court order. Dissolution is, in some ways, a misnomer; you are not simply undoing the adoption, but rather finding someone else to adopt your child. Since their other parent is continuing to parent them, that is not an option.
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As Ruth said, you can choose to not be a part of your children's lives but they're still your children. Yes, you're responsible for support. I'll add that if your spouse DOES have a new spouse willing to adopt the children they can have your rights terminated for abandonment. If that happens and they are adopted by the new spouse you may not be responsible for support. I don't know fur sure how that works legally. The judge will give you orders and you have to follow them.
When you adopt a child, you have the same rights and obligations as if the child was born to you. If you had been the biological father of this child, and then divorced the biological mother, the courts would have decided on custody, visitation, and child support matters. And it is the exact same situation, when you are an adoptive father. From what you have said, your wife was granted custody of the children, you may or may not have visitation rights, and you are obligated to pay child support. That's pretty standard in divorce cases, with both biological and adopted children.The adoption cannot be dissolved just because you do not want to pay child support, especially since your ex-wife clearly does not want dissolution; she requested, and was granted, custody of the children. She was, and still is, the legal mother of the children, and she seems eager to have the moral responsibility, too. Even though you and your wife are divorced, you remain the legal father of the children, and must contribute to raising them, at a level consistent with your income and ability to pay. Visitation is something that you can negotiate with her and the court, if you want a change in the divorce agreement, but you cannot just up and say that you don't want to be their father any more.Now, if your ex-wife ever remarries, and the new husband wants to adopt the children and become their legal father, she can approach you about allowing the court to terminate your parental rights and give those rights to her new husband. In such a case, the new husband would take on the parental rights and, in most cases, the financial obligations. So the best you can hope for is that your ex-wife finds a wonderful man who wants to marry her and adopt the children, and that a judge will choose to relieve you of your legal, moral, and financial obligations at that point. What the kids will think of you, if you choose no longer to be in their life, is another story.Sharon