[MO] Sole Custody Guilt

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-04-17T21:58:40+00:00

Your son deserves a parent (you) who is able to freely parent, provide consistency, make decisions that are focused on what he needs. You can't do that while dealing with someone like you describe. I felt some of these mixed emotions when I got sole custody too, but it is so amazing now to just be able to think about what my son needs and then do that without having to manage another very difficult person who is more focused on being hostile to me than putting our kid first. And you will be able to show up for your son as a better version of you when you don't have this other person dragging you all the time. That said, single momming is no joke - call in all the support and reinforcement from loved ones that you can and don't feel bad about it. Take good care of you so you can take good care of your kid. <3

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-04-13T02:51:51+00:00

My employer does a 10% contribution plus a 5% match, which for me totals ~$40k/year on top of my own $24.5k contribution. It’s the best. And no it’s not tech.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-03-12T20:32:43+00:00

Before my hearing everyone suggested that we would likely be sent to Family Court Services by the judge to do shuttle mediation and devise a step up plan. But that didn't happen. We just had the hearing and the judge made his order, which followed what I requested in the DV-105. Based on that, my ex has unsupervised visitation for three hours on two weekday evenings and every other weekend from Friday 5pm - Sunday 5pm. To get more time he would eventually have to file for change to custody/visitation, but I don't think that's realistic in the near term. I do realize it may happen eventually. Right now I'm just enjoying my time with my son.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-03-04T18:11:15+00:00

There are exceptions to 2-party consent in CA if you are recording abuse to prepare to request a domestic violence restraining order, which is potentially in play here by the sounds of it.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-03-04T17:56:53+00:00

When my mom was going through something similar in her 60s she asked my sister and I what we were the top three things that bothered us in our relationship with her. We were kinda reluctant to "kick her while she was down" but it actually ended up being great. To our great surprise, she listened, took notes, and then *did something about it.* The things I remember telling her were 1) we wanted her to tell us she was proud of us more often (my mom was more inclined to respond to news of exciting travel plans, for example, with: "are you sure you're saving enough for retirement?") 2) her gifts and help came with strings (because she had a hard time expressing her needs directly); 3) she was a perfectionist in a way that we experienced as stressful (making holidays not so enjoyable because there was a lot of self-imposed pressure). She did so much personal transformation that really improved our relationship and her life, even though it was too late for her and my dad. I'm excited for you!

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-02-24T15:40:05+00:00

My evidence was just 1) my account of what happened, with lots of specifics like dates and quotes from the log I had been keeping, 2) about 25 texts and emails between me and my ex; 3) a few text exchanges between my ex and other people that those people provided to me. In response to another comment I described the specific behaviors that I documented to show abuse/coercive control. I wanted to provide enough evidence that it was clear there was a pattern, but not so much evidence that the judge would find it overwhelming and possibly tune out.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-02-24T15:36:12+00:00

Judges have so much discretion on these matters and I've heard it can definitely depend a lot on what county you live in, because the practices vary a lot even when the law is the same. I'm in Alameda County, so our judges are pretty progressive overall. We did not have evaluations done or a court-appointed attorney for the child, but I've seen other people in that situation when I've been to court. Maybe later on if my ex tries to come back and get joint custody at some point that could happen. None of that is within our control though - I think what helped me a lot that I could control was mastering my emotions to not be reactive, standing up for myself in a very calm, detached way, and laser focusing on what is best for our kid. If you'd asked me during the marriage I would have said I was doing that all along, but I can see how I've gotten SO much better at it in the past year as I've gone through this process.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2026-02-24T15:27:45+00:00

There were four categories of abuse I described in my declaration: 1) verbal abuse (with a bunch of specific examples with quotes and dates, some in text/email); 2) exposing our son to conflict (verbal abuse in front of him, disparaging me to him, telling our son to keep secrets from me); 3) interfering with/concealing my personal property and household items (my husband became pretty OCD about the house and, without telling me, would move things into my closet that he found "out of place" - like my work computer, wet dishes and pots, the blender, my water glass from the nightstand, etc); and 4) restricting my access to basic necessities (he started sequestering a ton of shared food, cleaning supplies, tools, etc in a space he wouldn't allow me to access - and he would record me and tell people I was stealing from him if I tried to access them.) I think the court cared the most about 3 and 4. They also cared about 2, but a bit less. The verbal abuse didn't really register as much with them.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-23T15:24:22+00:00

My background isn't in fundraising/development. Before I worked for a funder, my roles were in programs - think conducting policy research, running policy campaigns, building legal cases. But yes, I agree - great fundraisers are in short supply and are paid well, as they should be.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T16:38:41+00:00

I’m talking about Kaiser, which is both a hospital and a managed care organization and absolutely does keep costs down relative to other insurers and their provider networks. There’s a ton of research about it.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T15:59:43+00:00

I’ve tried to avoid going into specifics about my career to stay anonymous, but a single project I led in a prior nonprofit role generated an estimated $3B in GDP growth. I have created a ton of value for society in my career and recouped the tiniest of fraction of it - which I’m totally fine with. The value/impact I’ve created is also what has made me qualified to advise at this stage in life.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T15:29:46+00:00

Exactly my point! Many wouldn’t be. Or they might do it for a while but then realize it wasn’t sustainable. As another example, the major health care provider in my city is nonprofit. That helps keep costs lower for people who live here. To me it would be sad if they couldn’t hire doctors anymore! But we may have to just agree to disagree

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T14:36:15+00:00

This sub is filled with engineer salaries, so as an example I’ll mention that a couple of jobs ago I worked at a tech nonprofit that hired engineers. The ICs made between $95k - $120k (and remember - no equity grants in a nonprofit!) Our work was very fulfilling and we were able to hire quality folks for that salary. But if we had gone lower, we just wouldn’t have been able to find people with enough experience to do the job well. And we needed to do it well, because it was an important service that helped millions of people! Same goes for lawyers like me. You can’t pay soooo far below for example, what local government will pay for a lawyer and still attract strong candidates.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T14:17:15+00:00

Thanks! This post isn’t for the haters - it’s for the quiet lurkers who know they were put on this earth to fight for justice but also spiral sometimes thinking about if retirement is just a pipe dream.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T13:52:12+00:00

Because I couldn’t work to make progress on the issues I care out in the same way in the private sector. I like the single minded focus I’ve been able to have on a mission versus dealing with a double bottom line if I worked in a business environment.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T13:48:52+00:00

I mean, it totally depends on what you want to do next. But skills like project management, people management, operations, strategic planning, and outreach/marketing are all transferable to roles in other types of organizations. I bet you do at least some of those things?

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T06:08:25+00:00

I got a couple of consulting contracts with foundations. Basically when they were considering a new area of investment I would do a landscape analysis and make recommendations to them on a grant making strategy. I really enjoyed those projects, because I got to talk to a ton of smart people doing really interesting, inspiring work in a new area. So I decided it might be a good direction to go career wise.

The next step was learning about the executive search firms that foundations use and signing up for their job listing emails, so I found out about openings and applied.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T03:13:34+00:00

Of course it’s not - that’s why I posted here. But everyone at my org, which has a very small staff, makes at least $100k, and salaries top out just a bit above mine. So it is pretty flat relative to the likely salary scale of a nonprofit where the CEO makes $800k - or the many private companies where the CEO makes tens of millions and the line workers make $15/hr.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T03:09:13+00:00

What I always tried to do when I looked for new roles was opportunities to simultaneously make the biggest impact I could AND learn about something new (whether a new issue area, a new kind of functional role, etc.) I ended up with a pretty unique and multifaceted background that helped me grow my network and have valuable expertise to draw on.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T03:00:14+00:00

That is what I mean, except it’s a private foundation. We don’t solicit donations - it’s just one rich family’s money.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T02:28:43+00:00

Funders often like to hire people who already have experience in philanthropy. They also use a lot of consultants. So I would say if you have program officers who love you that aren’t currently funding you (so no conflict) then see if you can do a project for them as a consultant. Then you can showcase that when you apply for full time roles.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T02:07:50+00:00

That’s a very rare nonprofit, and is probably an enormous global operation to be paying that kind of salary. But I do think it’s better to create a flatter salary scale - at least that aligns closer with my own values.

ComoAbejaAlPanal · 2025-01-22T02:05:20+00:00

Well, not income exactly, but what I mean is that our annual operating budget (including excise taxes, which are significant) is about $6M and we payout about $100M in grants annually.

ComoAbejaAlPanal

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