I dont know about where you live but in FL you cannot terminate parental rights unless you are able to deam them unfit in some way shape or form. I know in fl that abandonment of more than 6 months gives you grounds for termination of parental rights as well.....if you give me a little more on the situation with his dad and where you live I could look for you.

I don't think it's considered abandonement if he's paying child support though.

It is where I live. My sons dad pays child support. You can relinquish rights and still obtain support in some, In florida child support has nothing to do with rights or visitation as I beleive I read once before.

oh and to add I just read that the only way terminating rights gets rid of child support is if someone else os going to take responsibility for the child by adopting them. ( this was a general consensus on multiple states. )

hmmm I never thought I could have him relinquish AND still get child support... I would have to think about that. I live in New York... I tried to look up information, but all I really found were forms that were not so helpful. Anyway, the situation is that he has never had any type of relationship with Devin. He has "tried" a couple times, but he always ends up not calling or not showing up etc. (I have always said yes he can see Dev because I do not want to look like the bad guy if he miraculously wanted visitation.) He is going into basic training for the Marines in about a month, so he decided to try to see Dev before he leaves. Devin has no idea who he is except that he is a guy named joe that we met up with for the first time a week before Christmas. The other day he asked us to come over to his mother's house and he wasn't even there when we got there. He showed up for 15 minutes and then left again giving me a sarcastic response when I told him he should be here when he asks us to come over. So I am pretty fed up with the bullshit. I get really worried that one day he is going to want to be involved in Dev's life or he is going to get involved and then just up and leave. I want to do everything I can to protect my son from thinking he has a father that does not care about him. (For now I only introduce bd as joe and will not let anyone call him daddy.)

Oh yeah and his side of the family is slightly involved. We see Dev's other grandma like once every few months (did I mention she lives 5 minutes away?).

Anyway, I would like to seriously look into how to go about relinquishing his rights and to see if it applies to him. Thanks for the help!

i don't know about ny, but here the parent has to sign away their rights, so he would have to agree to it. do you think he might?

that's what I am hoping for. I'm hoping that if I bring it up to him he will be like 'where do i sign??' I figured he probably needed to initiate it, I was not sure if I was able to start the process.

still working on info for you. at work till 1:30 so ill do it as soon as i get the kids and get home

no need to hurry! I appreciate the help... apparently I am not searching correctly because I am not finding much.

Girl I did not find anything pretaining to new york and I am so sorry but I will keep looking for you. Maybe contact a lawyer for a free consultation?

yeah do you think i can directly contact family court? or maybe my mom's lawyer will be nice and give me some info for free

I would avoid court before seeing a lawyer for sure. Is there some kind of legal aid program where you live?
I just wanted to add that it's a good idea to be cautious about this. I know where I live the courts always consider it to be in the best interest of the child to see the father, no matter how erratic and irresponsible the father is, and so the mother proposing to disallow access to the father is seriously frowned upon. It doesn't really sound like he's planning on taking you to court for custody any time soon LOL but if something like that were to happen you might be in a bad position because the courts (here anyways) would favour the parent who would foster a relationship between the child and the other parent.

Obviously take this with a grain of salt since I'm nowhere near you, and I know that abandonment in some areas can be grounds to cut off rights. I wish it was here, actually. I just thought I would throw it out there that caution and legal advice are super important. LOL