Coparenting complications. Jim Edmonds and Meghan King have hit a bump in the road when it comes to their custody arrangements after their October 2019 split.
“Jim is talking with his legal team about getting full custody of the children because he is getting increasingly upset that Meghan has been out of town during portions of her custodial time,” a source close to the Edmonds family tells Us Weekly exclusively. “There have been numerous times where Jim has brought the kids to Meghan for her custodial week only to find she is out of town and he has to leave them with Meghan’s nanny.”
Edmonds, 50, and the former Real Housewives of Orange County star, 35, tied the knot in 2014 and share three children: daughter Aspen, 3, and twin sons Hayes and Hart, 2. Edmonds also four children from previous marriages. In October 2019, the retired baseball player filed for divorce from King after he was accused of having an affair with one of the former couple’s nannies. At the time, Edmonds vehemently denied claims of being unfaithful to King.
Since calling it quits, the estranged pair have been at odds over custody of their children, with King claiming in April that she was receiving “barely” enough in child support to pay for “groceries for my tribe.” A rep for Edmonds later fired back at the Bravo alum’s allegations, telling Us at the time that the former athlete “continually goes above and beyond what he is required to do.”
As the ongoing coronavirus pandemic continues to make things more complicated for the estranged duo, the first source notes that the California native “has been told Meghan is looking for a second nanny” to help care for their kids during her time with them.
“[This] raises his concern even more about the amount of time Meghan is away during her custodial time and the amount of time she is actually spending with the children,” the insider adds. “Jim feels if Meghan cannot be present during the week she has the children, then he should just keep them at his house and not leave them with the nannies.”
King fired back at her estranged husband’s allegations in a lengthy statement to Us the same day, noting, “I am a working, single mother and I have one live-in nanny (with no plans to hire an additional nanny). In the 10 months since Jim walked out on our children and myself, I have left Aspen, Hart and Hayes with my mother for three days (with my nanny helping her). I told Jim I had to be out of town for those days but he told me he couldn’t take custody of the kids because he would also be out of town.”
The St. Louis native took aim at Edmonds’ “tattered value system,” doubling down on the claims that “he had an inappropriate relationship” with their former nanny, Carly Wilson. (Last year, the 22-year-old caretaker denied the affair allegations on social media.)
“Jim even set Carly [up] with a happily married friend of Jim’s [one] evening and this was not the first time Jim has set Carly up with a married man. This further drives home the tattered value system of this man,” King’s statement continues. “Additionally, our children’s GAL (guardian ad litem, a court appointed attorney for our children) knew about me leaving for the three days Jim is questioning. I told her why I had to leave and she said that was completely fine, that parents have to go out of town all the time and find coverage for their children. I have had primary custody of my children since he left us, including when I quarantined them for nine weeks in L.A. while Jim contracted COVID while partying in Nashville (and also infected his entire home). And as much as I hate to bring up the past, it was Jim who was sending pictures of his penis to another woman on the day the twins were born, and it was Jim who left us and didn’t request to see the kids for weeks afterward.”
Earlier this year, Us confirmed that King had moved on with boyfriend Christian Schauf amid her messy split. The new couple recently spent time in Utah and celebrated the 4th of July on a romantic getaway to Wisconsin. Though their travels have apparently caused a rift between King and her estranged husband, Schauf, 40, told Page Six in July that he admires the way she’s able to cooperate with “an ex who is not that easy to deal with.”
Steve Honig, a rep for the former MLB player, tells Us he has no comment “on matters of custody.” However, he notes that “Jim has seven children and understands that as a parent you run your life around your children, not the other way around. Meghan has continually tried to smear Jim in the press and it seems nothing has changed.”
Despite Edmonds’ defense of his parenting, King asserts that her children’s best interests are always at the front of her mind.
“For Jim to suggest I did anything inappropriate, wrong, or questioning my parenting is — quite frankly — not only laughable but unfortunately in line with the way he has treated and spoken to me,” she claims. “I’ve kept my mouth shut through months of abuse and I’ve tried to take the high road knowing this is my children’s father, and I will have to have some sort of relationship with him for the rest of my life as we work to coparent, but don’t for a second think that I don’t have all the evidence I need to back up every fact stated above.”
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