Custody/handover problems

Sorry to hear this, OP. The handover period can be so, so bitter - especially when the Court has been perceived to have destroyed one parent's status over the other's (this can include 50/50 shared parenting as one gender in particular would see that as a loss).

It is so, so hard to rise above it when one has been destroyed. The poor kids, always. I think the suggestion of getting somebody else to do the handover might be wise, as there's a lot of evidence that recurrently tense handovers can do long-term damage to kids. Just bear in mind that times will happen when your child doesn't want to go with you, either. Nothing personal at all. If you can allow for that it might help you.

In the meantime take notes of what you child says is being said to him by your ex's side. f this gets to a more serious level of your being alienated by your ex from your child, you will need to establish a pattern of such alienation.

If your ex is threatening abduction, it is very important that you raise this at the next family court hearing (and there will be more) or apply for a court hearing on the grounds that you have an issue that needs the "direction of the court".

You can request that possession of your son's passport be held by you, or alternatively your solicitor. This is not something I would leave to chance.

Yes, of course there's impeccable logic. She's playing the gender card to get you removed from the family home. Game, set, and match. Don't keep your head in the sand here: she has declared war on you, and in the reality that is the Irish family law courts your gender makes you guilty until proven innocent. Naive people who have not gone through the Irish family law courts and who believe in the fantasy that is the just-world hypothesis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis) would have a more benign interpretation of what happens. Ignore them as you have to wise up very, very quickly to how fúcked you are as a man seeking equal rights to your child and family home. If you are a poor man, the situation is significantly bleaker. Poor men suffer a huge injustice far removed from the "dig outs" and free house which our self-declared "socialist" legislator Bertie Ahern got when he went through his own marital breakdown, a disconnect from reality which largely explains why our privileged legislators keep legislation which punishes poor men above all others. But your only hope is in fighting this, as often they trip themselves up with their lies if the case goes on long enough.

A bit of explanation. If she can get Tusla on her side she begins to remove you from the family home. That is the goal, and be very, very clear about that. Safety orders (which you both can get, while living in the same home), protection orders and, ultimately, the jackpot that is the barring order (differences explained: https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/birth-family-relationships/problems-in-marriages-and-other-relationships/barring-safety-and-protection-orders/#l80820) will follow as sure as night follows day.

In the barring order you're removed from the family home and a criminal case invariably commences. This is genius by the "poor women" as the criminal case must then be heard before your civil/family law case (divorce). You can be waiting years for the criminal case to happen, and all the while you as the man have been barred from the family home because of her mere allegation. Re-read that! While you're barred, she turns the kids against you - this is called parental alienation, but the Irish State-funded women's-superior-rights-to-control-the-family-home-and-children organisations deny parental alienation exists. It does, and that child who loves you can be turned against you once your rights to spend equal time with him have been stopped due to her false allegations. This happens again, and again and again. The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. If she wins the child (yes, the child is only the weapon for them), she wins control of the family home. It is that savage, and this is not a rare case - this is the most common outcome once a woman makes a false allegation.

You're eliminated from the family home and she starts creating her new life in the family home you're paying for while you live in a bedsit or with your parents. She also tops this off by playing the victim card. It's galling, to say the least, to endure the incessant "poor me" victimhood for women when so many men face this reality. And it's all based on a false allegation, or series of false allegations, that you are a danger to your child. Once an allegation of abuse is fired at a man - termed the "silver bullet" - he is very much guilty until proven innocent. It is uniquely destructive, and there is absolutely no punishment for all the women who do this (family law proceedings are "in camera"/private so the names of these women are never revealed, which of course acts as a massive incentive to falsely accuse men of abuse if they can win the family home and control of the children as a result).

She has the power to destroy you with her false allegations. She knows it, and you should know this, too. You need to get all the support you can muster. At 7pm in Navan tonight, 17 May Men's Aid will be meeting. It will be full of men going through similar experiences, who have extensive experience of Tusla, their reports, their trustworthiness, and so much else. You will get recommendations for serious family law solicitors and barristers who deal with this all the time. You will get details of judgments and rulings that you will never get access to because of the Irish State's "in camera" rulings. You will find out how fathers have won full custody of their children after years of never being allowed to see their children while the criminal law process, and Tusla reports, progressed. But those years with their children are never coming back thanks to the sheer evil (in the truest meaning of that word) of false allegations.

Ring Men's Aid without delay and you will find a whole world of men who will open up to you and help you as much as they can: https://www.mensaid.ie/