Divorce Support Forums: Opinions please- kind of long but really worried..

Hello- can anyone give me their take on my situation? 11 years ago my ex was awarded residential custody of our son with both of us having joint legal. Over the course of time, my son spent more and more time with me and his dad traveled alot. He is now 17.
Since last May, he basically lived with me until september when he went back to his father's house and had a fight with his father which culminated in my ex calling the police on him saying he was going to kill himself.
My son then stayed with me and the next time he talked to his father was on christmas day when my son called HIM. He remained with me until the end of february when I called him about something and asked him to allow us to modify custody which is flatly refused. I paid him support for all those months that he was with me (garnishment) and told him that we could change the situation by going to court- I told him all I wanted to to eliminate the support so I could get my son things he needed and he refused. I then told him that since our son had been with me for more than 6 months that it was "status Quo" and all i had to do was petition for it and he then yanked my son back to his house. He then made us resume a visitation schedule that we had in place from 11 years ago and my son was very unhappy since it basically only allowed us to visit on weekends. during this time, he locked my son out of his house one night and he had to walk to my house at 12am. The other nights my son would go there and go out with his friends until around 10pm because of his confrontiation with his dad.
Well, since I did not rush to file papers, I guess he assumed I was not going to and he began the whole travel thing again. He left on may 10 and was supposedly returning on may 18 but never came to get our son. At that point I put in the petition for change of custody and he was served on a thursday, which he was out of town on- I did not know he was out of town and as the custodial parent he should have let me know that he was not going to be home to be sure I was for our son.
Well the poop hit the fan and he called me on last sunday and asked when our son was- he was at a barbque until 10pm ( no more school here now) and he flipped out- screaming and yelling and then called the police on me. When they arrived I told them he was due home at 10pm and that I had told my ex I would immedialty bring our son home. He did not attempt to pick him up and just called the cops without even showing up.
When my son got home I took him to his dads and 20 minutes later, my son called the police becuase he had a shoving match with his father. since he had court papers from 11 years ago saying our son was supposed to be there, they made our son stay.
the next day I got an email from my ex saying that he and our son had come to an agreement and that my son would discuss it with me. Well, you guessed it- it was that our som could stay with me whenever he wanted ( which meant he could do all that traveling crap again) but insisted on keeping the support. I called my ex and put him on speaker phone to see if this was the deal or not and he would not say what they had agreed to and told me to ask our son. He refused to confirm anything.
I come to find out that my ex, who had prevously not allowed our son to have TV, computer or even the phone until his grades were "satisfactory" to him (whatever that means)now "talked" with our son and gave me a $300 cell phone, unlimited use of the computer and TV, promised to consider buying him a car, paying for drivers ed, and told him that when he turned 18, the child support I pay would be given to him to use. How odd is it that all this was done the day after he called the cops on me and got served-
My son wanted to spend time with me at my house which was not in the "visitation" schedule he wanted to enforce and I asked him to put it in writing (my ex)....well my son put the little contract together and had my ex sign it!
Seems like he did a big turnaround now that he knows I am petitioning -
Can anyone give me some opinions on how to approach this when I get to court this thursday? I have been the one taking him to the doctor, going to his teacher's conferences,and took him to a therapist to help deal with this stuff, all while paying this man child support.I am still going for custody no matter what but wondering if anyone has suggestions........? Please help-anything constructive is welcome.

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