informing ex about new man (& dealing with their eventual meeting)

[Debra1981]

nm who tbh has already met dd a few times- initially by accident;

when ex has tendency to be extremely jealous (afaik he is still single and was still pestering me til fairly recently), completely unreasonable, occasionally still abusive and threatening, with a habit of making up nasty lies about other people (ie me) to suit his own twisted ends...

When to do it and how to keep it civil with minimal impact on the nm?? (i really don't want to but there's a part of me telling me that i should!) guidance anyone?

[solidgoldbullet4myvalentine]

How old is your DD and how often does your XP see her? Ie is she old enough to talk to her dad about Mummy's New Friend?
If not, I wouldn't necessarily tell XP as it isn't, actually, any of his business (unless your nm is sometimes staying overnight when dd is there, in which case all but the most horribly abusive of XPs are sort of entitled to want to meet the nm).

[aseriouslyblondemoment]

Hi Debra!
glad things are working with nm
I haven't been in this position as yet but have considered it
Firstly,i would say that your main duty of care is to your dd
Does she realise that nm is actually that or just her Mummy's friend?
Assuming that she's ok with it and nm is getting along fine with her then that's your main concern
Telling the ex is secondary really but best got out of the way
You are expecting probs.from him so just brace yourself for it and hope that nm is equally strong
I would expect that ex will naturally feel displaced and will prob.want to pump your dd with questions re:nm and may try to slag him off to her as well.
You never know he might actually surprise you and act decently

[ridingjoker]

depends on the age of dc. are they very young? or will they tell exp?

and when you say ex was abusive and controlling?? how bad?

i am in the situation where i cant tell exp where i stay as he has a past for stalking, turning up at all hours and making my life hell sitting outside my house.

i tell exp as little about my life as possible. as in the past he has got a PI to follow me when we split before to find out what i was doing, who i was seeing.

hence i wont be telling exp about any nm i see. he tells me nothing about who he sees. and regularly lets his ex watch my dc at the shop. i dont trust this woman at all to look after my dc. but he gives me no say in the matter. therefore i see no reason to tell him my situation. even if there did come a time where a nm would meet my dc.

mine are very young and my situation is odd i suppose .

i'm only sharing this as there are some situations where it would be better for the dc not to cause mass upset.

however, if your exp is no where near as bad as mine, and your dc are old enough to tell your exp about him, then i would say as soon as dc have met nm, you have to come clean.

[Debra1981]

Dd is 2.9, not really talking coherently about anything out of context yet, so don't think she will tell her dad, who she sees every weekend.

But yes nm has stayed over once and expect he will again.

Not sure what dd makes of my relationship with nm, though she has slightly bemusedly watched us cuddling. She thinks he's great, reacts positively when I talk about him in his absence, to her I think he's just someone else to play with and show off to instead of just boring old mum.

Re ex... he has been persistantly abusive and occasionally violent in the past, partly why I don't really trust him to look after dd, but courts give me no say in matter as was too long ago...(another kettle of fish). I also know nothing of who he sees. Whenever I've tried to involve him and tell him what dd has been doing he has always found a way of twisting it to make me out to be a bad mum.

He doesn't stalk but when things were fairly raw (as I feel they might be again if/when he finds out) he took to abusing me over the phone several times a day. Although we now live a lot closer to him than we did then and after we moved (before nm) he came round quizzing my neighbours about me and my doings while I was out.

NM has hinted he won't stick around if he gets too much abuse from my ex, so am dreading their fairly inevitable meeting.

But I think I will just have to do the telling first and 'come clean' about her meeting nm, then see what happens.

[solidgoldbrass]

If he is abusive over the phone, tell him to stop it. Keep a log of incidents and report him to the police. He has NO RIGHT to be abusive to you in any way. You do not belong to him and who you see is not his business.