My dh walked away from his children after fighting to see them for six years - AMA

[Katypp]

Family courts about 12 years ago - things hopefully will have changed by now

Because I thought it might be useful for anyone who is still going through something like this or has done in the past.

Because he initially believed the narrative that her ex had 'abandoned' his daughter and his ex had been left to cope alone with no maintenence. It was only when he spoke to her ex (they worked for the same company but in different towns) that the truth became apparent, including the fact that he was still paying maintenence into an account my dh did not know his ex had.

I have been following this thread for days.

I was a child who stopped seeing my dad when I was 11 which until recently I believed was totally my choice. It is a long story but it is on another thread I made.

I am 25 now and I am a mum myself. I have youger siblings I have never met, these are aunts and uncles to my LOs who also have a grandfather they have never met. I wonder about my dad often and I am trying to piece together everything in my mind because I am now finally beginning to question everything and whether it was fully my choice to stop seeing him. I now understand a lot more about parental alienation, I have been reading up on it since I made my post.

OP for what it is worth I think you have had a hard time on here. Thank you for sharing your story.

Thanks for your response @buildingourdreams and interesting that you thought not seeing your dad was your choice. I think his sons would say the same and hopefully the penny will drop at some point. PAS is very subtle and many pps on here do not get it. It is not as simple as going to court, winning contact and seeing them. His ex would produce letters to the court from the children saying they did not want to see their dad, but when asked by CAFCAS could not say why other than he upset poor mummy. 'Poor mummy' was an ongoing theme in his very few contact visits, such as when he briefly had to meet them in a contact centre (at her request, to allay the mother's unfounded concerns, according to the judge) his eldest was at pains to point out that poor mummy said she could not afford the petrol to drive them there because he didn't pay her enough) etc. It was just a drip drip drip of subtle poison day in day out.

Thanks OP, my questions (upthread) were:

Would he consider hiring a PI to trace his kids?

How long did he pay 50% of his salary to ex?

@Fraine Private eye: No, the damage has been done now and any approach has to come from them, he feels. His ex accused him of spying on them when he suggested they talk to each other by text so hiring a pi would give her so much ammunition to beat him with. When he walked away, the children's wellbeing was so wrapped up in his ex's happiness it was impossible to untangle them, according to CAFCAS. This is probably why the judge suggested a fresh start.
Salary: He paid 80% for about a year after they split, then pulled it down to 50%, which he paid for another year. He needed the money for legal costs and at the time believed fighting to see his children was a better use of the money. Others will no doubt disagree. He then paid a standard £100 more than the CSA amount until the youngest was 20.

Thanks OP, that seems reasonable to me.

I think once the kids are 18+, they may be more
amenable to their dad getting in touch. Worth a try.

They are 21 and 26. There have been years in which their father could have contacted them.

My dad did not go to court. Everyone in my family kept saying well he doesn't want to see you that much then. But I had already said to him I did not want to see him. As I was in year 7 by then I wonder if he had of taken it to court whether he'd have just been told it's my decision to not see him and take my wishes into consideration

We also moved house when I was 12 . To this day I do not know whether my dad was told our new address 🥺

@knittingaddict have you actually read the thread? Or are you just assuming that the dad is in the wrong, as usual. The boys are completely alianated from their father. It's unlikely they would want to see him as they appear to have blocked him from their social media accounts. I find it unbelievable that you still seem to think this whole mess is somehow my dh's doing?

@buildingourdreams i doubt he was told you had moved house, tbh. As @knittingaddict shows, not many people understand PAS. His ex used to present to the court/CAFCAS as if she was doing all she could to facilitate contact but was not prepared to force the children to do something they didn't want to do, yet the children were unable to say why except it upset poor mummy. A real mess

We are still going through this with one child, and having stepped away for a while for everyone’s sakes are actually back in court soon to desperately try and make the point that although she is saying she doesn’t want to see Dad, it sis absolutely down to the way her mum behaves and talks around her.

I am not going into details here as all the vipers will be out to say what a terrible Dad I am, but if anyone has been though similar and has any useful advice or even just wants to chat it through, please drop me a message.

I have to say that as court gets closer it is taking over my life and my mental health is rapidly deteriorating. Which reminds me what I stepped away three years ago. The reality is it’s a battle I can’t win, but I feel I owe her one more try.

Thanks

I wish you the best of luck witsendwilly. We are about to apply to change our court order (to get the wording more precise as its currently vague in places and where it is, the SDD's Mum takes full advantage or takes the opportunity to cause havoc every single time). In 7 months she has broken the court order 20 times. There is no recourse for this, no way of having it enforced without the lengthy process of going back to court.
The process we now have to contend with is apply for the change, she has to agree, (she wont), court say go to mediation (unlikely she will) then back to court. The initial process was long and expensive and nearly broke Dh. Just the sheer amount of lies and false allegations (which we successfully proved) but also the effect on the kids who were and are totally scrambled by the poison being dripped in their ears by their Mum. It's honestly awful to see.
We are stealing ourselves for another year to 18 months of it.
I think a lot of posters on her here cant comprehend how awful it is. How it becomes all consuming and mashes your mental health at the very time you need it most because you feel you need to be exemplary as a parent, lest there are further allegations made against you-even the slightest thing is blown up and used as evidence against you. DD once fell over whilst running in the park and cut her knee. Not badly. That 'incident' appeared in the Mothers statement as evidence of how we couldn't adequately care for her. An innocuous normal trip over, solved with a kiss and a plaster! You live on your nerves. And all whilst trying to maintain work and everything else. It becomes a choice between your mental
Health and that of your children vs carrying on, and that's before you consider the massive financial costs, which in our case have been crippling.

This thread has been enlightening in a horrifying way as it's really shown just how many people are wedded to the stereotype of the dead beat dad or the dad that just fights for his children to harm the Mum. Of course they exist but so too and I think I'm greater numbers do the dads that actually love their children and just want fair turn with them. There is no way that sort of thought doesn't still pervade the family courts and how they operate and that's really worrying and sad.

I'm yet to hear a reason why, in cases where there is no concern about either parent, access to children doesn't start automatically at a 50/50 split between parents with an onus on both parents to make that work practically as well as possible for the children.

I agree @TheLastDreamOfTheOak
Some posters just can't seem to accept that some dad's are decent but in the main, the mum holds all the cards.
I know what you mean about walking on eggshells with the sc too. As I said upthread, one of ours smacked his baby sister and the fallout that caused was epic, including mum driving 120 miles to' rescue the frightened children from their abusive father' (as stated in court)
Apart from that did not happen, according to a pp, because that obviously would not fit the narrative of innocent mother/abusive father.

@Katypp @TheLastDreamOfTheOak thanks both.

I can see me backing out before the big day in court as as you both know it is solid destroying and probably pointless.

I might report back in a few weeks but this thread had been an eye opener and reminded me why I don’t talk about our struggles with friends

I hope you manage to make it to court witsendwilly. If only for your own peace of mind. Otherwise you'll always wonder how it may have turned out. And at least if you go through with it you will now you tried everything you could.

@TheLastDreamOfTheOak @Witsendwilly
I agree with your last post @TheLastDreamOfTheOak and wish you well @Witsendwilly@Witsendwilly.. Feel free to dm me if you think I can be of any help at all, although as I said at the beginning, our ecpetience was some time ago