desperate dad, controlling ex

[Helplessdad]

Split when dd was v young. Ex wife moved 300 miles away to live with parents while she got back on her feet. Several months later I also moved to be with my partner (currently pregnant) which unfortunately was I the opposite direction. Since then I have had as much contact as poss, every other weekend staying at hotels near dd plus a week here and there for holidays and Christmas.

I just can do it anymore. It's exhausting doing all the travelling and I can't afford petrol, hotel and eating out every other weekend.

I have suggested a new plan- 6 weeks no contact, but then a whole week with my girl up here so we can spend quality time and she can get to know her other family.

Ex has said no- it's not in the interests of our daughter, it's out of her routine, it's too long away from mum, etc etc. but how is it not in her interest of she gets to spend proper time with me?

Ex isn't budging and I don't know what to do. I just can't carry on like this. I'm broke and exhausted.

Aibu to try to take this to court?

Couthy brilliantly put that exactly how it is

Aah a tortilla

Aww I'm disappointed I thought I was gonna learn about something new! I honestly wasn't picking on a spelling mistake!

I read tortia as torsha! And just wondered what it was!

Sock, if you'd seen some of my older posts under my old user name, you would be even more amazed at how I have managed to bite my tongue when faced with extreme provocation...

The time where the OW threatened to kill me over a bottle of headlice lotion springs to mind, or the fact that SHE keeps cutting 10yo DS's hair AGAINST HIS WILL, or the fact that even as recently as 10 days ago, she made a complete spectacle of herself in a playground with 700+ people in it at the end of sports day, shouting and screaming at me while I calmly asked her not to talk to me like that, could she please use a reasonable tone towards me, could she speak to me calmly, could she please remember that she was in a packed playground in front of younger DC's, her own and mine included...

I got a round of applause when she had finished her tirade...

The good thing about it is a) She made a total tit of herself in front of ALL the teachers and other parents. b) My DS wasn't there to see or hear it as he was getting changed (though it was in front of my 17mo from a different relationship, and her own 2.10yo and 5mo baby) and c) I looked like the paragon of reasonablness in front of everyone, keeping my calm and talking to her politely, asking her politely not to talk to me like that!

Babies are hard work. Hell yeah, I'd need support if my OH left me in the lurch!

6 weeks is long time for an 18 month old to go between visits. I assume your OW is having her first child, and has no idea how unsettling a whole week apart from its primary care-giver can be for a child of that age.

Re contact arrangements - courts generally do not approve arrangements that involve long journeys for young children. They expect those seeking the contact with the children to do the travelling, not the other way round. So I don't think you would get a court order to this effect and even less likely that you would get one that forced your ex-w to do any of the travelling!

within 18 months of having a baby you're having another one with someone else - when you can't sustain contact with the one you've already got. What a dismal situation for your child and ex-w.

You say you aren't doing the current arrangements anymore - don't then. YOu wont see your daughter much or have much of a relationship with her - your choice. I bet you won't really go to court either - you will call your ex-w controlling and whatever else (she is allowing you loads of contact wiht your daughter so I cannot see how she is controlling) but I don't think you will take any action to try and resolve this. You'll just complain and whinge.

Hope you manage to keep your dick in your pants before you produce any more kiddos. FWIW you sound morally bankrupt and I don't think your dd is missing out by not having contact with you.

I wish your ex-w well though.

Dh has a child with someone who is not me, it went to court and now we never see her, despite it costing 10k in solicitor fees.

Dh cocked up big time with his ex, and even though we have zero access she is the one who is bringing her daughter up and for that I respect her so much.

The thing is, he can walk out of his DD's life for months or years on end, and then when he can be bothered, or his current relationship breaks down, can go to court, put in for access, and be granted it. Even after 12 years of no contact, no maintenance, nothing...

McHappy, I've just seen your post about working Christmas. When I have been working, I have been quite lucky, I have managed to swap Christmas with a younger member of staff (in 4 different workplaces!) for New Year's Eve. I wouldn't have been going out anyway, and that way they get to go out drinking, and I get Christmas with my DC's.

Would that be a possibility for you, or are you working because your DC's are away for Christmas?

I am half considering volunteering for a soup kitchen or something next Christmas, rather than be on my own. My only problems with that is lack of transport due to buses not running on Christmas day, and not knowing how my health issues will be until the day.

It is in her best interests that she sees her father and is involved with her new family- at our house- here. Not in a series of hotels every other weekend!

Helplessdad, hopelessdad, deludeddad...

Honestly, leave the child alone. She doesn't need this hassle in her young life. It's not in her interests at all. This is all about what you want, not about what she needs.

Also working new years lol, my dc will have to get used to it. But it hurts that I will not be there.

I know...[feels your pain emoticon]

Couthymow. I know this off topic but tell your ex to bugger off and then have your son with your for Xmas! He can have him boxing day or something. You deserve a nice Xmas too and you are his primary care giver.

So you had an affair, your wife moved to stay with her family (very sensible choice for all concerned) but happened to be 200 miles away. Your new partner lives further away and you choose to move in with her.

You are now waking up to the fact that children can't just be had and divvied up according to what parents want for themselves. Paying maintenance for your child does not mean you are paying to see her. The two are not connected, unlike the inference in your earlier sentence.

Suddenly you are realising that children are for life and that they have needs too. You have no money so reality is biting hard.

If I had a child that I was separated from I wouldn't move further away from her, I would move as close as possible, whatever the cost to me.

Regarding the holiday, why did you not get week long access with your daughters in the first place?

Krumbum - I can't, because DS is used to spending every other Christmas there, with his half-siblings. Much as it will make ME feel like shit, that's not DS's problem. My issue is that it would never BE like this had my Ex-H kept it in his trousers...

I think you are being extremely unreasonable.
You had an affair when your wife had a young baby and so you chose to be with your new partner instead of being a father to your child.
Your ex then chose to move to be near to her family for support (I assume you knew where her family lived and when deciding to leave your wife you would probably have considered that she would move away so this can't have come as a surprise to you).
You then again chose your partner over your child as you moved even further away.
so really you have brought this situation on yourself and can't complain now that it is costing you money. You can clearly afford to pay for a new baby.
I also don't think it is reasonable to expect your new partner to care for your toddler DD when she also has a young baby to look after.
Could a solution be to cut your regular visits to once a month instead of every 2 weeks and do some skype or phone calls inbetween. This way you are still seeing DD on a regular basis. Then when she is older she can come for visits in the school holidays.
But as the saying goes you have made your bed and now you have to lie in it i'm afraid.

Short version ........

YWBU to try and take this to court

HTH

I was ready to say YANBU when I read the title but I'm afraid now that I have read the thread, YADBU. I think the situation here is that you fucked up. You chose your mistress over your own daughter and your ex wife felt she needed support from her parents. You and your bit on the side caused that. Then you chose to move even further away from your daughter, so well done, you must be so proud of how you treated your own little girl.

You are her father therefore should have a relationship with her but you are hardly in a position to call the shots here.

YABU.

You decided to have an affair. What did you think would happen when your ex found out/you left her? That she'd stick around without her family to support her, presumably at a time when she needed them, for your benefit?

Yes, your ex has moved away, but you caused the situation and it is up to you to maintain contact with your child. Your child should have come first and if your new relationship made it difficult for you to see your child then you should have ended it before you decided to have another child within it. But then, had you been putting your child first, then you and your child wouldn't be in this position now.

So, stop whining about how much it is costing to see your DD and stop trying to make plans that are in your interests and not your DD's.

Id suggest you keep contact going. You'll be surprised how much damage it can be NOT having contact then suddenly turning up on the doorstep is to a child. She may start to resent you, not want to leave making things very difficult for everyone.

How long were you planning on keeping your plan up of only 1 week for? If ex starts putting your DD in regular nursery at the age of 2 for example you'll find it very difficult to put your plan into place. The year that your DD turns 3 she then gets 15 hours free nursery time 5 days a week. Can be spread out obviously but still, you need to think carefully & speak to your ex. Let her know you're concerned how this will all work & that its expensive for you & see if you can compromise. Can you move closer to her?

Just skipped from the first page to the last. Could tell this was an affair even then!

Op, you need to look at contact schedules drawn up my mediation services online. Your dd is in the same bracket as mine which is roughly contact every weekend, overnight every other weekend and half a day in the week.

My exp suggested only having dd every other weekend, you know, so he could have a life......

Anyway...IMO the amount of contact is quite important regardless of reasons for the split but maybe you and ex need to compromise a bit re transport. A friend of mine takes her kids half way to meet their dad when he has them for weekends. He lives in the southwest and she lives in yorkshire. The huge drives twice a week are a pain but they just get in with it - the kids are settled into a routine now and mum gets a break regularly.

Re your ex saying dd's routine is important. - it damn well is, it's more important than your convenience and I have fought hard to maintain this for my child. I won in court.

And if the ex is reading this thread - happy to help with legal advice pm me x

She doesn't sound controlling at all, possibly she is bitter but she has every right to be.

As someone else said, it is a shame that you did not feel this desperate to see your daughter or work with her best interests before you had an affair.

I am not talking about you being punished but seriously, you have decided that she belongs to you and your new partner, or that is what it sounds like, when in fact she has a mother already. You totally betrayed her mother and now you're trying to take the child away to become part of your 'new' set up, because that suits you, not because it is good for your daughter.

A small child needs stability and one solid grounded stable parent. Two parents is a bonus if they are able to communicate well and they are both stable.

A new baby will be hard for a toddler to deal with in her own environment. Having to deal with a new sibling PLUS a new mother/carer PLUS the only familar person in the house not being THERE most of the time she is visiting PLUS being taken away from her primary carer for a week at a time is likely to cause some serious, serious issues for this poor child.

Think about it, it's not good for her, it's just a fantasy on your part. Why not just accept that you have chosen someone else, have a new child coming along, have moved away and attempted pathetically to justify this with the fact your ex moved away for support she badly needed when you left - she had a good reason, you did not - and that all your choices so far appear to indicate that your older child is in now way your priority any more?

Let her be - yes, skype, and call, and go down when you can. But at least FFS allow her the stability and routine she deserves as a toddler with her mother as her primary carer.

I hope you do not leave the second child as well when it becomes too difficult to cope with things. Nothing to suggest you will but your history does you no favours.

As the first child becomes older things will be much easier to facilitate. You will not lose her entirely if your contact is kept reasonable and realistic at this stage. You will have your chance later but it has to be proportional to what your life choices allow and taking her away for a week (when you won't even be around!!!) is just not proportional AT ALL.

OP you may be finding it hard but it really is a situation of your own making.

You gave up on your wife and baby and drove them out of town. It's unsurprising that they won't be travelling long distances to help you feel better about your appalling behaviour.

Especially when you have already shacked up with another partner and are expecting another child.

You are unreasonable to expect your ex to rearrange her life to fit in with your self-made domestic complications.

Actually how it comes across is that you made some efforts to see your first child but now that you have another baby on the way, you can't be bothered. You would rather spend your time and money on your replacement family.

That is terribly callous, and in keeping with your past behaviour of betraying your ex and dd.

If you truly want to improve your relationship with your first child, you need to move nearer to her and work out a way to fit in with her life, rather than removing her from everyone and everything familiar to her for the sake of giving yourself a fatherhood pat on the back.

If the father of my 18month old proposed to whisk her out of nursery for a week and leave her with her new stepmother, I wouldn't be helping with the plan either. Infact it makes my blood run cold.

Try to consider others - your dd, your ex, your partner etc.

It is not impossible to find a solution but you're going to have to work a lot harder.

so just to summarise 11 pages:

-YWBU to have the affair
-YABU to start 2 families within 18 months
-YABU to propose these contact arrangements.

if you need a judge to tell you the second one - feel free to spend thousands in court. it will cost you more than a hotel and travel costs.