DPs ex insisting on having MY address?

[GirIFiend]

DP and I been together 10 months.

His DS who is 8 has always stayed with DP and DP's parents at their house which is where DP lived until 6 weeks ago when he moved in with me.

Last month DSS came to stay at my house to meet me and my DSes on his agreed contact weekend.

The plan was the same for this month but out of the blue DP's ex has texted saying she wants MY address or DSS will not be coming She says she has the right to know where her DS will be staying.

Can she insist on this?

How ridiculous! Why wouldn't you let the woman know where her child would be staying? I genuinely don't understand why this would be a problem. Unless you have something to hide there should be no issue!

I could not imagine anyone being comfortable with sending their child off to somewhere without knowing exactly where it was.

My sons dad came to my partners house before ds stayed there. He has all details comes here regularly and he's only has him 2 days a week.

Yab soooooooo u

OK just read there last page and saw it was a reverse aibu. Totally with you on this one. Have no advice, but i wouldn't be sending ds somewhere without an address

I agree entirely that you should have address, without it my dc wouldn't be going.

However I remember posting on a thread a while ago where someone said they wanted the address of where their young dc were going on holiday with his new DP and the DC and the majority of posters on there gave her a bit of a roasting along the lines of "he is their FATHER, he doesn't have to tell you, YABU!"

What's the difference?

The difference is a holiday address is not a usual address or a usual contact visit address.

And when mothers post about issues relating to fathers there is quite a militant group of people who automatically post quite doggedly from the precisely equal stance or what they think is the equal stance but its usually more biased against the mother they also tend to forget that some parents are not equal to the other some parents are also incompetent neglectful abusive (note the use of the word parent rather than mum or dad) and they also fail to remember that BOTH parents have a duty to protect the child in all circumstances especially if that protection is required because of the other parent and to protect children from them.

Good post SRP.

Ah, reverse AIBU. Somewhat irritating but still understandable.

I'd seek legal advice - you don't have to start anything, just get advised. I know in my situation exP and I usually always always tell each other where DS is and I'd be seriously unhappy if this wasn't the case but it has to go both ways. That said, he had a new gf recently and did have DS staying there without giving me an address or me really knowing anything about the woman / her home - I presumed there wasn't much I could do about that. Had he been actually moving in with her it would have been v different...

I am a mother and a stepmother. DSS lives with us and contact is limited with his mother.

In the past I have had problems with harrassment from her and the police have been involved. I have had to change my telephone and mobile numbers several times. However, she does know our address. It is written on all correspondence from solicitors and court anyway.

I can understand why he doesn't want to give out his address to a certain extend but, you need to know where you child is. What if there is an emergency and you need to pick him/her up in the middle of the night? Where would you go?

However, witholding the child from contact with the other parent is so very wrong and also something that happens all too often. The child is not at fault here and the issues you and your exP have should not involve the child. Sort them out via mediation or even better, be cordial to each other. It makes the whole situation much easier and better for the child/ren involved. They do pick up on tension and conflict.

You can request via the court that a CRB check is done on the new partner of your ex if you are worried about anything. If not, then try and speak to your ex and ask why he won't let you know where he is living and sort it out. PLEASE!

OP - if you don't trust your ex to keep your DC safe - withhold contact.

If you do trust him, then let it go. It's not nice, and totally unnecessary, but from experience I'd say that it's better for the DCs if you take the high ground and don't give them anything to worry about by asking for the address or withholding contact.

Yes, your ex is being an arse - but then that's not news, is it? If he wasn't an arse, he wouldn't be an ex! The key issue is whether he's a a good Dad - and if he's just doing this to get at you then I'd save your energy for issues that directly affect your DC.

Ex and I have not got on well and whilst I do trust that he will not harm my DS I find the way he treats me as DS's mother really unsettling.

He and his new g/f are making it very clear that they have no respect for me or my valid wish to know where DS will be. Its always been the agreement that I will know where DS is going - its just up til now, its always been the same place. I just feel like, if they don't think I have the right to know this one utterly fundamental bit of information then what the hell else will they decide is not my business to know/decide?

So when making plans for the next weekend, I said clearly that the visit was conditional on me getting the address. To which their response was to book ex's train ticket anyway, and tell me it had cost a lot of money and they hoped I wouldn't disappoint DS. When I reiterated that I would not be sending DS without the address, I got the aforementioned snarky message. They seem to think I don't mean it and ex is planning to come and get DS anyway

Oh and FTR, I have never harrassed ex, hidden in bushes, or anything of the sort.

He and his new g/f are making it very clear that they have no respect for me or my valid wish to know where DS will be

While you would hope that would be how a parent behaves, you can't force him to and as you say - you don't believe it doesn't affect his ability to keep your DS safe. I often found out after the event that my DD had been staying hundreds of miles away from our home town, with her Dads relatives, or at his G/F house while he was away on business. If I made an issue if it, he'd encourage DD to lie, or keep secrets, so eventually I left it because I do trust my ex to keep her safe even if he doesn't respect my role in her life.

It's up to you of course, but withholding contact is only justified, imo (and the view of the courts) if you genuinely believe your DCs safety is at risk. If your ex does choose to take this to court because you have withheld contact he may well be ordered to tell you where he is living, but at what cost? Court is not only expensive but messy, soul destroying and adversarial. You may be asked to justify, on oath, why you withheld contact and challenged about your motives. Is it worth it?

I can't understand why they have any problem with you knowing the address. It seems ridiculous to me.

Sparkly - when my ex goes away on holiday, I ask for an address and a land line if possible.

This is because if anything happens to me, my parents will need to get hold of him urgently and his mobile doesn't always have a signal.

In my experience holiday contact is often conditional n parents providing dates of travels, address and contact number. Again, I think this is basic information that both parents are entitled to have.

I think you are quite right to insist on an address and contact details. Your ex and his girlfriend are highly irresponsible and clearly putting their stupid need to play games with you ahead of any concern for the welfare of your child.

edam the thing is, the OPs ex refusing to tell the OP where he lives doesn't impact on the welfare of the DC at all, does it?
The OPs DS will only be affected if she chooses to withhold contact or otherwise mention it - if she ignores her ex's game playing, her DS would never know that his Mum doesn't know where he is.

If the OP has concerns about her sons safety when he is in Dads care then knowing where he is won't make any difference - and contact should be withheld.

I'm not saying its right, but the more fuss the OP makes the worse it will be for her DS.

I insisted on the same thing just this week for my children, I wanted an address of where they were going. I haven't even looked it up, merely stored it in my address book.
It's not unreasonable at all.

In the flip side I would gladly give my address to my partners ex if she asked

I disagree, pretty. The request for the address is perfectly reasonable. Withholding the address does affect the child as A. it causes antagonism without any good cause - there's no reason to be so difficult. B. in an emergency the OP needs to be able to locate her child/the OP's relatives need to be able to contact the child. C. Both parents are entitled to know the whereabouts of their child.

The OP's ex is being unreasonable and is putting his silly game-playing ahead of the needs of his child. That does not make him a good parent - in fact it casts doubt on his ability to understand what being a good parent is.

The OP's ex is being unreasonable and is putting his silly game-playing ahead of the needs of his child. That does not make him a good parent - in fact it casts doubt on his ability to understand what being a good parent is.

That.

You cannot be reasonable and sort it out with someone who is behaving unreasonably, it takes two. The mother's request is not ridiculous so why doesn't he go along with it, to ensure that contact takes place. Why should it be up to the mother to compromise if the vast majority of people think what she has asked is reasonable? It suggests that he cares more about winning than keeping things amicable for the child's sake, which makes him a crappy parent imo.

edam

A It will only cause antagonism if the OP rises to it; she can choose to ignore it, despite the intent, and the DC is not affected.
B If the DC is safe in the care of his DF, then what possible emergency could there be involving the OP that would require her son to be removed from that care?
C A parent has no legal rights regarding their DCs - the DCs have rights, not their parents.

Being a crappy parent in the eyes of an exP isn't a good reason to withhold contact (I wish it was) - as long as the DC is safe, the law protects a DCs right to a relationship with both parents regardless.

waffly we only ever hear one side of the story on AIBU - does that mean no one should ever say that someone is BU or not . In every thread people are just adjudicating on the facts as they are presented.

I agree, withholding an address can clearly impact on child's welfare.

Obvious practical example - when I was having chemo, strong chance over six months I would need urgent hospitalisation at short notice. Once my ex went to stay in relatives house over weekend, refused to give address or landline, saying I could call his mobile. Only problem was no reception at relatives house. Why on earth, if there is an emergency should there be any difficulty at all about contacting the parent who has the child. Why should my parents have to rush about ringing his sister or mother, trying to track him down. What would have been the impact on my daughter if I had been very unwell or even died and she found out at dropping off time?

You may think this is extreme or unlikely example, to which my response is - tough shit. I was primary carer, I know full well I was more responsible and pro active than my ex. I did not fear he would deliberately hurt her but I knew from previous experience that he wouldn't be too fussed if she was hungry or tired. So I did worry when she was little - now she is 8, I worry less. But if he wants to play silly games with me, I draw the line very hard and fast. I have all the stress and strains of being the main carer so he will respect that, even if he obviously neither likes nor respects me as a person.

Ad I think such disrespect for the child's other parent is harmful to the child in other ways. It causes distress to the parent who worries aout where his or her child is, that distress may well impact on parents emotional availability to the child.

It is just a bloody stupid, needless, provocative piece of nastiness, to refuse to reassure the other parent. My ex has done it to me so I have experienced this both as a lawyer and as a mother.

The stress it caused me was such that I took a hard line and simply said - you will not take our daughter out of my care overnight unless I know where she is. If he had wanted to take me to court over this I was quite comfortable as I know well how the courts would view his behaviour.

The stress it caused me was such that I took a hard line and simply said - you will not take our daughter out of my care overnight unless I know where she is. If he had wanted to take me to court over this I was quite comfortable as I know well how the courts would view his behaviour.

Which is why I asked the OP if it was worth it.

For you it was worth it; your circumstances meant the stress of not knowing was greater than for most people and your professional experience meant that Court was not a scary, unfamiliar place.
For others, the thought of 6+ months of family court, statements, meetings with solicitors, expense and impact on the DC is too big a price to pay for the reassurance of knowing the address the DCs stay when with their Dad.

I wonder how the OPs Ex would react should she state her intention to move house and not give him her new address.

Pretty - you are quite right, people need to think hard about what stress they can handle and family court proceedings are no walk in the park. They can only ever be a last resort.

But when I was faced with an ex who did to seem to understand my perfectly reasonable requests for information about where a three year old would be and how I could get hold of him if I needed to, I do not see what other option I would have had open to me.

Fortunately someone must have spoken to him and told him not to be an arse because he eventually saw the light and now provides the information without making big song and dance about it.

He has moved house. It is only logical and sensible that he updates you with his new contact details. It matters not that the house he has moved into is his girlfriends house.

I would do the same thing as you.