Who is BU? Contact weekends and DCs

[GaelicSiog]

This will be long, sorry. I don't want to drip feed.

Two families.

L is DM and R is DF to DD3
L and R split before DD was born, R remarried to F. F has DD1, DD2 and DS1 from a previous relationship, and F and R have DTS2 and DTS3 together.

DD3 lives with L, and has contact with R EOW. Other DCs live with F and R, with DD1, DD2 and DS1 having contact with their dad every month.

DD3 attends an activity on Saturday mornings. Activity takes up the whole morning. DD3 has been doing this activity since she was 3 and the hours it takes up have increased as she's gotten older. DD3 is now 7. L signed her up for this activity. DD3 attends this activity every Saturday morning whichever weekend it is and has done since R managed to get a contract agreement set up. On contact weekends R takes DD3 to activity and picks her up. F takes DD1 and DD2 to another activity.

DS1 has decided he would like to start an activity which also runs on a Saturday morning. Closest place to do this is a 45 minute drive away, which means R cannot drop off DD3 and take DS1. R suggests that DD3 no longer attends her activity on contact weekends and can choose instead if she would like to go with R or F. She will still get to attend on weekends with L.

DD3 is upset because coaches at her activity say she cannot do comps if she doesn't come every weekend. L suggests contact hours are changed, DD3 stays with her Saturday mornings and is dropped with R and F after this activity. R isn't happy with his contact being shortened, and suggests DD3 arrive on Friday afternoon as normal, L picks her up Saturday morning and takes her to activity and drops her back after. L says she is not a taxi service. Parent of friend of DD3 who also attends her activity lives near F and R and offers to help with lifts. R isn't comfortable with this.

L tells R DD3 has said she feels her dad is putting his stepson ahead of her. She says R and F's solution isn't fair because it favours the resident DC. R and F feel L is using this as another excuse to scale back contact. R does not want to spend the morning driving back and forth taking both DCs every other Saturday.

If you're still with me, who is being unreasonable in this situation? Sorry for the length.

jerry maybe I should have done that to start with. It's not even just the kids that's confusing, it's the timeline.

He knows it means no comps. I think he thinks everyone is saying that, but no one would really make a 7 year old give up. Yes, they would. You have to commit to the training to compete. He's basically buried his head in the sand because F wants him on call for her DS. Even besides that issue, atm ex has the morning at home with DSS1 between pick ups, and F takes the twins to soft play. The place DSS1 will be going to is 45 mins away in the middle of nowhere. So DD will just have to sit and watch with ex.

Going back to court might have to be the solution. Although that worries me, because how he managed to get the arrangement he has now I really don't know

F does the school run for her DCs. I live half an hour from them, DD goes to school here.

Surely R can drop her at yours early, at breakfast club, or can work different hours every other Monday?

I would say given that your current contact arrangement is court ordered you should write to R and say:
Either we do this plan (the one-in-six arrangement proposed above OR the friends-transport arrangement, or propose one of the two if you have a strong preference - the friends-transport could work out about 1 in 6 with illness/emergencies to be honest) OR we will be returning to court for a variation to contact arrangements.

You'll be happy for Sat-lunchtime to Mon-morning if he can arrange drop off at yours or breakfast club or school. Otherwise it will be Sat-pm to Sun-eve.

I would do as Chatty says, and also get a letter from the coaches at DD's activity, that clearly states she has to attend every week otherwise she will not be able to compete, and her ability level is such that she can as well as wishing to. Perhaps her dad has no real understanding of this and how much it matters to her. If it did go back to court it would show him in a poor light for not doing what is best for her, even though he loses time with her at week-ends.

If you refused to make her available for contact for Friday evening/Saturday morning over this, there is nothing a court can do to punish you, especially if DD refuses to go to her dads. Courts do acknowledge that contact sometimes has to change as the child grows and has their own interests and social life, it would be ridiculous on anyone's part to assume that it would stay the same for years. I think it's up to her dad to work out how to make the extra time for her, as he clearly favours the others. Maybe put it to him that going back to court could mean they find in your favour and he is ordered to see DD another day which is inconvenient for him workwise.

When DD was born he denied she was his, then did a massive u turn 2 years later, denied it all and said I was blocking him access and got contact in a contact centre building up to the arrangement we have now. I think he thinks he's invincible.

End result is he's been in his stepson's life since he was a baby, full time. This isn't the first incident of them being put first.

R is being totally unreasonable.

It smacks of him wanting 'his' time on paper - nothing an be varied, as he 'loses' time, when in fact, this isn't time he was spending with dd3 anyway since she is at an activity,

The starting point for all this, is the longstanding commitment dd3 has made to her sport. 4+ years, not inconsiderable for a 7 year old. I am guessing that this is the longest running commitment out of all the children (if I have their ages vaguely right!)

In all large families, there is compromise. Child 1 gets the first pick of activities, due to age and circumstance, but then as soon as another child comes along, compromise is needed somewhere. Sometimes this is the other parent stepping up, sometimes this is a non-preferred arrangement for child 1 (e.g. dropped early, or a lift share), sometimes extra running around for parents (to drop early/at lift share's house) etc.

There are 6 children in this equation, so it's never going to be simple, and that's without 3 different parent groupings.

BUT

dd3 wants to keep going with her sport. This is important for health and personal development. And crucially, it isn't a new arrangement which is eating into her contact time, it has always been there (so R cannot compa,in on this score)

Despite a very busy morning, with lots of different children/activities/places, all children currently get a good 'quality time' morning, whether an activity, 1:1 time with a parent figure, or soft play. There is no 'hanging around' for any of them.

R has been offered at least 2 reasonable offers to accommodate his drop-off issues. It is understandable that he doesn't want to lose the Friday afternoon/evening contact, but this could be worked around easily by him dropping dd3 off on Saturday morning, rather than demanding OP does the running around (to suit him!), which actually then makes it 3 reasonable offers.

The only person being obstinate here is R. He doesn't want to continue with the current arrangement, because ds1 want some to try an activity. Ok, fair enough, compromise needs to happen. But R doesn't want to lose contact time, doesn't want to drop dd3 off with her mum on Saturday morning, doesn't want to enable a lift share. R doesn't want anything other than dd3 to give up her activity for half the time, give up competitions, and to be bored hanging around watching her stepbrother(rather than have the option of a quality morning as all other children get).

It just doesn't stack up.

Why is R acting so negatively towards dd3? Even worse when you consider that dd3 is R's own child.

Why does everything have to be about what everyone except dd3 wants?

For making dd3 give up every other weekend R is BU. However he is NOT BU over wanting to allow DSS1 to do an activity he would like to do.
Neither child should ideally need to loose out.

If you think it is a matter of money could you suggest that they do not change how much they pay in maintenance would this make them agree to dd3 arriving mid Saturday afternoon?

Could you tell him to speak to her instructor so they can explain the impact it will have?

But they are committed to something on Saturday morning so they need to find an activity for ds1 that doesn't clash

Just like I have to with my two kids - unfortunately sometimes one misses out but the prior commitment stands

Or R could grow up and accept that others are offering to help. OP has said she will takeover the Saturday morning activity for dd3, b that doesn't suit R. OP has found a lift share with a friend, but again R doesn't want to. Both so,unions which mean ds1 can try his activity.

R is having a tantrum over things not going his way, and the only one inconvenienced is dd3.

He has never bonded properly with DD3 I suspect, and also that F pushed him to go for contact. Now he has it, he thinks he can call all the shots as convenient for him and his other family while expecting DD3 to just fit in around it.

There is also an element of control over the OP where she has to fit in as well, note how she is looking for compromises and solutions while his attitude is that DD3 gives up her activity some Saturdays to the benefit of DS1, and so that R retains his number of days contact. If that is such an issue him having DD3 for a certain number of days every year, does he not take her on holiday or week-ends with the other family? Family days out in school vacations during the week?

It is odd he won't consider the friend taking her - what's that all about? Is it because he doesn't want these people to thinks he's an arse? Because they'll think he's an even bigger one if she ends up missing out

If you are going to drop DD to her activity in the short term, could the friend's parents drop her back at your ex's house after the activity? It would save you having to do both ways and there wouldn't really be anything your ex could do about it.

What an arse. His behaviour is awful, but hardball may not be to the benefit of DD. I wonder if it would make any difference if you were to say you wouldn't be looking for any more maintenance to reflect reduction in contact...

I texted him and basically said that he has two options for the weekend. Either he finds a solution that doesn't involve DD skipping her session and spending an hour and a half in the car and more time sat around watching DS, which can be the friend lift solution I've already offered up, or I drop DD round after her session. He is welcome to keep her until Monday morning, but he will be responsible for getting her to school. If we can't come to an agreement that suits all DCs then maybe we need to look at revising the contact.

He's unhappy with this and wants to go back to court to get 50/50 residency apparently. I don't believe for a second that's what he actually wants, although I can believe he wants to pay less. DD doesn't have a fixed sleeping arrangement there and they're planning DC7, there is no way practically they want to take on DD more. Although how he managed to get EOW is beyond me.

I totally agree that DSS1 needs to get to do activities too. I'm the youngest in a bigger family than this, so I understand that there needs to be some compromise. I just don't think that DSS1 picking an activity that's 45 mins away and involves DD having to hang around for that time, that means DD has to give up something she loves and that means F's DDs are unaffected is the answer. F and ex are arguing that DSS1's activity is every weekend and should therefore take priority. DD's is every weekend and during the week too, it just only affects them EOW because that's when she's there.

boop he doesn't want help from parents I know because they'll have been told my made up, fantasist version of events about how we split, how he reacted when DD was born etc. All of it is lies, obviously. I'm mean like that. I am very tempted to go with love's suggestion for drop offs back there though.

Holidays. Lol. Officially, he gets her at Christmas because my family doesn't celebrate, I get her when we celebrate our religious festival IYSWIM. First year they made a huge show of their perfect blended family at F's parents. Year after that their twins were born right before Christmas, so they didn't want DD because it would be too much. Next year they had her, year after that they went away for Christmas to visit F's family abroad and basically gave me the option of not seeing her all Christmas break or her not going. She didn't go. Her choice, although I can't say I wasn't pleased she chose that. Last year they had her at F's family, which probably deserves another thread all to itself. Not awful, just thoughtless.

There have been lots of days out type incidents. They invite her if it suits them. Since they've had the twins it has suited them less. They will often take her along eg to DD1 and DD2's school play or something, family parties etc. Days out to places you have to pay to get the kids in, not so much.

He can't put himself out to find a solution to get his dd to a long standing activity once a fortnight, yet he wants to take in 50/50? yeah, ok.

If it goes to court, they will be most interested in the rights of the child. And she has spoken, and would like to continue a longstanding activity. What about that does he not understand?

Given how he's behaving, 50/50 could end up with him having her eg Sunday night until Wednesday lunch, which would alleviate his stress wrt weekend activities, but heap a hell of a lot more on due to school runs. Has he thought about that?

I kind of want to hear about that Christmas at F's now...

But yeah, 50/50 my hole. If either of you does apply for a court order on the matter, you'd be expected to go to mediation first, which could be an interesting experience.

If EX is concerned about having to pay more maintenance potentially, he will be even more concerned about paying to go back to court. Money that would be better spent on the DC. A court won't have to know about any changes to contact informally agreed between parents, unless one or other instigates another court ruling of changes to arrangements. They're overloaded with cases as it is.

They want to have another child when they can barely manage the activities of the ones they have? DD3 doesn't even have a proper sleeping arrangement there and he wants her 50/50 care? How unwelcome she must feel. How do they manage to transport all the DC around if all together?

Had you considered doing mediation regarding the matter?

DD3 should keep her activity every weekend. R is being selfish towards her. The contact times are for the benefit of the child NOT the non resident parent. The stepson's biological parents need to sort out the arrangements for his activity. R is going to find that DD3 is going to stop wanting to have contact as she gets older if he keeps making it awkward for her to do normal weekend activities

We had mediation before the contact as it is now was put in place. I found out I was pregnant with DD after we split, but I found out very, very late. Which I put down now to how stressful the situation with ex and a work situation, family drama etc were all at the time. It meant that there was a tiny gap relatively between me telling ex and having DD. That tiny gap was also there for me. It was stressful. It's a strangely embarrassing situation to be in. This was obviously a shock to ex and he insisted DD wasn't his and I was trying to con him into paying for her. My financial situation at the time meant I didn't need his maintainable for her, and quite frankly I had better things to be worrying about, so I left it. He moved in with F very soon after and her 3 kids from her husband at the time. He later decided he'd overreacted, that DD was his, and went to court for access. His version by that point was that he'd always known DD was his and I had been blocking him access. They believed him. He got gradual introduction to DD in a contact centre, which slowly built up to time spent at home and the current arrangement. Based on that I wouldn't be surprised if he persuaded them to give him 50/50.

Yes it's money for court that could be spent on DCs, but when it's money spent trying to screw over me I think he considers that money well spent.

I could try appealing to F's better nature. Although I seriously doubt that will get me anywhere.

I'm aware that makes it look like a total mess, it is a total mess. Although I still maintain he dragged DD into this mess, not me.

I had a similar situation with children's activities many years ago..and also the threat of court 50:50 , maintenance etc. I just called his bluff , put on a poker face, family courts saw right through it.. they see it everyday

I would now retreat and wait for him to react.

What will you do this weekend though? I would tell him as he won't promise to take DD to her activity or have the lift, he will have to wait until Saturday and pick her up from the activity.

He sounds like a total wankbadger.

DOn't worry about the court stuff. I doubt F will want him to spend that kind of money on court, or to have DD there 50/50.

Agree with Bluebell - call his bluff and poker face is the way to go.