Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Original poster

Am I wrong or was DP?

108 replies

crossroadsmum · 19/07/2019 17:49

I have NC for this but long time lurker occasional poster.
I just want to know if I am being unreasonable about something that happened the other evening.
DD went to the gym. She is 18 and walked up there it's about a 20 minute walk, if that.
She called just as DP (not her dad) and I were sitting down to a late dinner. It was just starting to get dark and she was walking home and she said she was worried about a man acting strangely. He had been on the other side of the road and had slowed his pace to hers, then crossed over to walk behind her. He had stopped at a bus stop and then when she had turned round to check he had gone and she didn't know where he was and she didn't want to get off the main road to walk the quieter roads to home.
I said right I am coming to get you (she was only 5 mins away at this point so close to home). DP was really cross that I did this. He thinks she was manipulating me to get a lift. I think I did exactly the right thing. I believe there was a man that was worrying her even if he wasn't doing anything intentionally. He may have wanted to catch the bus but she was worried and that was enough for me.
So was I wrong? I dont think I was but thought I would ask the wise mumsnetters, thank you.

OP posts:

Limpshade · 20/07/2019 05:59

I've been your daughter and it was very frightening to me. You did the right thing.

And EVEN IF she'd been pulling a fast one, it was irrelevant in the moment. There's no way you could have taken that risk, not even if you yourself doubted the story. I'm surprised he thought it was a risk worth taking, but from your updates it sounds like he doesn't care that much for them. Please consider the impact that could have.

howdyalikemenow · 20/07/2019 06:10

Sounds like he's got 'man of the house' syndrome. My ex was like that and it was so bad I have vowed never to live with another man as long as my kids are dependent on me because I can't bear the conflict and I won't be told to put another man before my children again.

SignedUpJust4This · 20/07/2019 07:41

Men may get attacked more but ask him if he would be more nervous if statistically his attacker would be twice as strong and wanted to rape him. dickhead.

TheStoic · 20/07/2019 07:43

This has made me furious on your children’s behalf.

Who the fuck does he think he is, getting annoyed at you for protecting your daughter?

Why are you not more angry?

LemonSqueezy0 · 20/07/2019 07:49

Not only your DC, he has blatant disregard for you as well... Do you feel an undercurrent of hatred not far from the surface. He's annoyed YOU went to get your own daughter who felt unsafe. It didn't impact on him or his dinner,but he's still arguing?! What a wanker.

You deserve better. And your DC deserve better. Imagine old age, where you don't see them as he's got worse, and they don't want to come over. Or he makes you feel like you have to sneak around to see them, to avoid rows with him.... Get out now.

Rm2018 · 20/07/2019 07:54

Ffs why on earth are you with someone who is so horrible to your children

MRex · 20/07/2019 08:00

Your DP's reaction is really quite odd. Most of the men I know would want to make sure a young girl is safe, whoever she is. Your DP can't even bear to reheat the dinner for your daughter. I don't like it, not one little bit. You need to have a think about his other behaviours, there's something wrong with this man.

WhatWouldTheDoctorDo · 20/07/2019 08:12

He sounds pretty unpleasant OP. As others have said, you deserve better and so do your children. Don't subject them to sharing their lives with someone who has such disregard for them.

BlueSuffragette · 20/07/2019 08:15

You did the right thing to go and get your daughter. I think you need to do the right thing now for all of your children and re-evaluate your relationship with a partner who is so horrible to them.

Prawnofthepatriarchy · 20/07/2019 08:21

Tell your DP that men commit over 90% of violent crime and 98% of sex crime, and that when male violence and predatory behaviour stops then you will no longer need to worry about your DD

Rosielily · 20/07/2019 09:37

** With all due respect, this goes beyond your DP being annoyed that you went to pick your daughter up because she was anxious, doesn't it?

He gets cross with me if they don't say hello to him first. He won't talk to them first and if I say they are kids, they learn from us he just says they have no respect for him. I have told him he has to show them respect but he says they are "just kids"

Not only is he treating you with barely disguised contempt, that is now being directed towards your daughters too.

Is this how you see your future, and do you really want to be giving your impressionable young girls that this is how relationships should be?

What is your relationship with your DP like generally?

In whose name is the house for example, who pays the bills, mortgage, rent.........

Original poster

crossroadsmum · 20/07/2019 09:44

Oh wow thank you all for your comments.

To those of you talking about needing to reevaluate my relationship with DP I am already doing this. I didn't mean to drip feed but the comments mean I need to add...ds2 has had some major issues over the last year which has involved a lot of extra support from myself, CAMHS, therapists and his school. I have had to give a lot of my time to him and therefore a lot of my "spare" time to my other DC because they need me too! DP has therefore not had as much of me as he is used to. Before this things were ok...not perfect but not like they are now. His true colours, I suppose, have been coming out.

I have been looking at my relationship with him in a very different light. DS2 is much much better and more stable, with a good support system in place at home and at school. So now suddenly all the things I hadn't had time to deal with, or just put down to a stressful time in general, are suddenly highlighted and not good enough.

I do love him but do not like him anymore.

lemonsqueezy0 has hit the nail on the head. My DC will not want to come and visit. Not how things have become. And they are my world, and things have come to this because they are my world and therefore I "neglected" DP while I was trying to support all of them through an incredibly difficult time. He is, as a PP said, a man child.

OP posts:

SignedUpJust4This · 20/07/2019 11:42

I don't understand why you would allow anyone who shows such contempt towards your children any part in your life. Please don't underestimate how much your kids will pick up on his attitude towards them and how that will make them feel as they get older.

Trickyteens · 20/07/2019 12:08

My own DH would have been in the car before I had a chance to think. Your DH is the manipulator, not her. Obviously, if it is true that she does make a habit of manipulating you (and teens sometimes do), you need to check this, but not over a safety issue.

MrsAJ27 · 20/07/2019 12:24

By the sounds of it, he brings nothing positive to your lives.

Get rid of him, before its too late and he ruins the relationship between you and you children.

ZillaPilla · 20/07/2019 17:06

If anyone called me at any time of day, male or female of any age, I'd help them in this situation.

mussolini9 · 20/07/2019 17:36

... but he has a habit of making me doubt myself as far as my dc are concerned. I would do the same for dd or my DS's. To the pp's who said about how he wouldn't understand as he has never felt like that, I have actually had an argument about this before when he said that women do not get scared or worried any more because there is no need and more men get attacked than women.*

What a charmer.
Was it his emotional intelligence or his flawless logic that attracted you to him most OP?

Seriously - he sounds like a thoughtless misogynist.
And the 'making me doubt myself around my DC' is concerning. Why would he seek to undermine you like that?

If somebody spoke to me about my child like that, I would initially give them an earful, & follow up with a good long hard think about whether I, or my child, needed them in our lives.

mussolini9 · 20/07/2019 17:41

Does DD often ask for lifts places? I think this makes a difference.
If she's usually pretty independent and gets about herself then of course YWNBU but if she's constantly asking for lifts to X, Y and Z and you've recently stopped pandering to her, then yes I would be suspicious she was making it up just to get a lift.

For goodness sake @NotSoSorry, your logic is as faulty as the DP's. The walk takes 20 minutes, The DD had already walked 15 of those minutes. Why would she then decide that it was a great idea to blag a lift for the last 5 minutes by making up a story that would worry her mum?

The DP was hideously crass, dismissive & thoughtless, but what you're taking from this sorry tale is an unlikely aspersion about the daughter?

mussolini9 · 20/07/2019 17:47

he just says they have no respect for him

Congratulations on raising 3 intelligent kids then, OP.
I have no respect for your DP either.

Kidworries · 20/07/2019 18:10

Why would she want to manipulate you for a lift. Surely she would just ask. And if she wanted a lift why wait until 5 minutes away. Your DP is a twat sorry

Original poster

crossroadsmum · 21/07/2019 07:32

Hi everyone thank you all for the comments.

Can I add, as I know a lot of you are wondering why I am with someone who is like this with my DC, that it wasn't like this to start with.

I really appreciate all of the comments. I understand in light of some of the bits that I have said that this doesn't paint me in the best light but I know that comments made against me are meant in the best way. I need to do something about this and I will, I have been thinking about this for a few weeks now and your posts have made me realise that I must. He is quite emotionally manipulative and this has become clearer to me lately. It kind of creeps up on you doesn't it?

Anyway I am going to ask mumsnet to remove this post. This is because of the way it has gone and the fact that I have now made a decision to do something about it. If he mentions the initial story to someone who is on MN then it will be very outing and I want to be able to deal with this without any added possible triggers for arguing.

I will update once I am the other side! I am not scared of being on my own and I just don't think he realises that.

OP posts:

Thewheelsarefallingoff · 21/07/2019 08:10

Best of luck, op.

awesmum · 21/07/2019 09:03

Best of luck op

MRex · 21/07/2019 09:14

Good luck OP, see you on the other (happier) side.

Pinktinker · 21/07/2019 09:16

You 100% did the right thing and my own Mum did this one evening for me when I was a teenager. She was actually in bed at the time but flew out in her nightgown to come get me, I was also only five minutes from home.

It’s what parents do.

Flip

1 2 3 4 5

Swipe left for the next trending thread