I’ve posted a lot in the past about my ex and the way he makes me feel I’m not up to scratch as a parent.
We cannot co parent together, as it leads to arguments that he involves our daughter in.
I try to take the high road & ignore his comments but it doesn’t get me anywhere. I always come off as the uncaring bad guy.
She obviously loves her dad but he says a lot of things to her that gets her mind ticking and she takes it out on me. I then spend a lot of time trying to persuade her that I do love & care for her because her dad has made her feel like I don’t. She always jumps to his defence if I try to defend myself though, so again I bang my head on a brick wall.
He has her EOW, extra time during school holidays but doesn’t pay child Maintenance. Although he buys her clothes etc.. it’s never at the time they are needed. He doesn’t attend parents evenings or help her with homework.
He works ‘occasionally’ off the books/cash in hand so he doesn’t pay tax.
the CMS cannot take from his wages
As they cannot find a paper trail for him. So he is able to focus a lot of his time on just her when she’s there. I work shifts around 30 hours per week sometimes more/less. My partner has a standard 9-5 weekdays.
My ex’s most occurring put down is that I don’t give our DD enough attention. This is the reason he gives for any bad behaviour from her.
Examples like: he made a comment to our DD that I didn’t hug/kiss or make a fuss when I picked her up after she had spent a week on holiday with him.
The reality is: I took her bags put them in the boot and she got straight in the car.i told her she looked very tanned, we all missed her etc. When we got home we all bundled on her with hugs & kisses.
He then made plans with her yesterday to go out for dinner because I hadn’t written anything on our family planner so he assumed I wasn’t doing anything with her for Halloween.
Reality: I actually had 3 hours of time available to spend with just her and we were going to do Halloween make up on each other.
I feel at constant war with him, he is always trying to show me up as a half arsed parent. But he has no idea what our home life is like. Although I’d love to be able To be home with the kids more, unfortunately I have to work to pay bills. And I have a right to work in a job that I enjoy. But he says I should Work in a school so I can be home more. All of this seems to make our daughter more demanding and attention seeking.
Our relationship is becoming damaged, and I don’t know what to do anymore. I’m already spread as thin as possible.
Our DD attends support groups & has had counselling & play therapy.
That was long, thank you if you’ve managed to read to the end.