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AIBU?

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Original poster

To almost ignore your kids after absence?

68 replies

inbloomfornow · 09/04/2020 15:19

My exh has not seen our children since Friday past.
He chose to spend lockdown with his girlfriend intermittently rather than see the kids as usual... eow and twic weekly for a few hours . He is now unemployed so had hoped he would engage a bit more as it was his work that hindered him from spending more time with the kids by all accounts!
Anyway as she lives away in another city and travels to see him and spend days at his house, I didn't want the kids to spend time there with him due to lockdown restrictions/ cross infection etc . He agreed . He chose her .
He has arrived to our home today to do some basic maintanance . That's not a problem . He is here just under four hours and has hardly acknowledged the kids.
Is this just weird ? Or normal to you???

OP posts:
vanillandhoney · 09/04/2020 16:37

I am seriously concerned about the intelligence of some people at the moment.

HE DOESN'T LIVE WITH YOU SO HE SHOULDN'T BE THERE.

sonjadog · 09/04/2020 16:45

Power washing is essential? What is he washing that couldn't wait?

tealandteal · 09/04/2020 16:45

Why couldn't you do the power washing? Or just leave it, your house will hardly fall down?

onanothertrain · 09/04/2020 16:47

Fuck sake. He is allowed to see the children. He should not be travelling to your house to power wash stuff.

1Morewineplease · 09/04/2020 16:52

Maybe go into the garden with your children and pull up your own weeds?

TSSDNCOP · 09/04/2020 16:58

@1Morewineplease or power wash. It's easy enough. Point. Spray. Volia!

1Morewineplease · 09/04/2020 17:05

Exactly @TSSDNCOP

OP what your ex is doing is absolutely not essential in any way, and can easily be done by you.

harriethoyle · 09/04/2020 17:10

So - you're using coronavirus to weaponise contact between your ex and your kids, but still ask him to come and do DIY when it suits you, which is CLEARLY outside the rules you're so keen to stick to when it suits you? Unbelievable.

AnneLovesGilbert · 09/04/2020 17:25

I’m with harriethoyle, have a word with yourself FFS.

Elieza · 09/04/2020 17:42

The girlfriend needs to Stay At Home and not visit him at an address she doesn’t live at.

He needs to Stay At Home at the address he is registered as staying at not your house.

You should not be allowing a member of your family who does not reside with you to come round to your house. It was not necessary.

I’d have understood if he was fixing the toilet for you or something urgent, as you would have kept the kids away and disinfected everything he’d touched.

But to power wash. Really? Nobody’s gonna die without power washing the drive or whatever. Are the rules do hard to understand?

Theresnobslikeshowb · 09/04/2020 17:54

Just stop!!

Poppi89 · 09/04/2020 18:11

He is a twat for not paying more attention to the kids.
He is also a twat for doing non-essential things like travelling to yours and his gfs house.

You need to go and sort the weeds yourself, if you are disabled and you can't then just leave them it's not the end of the world.

If you have asked him to come and do the weeds then I get why he is in a mood.

From now on tell him to not come and instead ring the kids at a set time.

Original poster
inbloomfornow · 09/04/2020 18:42

Thanks for replies.
He insisted on him
Doing it as it is half his house and the whole place is overridden with nettles, broken branches , broken fences etc. There is a little stream
Outside our boundary where a rotted fence broke off and is submerged . No urgency but he was insistent because Of
rodents etc
I have had a troubling time from him about the kids and he sees me as deliberately trying to mess things up for him as ' his girlfriend is all I've got left...' I am genuinely hyper protective of me and the kids and he is a bully who I can't handle . It was his lack of love or interest in the kids that had upset me originally but I absolutely take your points I suppose I am still
Reeling that he chose his girlfriend over the kids in lock down and f I am being honest . Thanks again.

OP posts:
Poppi89 · 09/04/2020 19:01

I get that the property is half his but I think it's odd he would come to do the weeding especially in the middle of a pandemic! Do you think there is a part of him that's checking up on you?
It sounds a bit controlling to just turn up and start doing it without warning you or speaking to the kids much

Dishwashersaurous · 09/04/2020 19:07

Given as you haven’t sold the property yet I assume that the separation is recent. It’s ok to feel upset about stuff but it’s not worth wasting the emotional energy on this

Canadianpancake · 09/04/2020 22:01

It did sound like he has an ulterior motive for being there and acting like that. It's quite manipulative behaviour.

Original poster
inbloomfornow · 09/04/2020 22:16

He definitely forgets that he is not in charge anymore. He started to tell me what to do on the phone and sniggered at some diy questions I had and ideas I put forward ... and I thought to myself ... you don't get to talk ton me like this anymore so I shut the blinds and watched a film with my children and ignored him. He left without saying goodbye. He is making sure that I don't make any changes to the house or outside without his consent . The irony here is that he did fuck all when he lived here and the place went to ruin . Dick . Thanks

OP posts:
user1473878824 · 10/04/2020 03:37

So YOU shut the blinds and watched a film so he couldn’t talk to them?

Don’t LET him come round. Power wash your own house.

He sounds like a complete twat but all of you seem to have no idea what the bloody rules are ffs.

Mittens030869 · 10/04/2020 03:54

I don't understand why it is that so many people can't follow such clear rules?

mortforya · 10/04/2020 04:12

Wow, people on here really need to be less judgemental to others during this lockdown. Any sniff of a chance to judge others and your off. Most countries have shown true compassion and kindness when times are tough, is this really what people in the UK are really like or just a small minority? The op has explained that there was no physical contact and no essential travelling that put others at risk. Really, try to stop searching for reasons to put someone down, it is an awful consistency on this site. The op had obided by all rules, no one was in her house, her children have not seen one single person in 3 weeks and nobody travelled away from their area. Please look at other ways to entertain yourselves, there really are better ways.

mathanxiety · 10/04/2020 04:24

You did the right thing by insisting on no contact if he wanted his GF instead of making his own home a base. He was teaching you a lesson by ostentatiously not interacting with the children.

You need to find a way to sort out the weeds and disarray in the property by yourself. How old are the DCs? Could they lend a hand if you were to make a start? Do you have a mower or is it all gone beyond mowing?

Flowers to you. It's really hard trying to deal with a jerk at a time like this.

mathanxiety · 10/04/2020 04:26

Don't swing any ideas you have for improving the house past him any more. He will just scoff at them regardless of how good they are.

Get the garden/yard/property cleaned up. He can;t haul you over the coals for this - you are cleaning up a hazard to the children and you are improving the property by cleaning up.

Mummyoflittledragon · 10/04/2020 04:26

I don’t see what op is doing wrong to be honest. She is protecting her children. He is the one, who isn’t and chose his gf over his kids. The power washing was done at his insistence, not because she asked... quite possibly to check up on her. This is his power trip, not hers.

Bubblebu · 10/04/2020 05:24

"He has arrived to our home today to do some basic maintenance"

From my perspective you are lucky - he is prepared to do some kind of maintenance. Mine left and that was it - learn it all from the get go.

Bubblebu · 10/04/2020 05:27

mortforya

Yes that is really what it is like in the UK.

Many many chat websites (MN is not the only one) have lots of people trying to put others down and tell them how wrong they are.

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