Ex putting suncream on my daughter

[CPParenttoDD1234]

HELP

Very acrimonious split with me ex resulting tin the courts making decisions about childcare and we still can’t communicate in an efficient way.

My DD is 3 she spend a few nights a week with him and we communicate via a book. I wrote in the book to remind him she’s allergic to most suncreams to remind him of the one we have used for the past year. This was back in April. He obviously ignored me and when I collected her he had used a branded one that she had reacted to. He denied it was the suncream.

Today I collect her again and she is head to toe in an itchy horrible rash - his explanation is it’s not the suncream as he has used it before a month ago and she was fine.

I’m furious as she’s now having to have piriton and is uncomfortable on another warm day and I don’t want to put anything more on her already angry skin.

The courts don’t care about this level of negligence - the father is always more important than the child’s needs in court. In my opinion it’s a form of child abuse as he knows she’s allergic to suncream yet he is purposefully exposing her to harm.

What would you all do please and am I being unfair for being so angry

There's no point in sending your own suncream. You know that.

Just RECORD. And FLAG - every single time.

Remember, the calmer and 'happier' about the situation you sound, the more likely it is that he won't be able to resist 'needling' you to get a reaction. If all your communication is text/email, you will eventually start getting evidence of his abuse. Be patient.

Sadly in the meantime your DD will suffer for this. Which at least will give you the resolve that you're doing the right thing.

Play the long game. And remember - if he's happy to do this, what it actually means is that he doesn't love his child, he gives not a shit about his daughter. So, when he realises that he can no longer use her to get to you, he'll more likely drop her.

This is very bad OP.

Send in the right suncream.
Also write him an email to remind him of using only that one and include pictures of your DD's rash and remind him that this was caused by his actions. I would also notify your GP.

Make sure he has access to the cream and document what happened now in case you have to go to court again and need evidence against him.

What an absolute dick!

No help, but you have my entire sympathy. My DD has also has a suncream allergy. I know how bad reactions can be when the wrong one is used (usually by well meaning parents of friends when she was playing out on a hot day and they were topping up their own child's suncream)

She was actually bleeding once in the creases on get arms 😢 Due to nivea (not the brands fault she just seems to react particularly badly to that brand)

She's a teenager now and knows what to avoid thankfully

What is your relationship like with his parents? Could they have a word with him?

Sending hugs

My ex has done this. DD has a milk allergy and he regularly feeds her milk. She is 7 and from what her and DS say to me, they even tell him selves that she can't have milk/cheese/cream etc when he presents her with it, but he just does it anyway. He's also fed DS some rubbish about how soya milk is bad for boys and men (so buy oat milk if you actually believe this!) so now there are issues around that.
I spoke to him, wrote to him, etc. It was clear that he didn't believe she was allergic (though he never explicitly said this). The last time she had to attend the dietician clinic I made him take her. I thought it might get it through to him that this allergy was real. It changed absolutely nothing sadly.
I think you have had good advice on this thread. Speak to your GP and keep things in writing. It is so hard to be in this situation.

Agree with what @honeybee85 says too

Send him an email when you are back from the doctors explaining what the doctors said with pictures of your daughter. Also stick some of the pictures in the book with notes of what has caused it and write what the doctor says.

Everytime you send your DD with him, put a note reminding him about the suncream. Even if you need to do it several times a week, and take pictures of the book with it written in. Just Incase he rips the pages out

What an arse
Both my dds react to sunscreens . At 18 pound a time it was bad enough to have to buy them one each for school without having to cover the dad and the grandparents tòo.

Its not much to ask to use a sunscreen ffs

Its not the sunscreen. Its a control and abuse issue.
If OP does send the sunscreen he wont return it so she will have to buy a new bottle every time.

See the GP and keep a detailed incident diary. If you can show a pattern then you can show its abuse, not a one off.

My ex does this. When an abuser can no longer easily abuse the mother, they deliberately torment, neglect and injure the child to punish the mother. Psychopathically controlling.

If mothers were doing the same and in such numbers, the children would be removed and given to the father. Our system which ignores abuse by proxy is structural misogyny.

OP, as PPs have said, continue recording everything, build a cause with GP records, social services. At some point you may have enough to reduce contact. When the children are around 9 their views begin to be taken into account. Moreso at 11, very much at 14.

Condolences on your monstrous twat of an ex. 💐💐

I got in the same type of situation with my ex, but was worse and far more dangerous. My dd has an allergy and was repeatedly exposed by ex. She had anaphylaxis, was unconscious and was hospitalised. She recovered. Then it happened again. The doctors questioned me over and over on is it was coming to this - i was in despair - it wasn’t happening on my watch and he was aggressive and obnoxious when I’d address it (which is did constantly). Communication turned completely sour. I described a scene to the doctors of when I had called him recently and said “did you take DD to xx-allergen?” and he replied “hold on! Wait! I’ll put you on speaker so you can have the audience you love - ok go ahead - let rip!!” (cue lots of laughing).

The doctors seemed to finally get that it was like banging my head off a wall and that I was terrified she was going to die. I could not get through to him.

Before I knew it, a child protection order and potential child abuse (medical) case was created. Cue a year of social worker intervention and his seething contempt for me buffered by others. It was horrible but it kept my daughter safe. At some point, he kinda broke down under it all. We agreed to speak. I said he had to get over any idea what this was a “me against him crusade” and all about her health. He admitted he knew that but couldn’t handle her allergy and accept it.

Communications wise we are better now, still a bit rubbish but we went from the worst to something vaguely working.

Medics will care if the risk to your dd is high. Definitely keep acknowledging what is happening to medical teams. Make sure it’s tracked and what is happening.

The only way I seem to be able to get my ex to do what’s right for the kids is to come down like a tonne of bricks on him. Appealing to his intelligence, rationale, and logic failed. I find it so exhausting being like this but it works. I have to be black and white - When he makes any mistake now I say “I’m phoning the consultant”. I have reported small breaches by him to social services. It has to be done. It took THAT MUCH push to get him to cop on.

I had this with my ex but a food allergy. I sent her with Piriton, a copy of the list of safe/unsafe foods and all the other info the allergy clinic had given me.

I told him that if in doubt, don't feed it to her.

He still made me pick her up early one day telling me she'd eaten something and had a reaction. He wouldn't give her piriton because he "wasn't confident to and it would be better for her mum to do it".

When I arrived she was totally fine, no reaction, and he couldn't even tell me exactly what she'd eaten or find the packaging to look at the ingredients list.

It was all about control. He wanted a reaction from me.

You have my sympathies.

Decant very expensive cream into a pot with only enough for a few days. Label it clearly and make sure your daughter knows its her special cream. Sadly your daughter will have to learn to manage her allergy if her Dad won't.

That is abuse and I'd be tempted to log it with social services and refuse anymore contact backed up with the doctor.

My father has permanent lung damage from an allergic reaction that nearly killed him. People are often very blasé about such things thinking ‘it’s not serious’, ‘they can have piriton’. Yes, but a massive increase in the body’s reaction rate can happen very suddenly. My DF was lucky he didn’t have a heart attack at the same time, as that can permanently damage the heart too.

This is so so serious it’s a child protection issue. If he was beating her it would be prevented. Please OP don’t assume an allergic reaction will stay the same. My DF was in his 50’s. At 70 he can barely walk. He had only had a mild reaction before the one that he very nearly died from.

If he has used it in the past and it was fine, then you would think it would be fine to use, could have been agenuine mistake. But DEf send the cream next time, and make sure it is returned when child is comes back. You would be hard to prove this is abuse if he saud he had used it before with out any inssues.

She may be allergic to grass, I used to come up in very angry spots after sitting on the stuff. These spots looked very alarming, I started sitting on a blanket and the problem never came back. Write a note about allergies and send some medicine.

Just to add, send some more of the right sunscreen and write a very neutral note. Try not to let your nasty split with your ex cloud your judgment.

I wouldnt let me child continue contact.

Hes neglecting her medical needs and doing it on purpose.

I would be reporting this to social services if the courts aren't doing anything and whilst its ongoing withholding contact until a resolution has been found.

What if this escalates? What if he hurts his child in other ways ? Absolutely vile

would this be grounds for supervised contact from sw

She doesn't need to send the correct suncream. He already has it. He is deliberately not using it.

It's actually concerning that people on here would only be concerned enough to send the suncream and not care about him not using it.

He's got the suncream. He just doesn't bother using it because he's too thick to. Plus the child is his child too. Why can he not manage to get some money and buy it too? Is he just that useless? Oh right the answer is yes..

It's not ops job to make him be a parent. He's clearly incapable. Her job is to be a parent and protect her daughter, not teach a grown man how to behave like an adult.

Show the doctor the reaction the child had. Send photos of it to his parents so they can see what a knob head they raised. And send them to a lawyer too asking for advice, with the texts from him saying he didn't listen.

It does seem like he’s now going after her to get to you. My Dad did that to us growing up. (It’s very hard even at my age to admit that.) I basically learned to manage him over many years and I mostly get to enjoy the good parts of his personality now and learned how to avoid the part of him that goes after anyone he perceives is attacking or opposed to him.

Can you pretend to not be sure it was the sun cream?

“The doctor believes she’s allergic to sun cream. Here is some of the brand he said to use. Who knows but worth a try and then we can see if anything else happens once we rule that out. Do you have any thoughts about it what it might be? Let me know and I’ll try to avoid those also.”

I’m sorry to even suggest you have to try and manage him. But it is a dangerous person that would knowing cause a medical reaction in a child to get at their ex. Arguing with him will only make things worse for your DC.

Document everything for the day when you have enough to go to court and limit his visits.

I feel you! My DD was continually exposed to an an allergen at his fathers house, (step mothers cat) father refused to believe it despite having to give him antihistamines ... resulted in DD being blue lighted away to hospital from his house with an asthma attack (I posted about it here under a Different name a few years ago)

After that my ex STILL needed a blood test to prove child was allergic to cats which gp gladly gave!

You could try sending the correct sun cream with her but in my case I can imagine her father still using his own with the attitude ‘she won’t tell me what to do’

Log all details, take pics and if child is coming to harm you can stop contact. I feel for you xx

Sending the right suncream along with OPs daughter is not likely to get him to use that suncream at all. He said it was fine the first time but OP said she had a reaction that time too - he is wilfully ignoring all advice.

However, decanting some of the correct suncream into a clearly labelled bottle, then photographing it and writing this down in the book and an email will be another base covered to say you have tried EVERYTHING and he is still resisting meeting her care needs.

So although it won't fix the problem, it will certainly help you to build your case as this progresses.

Honestly, i'd be straight on the phone to social services. They will speak to him.

Can't really add too much to the advice here.. but I do want to say what a cunt. And you used the word 'they' so he has involved others in this too. Unbelievable. The lady who said gone down like a ton of bricks is right. It's the only thing that works.