AIBU to be so upset and angry about DSs Dad moving to Australia?

[FirTree31]

I only posted about another matter (school) yesterday so I am sorry to be asking for advice again.

My ex partner, DS2 (5 years old) Dad, told me last night he is moving to Australia to "make money so that when he dies he has some money to leave him". His brother lives there. DS2 has tics (which GP said yesterday would now be classes as Tourettes as tics persisted over a year) and his own behavioural challenges which can be severe. Apparently tics only happen in our home and I need to get it "sorted". DS loves his Dad and would be so upset, I can't imagine how much worse his behaviour and anxiety might be. Not to mention the backdrop of what is going on right now.

Ex said he is not being selfish, that he needs to make money, he looked down on me for working PT after spending 5 years at uni. Says he doesn't get to go on holiday, says he feels trapped.

I can't properly articulate to him how devastating I belive this would be for our son, partly because I'm finding it very difficult to empathise with him. He has a job, he has friends and family, he has a house(although he rents). AIBU to think this is ridiculous?

Lots of comment on how hard it is to emigrate to Australia but I’ve known quite a lot of people , family and friends , who have done just that. None of them ever came back so it must be possible.

I’d just shrug and laugh and say you know Everyone will just say it’s an expensive route to take just to be able to abandon your child and try the ‘it’s not my fault I haven’t seen them in years’ line.

Sounds like a mid life crisis to me. He will have his bubble burst soon. Our borders are closed until the end of the year, at least as the second wave is slowly starting, so he has zero chance of being allowed in. Unless he plans on lying and saying his brother is ill and needs him. Also, our unemployment rate is growing do to the virus so I don't know how he plans on making all that money. Unless again, he plans on doing something illegal.

In the words of one of our most beloved characters, tell him he's dreaming!

I wouldn't even bother responding to this except with a very bored "hmm well that would be selfish". It's not very likely happen any time soon even if he really wanted it. And I don't think he really wants to do it, he is probably just fantasizing or stirring you. I mean what a coincidence his announcement should come right when Australia's borders are closed (for the first time in recent history).

My ex used to do exactly this. He had family in Australia too, an uncle with a business who was apparently going to sort him out with accomodation and a job. Spoiler alert, he's still here in the UK, some many years later and that idea fizzled out a long time ago.

I'd maybe have been concerned if I hadn't already heard the same shit a million times. He was going to move to Dubai at one point too. He moved to London (we live up north) and came home after about two weeks, I had to buy his train ticket because he was too skint. He phoned me crying saying how much he hated it and wanted to come home. It was pathetic.

It sounds like just a fantasy to me. Just smile and say 'thats nice'.

Sounds like an echo from the past. My DH when we parted years ago moved to South Africa, saying he was doing it for the benefit of our DCs, to give them a better life. Years later there was no benefit to that ‘better life’ he was bleating about. It’s just something they spout to make themselves look less bad to themselves, their family and their friends.

My DH is a doctor and although we got our temporary work visa relatively easily (after coughing up about £5000 and filling in endless paperwork) we are still really struggling to get permanent status over here. We then had to pay for flights, we had to pay to ship stuff over, we had to buy a car, we had to pay for temp accomdation while we property hunted, then huge fees for rental (as a new immigrant it is tricky getting a rental because you don't have an Aussie driving licence and you dont have a credit history or landlord references they can check)... It ended up costing us about £15000 in total. Now We want to get permanent status we are looking at another huge expense of thousands.

It really isn't that easy to move here permanently. Not to mention the fact that our borders are closed right now.

Sounds like he's living in lala land. I would just embarrass him by asking loads of questions that reveal just how silly he is being - how have you managed to get flights given the global situation? When is your job interview? Start date? When do you hear back about your Visa? Where exactly are you moving to? Got any pictures of the house?

*I agree he sounds like a fantasist. It's probably a mix of enjoying the day dream and enjoying getting a reaction out of you.

Don't react.

I really doubt it'll happen and you making a big fuss gives him someone to blame it on when his dream falls apart*

This, with bells on. The chances of him actually getting his arse in gear, visa organised, flights booked etc are zero.

But if you offer any criticism or obstacles it will be YOU he blames when it all falls through (and yes of course that will be totally unfair). I’d not offer any comment at all at the moment, and see what happens next year when the borders reopen.

I slept better last night. I don't know whether to broach the subject with him again as, although I think for now at least with the Borders closed and nothing concrete that I know of, this is really looming over me.

He will not be here for a few years!! It costs of fortune to get medicals and visas sorted and that Is having a job lined up. It took us two years. Then the boarders are likely to be closed for at least a year and his brother will have to prove that there were no suitable Australians, already here , that couldn’t do the job, that he may offer his brother. With the amount of unemployed today it’ll be even harder to get in.
Yes huntsman are yucky and very big and scary looking @Topseyt , they are actually cool to have around as they hunt the stuff that’s harmful to us ( I must remember this before asking if it’s reasonable to burn the car, when I found one on my seatbelt once😂😂)

@Colom

*Does anyone know of a mother anywhere, ever, who would up sticks and emigrate 12,000 miles away from their child? What IS it with some men?!*

Quite. While there'll always be exceptions I only know men who would even contemplate this. I can't even imagine thinking it would be an option to move away from my children? Selfish pricks.

Despite what those airport programmes look like, Australia is a piece of piss to get in to. There's always ways and means. I'm a citizen having lived there for five years and countless others I know were able to get visas so he'd probably be able to work that out. What countless people didn't do is make it rich! Most came out with pipe dreams and went home a few years later not much better off than they arrived. My DH made a success of it financially, but he was definitely in the minority.

Let him off. He's a fucking loser to do this to his child. He'll be back in a few years hopefully contrite that he was willing to traumatise his son.

Our neighbour did exactly this, although 6000 miles not 12000. She left her then-6 year old behind when she moved to the UK to.be with a man she'd met online.

They married and moved into our road. When he was little her son would come and stay every summer for 8 weeks but didn't mix/ play with the village kids because he didn't know them.

He is now in his early 20s and as far as I am aware hasn't come to the UK for several years. I did ask his mum a couple of years ago if he was coming over and she said he's too busy.

I have to say, people locally are incredibly judgemental about her. It's all very sad.

You can’t change him sadly
All you can do is download what the impact will be and step back
I’m really sorry OP
He is a twat

I would almost be tempted to wait a time period. Then say to him, that you are moving to X country & the child will be staying with him

Mind games

Ooh I like the ‘planning’ your own move! Any links to other countries? Any great career areas? See his face.

Yes, I too sadly know of two mothers who up and left their kids. One of them even took one of her kids with her and left the other with their dad (kids had different dad's) to be with a man she met online. She's not got a baby with this other man. I often think about the poor child who got left behind. Imagine knowing mummy took your brother but left you. Don't know how she sleeps at night.

The other left her then 17 year old son in charge of his younger siblings and moved abroad to again be with a man she met online. I know the eldest son, who is now much older, and his relationship has never recovered with her.

She's now now got a baby*

22% of voters are weird.

I believe Australia has a very short time limit before they consider a child resident for the purposes of the Hague convention on child abduction so I would make it super clear to your ex that your son will never be visiting him in Australia ever and that he will need to come and see him in the UK.

I'm sorry your ex is such an awful man, he is trying to gaslight you (which he probably used to do while you were together). I wouldn't bring the subject of Australia up with him, he is clearly revelling in seeing you upset about it.

The next time he brings it up, just say, "That's nice, please let me know when you've bought your ticket", and change the subject immediately.

Say exactly the same thing every single time he brings the subject up, and change the subject immediately after. He'll soon get bored.

Once this happens a few times, you'll laugh to yourself about how ridiculous he is. It's never going to happen, for all the reasons previous posters have mentioned, so please try not to worry about it.

Your ex is an utter cunt for blaming you for your DS's tics whilst at the same time planning to abandon him. Making the excuse that it's because he wants to leave money to your son when he's dead is even worse. He is scum and does not deserve your child.

I know I should ignore and not contact him but it's really looming over me. I don't even know what I'd say, because he'll just look at me like a neurotic woman.

I have a son with Tourette's and a son with tics and the GP is wrong about them lasting more than a year meaning it's Tourette's.

Most tics last more than a year, it doesn't mean they won't go away.

And children often suppress their ticks round someone else's house or the other person doesn't notice them, especially when it's a cough or throat clearing tic or a sniffing tic.

And the reason he does it more at your house is because he's more comfortable and relaxed there. His tics come out naturally!

As for your ex moving, that's rubbish. What a feckless father.

Don't rise to his fantasy bullshit. Honestly, let him be and just let it play out. Borders are shut. Visa processing has slowed to a trickle (prior to covid it was backlogged now its damned). His brother has very little weight with immigration (always a brother/cousin/uncle that will sort it....right... Aus immigration doesn't work that way. He doesn't sound highly skilled or of a useful occupation. At most he might get a working holiday visa some time next year but would be heavily restricted in what he does - so hardly gunna make mountains of cash admist a global recession and competing for employment with Aus citizens- who don't have the visa complexities that a employer would have to navigate.
If this does eventuate - Do not let your child travel to Aus with him alone, I could be wrong but if he decides not to return your son I believe you could have very little power to get him back (more wise MN will know more)
Unless he has a couple of million stashed away to buy himself an "investment visa" in the words of a famous Australian - Darryl Kerrigan "Tell him he's dreamin..."
Give your son a big cuddle, your ex is causing grief for no reason 💐

@JustJayne69 So when did all these people go and what qualifications did they have? Back in the Sixties Oz had fairly open doors. It's seriously difficult to go there now as PPs have said.

@OP Just ignore your Ex or as PPs have said just say "how nice". Reassure your son that he won't go anywhere he doesn't want to.

See how long it takes him to just visit Australia, it's expensive

Don't engage other than to say "That's nice dear" when he mentions it.

He's probably doing it to wind you up or let you know that he can escape if he chooses too and you should be grateful he's here.

I agree it almost certainly won't happen. Some people are dreamers but never actually follow through. It gives them something to think about.