to only communicate with my Ex husband via email?

[Vigorothello]

Posting here for traffic, please be gentle but honest!

I am separated from my STBXH who is an emotionally and financially abusive controlling arse. He is meant to see our children EOW but makes excuses why he can’t, ranging from the driving - he chose to move 40 miles away, to not wanting to drive at night, to his flat mate isolating and there’s nowhere to take them, to he’s exhausted, etc. He has had them overnight once. Mostly he has them for a few hours and then all they do is sit on his PlayStation and he lets them eat shite. He doesn’t like to do two consecutive days as it’s too tiring. You get the picture...

However, he is also v controlling and goes out of his way to attempt to spoil things, changes plans at the last minute if he suspects I might have booked something etc. He FaceTimes one of them for hours and they game online. And he was texting me telling me where I’m going wrong, why are they still up, why have they had McDonald’s twice in a week etc. It’s without fail abusive. He manages to turn every interaction with me into a rant about how unfair it is that I’m divorcing him and what a horror I am. So I blocked him.
I said email me.

He calmed down but the last couple of days has messaged me on FB. As usual it’s reasonable at first and then he gets into his set piece of how horrible I am. It’s like pressing play on a tape.
So I blocked him.

I said email me if you need to discuss the children, and copy in your solicitor because I’ll be sending your abuse to mine.

He still expects to FaceTime the children when he likes, although in reality it’s only one of them and in my opinion he winds him up. And also I don’t want my ex husband’s face looking around my house! He gets the kids to report on me and I caught one of them taking pictures of the inside of the fridge because he wanted to know what shopping i was buying!

So, AIBU to only communicate via email with him? And what is reasonable regarding FaceTime/phone contact with the kids? Currently they have a limit on their phone of 2 hours FaceTime max, and phones off at 9:30, which I think is more than reasonable.

Thoughts please.

I think the problem lies in that despite not seeing them, he firmly believes he should have an equal shout in day to day stuff, and that he has the right to critique what he sees as my shortcomings without any reference to his own. I’ve also worked out that he sees FaceTime as childcare. Seriously. He was on with one of them for about 90 mins sorting out a tech thing, and then said “your mum will have to look after you now, I’ve had you all afternoon.”

Peak2021 I considered that but then I also don’t want to play into his hands. He’s decided he’s CEV too and “really should only see the children if they’ve just had a negative covid test and have been isolated.” He knows fine well one of them is in school...

@HugeAckmansWife

Actually I'm not sure Random mess is right about that.. Definitely get advice on that. You really do need to get professional legal help now. Cms rates are pretty rubbish. Ex erns around 38k and I get around £450 a month for 2 kids on an eow basis.

CMS is completely separate from court ordered financial settlement.

Unless there is a court order regarding child support, and in my experience a court ordered child maintenance order doesn't last very long anyway.

I'd apply for CMS immediately, you don't get much and it takes a while to kick in.

Husband doesn’t pay maintenance/child maintenance any more. He’s covering the mortgage though, because that contributes to his asset, see? We haven’t sorted the finances yet.

Hopefully your solicitor can advice. What jumps out to me is to make sure he's not using your child maintenance payment to accrue equity for him in the house.

If you both pay 50% of the mortgage, you both accrue equity in the property. If he gets into a position where he's paying 100% of the mortgage, could he argue that he should be accruing all the equity?

That child maintenance payment is yours. You can choose to put it towards the mortgage as your 50% share, so it accrues equity for you.

You need to insist he pays maintenance to you, it's an obligation independent of any other payments. Whether he also chooses to pay 50% of the mortgage is a separate conversation.

Having said all that, I see that he's company director of a finance firm, so I'm nervous about him finding loopholes in the CMS payments - could he choose to be paid through dividends etc? As other have said, you need to assess how much you rely on his mortgage / maintenance payments. There could be a case for leaving well alone...

I think you have had a lot of good advice and mine aside to this would be to have a daily diary and write everything in it. Including the 'your mum needs to look after you now' comment, i mean what the hell, how in any right mind does he see that as child care but shows his personality and his behaviour to a tee!! With regards to the kids and the fridge photos, you need to have a gentle word with the kids that whilst keeping secrets is never a good thing (as you never want to encourage this) what is in the fridge is none of his concern as they are fed well and if he had an issue with what they eat he needs to raise that with you as that is an adult issue to be sorted between you two not a parent and child one

Sorry forgot to add, a good diary of events etc is (i have read) looked on well in a court if you are consistent with it and obviously honest

Reading this shows who the controlling parents are? Only 15mins calls, cant facetime their own children , why not? This is shocking and people are saying the father is controlling.

The question is how big is the mortgage payment and how much would he be expected to pay CMS?

@Coseynightin

Reading this shows who the controlling parents are? Only 15mins calls, cant facetime their own children , why not? This is shocking and people are saying the father is controlling.

The question is how big is the mortgage payment and how much would he be expected to pay CMS?

You think if the NRP was reasonable then there would be these restrictions? Luckily FaceTime didn't exist when I was growing up but the idea of having your ex basically in your home sounds awful to me. A voice call is far less invasive. Looking at the examples on this thread there's plenty of controlling behaviour being displayed by NRPs.

To answer your OP my mum only contacted my dad my text message. He wasn't allowed to phone. When we were around 16 we started making our own arrangements for contact. He wasn't allowed her landline number due to leaving threatening messages. If he called her mobile she declined the call, she didn't have voicemail anyway. A family court agreed this was reasonable.

@cosynightin did you miss the bit where he won’t see the kids but gets them to photograph the fridge contents and complains about how things are being done but without actually doing ANYTHING himself? Apparently so.

I would gently explain to the children that it is rude to subject the entire household to the FaceTime calls and to use their bedrooms for that. The rest, well he is a useless controlling fucktard and I hope you get a good financial package.

@Vigorothello please call WA and rights of women.

As PP have said, note everything down. I would also screen shot the messages you’ve referred to and email them to yourself and your SHL.

At 10 and 12, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for regular shorter calls. What 12 year old wants to be FT for 90 minutes ? Also, like I said before you need to firmly tell your DC, that they are to FT in one room only. I would also tell them, that they are not to photograph the contents of your fridge (and anything else you find intrusive) as FT is about talking to their father,
.

This sounds just like my ex.
I used to allow phone calls and Ft on children's phones, but he used it to spy on my home and whether anyone was here, I'm just glad he never thought of asking the children to walk about taking photos
I no longer allow FT at all, and no phone calls after 6 pm, so of course he never bothers anymore, hurrah!
He hasn't seen them since October because he actually hurt one of them, so I stopped him seeing them. Obviously he tried to force me to allow him to talk to. The child he hurt,, no doubt to persuade him that he was wrong to be hurt and over sensitive etc. I didn't allow that either, so he has now stopped maintenance, CMS are dealing with that. I don't need his money so not affected and it's not possible for him to control me like that.

You need to get to a point where you can exist without his interference and meddling as much as possible. If he isn't making effort to see his children, in a stable manner, it's not your problem. I would cut down the phone calls and FT, this shouldn't be so freely given, it needs to be structured. So certain times and on certain days.

Take control of your children's phones, they're too young to manage them themselves, you are the resident parent and need to set rules

And stop the gaming
I don't allow online gaming at all

@hamstersarse

Were your children very young *@Nonamesavail*?

I can understand it if the dc are very young and don’t have their own phones

Yes they were younger at the time. I guess that's why, though he is totally unreasonable. In the end I got a phone JUSt for him. A real basic on. I turnt it on at the time agreed in court 3 times a week and he talks to kids , I turn it off again etc. Only way that worked for me.

He sounds vile. Blocking my ex husband was the best move I made all round. Speak to your solicitor for advice but I think emailing only is perfectly reasonable

Yep I don't think you are unreasonable at all.

I will only communicate with abusive ex via e-mail. I blocked him as soon as we were in separate houses. He can phone DD any time he likes, but generally these calls are short as she's just not that interested in talking to him. She does visit him, but I don't even greet him at the door, he stands outside my front garden to pick her up.

Recently he e-mailed saying that he wanted to start a WhatsApp group between the three of us to arrange visits - I put him straight on that one right away!

Its bliss not having to deal with him and his criticisms of my parenting (despite the fact he seems to be able to opt out of parenting whenever it suits him!)

Limiting contact to email is reasonable, perhaps allow phone in an emergency.

Don't engage, as tempting as it is. When he asks you why the fridge is empty (I'm sure your children are well fed!) or the kids have had a Mcdonalds then don't answer. Keep all communication to contact times only and arrange with the school for them to send reports. If you have a child with special needs then you obviously need to work out how to keep him up to date with their progress.

It is worrying he seems to be manipulating your child into living with him so I would also definitely limit the facetime.

Also, like others have said get the finances sorted out via CMS.

My ex was the same and as soon as I started to ignore everything except essential communication things got a lot better. My DD did storm out to go and live with him after we had an argument and lasted one night before she wanted to come home!

I only communicate with my ex via email so that everything is in writing. He still tries to get me to call or meet him but it’s just not happening. He refused to discuss maintenance for the kids because I didn’t meet him in person.
Go through the CMS - you don’t need to tell him. He’ll be like my ex and try and talk you out of it or he’ll have a hissy fit but just ignore it. It’s one less hold he has one you.
Re the FT - yes limit it and stick to one room. And the kids should tell you when they are going on FT and when they are off. Keep the door of the room open if you need to so you can hear what’s being said if he is trying to go down the parental alienation/ emotional abuse route (ie trying to get your eldest to go to live with him).
When my ex was being abusive when picking up or dropping off the kids I would send a calm email saying ‘please refrain from x behaviour in front of the children when you drop them home. Have a lovely weekend with them.
Also, if you need to tell him about anything (and if you only made the email about that then he wouldn’t reply) put something else in the email that you know he will answer so you know that even if he doesn’t reply to what you need to know he has read it.

Oh and my ex also used to say I never told him anything about the day to day stuff and that he should expect to be told. A couple of days worth of emails with ‘x went to the toilet at 6:58; they then went back to bed and resurfaced at 9 when they had a bowl of coco pops’ type emails soon stopped that.

So op says its ok to critices that he lets them eat "shite" but he can,t criticise op? 9Well whats good for the Goose is good for the gander.). If he has 50 Custody in theory and paying the mortgage I would not expect him to pay the cm. Also I would expct travel to each others should be 50/50.

@june2007 but he doesn't have 50/50 custody so he should be paying CM and paying his share of the mortgage. He can feed them shite but he then doesn't get to get the DC to snoop around taking pictures of the fridge.

Did you manage to speak to your solicitor today @OP, can you afford to pay 50% of the mortgage, regardless if you can't I'd be pursuing CM. If you can pay the mortgage I'd be informing him of this via email so any payments is not for the children but to protect his asset.

Don't let him in your house - you're doing the right thing but record calls/visits if you can't keep it to email x

@june2007

He is meant to have them EOW. In reality he sees them for a few hours, usually lunch until 6 ish. He has seen them 3 times since the beginning of December and makes endless excuses as to why that is. So no, he doesn’t have them 50/50. More like 97/3. And he chose to move out of the area. I begged him to stay in our town but he says that the only way that could happen is if I agree to a more generous settlement for him. He openly said he would rather be out of the area in a bigger house and see the kids less than live nearby and see them more, and pay less maintenance.

I’ve emailed my solicitor and told her everything. We need to sort the finances at some point but he’s such a bully I don’t feel like rushing on his account.