many years of an emotionally abusive ex. Many years of trying to be flexible and then trying to avoid the awful behaviour and nonsensical demands. I now make little effort. I remain amicable to a point and try to be flexible if they do ask for contact - however this is now rare.
I don’t hear from them from one week to the next which is often a relief because they can be quite awful -e.g demanding after a year of NC to see the child at their whim. Making arrangements which last a few weeks then predictably fade out.
Never made any maintenance payments -I don’t have an issue with this and have never bought it up in relation to contact, ex never asks about DS between contact or pays any interest in ds life. Didn’t check in once when pandemic happened to ask after ds welfare for the first 8 months of 2020 Then started to demand contact and abused me via text only to loose interest after contact was established after demands( I agreed as I know there is a right to a relationship )
Is it my responsibility to try to force contact or arrange it? Ex won’t do mediation or court -i tried to set up mediation many times.
DS is 10. DS asks every now and then . So I do say yes if the ex asks. But many valid concerns about safety which make yes really hard.
Aibu to hope ex never contacts again and not force the issue?
I do realise it’s better for ds to have a level of relationship . But the behaviour I manage has been awful - threats of all sorts and unfair demands. All of which I have kept ds out of and ds of course has no idea about. I try to cover and make it all as nice as possible for ds. So they know it’s not their fault - that ex is busy etc.