Anonymous FB messages

[BaaBaaBlackSheepOfTheFam]

My ex and I broke up in 2022, when our little one was born. Things were quite volatile between us for a few months, a lot of arguing. However we've not spoken for well over a year.

Since the middle of last year, I've received a couple of anonymous Facebook messages, from two different accounts with different names, no profile pic etc.

The first one was along the lines of "Paul (not real name) has moved on, they've bought a house together, time for you to step back".

The latest one, last week was "Paul's got what he always wanted, a little boy, Oscar, time for you to disappear and let him move on with his family".

I don't speak to my ex at all and haven't done for over a year, bar the odd text mesaage in regards to our child. All contact with our child is done by him picking her up from nursery, keeping her overnight and dropping back to nursery the next day. I know nothing of his life these days however after the latest message, I did a bit of digging and it turns out he has had a kid, born recently. It rankled a little as our kid isn't even 2 yet, but we certainly weren't ever going to get back together, so whatever.

I'm actually feeling really unsettled by these messages. I don't know who is sending them, him? The new woman? We don't have mutual friends. I don't have anything to do with him so why would I care if he's bought a house and had a baby with someone.

Would I be unreasonable to go to the police about these messages? It's creeping me out knowing that there is someone who is contacting me but that I don't know who they are. Would the police even act and trace who it is and tell them to back off? I feel really....I don't know....invaded.

Hmm might go against the grain a bit. If it was me then removing fb would make me worry they will find another way to contact me.

The disappearing bit made me think if it's the current partner she wants the bloke to stop seeing your dd his daughter- since that's the only present contact he has with you. The letting them be a family made me think that too. It's either her or someone close to her.

I'm assuming that your dd returns to you happy and clean and her presentation in all areas is good.

I would send him the screenshots.

However, I wouldn't be accusatory.

I'd keep it simple and just say "listen, I've recently had two messages which I think you should be aware of. If you have any idea in who this could be, tell them from me to please stop, we're all just trying to move on with our lives. Cheers"

Can you not arrange to meet him for a coffee and have an adult conversation about your child, arrangements and finances going forward, and find out more about the environment your child is in when they are not with you.

Perhaps the best thing to do would be to discuss the messages face to face as well

Well now that you mention it... the past couple of times she's returned from overnights, she's been unsettled. Standing at doors and cupboards breaking her little heart. Sometimes saying dada. It's heartbreaking but I assumed that it was because he's recently started doing a couple of overnights in a row and she was unsettled due to this and missing him. I did suggest to him that we go back down to one night at a time for the time being to see if thst helps at all but he wasn't keen, he wanted the 2 nights.. However as I type this, I'm starting to think.

She does come back clean and tidy, I ask him to do things with her ie she's under physio and they've given me activities and exercises, he says he does them all and the way he's described the activites she's best at etc tallies with what i know about what she's s best at, so i trust that he's doing them with her. He most definitely isn't the type of person who would be bad to a child. I obviously don't know this woman but she surely wouldn't be bad to a 1 year old, she's the sweetest little girl. I need to give this all a proper think.

There's no way we could be face to face. I've spent the past 18 months or so since we last saw one another trying to heal from how awful he was to me during pregnancy. I ended up having to put him out of the house as even though we had broken up, he was still coming to stay with me for 3 or 4 days a week to help with our baby. But he was messaging other women while he was with us, blowing hot and cold with me, telling me how I was his favourite person and being lovely then blowing cold again the next day. He destroyed me mentally and its taken a long time to build myself up again. So long answer but no, we couldn't be face to face.

Things have worked fine by simply using text message to communicate so far, these fb messages are a fairly new thing.

He doesn't know my current address, I've since moved from when we last had face to face contact. He does have my phone number but that's about it.

I am concerned that if it is her, she wants my daughter out of his life..I'm not sure what he'd do if that's what she wanted. He's very much a happy man if a woman is giving him and easy life and sex; if that's what he's getting from her then he may distance himself from our child to keep the easy life he has with her. I don't know.

My concern would be that if I did say I had safeguarding concerns then she would as you say, accuse me of sending them to myself and also say that the whole "safeguarding" thing that I mention is me gearing up to keep his daughter from him. Which will blow up massively as at the moment, he has her for overnights, pays maintenance etc and this is all voluntary. We communicate via text message in as far as we need to regarding our daughter. However this could prompt him to perhaps want to go down the court route, which is something that I'm keen to avoid. As it is, we can swap the odd overnight etc if one of us has plans, things are amicable in thst we don't speak but work with the contact plan quite nicely. I don't want to jeopardise that.

Well now that you mention it... the past couple of times she's returned from overnights, she's been unsettled. Standing at doors and cupboards breaking her little heart. Sometimes saying dada. It's heartbreaking but I assumed that it was because he's recently started doing a couple of overnights in a row and she was unsettled due to this and missing him. I did suggest to him that we go back down to one night at a time for the time being to see if thst helps at all but he wasn't keen, he wanted the 2 nights.. However as I type this, I'm starting to think. She does come back clean and tidy, I ask him to do things with her ie she's under physio and they've given me activities and exercises, he says he does them all and the way he's described the activites she's best at etc tallies with what i know about what she's s best at, so i trust that he's doing them with her. He most definitely isn't the type of person who would be bad to a child. I obviously don't know this woman but she surely wouldn't be bad to a 1 year old, she's the sweetest little girl. I need to give this all a proper think.

Mostly this is quite reassuring. It's difficult to say with a one year old what's unsettled and what's normal one year old behaviour. Increase in overnights even if her dad is parent of the year will unsettle her until she gets used to them and actually dropping down again to one night is confusing and worse really. I would monitor this over time as she should settle though it may take a while.
Not having much discussion with the other parent must be tricky when the child is emotional though, have you tried a little notebook that goes in her nursery bag? Family court often recommend this. It's v factual a long the lines of 'sat 24/02 - think dd is ready to drop a nap, tried her with peanut butter she hates it, please return red jumper' that kind of thing,

Also nothing to stop you asking nursery staff what pick ups and drop offs with dad are like although reading your last post it does sound like dad contact and the arrangements are pretty calm just now.

Also a new baby will have unsettled your dd massively!! I mean it's a bit out of order he didn't tell you about that but too late now.

We did try a notebook when it was just a daytime contact of a few hours at a time, handover faciliated via a third party. I used to put a lot of information in ie what she had been up to over the course of the week etc as I'd like to have been kept updated with all of this as the non resident parent, however he didn't even bother writing in it to say if she's napped, eaten, anything really. So I stopped.

It’s worrying that there is a Mum and Dad to a one year old little girl and neither know where she lives when she’s not with them. That is just beyond comprehend-able to me.

You have no idea where she is when she’s not with you? You don’t know this woman who lives with your child two nights a week? They have a newborn baby, but you didn’t know. Does your daughter sleep through the night with them? Does the baby wake her? Do they have separate rooms for the two babies? I can’t get my head around the fact you don’t know the answers to any of these questions. You need to meet him face to face, you need better communication, this is all far more of a worry than anonymous messages. You don’t know where your baby is when she’s not with you????

Im certainly not comfortable with the situatuon. However I know that she's with him when she's not with me. I don't need to know his address and I don't want him knowing mine. Unfortunately he's kept all this information from me about a new partner, new baby etc, I didn't know there was a new baby until I recently received this anonymous message. He says she sleeps in a cot in his room, that she doesn't wake in the night, apart from very occasionally (which is in line with her sleep pattern when she's with me).

His behaviours were extremely emotionaly damaging to me when we last had anything to do with one another and I honestly don't know where my mental health would be/if I would be capable of being a proper mum to my little one if I had kept up communication with him. So face to face is not an option. Nursery has all of our personal details so should there be an issue while she's at his, there would be contact details if needed.

This all the way. I’d be out of my mind worrying in case there was an emergency etc and I needed to get there for her. I’d need to know exactly who my child was with. Especially if he has demonstrated bad behaviour during pregnancy.

If there was an emergency then he would call and let me know where they were and I would go straight there, more than likely hospital if it were an emergency.

I used to work in a contact centre and it was quite common for the parents to do all contact via the centre and for ex partners to not be given current address details.. It's not that uncommon for ex partners to not share these details with one another, should there have been 'issues' in the past.

When I say he displayed bad behaviour during pregnancy, it was more messaging other women, being on dating sites etc. Along with playing with my emotions. Not abuse. Although I grew up in a very abusive household as a child so I'll admit that I can't always recognise what's abuse and what's just behaviour that I don't like.

What if something happens to him and you need to get her?

Back on the original messages, the tone is a bit weird. They suggest jealousy and immaturity.

Madness. My daughter would not be going to his with immediate effect. These anonymous messages are a perfect excuse to stop contact. Someone has said to you ‘time for you to disappear!’ Is that a threat? It’s clearly his new partner!! And you’re sending your child there?! I say there, but the reality is you have no idea where ‘there’ is! 2 streets away? A mile away? 50 miles away? Who knows? If there is an emergency in the night, he will not be able to get your address from the nursery and vice versa.

I would tell him you have grave concerns about your own safety and you are going to need to know the full picture before visits continue. That means addresses, any new children that crop up, info on your child’s new step-mother, really really basic stuff that even the most acrimonious of couples have knowledge of.

If something happened as in he took unwell? Then whoever informed me that he'd taken unwell would, if they're phoning to tell me that, also tell me where she is to come and collect her. If I needed his address urgently to get her, then I'd call him or nursery will have his details. I also have his mothers phone number and can contact other members of his family.

The messages; I'm hoping that this is an end to them seeing as I've deleted my social media. I don't know why this woman (if it is her) is targeting me, likely as you say jealousy, but hopefully they'll cease now that I've gotten rid of my SM.

Maybe it wasn't her but I don't think it's really difficult to imagine that a sleep deprived woman who's full of hormones and tied to a baby 24 hours a day would have time to send two messages. It's not the iliad.

I wouldn't say that the most acrimonious of couples do have these details. I've worked in a contact centre previously, many ex couples don't have personal details for ex partners, it's all done via a third party. In any event, I have his family members contact details and they are decent folk who would give me info I needed in case of an emergency.

I took the "time for you to disappear" as mpre of a 'just piss off out his life' as opposed to 'time for a bullet to the head for you' type of thing.

If there is an emergency in the middle of the night, he has my phone number and I have his.

Stopping contact will simply make him go to the court and get contact. No judge is going to say that he needs to tell me his address, info on new partner etc. They can say that this information needs to be logged however they won't give me these details willy nilly. I've seen it myself from my time working in the contact centre; the court has stated that the contact centre has to be given address and personal details but for various reasons ie past abuse, the info is not to be shared with the other parent.

Op this is not comparable to a contact centre! Your DD is staying there for two nights and you've no idea where or who with. I'm absolutely flabbergasted. This is completely different to a session at a contact centre that someone drops there DC off at for a couple of hours.

I think you're mistaken on the overall purpose of a contact centre, which is understandable if you've never used one before. A contact centre is not only for a few hours visit inside the building, it ranges from one hour visits to facilitating handovers for overnight stays. And it was regular practice in the contact centre that I worked in that many of the parents didn't hold personal details ie addresses for one another and all of this information was held by us at the centre. Often, the parents would only have phone numbers for the other parent in case of emergency while the child was in the care of the other. Any additional details were held by the centre themselves.

I'm also not having her over to a random to look after, she is with her father.

This!

Sorry if I missed this but how did you know her name to look her up on LinkedIn?
Have you told ex about the messages?

No, I've not yet told him about the messages, I will be though before he next has our daughter. He's not had her since I received this 2nd message and i did a bit of digging. There were 2 messages, I thought perhaps the first one was a bit of shitstirring so i didn't mention it however the 2nd message I received a few days ago made me do a bit more digging and I've subsequently found out that he does now have a new baby and partner. And a new home which was a bit of a shock as I assumed he was still taking her to our old house.

I knew the messages were something to do with him, so I had a look on his social media and there were a lot of likes/interactions from this one female. I did a bit of digging from there.

I'd also like to add that she hasn't stayed with him since I did a bit of digging after the 2nd message a few days ago and found all of this out. So no, she hasn't been staying with him and I've simply let her not knowing with who or where. As far as I was aware, until a few days ago after receiving the 2nd message and doing some digging, i was giving him contact for him to take her to our old house that we shared, on his own.