To hand my daughter over to her dad.....

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Dd is 5.

She has not spent any quality time with her dad since 21st January. Ex has chosen not to see her for various reasons, one being he has been mentally unwell.

He has been very abusive towards me and since we separated 6 months ago, the abuse has become worse.

Ex is back again and wants to see dd however I feel very uncomfortable just hading her over to him. Equally I don't think she would be harmed in anyway. He claims he is in a better place now.

He is extremely difficult to talk too so I know if I don't agree, I'll get more abuse off him however. He can only contact me via email as he is blocked on everything else.

Annoyingly, dd seems to be doing better without her dad. The constant questions of when is she going to see him again have stopped and she seems to be doing ok now. I do know she wants to see him again though.

What would you do?

I would have a 3rd party be present until regular contact is rebuilt. You can't just leave your daughter with him after so long. He isn't a consistent adult that she feels safe with after such a big gap in contact. If a third party isn't possible (and I definitely wouldn't be supporting contact given your history with him) I am not sure about contact centres but could be a possibility.

I'd be concerned he will do a disappearing act again so a contact centre would then show evidence of failed contact for when/if he disappears from her life again. Then he can take you to court for contact..

I only really have my mum to do it but I agree - although this will make him incredibly angry.

It's such a scary thing and part of the issue is I don't see how bad this actually is. I don't think dd would ever be in real danger but he really doesn't prioritise her or take any accountability for the whole situation.

If he doesn’t understand why he can’t just come and go and that this might be eased by having a third person there and this makes him angry and abusive then no way should your daughter be going. She and her well-being clearly aren’t in any way a priority to him

let him go through official channels if he wants access and show your evidence of his abuse to you and lack of consistency and see what the courts think is appropriate. I don’t think the answer will be “swan in whenever you fancy and then disappear and yeah sure if subscribed makes a single word of dissent about having to cancel plans be as abusive as you want”