I have an 8 year old DD. We haven’t seen her dad (and my ex-husband) for the last 2 years following a court case where CAFCASS and the judge said that direct contact was not safe given quite a long and severe DA/DV history.
I also raised concerns about immediate members of his family (they enable his abusive behaviour, allow it to happen in front of the children in the family, have acted aggressive towards me in front of my DD and the list goes on) which means that DD hasn’t seen them either for quite a lengthy amount of time.
Just recently him and his family have asked me to facilitate contact between DD and his family members (not himself as he knows this is a court issue). I have point blank said no, it’s not happening and if he wants his family to have contact with DD then he needs to take the issue back to court for them to assess and decide.
My reasoning was that I still have these safeguarding concerns, I don’t want to get involved as they are his family and they are not my responsibility (I facilitated the relationship between them and DD for years and still got abusive behaviour from them). DD also has additional needs and it would likely be very overwhelming for her given that there’s been no contact for years and if the court ever did allow it, it would need very careful management for her to cope with the change.
DD has never been very close to them anyway due to living 2-3 hours away and when they was allowed, they barely made the effort to see her anyway (probably 2-3 times a year). DD wouldn’t know them if you showed her a photo and never asks about them or for them so she doesn’t feel like she’s missing out or missing them, as harsh as that sounds.
Of course, my ex-husband then blamed me for this and made out like I was being very difficult and that DD having a relationship with his family is ‘inevitable’ so I might as well start somewhere with them…
AIBU for sticking with my guns, saying no and letting them go back to court if they want to?