Ex calls me a cunt to teenage child. Parental alienation?

[Regalhen]

I'm a single parent of a 15 ds. I have brought ds up since we separated due to my ex's domestic violence against me when ds was a baby. Ex didn't want overnight contact until ds was 5; and then only every other weekend plus daytime contact in week.

I have pretty much brought ds up single handedly (financially, boundaries) . Ex has tried to sabotage relationship with ds throughout over the years (multiple social services referrals over the years). Tells son constantly I'm a bad mother (I had severe PND after birth and had to go to a mother and baby unit. Aggravated by the fact ex was punching me while breast feeding and telling me I was useless).

Social services have investigated dutifully every time; but it's the constant drip of poison in my son's ear that I'm useless, a bad mother, evil and mad.

It's complicated by the fact my son has autism. The type of autism he has (demand avoidance) manifested in extremely challenging behaviour when he was young and my son was excluded from mainstream education at 7 years old. He has massively improved since going to special school and now is coping with mainstream secondary and doing well academically and maintaining friendships.

Recently ex has escalated alienation. I have told my son and ex many times that they have every right to explore living together post GCSE'S; if they both agree I'm such a shit parent. Every time both immediately row back on this and say they don't want status quo to change.

Today I collected son after he has spent 4 weeks with his dad. He didn't want to come home, and has been pretty much closed off and silent with me so I've matched his energy and been polite but cool with him

Today I checked his phone. Don't do it v often but found his dad has called me a 'cunt', 'selfish fuck' and a 'shite parent' to our son for not making more of an effort. They are constantly in contact - like 100 whatsapp messages a day plus - yet when he stays with his dad, there is no contact the other way, even when I try to initiate

They seem to bond over hating me. This is parental alienation right? Is 15 too old to do anything about; or is there anything I can do now?

Am I wrong for wanting to also fuck my ex over

Yes, 100% this is parental alienation of a particulaely vile, misogynistic sort. He is indoctrinating your son not just to hate you, but to hate all women. Can you afford to take him to court?
I don't know the law where you are, but he is still a minor, so you should be able to do something. Check with a lawyer.
You are absolutely not wrong for wanting to fuck up this bastard's shit. He's the lowest kind of scum there is.

Thanks XChrome; I've taken screenshots and my plan of action is to for the first time ever, initiate contact with social services . My second plan is to see if I can get free 30 min solicitor appointment for advice

My 3rd stage is to send screenshots to ex with a request for an explanation. This is the nuclear option though; as son will hate me for invading his privacy so will mean that he changes his pin. Additionally I want to send this to his dad after contacting social services and getting legal advice; as ex will simply wipe my son's phone which is connected to his account - but in acknowledging this, he will be giving me written confirmation he has done this

Don't send anything to him, just go via intermediaries. Keep your slate squeaky clean

No!!!!!!!

DO NOT CONTACT YOUR EX ABOUT THIS!
To do this would be to hand yourself to this vile bastard on a plate.

If your current visitation is court ordered, then you can apply to the court to have it ended.

If the current visitation is not court ordered, you can simply stop it, and your ex can go after you through the court to get it ordered if he wants it to resume.

BUT:
You need to go to a solicitor with your screenshots, and discuss all details of the situation.
Get a really good solicitor.
Don't do anything without the sol's advice.

You may ultimately need to get a guardian ad litem appointed to represent your son. Talk to the solicitor about this.

This is alienation. Gird your loins for a fight.

Definitely don't send it to your ex!! Do the rest.

Don’t waste your time sending to X. It will make things worse and tbh, he is probably a very experienced manipulator and has a game plan anyway. (I suspect your DS’s benefits.) Definitely worth discussing with Social Services and include big picture theory.

Thanks so much for your messages. Apologies for the late update; so much has been happening and I seem to be making everything very much worse with the relationship with my son.

Unfortunately my ex knows that I looked at the phone and read the messages, and told our son. His phone is connected to his and he could see immediately that the phone was being accessed at a time when our son was in bed

As a consequence he has conspired with my son to change the passcode and set up 2 factor identification so I can never access the phone again

It seems that my son has already agreed / wants to move in with his father post 16; but continues telling me he hasn't made up his mind. However his father applied for a 4 bed house swap months ago (currently his household is him, his partner and daughter), so it's been planned quite a while. I think he was only planning to tell me about this post GCSE'S for maximum shock and hurt

Additionally, to my shame when I found out my son had changed his passcode, I demanded that he unlock it so I could read his messages from his dad. He didn't want me to read it because he said it would be an act of self harm for me

What I found was worse. I forgot a hospital appointment for our son on Tuesday (minor issue - cosmetic), because of what was going on at the time.

My ex has left around 20 messages for our son, including 2 voice notes berating me and saying that I don't love my son, that I don't care for him and that this demonstrates that I am an unfit parent and that our son shouldn't be in my care.

I mean it's not great, but I have only forgotten one medical appointment for our son in 15 years of bringing him up singlehandedly

He told our son that his home environment is unsafe (we are rennovating), there is asbestos in the home (there is not), that I am neglectful, abusive, sefish and care more about my partner than my son. He feels for our son so much having to live like this, and only he can provide the love, security and nurture that he so desperately needs

Unfortunately I wasn't able to get screenshots as my son wouldn't allow me to take the phone

If be very tempted to call their bluff and tell them all DS is moving in with his father.

Yes it is, "He didn't want to come home, and has been pretty much closed off and silent with me so I've matched his energy and been polite but cool with him" but don't do this. His dad is telling him you don't want or care about him, behaving like this is showing him that's true.

All you can do is keep reassuring him and showing consistency. If he moves out at 16 it will be fine. He's close to a period of independence anyway, most older teenage boys don't spend masses of time with their mother, and often spend alot more with their father even if their parents aren't separated. He will come back to you, so long as you keep up your end. If you match his energy you'll lose him. He's a teenage boy, you're a grown woman and a mother, of course you behave differently at the moment. He'll grow up.

Anyway; I have reported the original messages to social services and requested family support - but haven't heard back.

I have emailed the school and included screenshots and outlined everything I'm concerned about

I haven't got legal advice yet. I spoke to my son's counsellor and he said the priority was to preserve the relationship with my son. I think that's gone though and I've dealt with things extremely badly

My son says he only trusts his father. If I try and defend myself I'm only spreading hate about his father to him.

I've demanded that his father give me the passcode or I won't allow that phone in the house, and will instead supply a different phone - but if I do that I don't think my relationship with my son will survive.

He just sees it as unfairly targeting his relationship with his dad, and I've betrayed his trust by snooping at his private messages. Although his dad has his passcode, is linked to his phone, and has parental controls - he absolutely trusts his father would never monitor his phone

He hates me asking for the truth about his living arrangements, and views my concerns as just trying to ruin his life. I don't think he would keep in contact at all now when he leaves

I desperately want to reconnect with him, but our relationship is utterly fucked if he stays or leaves

Unfortunately your son will be influenced by his dad and it's probably too late to turn this around.
I'd just take a different tack and tell your son you love him, you are disappointed in the language used by your ex and you think it's very inappropriate to talk about anyone in that way. But that if he wants to live with dad then he can as long as he visits you regularly.
I don't think fighting him at this age will be productive

I have tried to make it up to my son and apologised if he thought I was being off with him. He acts like he dislikes me for about 24 hours when he comes home from his dad's so I was trying to give him space

borninabarn

llamajohn I have said this now; ultimately he is unhappy being with me so we need to change his living arrangements, and he has every right to explore living with his dad

andwegoroundagain I agree unfortunately that he's been too influenced to turn this around. He says he will visit and come back sometimes; but I don't think he will stay in contact. He spent 4 weeks with his dad and didn't reply to messages or only sent one word responses when I tried to initiate communication

What an awful disgusting human being your ex is.
Keep reassuring ds and tell him that his father is wrong when he talks about you and the language he's using is inappropriate.
Gently remind ds that you've done everything for him because you love him, you've cared for him, you've bought him everything he's needed and you want him to be happy.
Invite him to make his own judgments about you in a way that proves what he's hearing from his father is wrong.
Remind him and reassure him of your love as often as possible without getting overbearing.
He may need reasoning and "proof" so give it to him a couple of times a day even if it's something like "I bought you your favourite snack. I thought you might like it. I often think about what you might like because I'm always thinking about the things that make you you happy. You're my son and I love you more than anything else in the world so these things are important to me"
I'd say send him texts too but as your disgusting ex can see them, he'll just belittle you and claim your faking it or something. Maybe leave post it notes every now and then if you're not around?

Tell him that you're sorry that went through his phone but you wanted to check things for his safety. You can see that some messages were inappropriate and no one should be using that kind of language about someone's mother.

So that can be an attempt to repair the situation but to reconnect think of little things throughout the day that causes verbal or physical connection.
A hug, a pat on the back, a high five, small gifts, a note
Verbal - I love you, I'm proud of you, wow you're amazing, you did an excellent job here etc.
Take him out for food or shopping Or cinema.
Let him be the dj on a car journey and make positive comments on the song.

Sadly your son is being used to continue your control and abuse you.

Get as much support as you can and report your ex for coercive control.

@Regalhen sorry but relationship is too far gone for recovery. you son is in the total control of your ex. I would just tell your son to go and pack all his stuff and live with his dad from tonight. it will be hard but it is the only thing which will work for your mental health. your son does not care enough about you to do anything about his situation. he will perhaps realise when he is older what happened with the relationship. and tell your son when he is on the way out the door that his dad did not want anything to do with him for the hardest part of a childs life. and when he did eventually want to see him, he would only see him overnight once a fortnight. that is not real love.

I'm really sorry, it sounds awful. I agree with @allthemiddlechildrenoftheworld that you should let your DS move in with your ex now. He's too deeply controlled. Perhaps in time he will realise how cruel his Dad is and come back to you. For your sanity and mental health I think it would be best to let him go. You really have done everything you could.

I really feel for you and the impact this must be having on you. But your son is also a victim of your ex and by undermining his relationship with you he will be doing untold damage to his mental health and development as well.

I think you are right to report it to social services and to take away the phone his dad controls while he is with you. It will give him the space to work things out more himself, without poison constantly dripping into his ear

Thanks GalacticalFarce; that's really helpful as a list of what to do right now when I'm feeling overwhelmed.

The ironic thing is that normally, our relationship is like this; that's what I do routinely. When our relationship isn't being sabotaged. He calls me the name of his guinea pig mum, because he says I'm annoying but adorable, like her

allthemiddlechildrenoftheworld & blahblahblah24. I have thought about this, but unfortunately his dad lives in the next town and it would be too hard to get him to school; so it would have to be post GCSE'S.

His dad would also refuse to take him now as he is not 'ready' (I have requested this last year when I got utterly fed up with them bonding over my awfulness as a parent)