Email from ex?

[nc7809]

I have a toddler with my ex (1.5years).

Broken up and got back together a few times. Had been trying to "make things work" for the past year (not living together), however I ended things a couple of months ago as realised he just wasn't making us/our child a priority.

For example he could regularly go weeks without seeing dc, citing work reasons. He really just popped up when suited him.

If I ever asked him for help, or asked if he could have dc while I had an appointment/wanted to go for a meal with friends he always declined. Had plenty of time to go to the gym every day and go out with his mates though. Caught him out in many lies when he said he was working/had no time to come and see dc but he actually wasn't.

He's recently asked for every other weekend, which I had loosely agreed to. Dc still breastfed and under 2, he's never had them overnight so I thought daytimes best and then build up to overnight from age 2 was reasonable.

I've had a MASSIVE long email from him now. Sounds very legal but send from him. Saying that he wants equal shared care and this that and the other. He lives over an hour away not sure how this works!?

It sounds very threatening, and says I've prevented him having contact from birth, which isn't true. In fact most of the little contact he's had is because of the effort I've made, often taking dc to his workplace or to see his family. The effort on his end has been next to nothing.

The email is bigging himself up massively, and putting me down and making me sound like I’ve been unreasonable. I’ve always told him (since the relationship breakdown) that he can have dc but that it needs to be set days and build up to overnights, that routine is important, being settled in nursery etc.

He’s had her of a Saturday twice now, one of the weekends which should have been his Saturday he said he couldn’t due to being busy with work…

Why is someone who does this, sending me a threatening email making out like I’m preventing contact?

AIBU to think it’s manipulation and him trying to start a paper trail of some sort?

I wish I could get inside the head of these men and work out what they are thinking.

His mum probably wrote it.

It always goes back to money he'd not interested in seeing his daughter he's pissed you asked for money.

He isn't going to do anything to you I would ignore and continue with CMS application and your daughter having some sort of relationship with her fathers side of the family.

It's as meaningful as a used piece of bog roll. He's trying scare you by getting an AI to write a nonsense legal sounding letter. Silly bastard.
Just totally ignore it. It probably makes absolutely no sense anyway. He is the one refusing to see his child. What a loser.

Strange bloke. You're in a good position as he has put so much in writing / text.

Contact is for the benefit of the child, not him or his mother. Just ignore, ignore, ignore.

I’d send: hi ex, interesting emails, the only bit that’s true is you got my name right. I suppose the gist of it though is you’d like to be a more active, involved parent which is great. You did also just cancel Saturdays contact with ‘Ben ’ - does this wish for shared care mean you are going to commit to regular Saturdays and would you like to see Ben this weekend after all? Also, on the dd/mm/yyyy you sent a long list of the dates you can’t see Ben (Saturday wasn’t on it, which is why we agreed it as a contact date), does this mean you are going to reconsider those dates and plan more time with Ben? Let me know what days you would like and we can make arrangements. At the moment we have booked in this Saturday although you cancelled that in your text yesterday and next Saturday.
Kind regards,
op.

This one is the best reply of all the ones mentioned.

Can I get an amen!

Keep your replies really simple.
Save the loaded guns for when you need them.
Record everything, email is best, reply so it is a record that benefits you.
Thank you for the email.
Please confirm as previously agreed that your contact will be....
Or sorry you could not do a visitation on x date. Thank you for informing me...

You do know this is because your going to have to garnish his wages via CSA and he won't be able to stop payments....

Also i would buy a school diary, the week to a page ones, they are cheap in the works .
Start putting down dates he emailed.
If he picked up. Or the excuse and how he sent it.
Any money he gives, as gifts or maintenance. If your child was sent to Grand parents instead.

Events missed , to have it all to hand if you go to court, really will help you plan bettter.

Haha! I'd be waiting with bated breath for his top notch legal team to get in touch.

As others have said, you have all the written evidence as to why he has been the one who has been stopping him from seeing his kids so just keep all that safe in a draft email in date order. I doubt you'll ever need to use it, but just in case ...

Log the times he hasn't turned up, write as many as you can. If he wants to go to court/the legal route, you need evidence and he needs to understand that you aren't just going to hand over your child at the drop of a hat, particularly when he isn't even on the bc, which he'll need to sort before having parental responsibility. Sadly, you can't prevent him from going on the bc eventually if he wants.

I wonder if his “top notch legal team” is aware that he is not on the BC?

Do not put him on the BC or give him PR if you can avoid.

Agreed this one is the best. It’s not promising anything and very succinct.

Amen!

I bet he’s got a girlfriend that he’s trying to play happy families with. My ex wanted all the contact when he had a girlfriend who had a child herself. He played all this act of the greatest dad in the world to his girlfriend - yet as soon as they broke up, he dropped all contact with our son to only twice a month. I know it’ll happen again that he’ll get in another relationship and try and have our son more so he looks good (and so the girlfriend is the one caring for him). It’s textbook ‘deadbeat’, they pick and choose if and when they want their child - when you set boundaries for your child’s best interest, you’re the ‘bitter baby mum’ and the devil to anyone they want to tell.

He's definitely starting a paper trail. I'd personally be making sure I had my own - screenshots of relevant messages etc to support your side!

This smells like a new girlfriend is in the air and he is trying to make you look like the “crazy ex” to justify why he doesn’t see/know his kid. Also he’s played victim (the poor dear has been beside himself because you “won’t let him see his baybeeeeee’”) and sympathy for this cruel situation got him in her pants.
This guy sucks.

He’s realised how much maintenance he’ll have to pay you if he only has the child eow, balked at that and is now playing funny buggers and talking about shared custody. It’s a load of nonsense and he won’t stay the distance. The clown hasn’t even done anything about getting his name on the child’s birth certificate.
I would reply to the email, reiterating what you’ve said about how he can work up to overnight contact and what you are offering currently. Don’t even refer to his comments about preventing contact. You know it’s rubbish, he knows it’s rubbish. Not only can he not prove it, he most likely knows that you are able to rebut that argument easily. By not even referring to it you’ll maintain the upper hand and he’ll be thrown off.
If you haven’t already, make a list/chronology of the efforts you’ve made to promote contact for use later if the silly twat continues to try to pull at that thread.

I would respond to his email, point by point, in a dactual/non critical way. He just doesn't want to pay maintenance I guess.

Exes only exist to annoy you.
Part of being split up

He's trying to scare you and exert power.
Let him do hat he's got to do, he has no chance of having the child for half a week. None whatsoever.
Don't let him rile you, it's what he wants.
Sad to say there will be more to navigate no doubt.

The best solicitor response I've seen in very similar circumstances =

''Thank you for your correspondence of.......

It's contents have been duly noted

Yours''

And it can used over and over again if he gets into the habit of writing this sort of thing

this comment has made my day!