My daughters father mess up her routine

[DenimBird]

My daughter goes to her dad's 3 times a week
She's 11 months old. She usually goes over there at 3pm-7.30

Now when my baby is with me and not seeing her dad I find her routine is amazing, wake up, breakfast, play, then a nap about 12 noon-2pm, then she stays awake for rest of the day, playing, having dinner, watching tv, having a bath, bed time bottle etc and she's usually Zzzzzzz by 8pm. Perfect!

Now when her dad has her, he picks her up after her afternoon nap. So basically she goes to him fresh as a daisy. Now everytime she is with him he texts me and says she's really tired or she's falling asleep etc at around about 5-6pm. So I tell him can you keep her awake then please, play with her, talk to her etc

Her father lives with his mother still. And when he has the baby he lounges about watching tv for majority of his time with her. I had to tell him a few months back to stop letting her nap after 3pm, as her bedtime is 7-8 pm.

Now today he's messaged me at 6pm saying "the babys fallen asleep in my mums arms, she's really tired so my mum is cuddling her" I told him to take the baby off of his mother and keep her awake. There is no way she should be napping at 6 in the evening. Anyways we've had a full blown argument over it and I've told him every single time he has our daughter it makes my life harder, she comes back wide awake, and doesn't go down to sleep until 11 o'clock at night at times for me, all because those idiots let her sleep their whole visit away.

He actually does act like he's treating me when he has her lol

But he's not pulling the weight like a parent.

You can think you have equal rights to the main parent when at the most all you do is watch tv with your child 3 times a week

Never done a load of her washing, has stopped paying for anything towards her, doesn't do over nights or weekends lol

Sorry this reply was for someone else, not your comment

Yes, also I will not be 'cherishing' the bare minimum from him

Id probably jus cut his time down and let him take you to court for access and put a CM claim in and contact grandmother to say when grandma can see the baby at time that suits you better.

I absolutely understand that it is infuriating. But this is her father. You picked him. I appreciate that you may have not realised he would turn out to be a useless twat, but you cannot stop him having contact. Or bypass him and go to his mother (unless he is grand with that).

I get that it is awful, but nit only does he have a right to see her, she has a right to see him.

Unless, of course, he actually is stoned around her. Then you can push for contact centre set up.

In all likelihood, though, you will be dealing with this prick for a long time. It would be best for your own mental health if you can find a way to make peace with the fact that he can just sit and watch tv, he can feed her nothing but McDonald's, he can have overnights and let her run around until she drops, unless he actually hurts her (and I have seen plenty of that not even counting), it is very unlikely that he would not be granted some access.

He would need to go to court though, would he?

Of course not, why should you? You have every right to feel whatever you feel. But the sad fact is, that he can do the bare minimum and totally get away with it. Until your child grows up and catches on.

Are you saying he's stoned while he's looking after your daughter? If that's the case, I would stop access and tell him to take you to court if he wants. It's irresponsible to allow her to be looked after by someone who's under the influence of drugs.

Not very clear what you actually want OP. Would you rather he didn’t have her at all? Fewer hours?
It’s not as if he will put up much of a fight by the sounds of it.
Why isn’t there any maintenance if he has money for weed and weekend benders? Have you put in a claim? Might as least focus his mind on what his obligations are.

Seriously? You haven't considered the risks of him smoking/ using drugs around your baby?

Can you speak to his mother? I'd say 2 hours a day if she sleeps the other 2 anyway she mat aswell be st home. He might try keep her awake then! Sleeping at tha time is too late for a11 months old.

Does she nap 2 hours or 3 with you? Would a reduction in nsp time on your end work? On his days...

I cant claim CM as he does not have a proper job, he works the odd day here and there for his dad which is cash in hand

Don’t let her nap before she goes. She can have her nap in granny’s arms as soon as she gets there.

I'm assuming that her ex-MIL knows that her son doesn't contribute a penny in child support, that he refuses to have the baby overnight and does absolutely nothing with the baby except sit on the sofa and watch TV, so I hardly think that she is grandmother of the year for holding a sleeping baby.

And the fact that you think that the OP should cherish the thought that her baby has a father who is a teeny tiny bit involved a few days a week is absolutely ridiculous.

Well his mum brought up an absolute twat of a son and still enables him to behave like this so I wouldn't take her wants/needs into consideration.

Why are you ignoring the drug use around your 11month old baby??

He sounds horrible, spriteful and controlling. He's most likely doing this with the sole purpose of messing up your evenings and he likes that he has control over that.

I would come down hard on him and make sure that he needs to have clean drugs tests if he wants unsupervised access to your DD and until then he can only see her under supervised forms in a contact centre. You'd most likely need to go to court for that but having a drugged up father around a baby is super dangerous. Also, claim CM right now. It sounds like he has a job so you will get something at least. He can't just choose to not pay anything. Right now it's all on his terms but he's the least important person in this trio.

You can and you should. You will get something even if he's on benefits. It won't cover more than a teeny tiny portion of what a baby costs, but it's the principle. You need to take back control.

Any one saying I'm ignoring the fact he's drugged up around my daughter, it is n secret that he smokes weed. He promises he doesn't do it around her and until I have proof what exactly can I do

As for me saying about he looks stoned, he has that stupid dopey look on his face 24/7

The bare minimum aswell

Wouldnt surprose me if He only sees the baby to see what's going on in my life

I made a claim last night, I'll probably get £5 a week lol

That's great! That's at least one less way he can mess you around.

Does she smell of weed when she gets back?

Does he have a pram or stroller to even take her out? She’ll be toddling soon, and him lolling on the sofa won’t cut it.

Could you cut down to two visits a week, say drop the midweek one so you’re not battling every second night to settle her?

She did once or twice in the past and I had it out with him be cause of that. But past few months no