So I have a daughter, she’s 9. Myself and her dad haven’t been together in around 7-8 years. He was in a relationship with someone for around 4-5 years after me and they split recently. He is now in a new relationship with someone else, this is important for the story. In the last almost 2 months my daughter has been saying that she doesn’t want to stay at her dad’s house. She says that when they are alone together all he does is shout at her. Myself and her dad have a terrible relationship as he blames me for the breakdown of our relationship because I left him supposedly “for no reason”. Whenever I try to talk to him about our daughter he calls me “c**t” and tells me I’m controlling and I don’t know what I’m talking about and that I’m lying. I sent him a message to ask him to have a talk with our daughter because I felt like she needed to explain that she was worried about how angry he was towards her and that if it came from me it could just make things worse for her especially if I told him that she had said she didn’t want to be alone with him. His reply was “don’t tell me how to be a parent, I’m a better parent than you and I will talk to my daughter if I feel like she needs to talk not when you tell me”. When she came back that night she said that he’d asked her what I was talking about but that she was scared to tell him anything coz he was angry. She also told me that in the car on the way home she noticed that it was almost 2 hours past the time she was usually back and had mentioned this to him and that he said “if your mum has a problem with this then she can tell me and I’ll hit her”
The next day, while I was at work, my daughter told my partner, who I have a child with and who lives with us, that “when my dad is angry he hurts me” when I heard this after work I spoke with her and asked her to describe it a bit more. She explained that he had on several occasions done something called a “horse bite” I had to look this up as id not heard of it. She said he did it on the back of her thigh and when she told him it hurt and she was crying he asked where it hurt and she showed him and he did it again in front of his mum and new girlfriend. She has said that when he grabs her arms and squeezes. She said that she can’t remember the last time he just spoke to her without shouting. I immediately called social services and as my daughter had also disclosed to school they had called them too. In the meantime I stopped contact. SS told me to tell his mum and dad that contact had stopped with their son but that if they made provisions to have their granddaughter for the weekend they could but they had to keep him away. They refused to keep him away “if he wants to see her I’m not going to stop him” so contact was stopped for them too as they unfortunately couldn’t be trusted. SS eventually spoke to him and he told them it was a joke and that he’s homeless (he isn’t) and that my daughter (9) is a liar and that I’m making it all up.
Contact is still not back as my daughter doesn’t want to see him. She has asked to see her grandparents but has said she isn’t ready to see them yet as she’s worried that they will invite her dad round while she is there. I have suggested mediation between me and her dad but he’s refused saying he wants mediation while our daughter is there which is ridiculous. He has on several occasions turned up at school, when he has never been to her school before to grab her away from my mum and tell her that I’m a liar and that she’s hurting her Nana’s feelings (his mum). She’s not sleeping properly. She’s very obviously depressed and whenever anyone mentions her dad she gets scared and is worried that he’s going to show up. He turned up at my mums yesterday to see my daughter who wasn’t there he said he wanted to give her some Xmas presents. He was turned away and then an hour later went to my grans saying the same thing, he has since said he is coming to mine Tuesday and I’ve asked him politely not to come as after asking my daughter if she wants to see him she has said she doesn’t want to see him and doesn’t want his Xmas gifts. He has since told me that I can’t stop him and he’s coming whether I want him to or not. I’m not sure what to do so close to Xmas. I’m obviously not going to allow him to see her but if the police are called will they tell him to go away? I am in the middle of getting a solicitor and working out legal things and have made the decision that if she doesn’t want to see him I’m not going to force her. He’s a very angry person and blames me for everything. I’d just like some advice and see if anyone else would do things any differently. Sorry for the long post. I could have made it longer it’s been a hell of a 9 years unfortunately.