Him not seeing his son

[user0872883848]

I've been talking to someone. We get along really well. We have a great connection and click well.

Just one thing. He has a young child whom he doesn't see. No abuse or anything. Was an accidental pregnancy and the child's mother was annoyed at his behaviour and told him to leave them (her and their child) alone. He did as she said and hasn't tried since.
He bumped into her not long after and she asked why he hasn't contacted. He said you told me not to.

This is a sticking point for me. Even if I accept this how can I go on to have a child whilst knowing that they have a half sibling that they can't see. And what's to stop him not doing the same to future child.

He says I'm being unfair.

I'm nd so I thought I'd ask here.

Aibu to not be comfortable continuing things to get into a serious relationship with someone who chooses not to see his child?

I would not touch this man with a barge pole. Anyone who doesn't see their young child is a horrible person.

He needed weeks to sort out a problem so couldn’t see his child?

Exactly. It was to do with his housing situation. But I pointed out that she didn't have the same luxury. You cannot pick and choose to see your child.

Bin

Please don't waste your time doing this! Just stop talking to him!

Whilst I understand people saying no they wouldn’t date him, my ex doesn’t see our kids and he doesn’t struggle finding women to date him. So doesn’t put most off

I’m not liking the way he’s talking to you one little bit, glad you’ve seen this side of him before you get serious with him.

He messaged me saying:

I told you that I want to have a family!! Go home to my gf/wife and child/children and be a happy family, if that makes me a bad guy then so be it, but I'm done with women trying to make me feel bad or tell me what's right.
You will never understand so we will leave it there

So I guess I'm doing everything wrong here. I'm not even trying to be judgemental and I don't think he's a bad person but I guess that's it.

Sounds like he already had his foot out the door with the inconsistent contact, then jumped on a comment possibly made in the heat of an argument as the excuse to do as he already wanted to and abandon the child.

The fact that the ex asked why he hadn't been in touch suggests that she said 'leave me alone' to mean 'I want to stop this discussion/you to leave because we all need time to calm down' not 'I don't want you to ever see your child again'.

Even if he had thought she meant never contact her again, why wouldn't he jump at the chance to resume contact once he discovered she didn't intend to prevent him seeing the child.

The thing you are doing wrong here is trying to even have any relationship at all with such a twat

Oh god he's awful. He's now trying to manipulate you into thinking you are the problem here. He is! He sounds like a butthurt incel. Please walk away, don't bite back, just walk.

That is a very, very manipulative message. However nice he seems (or, I'm guessing, constantly tells you he is) he is not a good person.

Message back OP, “you’re right, we’ll just leave it there” then delete/block and move on.

Huge, glaring red flag there. There is no excuse for this whatsoever. Dump.

Off the point of the thread, but did he actually use the words "a female"?

I'd bin a man off for that alone. Reveals a lot.

There is absolutely nothing attractive about a deadbeat dad.

Run a mile and be grateful you've dodged a bullet.

Wow, what a message - what a toad!

You could’ve avoided hassle by dropping contact with him when you found out.

Yanbu. He 'wants a family'...he already has family, he has a child. There is nothing complex to understand here, the facts are

1. He has a child
2. He isn't doing everything he can to see them (I mean, he isn't really doing the minimum that he can to see them)

'You don't understand' means he can't explain it, because it's inexplicable

Also I wouldn't accept anyone saying to me 'you wouldn't understand because you're a woman' to anything in my life (unless it was explicitly and exclusively due to male lived experience e.g. a man's experience of asking to go part time after having a child and being laughed at because it's 'womens work')

Plenty of men have their kids 50 50, plenty go through mediation and fight through courts to see them as much as possible. I don't think they would understand his logic either

Thanks everyone for helping me navigate this.

To follow up on a few things, I make a point that I'm a gc feminist so he essentially is putting this down to my feminism but that's by the by. I'm saying this because 1. There's an innocent child caught up in this. And 2. I can't bring another innocent child into this. That's why he's making the "you're a woman you don't understand" comments but I'd say the same if he was female. The point is I cannot understand why anyone, how anyone could not run over hot coal to see their child for even a millisecond.so yes I don't understand, but that's because I can see the importance of children and their early lives not because I'm a woman.

'He was sorting some personal issues and said he couldn't see child for X amount of weeks (usually saw him weekly) and she (rightly imo) didn't react well.'

He thinks that having some personal issues is a reason to stop seeing his child for a few weeks? What have I just read?
What if mum had personal issues, should she stop being a parent for a while?

This would put me right off him.

That's exactly what I said. Her anger was valid.

Run as fast you can is my advice

Massive red flags. Definitely don’t have children with this man because he’ll just do it again.

The court would help him up to 50% contact if he didn’t want to arrange contact through his ex. His ex has provided him with a convenient excuse that covers up the reality that he can’t be arsed/doesn’t care about the child.

The “You don’t understand because you’re a woman” is a massive red flag too. It reveals everything about his attitude to babies and women and you’d be a fool to have kids with him when he’s so publicly unashamed of using a line like that.

In which case he has absolutely no excuse to be speaking to you like this. He's being manipulative. You say he's not abusive but that text he sent you is a massive red flag, on top of the huge red flag of him making no effort with his child. Please do not put yourself in this position, get away now while you easily can

Thank you @Dramatic

Sorry I feel a bit emotional. As bad as mumsnet can get, the army of women is just amazing. If you all hadn't have commented on that text I'd continue thinking I've done something awful. It is manipulative, isn't it? And I'm not saying any of this to him for my sake, I'm only thinking of that innocent little child.

I could never bring a child into this situation so it was more like should I just sit and wait for him to do the right thing but that's not good enough for my future child(ren) really, is it?

Thank you all for your comments honestly. I think my autism causes me to think that I'm just so odd for acting this way because quite honestly I see so many women accepting these situations.

My ex has a girlfriend. But even as a woman let alone a mother how could you be with someone who is an absent or shitty parent?

Thanks everyone. 🥲