Do I allow facetime every night?!

[LO3622]

Me and my partner recently split up. He is demanding facetime every night with our 2 year old. She stays with him on a Tuesday and Thursday night and every 2nd weekend. I feel the calls are pointless and really getting me down. On the nights she says with him I get a facetime but she's never settled, so either watching telly or running about. He doesn't speak to me in person and can be quite rude when asking/demanding anything from me over messenger. I'd like to add that he walked out on us after I quizzed him about debt he has due to not paying the bills. I need help cause I don't know what I can say without it being wrong. I want the face times to stop. Or have them at the weekend only when the other parent has her?

If you say no then you might have to be prepared for him to stop her FaceTiming you on his nights. If you’re ok with that then just say no.

I am totally fine with that, as I say she's never settled to speak to me anyways.

My ex tried this, daily calls with a two year old. I think he kept it up for a fortnight, then the excuses started, then it just stopped. It was a total pain and not productive at all. If you think he'll get bored, let him crack on, or just say no.

Why do you feel they’re pointless? Does she not like talking to him?

It’s understandable that a 2 year old isn’t interested in FaceTiming.

I do daily FaceTimes with my kids as does my ex, and have since my children were 2 and 4. It relies on the parent they are with helping to facilitate the conversation but, now mine are older they chat away and it’s lovely to keep up with what they have done that day.

don’t be hasty. A 2 year old is never going to sit for a riveting conversation but now isn’t how it will be forever

She's just not interested in a conversation. She's only 2 so there's not much conversation and he uses them quite often to try get my back up so I react (which I don't)

I won't mind when she is old enough to hold the phone and have chats but I have to be there and more often than not she wants to cuddle into me. It's not like he doesn't see her much.

I think it’s a way of controlling your time, seeing what you are up to, and being a pain.
I wouldn’t continue
But then I am a bit grumpy, but it would really get on my nerves, so I won’t agree to it at all.

Just hand kid the phone and leave her to it. It will soon stop.

I think it’s a way of controlling your time, seeing what you are up to

Me too.

I'd facilitate it on the grounds that I'd want to beat him at his own game. I'd call him, at the same time every night. Give her the phone, press the buttons and off camera say

'I'm just going to fold the laundry/polish her shoes/change her duvet/get her some milk/' and then I'd stand in the doorway and wait it out.

I wouldn't make any fuss about it and I'd choose virtuous motherly tasks that were occupying me.

No you don’t. Give her the phone, let him crack on talking to the ceiling and trying to get a reaction from someone not even in the room. You don’t have to sit in your own house and take shit from him.

or stop the calls, either is fine.

This. I would stop it.

Ok thank you everyone. I'm glad I'm not the only one who thinks it's a way of controlling me. I'll carry on just now and not be in the room when she's on FT. I'm tempted to say to him that I don't need them. So it's only 1 way until he gets fed up off them.

I would say you would also like a FaceTime every night when with him

trust me… he’ll soon stop demanding when with you

Surely it's not a long facetime for conversation, its just a 'night night' to which ever parent she isn't with.

Exactly this. I stopped daily calls with my ex and one dc was around the same age the other a couple of years older.
They had nothing to say and they didn’t want to do them. He wanted to control where I was at a time that suited him every day. I started pushing back when he wasn’t consistent with times and would call late and expect the dc to come running and he’d get annoyed with me if the didn’t or I had taken them out.
It is very intrusive as well it feels like your ex is in your living room ever night too and he never gave them the option of calling me when they were either him in face he would tell them no. I insisted on a routine and some rules around it and he eventually stuck to it for the most part. I worked much harder to facilitate a good relationship with than he ever did to be honest.

Give child the phone and let them get on with it,
When he's face down on the carpet, so be it

Expect the same back though when she is at his

I'd get a good looking male friend to hover in the background while you're FaceTiming!

It's not so much the face timing for me but I do think its (a) unrealistic to get a 2yr old to have a conversation of any meaning every night for any length of time and (b) inconvenient to be in the same place at the same time every night waiting to facetime.
I remember being with my ex and taking his daughter away. This was 12yrs ago so phone signal wasn't as great, at the same time every night we had to stop what we were doing or find somewhere with signal so she could call her mum. Of course we always did it but it wasn't always easy.

If she goes to stay with him every Tues and Thurs and every other weekend, could you suggest that on weeks where he has her at the weekend there's no facetime, and for the weeks where she's with you at the weekend then you facetime at some point over the weekend? That way he's speaking to her / seeing her every other day near enough.