My co-parent threatening to stop me seeing my 4 year old daughter after I said I was looking to change rear-facing car seat in my car to front facing.

[lovingthegiftcom]

While I was discussing some issues of concern with my coparent via her friend, my coparent threatened to not allow me to see my daughter again a few days ago.
The reason?
Because I was looking at changing the rear-facing car seat to a front facing car seat for my daughter who is now 4 years old.
I have 20 years no claims on my car, my co-parent has made a few claims and had accidents in the past few years.
I appreciate they are a bit safer. But rear facing seats can cause sickness and vomiting plus it gets uncomfortable as the child gets older. I get that a baby should be in rear facing but government guidelines are:

https://www.rac.co.uk/drive/advice/road-safety/car-seat-laws/

I am upset and confused as my coparent does not take into account other more serious everyday issues:

1. My daughter gets foot injuries at her mum’s place sometimes: cuts etc due to glass and nails and other items on floors and in the garden. She blames my daughter for losing her shoes (true my daughter is guilty there) but theres plenty of shoes and slippers about. Her mum has lost one of her cats 3 weeks ago after it ate something lying around in the house. (It died due to internal strangulation or something) Now she has "only 4" cats and wants another one.
2. On car seats: I bought an expensive £200 Swedish safety rated rear facing seat at my co-patent’s insistence but she doesn't care much about the dirt, pc tablets, rubbish and crap in the car that’s far more dangerous in a crash at 70 MPH or if the car topples over: those items will smash on the kids heads. My coparent has already had a few car accidents and incidents in the past few years.
3. I had an allergy to cat fur myself, my daughter has asthma as does her mum. A few weeks ago when I was up there, my daughter had a very serious episode of coughing in the middle of the night lasting a couple of hours. Again letting the cats sleep on the bed does not help but my coparent doesn't think its an issue as she keeps giving us the impression she knows more than the medical professionals.
4. There are flees and fruit flies in most of the rooms even in the cold winter months because of food bits and plates and cutlery because the kids can eat in bedrooms etc and sometimes plates and cups stay there for days. This doesn't seem to bother my coparent much. And she has a cleaner paid for doing 10 hours a week cleaning.

There are other issues which are not needed to be said.

Maybe its me. Maybe I am in the wrong. My relationship with my coparent has gone south in the past year or two but that’s life. I have 2 grown up kids from a previous relationship and I am a good parent as far as anyone can see but yes I also have faults. I am not perfect and I have tried to listen and placate my coparent as I know she really loves her kids. (She has 2 older boys from a previous relationship too) I hope we can find a middle way forward for the sake of our daughter who has so much potential. We got on fine until about a year ago as we found a middle way even when we disagreed but there is someone stirring things up between us which does not help. It is not her friend that I know too a bit but someone my coparent is friends with as my coparent talks to me rudely and looks at me like I am a piece of rubbish sometimes. It is one of 3 people or a combination who are causing trouble.
My coparent will no doubt comment too as she will get the link to this.
Thanks for reading. Any advice or comments welcome but lets be fair too!

Surely it is his business if he thinks his child is at risk.
OP if you haven't got a child contact order get one so that contact arrangements are set down legally.
If you think your child is at risk with her mother apply for full contact.

I didn't realise a 4 year old would fit into a rear facing car seat - both my grandchildren have front facing seats, 2 year old has one with 5 point harness, 4 year old has a booster seat with back support using the normal belt.

The state of the house I would reporting to SS

How do you know what her house is like if you only communicate through a friend?

I don't think SS would do much with the living conditions, they allow many kids to stay in a much worse state.

OP, I imagine your child's mother has been got at by one of the crazy car-seat groups. Regardless, she can't restrict your access, but if it's not formalized, I'd get right on that.

The house situation sounds potentially dangerous.

I expect you are scared to report it but I think you should. Poor kid.

So you were in your existence house overnight a few weeks ago to hear the 'cat induced' coughing fit, but now can only communicate via a third party?

There seems to be a lot more going on here then car seats and a kid going in the garden barefoot.

You don't need to announce you're changing a car seat as long as the car seat you switch to is the right one for the age/height of your child. Your first mistake was mentioning it.
You only have contact via a group chat and a friend indicates that the relationship you have is poor. In which case you only need to be speaking about essential matters. Don't offer up anything else in future.
For the sake of keeping the peace of stick with the RF car seat for now, as it is still safe to use. Other than preference there is no need to change and cause an issue now.

Going forward if you have safety/neglect concerns regarding your child health you need to be reporting those.

Otherwise only speak on a need to know basis from now on.

Your poor poor daughter and friend

thid needs a court ordered agreement - get legal advice and get it started clearly setting out expectations

and look at whether your daughter is safe

If I thought my child was living in an unsanitary home and her health was being compromised, I’d be straight onto social services. Why haven’t you done this OP? The car seat is the least of the issues here.

You aren't thinking things through here. You go on about your perfect driving record as justification for 'turning' her, and then mention how your ex has crashed several times.

Once you FF your child in your car, it'll be harder for the child to accept still being RF in mums car. And yes, that's entirely your prerogative, but in reality it means your daughter will end up FF sooner in her mum's car, where according to you, she's less safe anyway.

You seem so concerned about tit for tat that you have stopped thinking about the best interests and safety of your child. You are also using issues of concern over safety and hygienist in mums home more as ammunition rather than trying to resolve them.

Then you would have been better to explain that you had concerns about all of the other parents parenting skills rather than presenting their shortcomings as supporting evidence in your alleged worries about the car seat.

And discussing the problems with a mutual friend? How is that supposed to help an already fraught situation. If you are really concerned about your child’s safety then you need to apply for full custody through the court.

Can you afford to pay for a cleaner for your co parent? Obviously you shouldn’t have to but it would mean that you would know your daughter was being looked after in a clean safe home and would probably make you co parent a lot happier

The most serious issue for me here is that she is threatening you with not seeing your daughter. This is parental alienation and it is abusive. If I were you I would make a note of that and keep any messages and your responses to them. Make sure your ducks are in a row in terms of any shared custody arrangements and who pays what for your dd. The lack of hygiene and safety in the house is really concerning and a red flag. A four year old child should not be living in a filthy unsafe house with flees, sharp objects on the floor, flies and too many cats exacerbating asthma. This is neglectful. If what you say is true then I would say your dd is in a situation that requires intervention from social services unless you can persuade your ex for you to be the primary carer and her to have your dd just at weekends only or similar. I would not want my child living like this it’s not good enough at all. Please do your best to get proper advice to safeguard your dd you can start by letting school and gp know of your concerns and asking for a health visitor to be assigned to visit and advise. I would also be looking at full custody.

Well exactly. I suspect the OP is a man who wants this forum to do his wife-work admin for him so he can beat his ex around the head with whilst actually doing fuck all themselves. We see it here too many sodding times.

Why haven't you gone for full custody @lovingthegiftcom ?

Hmm … I might be wrong but your eclectic list of the neglect at her mother’s sounds like something my ex husband might have come up with, not insofar as the specific criticisms but starting from a grain of truth and building a castle around it.

How many times has your daughter sustained a foot injury at her mother’s and what were they?

Many households allow children to eat in their bedrooms (I didn’t) ; many households will occasionally get fruit flies. If you have pets, you may get a flea problem occasionally. Households that have experienced these problems are not necessarily unsafe or unpleasant unless the house is filthy which it sounds like it isn’t. Children fall and hurt themselves and have occasional accidents. If she tripped over a toy she had out this could be “she sustains injuries because of the amount of clutter in the rooms”.

You come across as someone who has taken major offence at her questioning the safety of your less safe car seat and you are engaged in retaliatory tit for tat in a way that sounds like you are trying to evidence she is an unfit parent.

If your car seat is assessed as safe for your daughter then she can’t stop you having her on that account and I’d go to court over it if I had to, but initially I’d write her a neutral letter stating why her stance is unreasonable and stating your willingness to go to court if necessary but that you hope it can be avoided.

Are you having mediation? It might be a good idea.

In the last year my house has had ants in the kitchen; damp on one wall through water ingress from a balcony in torrential rain; in the summer we had fruit flies briefly a couple of times around the counter integrated compostable bin. My husband turned his ankle coming down the stairs. We live in a hot summer climate in a very clean and luxurious house but you could make it sound like a plague pit death trap from that.

Is the house really filthy and unsafe? If it is then I’d refer to Social Services.

Rear facing is absolutely safer. But it’s also a choice.
I have my four year old rear facing in a 36kg ERF seat which will last him until he’s around 6/7, he will grow out of it due to height way before he reaches the weight limit as he’s not a large child. He’s got tons of room in it, never uncomfortable, never sick, it’s what he knows.
But it was an expensive seat. Beyond the age of around 3.5-4 your best options for rear facing are 25kg or 36kg seats and they do cost significantly more.

my co parent also rear faces him in an ERF seat but if he decided to chance at any point I’d want to chat with him about it but I couldn’t stop him seeing him because of it.

My point is, either rear face your child And avoid the argument, or don’t, she can’t stop you having your child.

To add, having an unblemished driving record means nothing, it’s survivor bias. Doesn’t mean you won’t pull out of your street tomorrow morning and some nutter T-bone you at 50mph. You might be a very safe driver, others are not.

You are not unreasonable to use a forward facing seat, and s/he cannot refuse you contact with your child for using one. No court in the land would allow that. You will be using a legal seat, and that's it.

Communicating via a friend and by sending links to a Mumsnet thread where you slag of the parent that you were living it to, is entirely unhelpful though, and just adding petrol to the fire that is your relationship.

The friend is either in a terrible position or could be adding to the problems in the way that she reports back. So this can't go on.

The car seat issue is the least of the worries here. If the above is true regarding the state of the home and living in filth then your ex needs help with getting the house sorted out otherwise it seems you need to become the main carer for your child

I also think you are raising more serious issues as just “context” to a relatively minor issue.

These sound like the real issues if they’re as bad as you say, and you need to address them.

Go to court to get a proper shared custody order. Stop the tit for tat accusations, it’s not good for the child. If you’re really worried about safety and cleanliness then report it to ss and apply for full custody, otherwise grow up and try to communicate properly with your child’s mother.

I, for one, won't be used as a pawn in your power struggles with your ex.

If your child is living in an unsafe environment, then take it to court.

A 4yr old in a rear facing car seat!!!!, WTF. I have never heard of this before. Seems cruel.
You need to contact ss about the major other issues though.

I don't think a four year old needs a rear facing car seat, but as others have said that is the least of your problems. You should stop using a go-between and get some professional mediation support for the sake of your daughter.

Where do the 4yr olds legs go? I've never seen any 4yr old in rear facing car seat before.