Leaving DP because of his ex.

[Brokenn]

I can’t take it anymore.

My DPs ex is genuinely batshit. He shares a child with her. For the first few years of our relationship she was ok, but since we got married and had a baby in the last couple of years, she has amplified her behaviour to such an extent that I feel I have no choice but to leave my DP (even just temporarily until their shared child is older).

I can’t detail all of her behaviours out of fear I’ll be outing myself, but I’ll list a few so you get an idea:

• making threats to turn up at our house and death threats. made via their child and social media. this causes my stepchild to have massive emotional stress which we then have to deal with all the fallout.
• constantly telling their child what an awful person my DP is and that he’s an abuser in every sort of way, and saying horrible things about me, I’m fat and lazy. she sends text messages and makes social media posts about us which my stepchild then shows us.
• making fake child maintenance claims saying my partner has his child for zero overnights, which we still haven’t been able to resolve with them and it’s costing our family hundreds every month.
• constant emotional abuse of my stepchild, she blocks them, tells them she wants nothing to do with them, threatens suicide all the time, sends them lists of reasons she hates them. It’s like a teenager bullying another teenager, except she’s an adult mother.
• putting a phoney claim in for universal credit in my name, attempting to claim my babies child benefit which I got a rival claims letter for, me and my partner get lots of random post from companies we’ve allegedly signed up for recently, which we definitely haven’t and have never heard of the companies (I don’t have definitive proof this is her but it’s obvious given the context of everything else).

i kid you not, she’s done something new every week. every week we are having to deal with more abuse, more craziness. Social services are involved and have been for a couple of years, but frankly they are pretty useless. The police say they can’t do anything as she mostly terrorises us through the child (a third party as they say) rather than directly.

I just want to enjoy my baby. Would I be a terrible person if I left? I feel dreadful for my stepchild as they understandably already have huge trust issues and we have a great relationship. Also I love my DP and it’s not his fault his ex is like this but I am not myself and haven’t been for a long time, my family and friends have all noticed.

Oh she’s evil!

Good luck in whatever way you move forward.

The bar for social services to remove children, unless extreme physical neglect or abuse, is just so high. In an ideal world all of these kids would bebin foster care - ideally kinship care - while the mother got intensive therapy.

If she chose to continue to be emotionally abusive to her kids, she shouldn't get unsupervised access to her children.

But as no one's died, or is going to die, police and social services can treat this as a very low priority.

The kids will hopefully break free when they're older - the OPs stepchild has a good chance, as he has a supportive involved father. Hopefully the other kids will go NC too, and be able to get family support from each other.

I had an ex once threathen to commit suicide - the very worst type of emotional blackmail, it's disgraceful for a parent to do this to a child.

Why would the children be in foster care in an ideal world?! In an ideal world they would be with their fathers. Why would foster care come into the equation?!

Why are the police so bloody useless.

I haven't read all of this, but I would have thought there would be potential recourse via the Protection from Harassment Act, or at least the threat of it. I think you should take legal advice from a specialist solicitor.

If you have Employee Assistance Pregram at work, you can get FREE legal advice, Free counselling and also sometimes
even free counselling for a member of your family (so the teenager may qualify)

It is all confidential and is worth a phone call today. Don’t leave yet!!

If you have EAP at work or your husband does, try that they can be really helpful. Good luck x

I may be way off with this but she sounds like she needs to be sectioned under the mental health act. My first step mum was acting crazy after they got divorced and threatened me, she ended up sectioned. I was 12 so I don’t fully understand what actually happened process wise. I’m sure it’s very complicated but she sounds genuinely unhinged and if she’s making threats of suicide to her child surly that’s a sectionable offence?

This is an awful situation for you.

You talk about your stepchild and then say: "constant emotional abuse of my stepchild, she blocks them, tells them she wants nothing to do with them, threatens suicide all the time, sends them lists of reasons she hates them".

How many stepchildren? That is confusing, at other times you just mention one.

If he/she is a teenager now mother will soon be less able to manipulate. I presume the other children are younger and feel very sorry for them being in the middle of this 'war'.

Keep evidence. It will add up.

As you have a young baby of your own, I can understand you wanting out of this situation. However I doubt your husband wants you to go. He should take some advice from a solicitor, producing copies of all the messages and posts his ex-wife makes.

I wonder why she is so bitter or if she is mentally ill though that is not your problem.

A warning to other young women, often said on Mumsnet. Do not get involved with men who have dependent children!

One stepchild. I’ve used them deliberately to not reveal whether its a girl or/ boy so I can try to maintain some level of anonymity

Not sure of advice but I am exactly in yours shoes so thought would share my story if it helps at all. DH’s ex has mental health issues and is very abusive and destructive, false allegations etc. I also have a young DC with my DH and didn’t want another child to have a broken home if we could avoid it and our own relationship is great, just her behaviour that cast a constant cloud. I did consider leaving but chose to stay. Why should she ruin my marriage basically. Our solution was to go NC with her so she has as little “ins” as possible to our life. DH blocked her on everything. We stick to agreed contact times so don’t need to contact her nor she us. SC are 14 and 13 so more than capable of communicating to DH themselves if anything comes up like illnesses etc that mean they can’t come. Wasn’t easy at first as it made her worse to SC about us initially but then it was like without any info or outlet she got bored and things have been better. I would say NC or minimal contact if you feel you cannot go NC. Even just being able to give her less of your head space is an amazing freedom.

OP, your life shouldn’t an ongoing conflict you need to win. So what if she wins by you leaving him, if by staying you lose far more? Staying and ‘winning’ would be a Pyrrich victory for you if ever there was one.

Is it your husband’s fault? Or your stepchild’s? No, but that doesn’t mean you’re in any way duty bound to remain in a situation you’re finding increasingly intolerable. You have one life, you don’t have to spend it fighting and being miserable.

I have been where you are apart from my dsc were a lot younger and far more malleable. My DH turned up every time he had court ordered contact, she brought the children to the door and made them tell him they no longer wanted to see him. He still tried to collect them until she had him arrested for harassment. We tried going back to court to enforce the order, she claimed he had assaulted her and the children during a collection.

She attempted to make the first 10 years of our marriage as miserable as she could. Dangled the children when her abuse failed. Those children are now in their 30’s, she died about 5 years ago. My DH and his children are rebuilding their relationship, they are damaged to a degree and each meeting brings out more of the harm she did.

Think carefully before you split with your DH, it won’t stop her, she might even ramp it up, to include that they are sleeping together etc. Get some legal advice together, you are stronger together than apart.

I hope this works out for you OP. This sounds so tricky for you. Your solution of a combination of a solicitor and therapy may help. Unfortunately your SC may have to choose beteeen a relationship with their siblings and living at yours.

I agree they could and they should, but they aren't. So it's either find a way to escalate to someone more senior and get the complaint taken seriously (difficult) or try another approach.