Concerned about child's father parenting

[fooddiee]

So when my child's father has DC he will give DC unsuitable drinks from bottles which are full of sugar and sweeteners.
I'm talking about Innocent Smoothies, milkshakes etc.

Food wise he will give DC crisps and other rubbish.

I provide DC with healthy and nutritious meals which he loves.
DC eats a minimum of 5 fruit/veg a day and I follow the basic guidelines for his meals.

I am concerned that the junk he eats/ drinks with his father will start to affect what he eats and drinks when he is with me.

My ex can't cook as it's a "woman's job and women should cook for him".

I have told him that unless he can stop this and learn how to cook DC will not be having over nights with him and I will happily tell the court the reasons why.

AIBU to feel this way or am I being too strict?

You can only control what they eat when they’re with you

the court won’t be interested, sounds like your ex knows it annoys you and likely plays on that to wind you up so disengage

@Bigtreeesss is right, a court won’t be interested and it definitely sounds like it’s an attempt to wind you up.

What age is DC? And how often is DC with the father?

Of course you can’t block contact like that

Court won’t support you on this one.
Don't engage with your ex on this one, you’ll just wind yourself up and he’ll enjoy every second of it.
Feed your DC decent food at your house.

Your house, your rules.
His house, his rules.

You need to breathe and let your child breathe too.

Sorry, it's not ideal but not much you can do about it. Just to to keep doing the same when DC is with you.

You can't just block contact like that. The courts will rightly give you a telling off.

I had similar with exdh, I ignored it and made a point to be extra healthy on my days. I had a few issues in teens but now as adults both dd are pretty healthy. But no there’s nothing you can do I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of letting him know you are bothered.

You can't stop overnight contact because you don't like what he's feeding them.

You can’t control what goes on at his house or what he chooses to feed the child. That’s up to him. You cannot dictate whether the child has overnights with him or not - the child is just as much his as yours. You don’t get to make these decisions unilaterally.

For all the moaning and complaining you’re doing now about his parenting skills - you picked him. You chose this man. He’s the father of the child and has as much right as you to raise them.

I agree with you and it’s infuriating however legal advice and advice from mediators is that each parent has the right to chose how to feed their child in their own time. (Unless they are poisoning them or giving them something a doctor agrees they are allergic to - only then would it become neglect or a safeguarding issue)

issuing threats like ‘do it ny way or the highway or you can’t see him’ is how you end up in court and if you end up in court all choices about overnights will be taken away he might even get 5050 which would totally disrupt your child’s routine.

you have to pretend he is a customer at work that you are not allowed to be rude to and work from there. Use charm and flattery- eg ‘we both love baby so much and I know you want the best for him. You do lots of lovely things together and he loves playing with you. Something I wanted us to try to be on the same page as is diet. It’s great that he’s happy to eat with you. But these are the foods I’m concerned about and why ‘

His attitudes stink, but hopefully life will teach him that. Sounds like a wanker.

You chose to have a child with this man...

You will just have to educate your son with what healthy eating looks like and why it is important.

Nothing you can do sadly.

Ex gave mine shit, they stopped eating healthy food and they put on weight. They've lost it now they are interested in healthy eating for sport and can cook for themselves.

How old is your DC? If they're a baby or young toddler, then I think YANBU, but older than that and this is probably something you have to let go.

Ultimately what he's doing is "stealing your slack". NRPs with minimal contact who then give kids shit to eat and stick them in front of screens are very annoying because then the onus is on you to be the "strict" parent the rest of the time - you feel that you can't give treats or have lazy time in front of the TV with your kids because you're constantly counterbalancing what their other parent is (not) doing. It's frustrating but unfortunately not a reason to stop or limit contact.

Honestly ive had the same feeding them cereal and milk for tea in the car by the park in winter because I called child maintenance on him (he hadnt paid anything for years and still hadn't at this point) giving them big tubs of haribo and coke cola for a meal feeding them shit till they puked then telling me off because they were sick and I "must have known" then there was when our youngest was lactose intolerant he kept feeding him chocolate and milkshakes the nursery noticed his nappy was awful every time dad had him (the day after) and asked him if he needed support providing appropriate food (sweets dont digest when they go through fast so they could see what he had been fed clearly) i had to ride it out it didnt meet threshold for intervention the kids grew and learned to say no and learned to talk loudly in school

It's annoying OP, but it's up to him how he feeds DC and it's not a reason to stop contact.

You think withholding overnight contact is reasonable? Wow. How often is he in his care?

Yabu. Hes not a bad parent because he doesn't do what you want so you have no right to say if you don't do this I'll restrict your time with the children like imagine if you did something he didn't like (and trust me you probably have and/or will) and he did that to you. If it was other way round you'd be on here saying he's nasty and controlling and rightly so.

DC is 22 months old.
At the moment DC is picked up from my house and he takes him out for a couple of hours at the weekend.

DC has never been to his flat as he can't be bothered to childproof it.
DC can open doors so childproofing his flat is paramount.

@TheunamedcatThats is awful, I'm sorry you had this experience. I can imagine my ex doing something like this. Haribo and cola for a meal? That's absurd.

I don't think he is too bothered about having DC overnight but he has mentioned but I think only says it because I start voicing my concerns about the lack of childproof safety in his flat.

Ps - following on from the advice below, my child’s father introduced him to juice which has been the bane of my life as he was so good at drinking water before and now is a juice fiend. I did give in when he was ill in hot weather so then juice made its way to my house. I just had to accept it.
the only other think you can do is provide him with a healthy snack box - of course you shouldn’t have to but if it saves him time and money he might use your snacksn

Op even though I said yabu I’m on your side. It’s so so hard as the safe mum that does all the work to have the lazy prick of an ex who has to nothing at all ruining your tough efforts to be a great mum and your hard work.
the reason he’s not staying overnight isn’t due to you controlling diet, it’s due to this man not making the effort to make a safe space for his child there . That will come eventually, probably once you’ve done all the efforts of potty training! I feel for you as I’ve been there

Omg what a good phrase - I feel exactly this way about screen time! I’m the one who needs a break yet I can’t feel I can use it as he shows him screens in the car to and from his house and at his house too

Of course she can ‘dictate’ if child does overnights.
the process goes as follows: keep to the status quo as children love routine. If there is to be a change to the status quo, both parents need to agree (so dad cannot ‘unilaterally’ decide the toddler has a sudden dramatic change in its routine) how to manage this change in a child focused pace. If they can’t agree, then they go to mediation to try to resolve (this helps make a plan for ensuring child’s safety and gentle pace, if both take part in good faith. This worked very well for me. The mediator helped my ex see that I would be well placed to help him baby proof so he invited me round to look at stuff, the mediator suggested we write a list of any changes to make together and ex sends me photos of the changes made, such as cupboard locks and stair gates, before child visits the home. As this came from mediator ex agreed, he wouldn’t have if I suggested it I’m sure. I wasn’t even planning to invite myself over my plan was to ask him to ask his mums friend who owns a nursery to baby proof with him).
if mediation doesn’t work then the next and final stage is to apply to court. IF court orders overnights, which they’re likely to, then they will still order a staggered build up to it and I’m sure cafcass would visit the property if mum
told them it’s not toddler safe.
a parent who has been absent, hadn’t built up more than a couple of hours experience of child care and doesn’t demonstrate awareness of their health and safety doesn’t just get to take a baby away overnight suddenly just because they have equal dna to the resident parent,
this isn’t just my view I’ve had hours of legsl
advoce around dealing with a similar man (see my post ex DP burnt my baby).

The courts aren't going to agree to reducing contact over this. I think you could end up being viewed more poorly than your ex if you put this to the family court.