Dad thinks he should have the kids if I'm not available.

[Daniella66]

My ex has the kids dd13, ds14 every second weekend and one evening a week. He has a close loving relationship with them. He's a good father.
I always leave the kids with my mother who lives next door if I'm unavailable. Ex says he should be given that time when opportunities arise. (He lives 5 mins away) I don't agree. It's my time so I'll decide what happens in those instances.

What an annoying drifted post!

An 8 Yr court order is bull @Daniella66 you're children are old enough now that you can actually just speak to them. You say they are happy but you also don't sound like you'd care if they weren't.

You are missing a lot of context in your post. How long are you leaving them for (an hour, overnight)... how often are you leaving them (once a week, 3 times a week)

It's perfectly fair that if you are gone for an extended period of time, that he would have the kids. Nobody is suggesting it isn't OK to have your mother do some childcare and obviously it's important they spend time with her. But why does that need to be at the expense of their father?

I cannot believe that you would make him go to court (and if he's suggesting this, you're leaving out alot of facts here and you're probably MIA alot) to see his teen kids .ore rather than a) asking them or b) coming up with a compromise. You could always suggest that if you were away overnight Dad can take them and vice versa?

The fact you keep banging on about how the kids are happy.... but you haven't bothered asking them. I've no doubt they have expressed to their Dad that they'd prefer to be with him.

At 13 and 14 they're not 'kids'. Those days have gone I'm afraid.

If she's coming home at 10 I'd expect them to be sleeping over at Dad's, not sitting waiting for her call.

First time poster, hey? Deliberately only answers half the questions asked in an effort to further fan the flames, gives the smallest amount of information as possible … 🥱

I love how many people complain about awful men and here we are with a post complaining about a good dad wanting to spend time with his kids.

I am sure the kids are happy with the current arrangement, @Daniella66, because they don’t know that their dad would like to see more of them! They might be a lot less happy if they found out he was asking to see them more, and you were saying No.

You say he is free to challenge the current arrangement - I assume you mean challenge in court - but surely it would be better for the children (the ones who matter most here) if you and their father could sort things out like adults, without the adversarial nature of more court proceedings.

I don't know! I'm just baffled why she'd be upset by this and that seemed like it might be the reason.

And you will see that most posters are standing up for the dad here, so what do you mean?

I meant the OP. She seems to be angry at the fact the DC’s dad wants to be involved in their lives more and it’s frankly utterly baffling.

This.

Makes you wonder if they're fed the narrative of how Dad doesn't bother/barely has them, whilst implying he's a borderline deadbeat.

What OP needs to consider is that when the kids get older, if they ever find out that Dad wanted and tried to see them more and Mum stopped it.. It could really impact the relationship between OP and her then adult DC.

Adults end up in therapy over their childhood stuff.. It's no joke, it does lasting damage.

Agreed.
I am inclined to think it's either financial or because of the way the relationship ended and OP is holding onto hurt towards the Dad.

Hopefully we're wrong and if can be sorted amicably for the DCs sake!

They are old.enough to make their own decisions about where they go. I think you should ask them and let them decide

there speaks someone who never had to deal with a controlling, abusive ex husband who still thought he had a right to know their every move to the point of stalking and escalating their abuse.

It's just easier to not share my movements with him.

I did also tell the OP that if he isn't an abusive cunt, and she's just using the court order, to stop being stupid and let him have them.

By your own admission, he’s a good father who has a close and loving relationship with your the DC. You’re going out. One parent is unavailable. Why on EARTH would the children go to a grandparent when the other loving parent is there and wants to have them? That’s downright vindictive and punitive. You’re using access as a weapon with which to punish him.

You don't know what I've dealt with in my life.

Let's not derail the thread further though as we agree OP should let the children have more time with their father if she is 'not available'.

Right of first refusal is very common nowadays . It generally works very well. If he goes to court for this, he will be granted it as refusing when you're not with you kids anyway just makes you look spiteful.

The kids have never been asked or given the opportunity to have it different, so that is not a justification being made in good faith.

On the face of it you are not centering the kids best interests at all. You have at least one eye on sticking it to him. I think he should go back to court to be honest. My guess is you’d be happy to use him as babysitter if your Mum wasn’t available and you had to pay. Demonstrating that you are using your mother as well as using your kids to hurt their father.

I don’t understand why you posted this. You clearly think you’re in the right and have no interest in alternative viewpoints. You don’t seem to care what the kids might think or give them any autonomy. If the arrangement ends up back in court it’ll serve you right.

The question is why he won’t go back to court if he thinks things have changed

This doesn’t sound like a new thing.

Whilst it might seem that Daniella66
is being inflexible when all she is doing is sticking to the court order.

I don't think there is anything wrong with following the letter of the law if it works for you.

I do think if he has a problem then he needs to go back to court even if the court only say to sort things out themselves as that would be seen as a new court ruling.

If they want to be with their dad I don’t see the issue, no wonder he thinks you are being unreasonable.

You sound spiteful and petty tbh. He's their father. Why wouldn't he have them when he can? He should take priority over your mother if he wants the kids and has a good relationship with them. You haven't given a good reason why he cannot/should not, so unless there's a massive dripfeed coming about him being controlling or coercive etc, right now it sounds like you're blocking him having a closer relationship with them just because you feel like it. YABU.

I would just offer the teens the choice of who they go to, it’s really no big deal.

If I were the parent who had less time with my children, I would want that extra time if possible.

The OP has said that the Father has said he will go to court.

So presumably something has changed to trigger this. My assumption would be that the OP is spending less time with the kids (maybe the OP works late, has a newfound social life, does extracurricular activities that take up more time). I don't think the Father would be asking for this time and saying he'll take it to court if the OP was only away from the kids for an hour a week or something.

It might work for her, but does it work for the children. They haven't even been made aware that their dad wants them during these times. They are being used to punish the dad. That's awful parenting

These are not problems. The fact that OP prefers to ship them next door to their gran’s instead of literally five minutes away to their dad’s is lazy and absolutely not in the best interests of her kids. And if dad only lives five minutes away, then at age 13 and 14 they shouldn’t need ferrying to and fro.