To think he’s mad for saying this? Or is it me?

[Chabgeu]

I genuinely am at my wits end. And I’m prepare to be told I’m the unreasonable one. Me and ex don’t have a great relationship though we try to get along for ds. He sees ds fortnightly for a night, he doesn’t want more time. Not sure why. He doesn’t have other dc but has always been quite self involved.

Ds birthday is coming up and I asked him what he thought might be good to do (ds will be 6). As is usual, he didn’t offer any suggestions so I eventually asked him to keep a weekend free coming up. He agreed to this but then about five days later I realised it was half term and a few of DS’s friends wouldn’t be around as they’re on holiday. I told ex and suggested a different weekend, to which he said ‘why should I organise my shifts around people’s holidays.’ And ‘it’s clear I’m not the priority as to who is there, it’s about his friends’ availability not mine.’

I reminded him that this is several weeks away and im sure his work won’t mind if he requests this time off given it’s over 7 weeks away. He said I was being demanding and want things my own way. I explained this was for ds and nothing to do with my wants and needs and reminded him that I had done all the legwork in making enquiries as to venue and sorting invites and I will be doing party bags etc, meanwhile he doesn’t do anything so the least he could do is not give me a hard time about changing the weekend.

AIBU? I’m exhausted and feel like I can never win with him. I’d prefer people to be blunt though (hence posting in AIBU), if I’m the issue then I need to know. I’m trying my best for ds but don’t know if I’m too much or too demanding… I don’t know.

Next time don’t invite him. You organise something fun to do with DS and his friends for his birthday. If ex wants to organise something for his sons birthday, he can organise his own thing.

@Hollycoco but Ds would want him there so that’s not an option I am comfortable with unfortunately

He's your ex. It's not up to you to twist yourself into knots so he will be at your son's birthday. Make your arrangements, give him the info, and that's it. He shows or not. He's a shitty dad and you can't hide that for long or force him to be a good one. Unfortunately, he will probably disappoint your son a lot and there's nothing you can do about that.

Your ex should be organizing his own birthday thing for your son, not riding on your effort. But he won't.

@outerspacepotato I just think surely we should both attend his birthday party as despite not being together we are both his parents and it’s for ds? That’s why I try so hard.

He sounds like my baby’s dad! Very self absorbed! Sounds like you just wanted to make sure your little one got the best birthday with their friends there and that is the priority but dad clearly think it’s all about him!

'why should I organise my shifts around people’s holidays.’ And ‘it’s clear I’m not the priority as to who is there, it’s about his friends’ availability not mine.’

I'd have replied to that, correct it's about Bob not you. What a knobend

I get its annoying that the weekend has changed but i hadn’t realised the one we went for was half term. My mistake but he could also have given that some thought.

It doesn't matter what you think. You had a child with a man who puts himself first in everything and seems to care little about his kid. You can't nag him into caring. You can't nag him to go to a birthday party. He's choosing to not be involved with his kid. Just tell your son you invited him and you don't know if he'll show or not. Very bluntly, this is life when you have kids with a selfish dad who doesn't care about their children.

He's an ex for good reason. Your dc needs you with great mental wellbeing more than he needs a feckless fuckwit of a df ..
Let him do the bare minimum and be thankful he hasn't got much input in the raising of your lovely dc ..

I know you want him to be there for your son’s sake but you can’t make someone be the parent you wish they’d be. All you can do is work on accepting the parent they are.

My ex has never bothered to organise a birthday party for our son and was initially vague about whether he’d make it to this year’s one. Apparently he’s now going to pop in.

If the shoe was on the other foot, you know you’d happily do whatever it took to arrange things so you could be at your son’s party. The fact that he won’t says everything about him and nothing about you.

Why are you doubting yourself? Would DS prefer his friends or his dad at his party? Bearing in mind his dad could celebrate with him on another day

Don’t bend over backwards to try and include him. He is invited to the party and he can come if he wants to. Otherwise he can actively help with the planning.

don’t worry about your DS as he gets older he will see who consistently shows up for him and who doesn’t.

@outerspacepotato i can’t say that to a six year old. I just can’t

You are separated parents. You do separate things for his birthday. Stop torturing yourself trying to include him and let him make his own plans with his son.

@Chabgeu it is honestly better for DS to understand you and his Dad are not together. Yes, ideally you will be civil but you don’t have to be together to celebrate DS’s birthday

@DaisyChain505 there’s absolutely no way he will organise a party. He doesn’t even know his son’s friends’ names. I don’t agree that separated parents have to do separated things on birthdays.

@outerspacepotato i know we don’t have to be but surely that’s best? Just seems unnecessarily sad

No you're completely unreasonable to include your ex in planning something nice for your child. That he would like to do. At a time when his friends will actually be able to attend.

How dare you think weeks in advance about his child's happiness and allow him weeks of warning to be a part of it...you...you...nasty person.

Op in all seriousness just tell him. "Fine, I'll tell ds that we thought about moving his party so his friends could come but his dad couldn't be arsed to sort his shift so we're having it with no fucker there instead"

Finalise your plans. Invite him (be the bigger person) but don’t try and get into his headspace and over think it. So long in your heart you’ve tried that’s the main thing. Kids don’t stay little, they eventually remember who showed up and when x

IIt’s really best that you start putting in boundaries now.

And that means having separate birthday celebrations.

God he sounds a right tit. Sorry op you have my sympathies. I wouldn't involve him in future, he'll just ruin it.

Honestly all my friends who are separated don’t have both parents at the kids birthday party with their friends. Some of them the Mum does all the work every year, some of them the parents take it in turns each year to do the party with the kids friends.
Honestly, I go to a lot of kids parties where the parents are married and only one parent is there. The other is working, or looking after other children. Don’t overthink this.
Your son is off an age too where before you know it, it’ll be birthday parties with only a couple of friends and it’ll be awkward for you both to be there!
Sounds like you should organise the party with the friends, and just tell Dad the details for it.
And for your son, you hype up his special 1-1 time with Dad for his birthday instead. Parties are about seeing his friends.

It sounds like this might be more about you and your difficulty letting go than about your little boy.

Tbh it probably doesn't matter what you arranged, he would have found fault with it somewhere.

I get that you are trying to put on a united front for your DS and to include ex because that's what your DS wants at the moment. Fortunately as DS gets older you will need to accommodate ex less and less.

You are doing the right thing for now. Don't beat yourself up about it.

@Pumpup thanks this a a helpful perspective. I hadn’t really considered it like that. I could definitely big up his day with his dad at a different time and then it saves me the stress of this sort of interaction with him