There is no question the background to this has an impact of where we are now so apologies in advance for the long winded post.
I am stepdad to an 8 year old boy (H), dad to his 13 month (half) brother. Until very recently my work meant i was away Monday to Friday and only home for weekends. To try and ensure a more normal and stable family life, i have changed careers to be home every night. I have been in thee 8 year olds life for a number of years.
My partner and the 8 year olds father had a very acrimonious split before thee birth. These issues still aren't resolved. Father is not consistent, prioritises his other children and current family (this is clear to the boy) and consistently fails to keep promises made to his son. He also appears to use maintenance as a tool to exert some control over the situation (routinely fails to make basic contributions). Of course this isn't about money, just painting a picture.
H's Dad has recently started making a bit more of an effort but his approach seems to be having a detrimental impact on H's behaviour. At H's request, he agreed to take him to kidzone last Saturday. 30 mins before pick up time he called to tell H he was busy with his other children and it would have to be later. Promised to call in an hour, 3 hours later we called to find out what was going on, he was again busy with his other children. An hour later he called and said he could meet us at kidzone as long as we drove H and picked him up when he called. While this is extremely frustrating, its clear H wants a relationship with his Dad so we accept this messing around but god knows what H was feeling for the day!
H is becoming extremely emotional. Does not want to talk about his feelings. Has starting crying and/or flying into a rage at the smallest issue. I have little doubt some or all of this is tied up in unresolved feelings with his Dad. I'll admit we over compensate because we know the situation is emotionally stressful.
We won't change the Father. We accept this. It is in H's best interests to have a relationship with both parents, we accept this. How do we help H deal with this situation, maintain access with his dad but deal properly with the behavioural issues that are developing during this recent spike in interest from his Dad?