Denying Access to My Child

[JurassicAllstar]

My Ex and I have childcare arrangements where I have my daughter every other weekend and we share the holidays. I would have my daughter more but distance between us makes that difficult with Schooling.

I have recently got married, my wife and I chose to marry abroad for just close friends and family with no children. My 6 year old was in school at this point so I wasn't going to take her 2 weeks out of school for this with many people she doesn't know, only one of my family members could make it.
So we made the decision to have a smaller event in the UK after that would be more suitable for my daughter, we can make it more special for her then and not have to take her out of school where she would have more family around her.

My Ex (Daughters Mother) has since denied me access to my daughter, she is very angry I didn't take our daughter abroad. On fathers day she sent me a really nasty and abusive text message and I have had more since.
I have explained the reasons and that we have another event but she is having none of it.

Me not taking her abroad and out of education for 2 weeks I did in her best interest, it would have been selfish of me to put her in that situation with people she doesn't know and very little family of our own there, she already has anxiety issues.

Any attempt I make to find some middle ground with my ex just results in more abusive messages that are intended to hurt me but more alarming is that she is upsetting our daughter.

My Ex has a history with social services etc.
I just feel so desperate now, I want to protect my daughter and I don't know where to turn.

@CocoPlum EOW is pitiful, even if lots of people choose to do it. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Bloody hell, please give me more info as I’m completely out of the loop op. I haven’t even heard about this weird time warp where a few hours here = a fortnight on holiday. So strange that you couldn’t find the time to get married at home, but you could for 2 weeks away. Also strange that the wedding was only for close family and friends, but your 6yo daughter with anxiety, who you barely see and is under the care off ss didn’t make the cut

Every weekend is no good - it gives you all the fun while your ex does the difficult, hectic school day stuff. And given the distance, would move your DD away from all the class parties etc.

Complete dick move to organise your wedding such that your child couldn't go. She should have been top of the guest list and non-negotiable. She must have been devastated, and when she is an adult she'll fully understand that you chose not to prioritise her.

Having said that, get to court and formalise access so you can stay in touch with your child.

Then now we’re talking parental alienation.

Why is everyone fixating on the wedding? I presume the ex moved away (therefore making it difficult for the child to see her dad), before the wedding. And no matter how bitter she feels about the wedding, trying to estrange her child even more from dad is not the answer.

OP, go to court.

No one forced you to get married abroad. You sound selfish and no wonder ex is upset. By excluding your daughter youve made her feel unimportant

Sure ... but it's not "shocking". EOW plus one night a week is fairly standard if not 50-50. Especially if there's a distance between homes and child needs to go to school.

But that's by the by, considering the OP couldn't get married on one of his weekends ...

Parents of school aged children don’t get married abroad during term time…

They do if their second wife insists on excluding the stepchild.
Or if they can't be bothered to look after their child themselves.

Because it’s a fucking shit thing to do to your own child. The ops excuse being he couldn’t include his daughter because it was only for close family and friends! And yes it has turned into a bit of a pile on about the wedding, but only because the op started telling blatant lies about why she couldn’t attend, no one likes a bullshitter. This is a major life event where the child should have been included to enforce the fact that she’s being welcomed into a new combined family, and there’s no do overs for this, she has to live with this forever now. I’m also wondering if it’s the new stepmum being so cruel and the dads being a walkover. And given the ops lies already, I’d love to hear the actual mums side of this. If she’s as toxic as he’s saying then she’ll be telling the daughter that she wasn’t important enough for daddy to make the effort for her to come to his wedding, and the horrible thing about it is she’s right. That little girl should have been at the alter with him with a pretty dress and a basket full of petals, not sat in school as he couldn’t have possibly arranged any other wedding but that one

@JurassicAllstar

Did you have the assistance of a solicitor when making the arrangements with your ex?

What do you mean why is everyone fixated on the wedding? Because that’s what the thread is about? Dads nobbed off on a 2 week holiday to get married and left his daughter behind. Mums cut contact to deal with the fallout. And I don’t know what you mean by estrange him even more, he had every other weekend and half of the holidays. Eow is standard, statistically half of the holidays is very much more so, and this was agreed happily with no court order. She’s certainly not estranged him there. Also baring in mind that if mum was trying to alienate the child from dad then she’d be trying to prevent the child from going to the wedding, not going absolutely ballistic that he’s left his child behind and got married without her. I assume he didn’t have his contact weekend either seeing as he was away for a whole 2 weeks

Oh I do wish you'd put this in AIBU rather than Childcare OP.

Watching a shit dad get eviscerated - such fun!

You both need to start prioritising your child in your decision-making processes.

Neither of you are coming out of this looking good, but if you're telling the whole story and there aren't other reasons why your DD isn't seeing you, then your ex needs to make your DD available for you to collect, however pissed off she might be.

🤣🤣🤣

He won't be back now anyway.

You'll need to go to court by the sound of it.

You should be ashamed of yourself for justifying excluding your child from your wedding, she will likely never forgive you when she's old enough to understand what you did.

Your reasons are crap, you could have planned a wedding that was suitable for your child.

I never forgave my dad for doing the same, and if you read past threads on the topic, neither do the majority of former step children who were also excluded.

I am back and I take onboard what you all say. Again thanks for your comments. Signing off now, take care.

@JurassicAllstar

solicitors.lawsociety.org.uk/

Court order.

I’m praying it makes trending. Honestly I was full of sympathy when first reading the op, but I think most people usually are when reading it from their point of view, especially when withholding contact is involved. It only takes a minute of thinking about what he’s actually done though to realise how nasty and unnecessary his actions were. Also full of backtracking and excuses as to why he’s done this

My ex used to go on "family holidays" and not take our DC. Clearly they aren't family.

Oddly enough they don't speak to him anymore (they are late teens). According to him my fault.

Planning your wedding when your daughter couldn't attend will have been damaging to her, both now and in the long run. I'd question how much you have her best interests in mind, rather than just your own

In other words, "I've been rumbled and I'm not even going to try to defend my shitty behaviour".

Pathetic, OP. Your poor daughter.

You were expecting everyone to agree with you and denigrate your daughter's mother.

This

Maybe the daily fail will pick it up. I’d love to hear mums side to this.