Not returning on time after access

[CardyMow]

Ex-H had DS1 for the first half of half term. He had agreed with me to bring him back at 1pm today. So I made access arrangements with my Ex-P to meet him at 2pm (a bus journey away) for access with DS2 and DS3.

At 12.22 I received a phone call from Ex-H. He said "As I am punishing DS1, is it OK to bring him back a bit late". I replied "NO, as I already have other plans, he MUST be back on time". Ex-H said "OK" and hung up on me.

Now Ex-H only lives a 15 minute walk away from me, if he had left straight after the phone call, he would have had DS1 back on time. He didn't.

I had no phone credit to ring anyone. Ex-H didn't bring DS1 back to me until 1.25pm. I was meant to be on the 1.05pm bus. Obviously, I was cross, because I had expressedly told Ex-H it was NOT OK to bring DS1 back late. When he eventually strolled up, I admit I raised my voice, and said "I TOLD YOU that DS1 HAD to be back on time". He turned round to me and said "Do you expect me not to punish him?". I then said "NO, I expect you to return him on time, your access arrangements are NOT the only access arrangements I have to keep".

He started calling me B*@&h, and calling me a liar - in front of 3 of my dc. I then found out that as he had been so busy punishing DS1 - he hadn't even given him LUNCH. So I then had to run indoors and make DS1 a sandwich to take with us on the bus, making me EVEN LATER.

THEN I got shirty phonecalls from my Ex-P (DS2 and DS3's dad) about being late for HIS access. .

What do I do about making Ex-H bring back DS1 at the arranged time, no matter whether he wants to piss about making DS1 write 100 lines. He just totally ignored me asking him to return him on time on the phone, and did what he wanted ANYWAY.

The additional problem is that I am totally unable to get a family law solicitor - Ex-H has blocked 2 firms (conflict of interest), Ex-P has blocked 3 firms (again conflict of interest), and MY old solicitors no longer takes legal aid. There are no more family law solicitors in my town, and as I am a lone parent with 4 dc, and cannot drive (disability), I cannot get to another town to use a solicitors there, and cannot really afford to pay privately for a solicitors to write Ex-H a letter (on benefits).

WTactualF do I do?? I cant help but make contact arrangements on the same day sometimes, as I have to work around Ex-P's JOB. Not that Ex-H would understand what a job is, as the workshy eejit hasn't worked in 9 years...

It takes 45 mins by bus to get to the soft-play place, and 45 mins back - that doesn't leave much 'playtime' for DS2 and DS3 if it is only 2 hrs max before he needs a feed...

Kafka's "The Trial" is a classic nightmare about being subject to a trial you don't understand, with an accusation you don't know, accusers who aren't bound by the same rules as you... Don't read it, actually; it would upset you even more. However, it is a useful concept to be able to throw at your accusers, as it highlights inconsistency and unaccountability: articulating the situation in this way helps you reveal what they are like to others.

From my union days, I seem to remember that you can record anything you like, as long as you make it clear that you are recording. That mediator sounds like a total incompetent; it sounds as though you could well need a recording to get rid of him/her, too!

Oh, I see. YES. It is totally a situation where I feel subject to a trial I don't understand, with an accusation I don't know, and accusers that aren't bound by the same rules as me...

I think any mediator would be incompetent when faced with my Ex-H's new partner...she's a bit like a very shouty, agressive steamroller that believes everything in the world should run the way she wants...

In that case, definitely don't read it!

Sorry my responses are not v helpful; I don't have any experience of this sort of thing, more of crap bosses and work and immediate family politics, which are, quite evidently, different.

Still, thankfully half term is ending soon, so you will be back to the weekend access which you seemed to find more doable. For Christmas, I'd try to insist that exH have DS1 for the latter half of the holiday (or put tempting holiday leaflets through his and partner's door, to get them out of the way - after all, if he doesn't work, he should be wanting to avoid the school holiday rush out of the country) so you do the handover, not him/them. And if you're not doing this already, start putting things in writing, even if they try to respond in person/by phone.

AHA Christmas doesn't work like that - we have VERY defined Christmas access. This year, it is Ex-H's Christmas, he has DS1 for Christmas eve and Christmas day, to drop DS1 back at mine at 6pm on Christmas day so I can have him on Boxing day.

Then we share the other side of the Holidays. But Christmas eve, Christmas Day and Boxing day access is VERY clearly defined in our court order.

Which brings me to the realisation of WHY they are being Cunts. They asked this year if we could split Christmas day for this year and next - and I said no, I want to keep to the court order. OK it means that DS1 will miss most of DS3's first Christmas this year, and most of Ex-H's new partner's baby's first Christmas NEXT year (thus affecting us both equally), I want to stick with the court order because otherwise I cannot go to see my family during Christmas day. And IMO the SECOND Christmas is better thsn the first anyway - and DS3's SECOND Christmas is my Christmas with DS1.

NOT going to give in on this - or it will RUIN mine and DD's Christmas day this year. And ruin ALL of our Christmas day next year. I will not be able to see my family over Christmas if DS1 is brought back at 2pm. Either year. That isn't what was court ordered, I want the court order adhered to.

OH FUCK - If I don't bow to his bullying behaviour, he isn't going to bring him back on time at Christmas, is he? How the Heckity do I make it so that he HAS to? Or he will ruin ALL of our Christmas. Either way, they aren't going to stop being horrid till they get their way, are they? Or until AFTER Christmas 2012.

FUCKERS.

Keep writing snotty e-mails, track every bit of bad behaviour, lay a paper trail so clear that even Mr Bean could follow it. It's ammunition for the future which you seem not to have now. How long have you been dealing with this? Surely not since the beginning, as you said you had split up with ExH when Ds1 was very young, and he is 9 now! Or has it got worse since you've had to co-ordinate it with ExP?

Because I have court orders stating that the dc are with me every other Christmas - and that ALL THE SIBLINGS SHOULD BE TOGETHER. And it states that on my court order with Ex-H AND my court order with Ex-P (the one for DS2, we don't have a court order for DS3).

I realise it makes no sense that I have a court order with Ex-P for DS2 but not for DS3. We had DS2, split up for a few years and I was awarded a court order because Ex-P went to a solicitors insisting contact couldn't change when DS2 started reception. The only problem with that was that DS2 couldn't have access during the day on a Thursday...because he was AT SCHOOL! Ex-P refused to accept that (!) took me to court, got sacked by one solicitor because he wouldn't listen to the fact that he would lose in court (!) because his son had to BE AT SCHOOL.

We then got back together a few years later (don't ask me why - I thought he had changed, I was very wrong and stupid) and had DS3, hence having no court order for DS3.

What is wrong with expecting all my dc to get every other christmas together? DS1 gets to see his other siblings at Christmas just as often - every other Christmas. So why shouldn't I expect the same?

Ex-P's court order for DS2 actually states that he can have DS2 for Christmas day on the years that DS1 sees HIS dad. So it IS stated in court orders that the dc from the RP get to spend every other Christmas together.

MJ - YOU may accept that, but IMO, being the RP, doing 338 days out of 365 of the grunt work with DS2, and 100% of it with DS3 - I do not accept that I do not ever have a Christmas with all my dc together. I am totally willing to split alternate Christmasses with Ex-P (as I do with Ex-H) BUT it will not encroach on me having all my dc together for Christmas every other year.

And I have to say, MJ, you seem to have a personal problem with ME. I am NOT the RP for your DSD, I do not act in the ways you have described your DSD's RP doing - I just want advice on how to deal with two ex partners that are very controlling, and still try to control my life long after we have separated. All I want with my Ex-P and Ex-H is to be able to politely co-parent, and to share care in a reasonable manner that works for ALL OF US. Including ME. I do not feel that my feelings should be ignored, or that I should be 'ganged up on' by my controlling Ex-H and his even more controlling new partner. I believe that if I am asked if it is OK to bring my DS1 back late, and I have said NO because I have other plans, and he needs to be back on time, that my Ex-H does not (or at least SHOULD NOT) have the right to IGNORE ME and do whatever he wants anyway - no matter how many other people it inconveniences.

I believe, after a thread on MN, that trying my best to work around my Ex-P's work shifts is something I have to grudgingly bear - yet when I tried to do this - I was thwarted by my Ex-H ignoring my request that DS1 was brought back on time. Despite the fact that Ex-H does not have to worry about his access having to fit in around his employment.

Please, MJ, if you want to harry someone and upset them when they are genuinely asking for advice and not knowing what to do, find someone else. I may be quite vocal in my beliefs on AIBU, but when it comes to my ex partners, I am considerably LESS forthright, due to the way I was treated IN those relationships, and REALLY not knowing if I am right in how I feel or not. I am on this thread asking for advice not to be told that because YOU don't have access with your DSD at Christmas, I should give up on the idea of having alternate family Christmasses with all my dc present, even though I am the RP, and DO do most of the hard work, at least with DD, DS2 and DS3.

I understand that your situation is less than ideal - but instead of taking that out on me (when all I want is my Ex-H to bring DS1 back on time, and to have alternate Christmasses with ALL my dc present - note alternate NOT every), why don't you and your DH go back to court to ask for your Court Order to be enforced?

I will reiterate - I am NOT your DSD's RP, and if I was, you would be getting your DSD every other Christmas because I believe it is best for a dc with separated parents to experience the traditions of both sides of their family at Christmas. AND you would be getting half of her Birthday every year too - and any half-siblings she has (that you are the parent of) would be getting an invite to her borthday party too. (Yes, I do invite DS1's half brother and step-brother - his SM's 6yo - to his birthday party every year, even though I have paid for the party, it's not usually on his birthday, and is always done when DS1 is at my house - his 1/2 brother and Sbro are still DS1's family). Please stop taking out your awful situation on an RP who is NOT like the RP in your case.

plupervert Ex-H doesn't behave like this when I am with Ex-P. Only when I am single and he knows I have no back-up. Ex-H's partner is like it all the time - but I just refuse to deal with her as much as I can - she once threatened to kill me, in front of all my dc, over some headlice lotion she accused me of not giving to them to use - when in fact it was in my DS1's school bag because my friend had taken DS1 to school for me as I was ill that day!

It has got much MUCH worse since Ex-P and I have split up, and of course, having to co-ordinate access and arrange it around Ex-P's work, as well as not deviating from the court order for Ex-H...it's a bloody nightmare tbh.

I have also realised another reason why Ex-H and his new partner might be trying to be swines. Ex-H asked me about a week and a half ago if I could swap DS1's Child Benefit over to them for a while so that they could get a bigger house, but they didn't want any extra access to DS1. So I would still be having him more than them - but they would be claiming the Child Benefit, the Child Tax Credits AND be able to have DS1 on their housing application, thus taking him off mine.

When I looked at him like , and said why on EARTH would I do that, when I need to feed DS1 when he is here, he is with me more so needs to be on my housing application, and if I could help them with their housing issues in another way that wasn't so, well, , I would, Ex-H walked away tutting and huffing.

They have also told DS1 that they need to have his Child Benefit so that they can keep having overnight contact with him, or they "aren't really sure where he is going to sleep when the baby is born". I had to explain to my 9yo DS1 how the intricacies of the benefit system (ChB, TC's, council housing applications) works, to explain WHY I couldn't just sign my ChB over to Ex-H for a 'short time'.

blimey!!

My thoughts, you needed to catch a bus & explained this to exh, then catch the bus. If he wants to delay bringi9ng ds home due to punishing him he will have to keep him until you return with the other children. Might make him think that it might be worth returning him at agreed time. My ex was getting later & later picking up the kids from the times he had said so one time I just drove off woith them in my car to where I had to go & he saw us at top of the strreet & they got into his car & I wasn't late for whatever it was I had to do but if he had been a minute later there would have been no one at home. Made him more punctual that's for sure.

Got terribly confused with a lazy read of all the posts, not quite working out who is exH and who is exP, and who has a court order.

Any chance of getting both dads to speak to each other and sort something out? When exP complains you're late, just tell him to speak to exH. You need either a longer gap between handovers (though may encourage exH to be even more tardy), or to alter the venue of the collections/returns. RedHelenB makes a good suggestion too. Sods law says you'll never have phone credit when you need it, but try and keep it topped up as a text to say what you're doing is a good record. Whether that will work or not depends how much that would inconvenience him.

The only advise I can offer is to look at trying to tackle this from the child is being taught.

Poor time keeping and broken agreements.

Ask Ex-h to be mindful of examples DS is picking up.

Just a thought.

I found life was a lot easier once I accepted ex wasn't going to be reliable about time keeping and just planned accordingly.