Dad collecting DDs from school

[ThoughtsPlease]

I would like some views on this please......

My DDs dad likes to have a court order where everything is set out in stone. He started the process of court orders instantly 5 years ago when he left.

Contact has broken down many times, we are going back to court in October, in July the Judge ordered that even if the girls were upset they had to go and stay every other weekend. DD1 has screamed hysterically every single time, 5 weekends now.

Their Dad sent me a text at 1.30pm today asking if he could collect them from school today. He has never collected them from school in the 3 years that the eldest has been at school, and so I said I didn't think it was a good idea today as they had no expectation that anything other than me collecting them as usual would happen. Obviously if we all had a hunky dory relationship with no major issues with contact, and this sort of thing sometimes happened, it would be lovely, but DD1 in particular screams 'Mummy, Mummy I don't want to go' when I hand her over, and in light of this I felt that him suddenly turning up to collect when they knew nothing of it when I took them to school this morning was not a great idea.

Was this reasonable?

Are the children are expecting to go to their Dads tonight? IF so, perhaps you could arrange for both of you to be at the school gates. Also, will the school 'release' her to him if they are not familiar with him.

Sorry, just noticed the time. Hope you've got the situation resolved by now.

No they never see him in the week, just every other weekend.

He was proposing to collect them and bring them straight home to me.

Tell him no , but you really need to look into why your DD doesn't want to go to her dads if he has always made an effort to see them .

I think it's completely unreasonable for him to be waiting to pick them up when they're expecting you, especially in light of weekend visitation issues. It would surely upset them. Perhaps if they were aware in advance it would be different?

How does he feel about DD1's reaction when you hand her over every other weekend?

say no;
what is the point of him collecting them to bring to you ?

Totally reasonable to refuse on this occasion. If it is something that he would like to be part of in future, it should be trialled by mutual arrangement, with the children being informed in advance that this is what is going to happen.

Maybe the bigger issue is why the girls are screaming that they don't want to go? Is he abusive? Have the girls explained why they are so terrified and upset?

I disagree - why not let him pickj them up, without you there as an audience I very much doubt dd1 would be screaming. Obviously let the school know what is happening along the lines of "Mummy's asked dad to bring you home to me tonight!

I wonder if he is thinking of making the weekend collections from school instead of home and see if that allieviates the screaming?

You say contact has broken down many times, obviously it is a difficult situation - what are the major issues causing problems?