Ex is taking me to court and his parents.

[Babygirlmum]

My ex and his parents are taking me to court for some kind of custody of my daughter, cut a long story short he walked out on me when I was pregnant and he said he didn't want to know DD when she was born etc, then I applied for child maintenance when she was three months old and surprise he wanted to be a part of her life, after a while I allowed this and for him to meet her he's been inconsistent in and out of her life for the past 8 months she is now 1 and he just isn't consistent at all, his parents have met my daughter I even drove 2 hours for them to meet her a few months ago and I invited them to her first birthday party I have tried everything to be fair with him and his family, now because I asked him to go out on his own with DD to bond because he always wanted me there around when he would come and visit DD, all of a sudden he is now taking me to court and I am no longer being fair to him apparently, the more I have heard him out the more I believe it's because of his mum who is quite a possessive and obsessive person however she told me to get an abortion when I was 7 months pregnant and all of a sudden she thinks she is grandma of the year, my BD has applied for court and of what it sounded like so have his parents also applied for court too, I can not get my head around this and I do not know where I stand in regards to any of this I am going through a really tough time at the moment and they all know I am, my dad has been taking into a hospice and they want to add more stress to my life after what they have already put me thorough when I was pregnant with DD I even said I would be fair and allow for DD in their life and he refused and wanted to take things to court. This is alot of stress for me I do not know what to do, I also do not know what type of custody he may be entitled to.

They are bullying you and their behaviour is horrible.

Do not be afraid and try not to feel intimidated. You have done nothing wrong. You have not caused their behaviour.

You are under no obligation to be present when he has contact with his daughter.

Stay calm and don't let them get to you.

Make a list (perhaps get a small notebook for this purpose) of all the times he has had contact with your daughter, where the contact took place, and for how long. Note down if you were also present during the contact time, so you can demonstrate that he has refused to see her without you being there.

Also note, if you can, all the times he has not turned up for pre-arranged contact.

Continue to keep these notes.

Again, you are NOT obliged to be there to facilitate his contact time. You do NOT (and I would suggest should not) let him into your home, as he has been abusive towards you.

They are probably making empty threats towards you because you are not doing exactly what they want you to do. This is bullying and intimidation.

If they want to make something of it, then let them take you to court. I can assure you that if it comes to that, it will not go well for him.

Don't engage with them and don't get drawn into any arguments.

Sorry you are going through this.

Something that will look good for you in court is if you formally offer your ex a stable feasible visitation schedule with a plan for the next few years. So building up to every other weekend over the next year kind of thing. Starting with him coming to visit a couple of times a week for a few hours with your present (which it sounds like you’ve already been doing/already offered him), then building to him taking her out without you for a few hours at the weekend, then all day one weekend day, then switching to overnight Saturday every other weekend and perhaps eventually adding Friday night and even Sunday night in EOW if that schedule would work with school. This is not a thing that happens over a month but over the next couple of years. And it requires him actually consistently turning up. His parents can come with him sometimes and when he starts taking her alone all day then overnight they can visit his parents whenever he likes! Another thing that would be good is if you can invite him to mediation before it gets to court to try to come to a reasonable agreement without needing a court order.

And if it does end up in court then they are likely to order something very similar to what I have suggested.

Sorry I can't offer any help with the Court apart from talking to Rights of Women

I'm so sorry about your DF too. If you need to talk to anyone, we're always here

The grandparents have no rights only on rare occasions,ie when the GPS have been in the child's life everyday and played a big part do they ever get any success in court.

As for the ex this is super common. Here is what I did:
Got my solicitor to make a referral to a supervised contact centre so that DD and ex could build their relationship without me - the waiting list was several months long but worked in my favour that I had a plan in action.
Contact at that age needs to be little and often so when we moved on from the contact centre I offered 10-2 twice a week and then progressively made it longer until it was 9-6pm as their relationship developed. Again Court was happy with this arrangement.

For our final hearing, I put forward the following which the court was happy with providing it extended as DD got older:
Birthdays and Mothers/Fathers day spent with the relevant parent.
No overnights until DD was 5.
DDs birthday and Christmas alternated (Christmas eve noon to Boxing day noon so DD didn't have to move around on Christmas)
Contact Wednesday 9-6 school holidays and school pick up until 6pm term time.
EOW sleep over once she turned 5 (didn't didn't like sleeping over so instead we have 1 day a weekend each instead)

@AmandaHoldensLips Thankyou so much I am glad that someone else sees what they are doing and that it's wrong

@Singleandproud Thankyou I
Will put something like this forward to my solicitor as this sounds like a good plan of action