anyone gone no contact with an ex despite having children.

[nocontactforevermore]

Hi everyone. I am feeling pretty low tonight and realised that if I don't get help with this aspect of my life, i am going to wreck it, basically.

My ex and I split up years ago and its been very acrimonious. We never married and have one young dd. He has dragged me to court several times and his wife also involves herself in our situation. He uses our dd against me - for example won't let me speak to her on the phone if I've upset him in any way and gives me constant unrelenting grief about the way i parent her. I feel as though he is trying to dismantle every important relationship in her life, he reported her cm to ofsted, told cafcass I was a terrible mother, is always up at the school telling them I'm withholding information from him. His latest thing now is that he has convinced dd her best friend is bullying her and has reported that to the school as well. i get on with her mother really well and am mortified at the fall out it will cause.

I feel completely and utterly depressed by it all. Court proceedings haven't brought us any relief because he constantly attacks my parenting. If we have the slightest disagreement about any normal aspect of parenting - he will bring out the big guns and swing low every time. His court statement was the most horrific slandering of my care of our dd This weekends instalment was about how i left dd with a babysitter and that he wasn't letting me speak to dd on the phone because she didn't want to. He ranted and raved about how unhappy I make our child by leaving her with her grandparents on xyz occasions and how our holiday times are a joke because all I do is run with my mates while she left with whoever.

The problem I have is this……I just cannot get the messages out of my head. Even after 6 years, he knows exactly what he needs to say to upset me. I KNOW thats his intention, I KNOW I need to delete and laugh them off, but I just can't. Heres what I do, in exactly this order:
Read them over and over again, respond to them defending myself and sometimes engaging in a slanging match which I then beat myself up about because i have stooped to his level….read the messages over and over, question my parenting, ring my mum and friends, cry my eyes out, ask them if he's right, talk to my partner about it all night long and read and re-read those awful messages/emails again and again. A sort of gloomy silent depression settles over our house when I get these messages. If they come while I'm out at night in a restaurant or wherever….we have to go home because I am so upset. It lasts for days. My partner is so upset by it all because he says that my ex has such a hold on me after all these years and something needs to give.

I think what i'm terrified of is my ex managing to convince my dd in years to come of my perceived failures. What is normal for most people (i.e. leaving her with grandparents while we go out for a night) is being portrayed to her as neglect. I am terrified that he will normalise all these things for her and warp her against me. I question myself all the time….worry that I am a crap mother, that he's right, that I will lose my child to them. He seems to know an awful lot about my life. I can't tell if dd is complaining about me or he is grilling her. She is only 7.

I felt so anxious and stressed about all of this last year that my doc offered me anti-d's. I didn't take them but took herbal ones instead as I want to try and deal with this properly. I am very happy with my partner ( ex even demanded a CRB on him last year) but I live in fear of the next allegation….the next 'complaint' to an official body….the next friendship he destroys. I am ordinarily a strong woman, have a professional career, no history of depression etc, but this has controlled my life. A relative of mine said that I am never going to be free of him, so I need to find a way of managing how I respond to him….so thats why I'm here.

Here are my ideas so far:

1. get a pay as you go and only turn it on once a week for dd to call him on his allotted him. I can't bear to see messages and emails from him coming through to my phone as they make me so so anxious.
2. set up an alternative email address and get my partner to field emails from him/filter them. Check only once a week.
3. get some kind of therapy. I don't know who to approach for this or who I could see- I need someone to help me deal with how i respond to him.

What I would like to know, is can you see any potential pitfalls of going no contact with him? i've resisted it so far because I'm terrified he will need to get hold of me in an emergency and so I will end up checking the phone constantly anyway. I also fear that this is moving our already awful relationship 'down another level'. Can two people raise a child without speaking….ever? I mean we don't text all week usually but we are able to exchange simple messages about her school needs etc. What would I do about these situations? i guess Im trying to say that I've tried in the past to only have this kind of arrangement with him but every time he sends a nasty message, i am back at square one. Going no contact seems to be the only solution….but is it? What else could i do?

Finally, I would love someone to tell me for sure that they will not be successful in convincing my dd that she is being shortchanged by me….but she aready questions my choices. I can see already that she is being worked on and i want to try and stop this. I never ever speak badly about her dad in front of her, but she isn't daft and has picked up on the conflict from the other side ( she tells me for example that she keeps her sm happy by not mentioning my name). I feel so so sorry for her…..is there a therapy of any kind that I could engage her in to show her that she is not being failed in some way by me?

I am SO sorry about the length of this….thanks for getting this far.

Idont. - no he left. Met someone else (which he denies but married a year later!). I'm not sure what he's gaining from all this because it certainly isn't bitterness of an unrequited or scorned love. We were never right for each other so would have not made it anyway....but he did the textbook version of ending a relationship when there's someone else on the scene (ie being utterly cruel about it. DD had just been born so it was a tough time)

All that aside I would love to get on with my life. In so many ways I have......my dd is balanced and so very lovely (I know I'm biased!).I'm very happy with DP, have a great career. I just feel so held back by the forensic scrutiny as someone else put it.

I think there's an element of guilt in ex's actions. He is very keen to ensure dd 'prefers' him and doesn't get my version of how he left. This manifests itself in him going absolutely over the top in his care for her. He argues with the professionals in her life, tells them how to do their job, takes issue with her tiny friends if he believes dd isn't being treated well, whips her off to the doctor if she sneezes then tells me it's a shame I didn't notice she was ill. From the day he left he accused me of trying to take dd away from him even though she stayed overnight almost immediately. He has whipped himself into the most awful paranoid frenzy that I talk about him all the time and have no respect for his role in dd's life. Taking me to court achieved nothing but he saw it as one more victory in the 'fight' against me. All of this I suspect ( and I may be wrong) is perhaps tied up in some guilt. He has made our relationship as difficult as possible so that he has a man made situation ready for when dd asks. I dunno....maybe he's just an arse and all this is armchair psychology but I just don't think he feels that secure either. He writes the most inane phrases in his day to day communication with me that I think who the actual fuck are these emails for? Like....'dd' has the right to relationship with me and her other family therefore I am going to wait until she is here to put our Xmas tree up'. He simply cannot send a simple email about xyz, it will usually come with some nugget from the parenting bible he's written. These phrases make me cringe. He is very effeminate in his manner so when he tries to verbalise them to me I want to throw up. (sorry very childish I know but....!)
One thing I know for sure is that he is also keeping this log for dd. His communication is so random and nothing to do with the matter in hand that I can see through it. For example, he finishes ranty emails with things like, 'we are desperate for you to get on with your life', why do you keep contacting us? It's time to move on'. This will be at the end of an email that rants about my not replying to his previous email!

It's like he's building up a picture of a family man, worn out by harassment, from a bitter ex, you know?

Yes my abusive ex left (he filed for divorce with made up grounds when our DD was 6 weeks old after physically, sexually & emotionally abusing me during the pregnancy & within days of her birth. He thought I'd contest it but I didn't). The reality of facing the horror of the truth of their behaviour is impossible. So they invent an alternative truth, ie that you are the bad guy & play that out forever.

Please end all non verbal communication. I bet he ain't brave enough to say any of this crap to your face!

He's harassing you. I really think he is. I would seek legal advice. Keep your own log too.

You have almost exactly described my ExH, OP - especially your last post. Do you think these men have some sort of club complete with funny handshake, manual and emergency twunt helpline when they have a scathing remark deficit or something (no wait, scratch the emergency helpline - wouldn't lower themselves to asking for help)

I'd keep a log of all of this - it's good you've got a lot of it in emails - mine refused to do emails for the longest time - phone only. Eventually I wised up to that - he's got less room to twist things when the evidence is in emails - though he does still twist things - I think he forgets the bollox he's already said and so then trips himself up.

Try to let it not bother you - it is very hard living under such scrutiny - my life has been so much nicer these past few months since I put my foot down and said no more phone (though he still calls occasionally, as if magically I'm going to change my mind and pick up the phone) and I'm reassured that he can no longer lie about things DC has said and DC is now not under pressure to talk either, he can take it at his own pace which is far less stressful for him - and me.

I think it's a great idea that you have an email account just for him and that a third party deals with it - taking out the shit and just forwarding the details regarding DDs arrangements to you.

Change your phone number and don't let him have it.

Big hugs. It's so wearing, so exhausting, so anxiety-inducing - I used to constantly live and a state of hyper-awareness - something I wasn't that aware of until I went almost completely NC. Now on the occasions when I do have to deal with him all that comes rushing back and I realise exactly how much control he was still exerting over me just with a few words and how much it affected me.

I think your analysis is a good one, OP. Can you let that knowledge be freeing? You know that he is playing out his own little drama, and it's utterly irrelevant what you actually do. You're just the blank screen onto which he's projecting his own film so it doesn't matter about doing it right. There isn't a way to do it right.

The more you can learn to laugh at it, the better. Play Twunt Bingo. Make cynical little bets with yourself about how he's going to distort something you've done. Your attitude will eventually convey itself to your dd. I'm not saying to mock him to her, but if she's repeating some nonsense from him and you greet it with an expression of amused pity rather than twisting yourself into knots of anxiety, can't you see how much more reassuring that is for her?

Laugh, don't cry. Easier said than done, but it's an attitude that's worth working at.

You are all so right. I know there is nothing I would never be able to do to change his mindset - he makes ill of every (and I mean every) good thing that happens, he twists all that is good into something sinister and that's not something I can influence. He won't pay more than a pittance in maintenance because according to him, I don't spend it on dd anyway. How can i reason with that? He asked the court for a shared parenting order but has left the cost of actually raising dd to me and her stepfather. I can't fathom that at all.

I really do believe now for my own safety that I need to go nc, because he is constantly referring to my obsession with him, how he just wants to be left in peace, how he feels harassed. I am worried sick he is planning his next move which is to formally declare that he is being harassed. Ok I know there will be no evidence, but even the angst of having to prove that is enough for me!

Aren't you going through the CSA?
Why not?

Yeah I've gone through them. He cooks his books though so will get away with the pittance he pays. Me owns several properties though!

Regardless, it's another way of detaching and making sure you don't actually have to deal with him.

I think you may be right about his intentions, it seems odd to keep mentioning harassment, when it is actually him doing it. Divert his emails to a folder, give it a suitable name and then save everything just in case it is ever needed.

He will be fooling no one.

Yes he is definitely planning something. I can tell. He is pretty transparent.

Time to go no contact. Definitely.

Just adding my voice to wish you well along with others. I think the idea of trying to detach, not rise to the bait, limiting things to e-mail, keeping a record and then taking it along to a solicitor is a good one. I suspect the doctor, school and other bodies he has also harassed would be prepared to testify that he is overbearing/unreasonable. No single communication may be enough to damn him/them but, if you turn up with a lever arch file full of similar unprovoked stuff, that is going to be what they call 'a case'. :)

With your daughter I would suggest that you don't follow his example and be tempted to overcompensate. Keep going on activity holidays, keep going out for the evening and using baby-sitters etc. A 7yo is big enough to understand that Mums are people and need grown-up versions of friends and playdates. If she learns that, by complaining, adults will bend over backwards to keep her sweet all you'll end up with a spoilt brat. You sound like you have a good relationship with school so make the most of that. They'll have already clocked you ex as Mr PITA.

If keeps taking you to court over pettiness he will eventually be pegged as a vexatious litigant and placed on a list so he can't use the courts again. So let him, if he wants. You'll have a lovely big fat folder full of his harassment.

I wonder Iactuallydothinkso 's XP is on that list!

I think you have come a long way OP because you are asking the right questions about this situation and you're getting help. Some counselling or behavioural therapy would be useful I think, for any of you that needs it. You can get free CBT via the NHS if you ask your doctor although it will involve a wait so the earlier you ask the better.

If it reassures you at all, my ex took me to court for a penal order (to have me put in prison) because DD wasn't available for contact one weekend because she was a bridesmaid for her Godmother 150 miles away. The district judge passed it to the high court & the high court judge wiped the floor with him & the junior solicitor his firm sent with him & awarded costs to me (so that little shenanigan cost him £5k in the end) & told him if he ever put an application through court of that nature again he'd have him for contempt of court. Don't be afraid. You are a good mother & you have nothing to fear.

Midwife Just wanna say that your ex, is a first class self entitled and important wanker and im so glad that the judge pissed on his crappy parade.

Absolutely. And he ended up with a total legal bill of £25k & no "positive outcome" so honestly - they can't hurt us if we have nothing to hide. My DS's head teacher & our GP wrote a letter to court on my behalf to give a character reference & to say what a great parent I am. Have no fear OP.

God I love MN. Thank you all so much. I feel a million times better than I did this time last week. It really helps to thrash this all out and hear your experiences (I'm not happy you've been through all this as well though)

I am definitely asking for CBT. As much as I know that ex isn't secure in his parenting (driven by guilt I would say), I am also lacking confidence as a parent and always have. Mine however is driven by the scrutiny I'm under and this will never improve if I don't change. I accept that he won't change so I have to be the one that ends this cycle.
You know it's funny. His wife usually writes his emails for him and I can tell by the grammar (he isn't that bright). Whenever they are written by him though they are dreadfully written and loaded with 'pleas' to my better nature; why won't you leave me alone? Why won't you stop harassing me? I could laugh at them if I didn't know that he is playing a long game.

Can you guys help me answer a few practical questions about going NC?
He is due a phonecall once a week from dd. In the holidays it's every other day. He often changes what time he wants the call, what time he can take it etc. this means I'm often on tenterhooks waiting for it etc. If I get a payg and then end up doing the same- it kinda defeats the purpose. How should I handle it?
Also, as painful as it is- I am not going to request a call from dd when she is with him. This is because he plays games with me, either doesn't let me speak to her, says she fell asleep, doesn't want to speak, or rings without warning at a random time then if I've missed it - won't answer when I call back. This has left me upset on so many occasions (you can imagine, her birthday, while she's on holiday etc and I used to sob my eyes out at the frustration and misery he caused over the calls when she was tiny and I didn't have a clue how she was). In essence, the calls make our home life a misery and if I am taking back control then it means not speaking to her at all. This includes Xmas day etc. I am worried for my dd on those days because if I know my ex, if I don't ask to speak to her, he will try to call and then tell dd I obviously don't want to talk to her. How can I manage this? Tell dd in advance? I would hate for her to be trying to speak to me and the end up upset, I just can't keep allowing her father to control whether we speak or not. It's pointless telling me to keep the phone on and if he calls he calls - because I will stare at the phone all day long, waiting and hoping:/

Another practical issue that worries me is energencies. I don't intend to have his emails wired through to my phone anymore. I'm gonna check them once a week or so and that's it. I'm obviously worried though about something happening and I've not realised until days after.

You tell him when your DD wants to make the call and is available to make it.
He arranges his life to suit your DD. If he's not available, it's his problem.

We have a set time when DS and exH contact through skype. Sometimes he says he can't, I'll just say ok. When he wants other times, if it's not convenient for us I just say no.

Matilda it's a week on week off at Xmas. Killer.
At the moment the calls are all about his convenience the more I think about it. So you think i should say by text on the day 'dd will be free to call you at xxx? If he responds and says that's not poss, it has to be xxx time , do I just ignore? I want as little communication as possible (Sorry if I'm being very prescriptive here....need to get it all straight in my head).
Is it wise for me never to request calls to dd on his time?

I think stop playing his games completely. Get your DD a v cheap PAYG phone for contacting her when she's away & tell her you will phone her every day at 6pm. If she doesn't answer leave a cheery "sorry I missed you, hope you had a great day, love you" message & try again the next day. If she comes home & the phone is off or uncharged play her all your voicemails after she returns & she will know you tried. He can make similar arrangements if he wants to call her. No need to go through him at all. If contact is set in stone no need to discuss. In a dire emergency he can come round to your house or send the police. That's that.