Previous thread here
Basically on June 29th my stupid agressive moronic a*hole of an XH yelled at our DDs for 2 hours because they hadn't bought him a birthday present or made him a card. They are 8 & 9. They had spent all morning at church with him (not their favourite activity - mass in a small rural catholic church in France is about as dire as you can possibly imagine). They did know it was his birthday, but as his girlfriend of 2 years was there I really don't think it was up to me to sort this in any way, shape or form. We have been divorced for 6 years.
This was the final straw for my girls, who asked to stop having to go to his house every weekend, and they wrote letters to the judge. He was so agressive that they thought that his girlfriend who was standing next to the phone was going to call the gendarmes. They were really shocked that (once again) she did nothing. This was a couple of weeks before they were due to go his house for 3 weeks of the summer holidays. We got an emergency court date for 30 July, and the girls saw the judge on 2nd August.
So the court have made the following arrangements. My DDs will have supervised visits with their Dad of 3 hours every 2 weeks for a period of 4 months.
Both parents have to contact the access centre, and the 4 months start from the day of the first visit. I have made contact but there has not been a dicky bird from their Dad. The centre has said that if they don't hear from him for 3 weeks they will contact him by letter, to say that they are there to facilitate contact if he should want it.
The girls are starting to miss not having contact with their Dad. They do want to see him but just dont want to spend any nights with him. He is a agressive drunk, and they are scared of being around him later in the day as the alcohol builds up, and the agression with it.
I have said that I think they should at least wait until the three week period is up (we are at the end of week one - but they havent heard from him since June 29). He has said to his brother that he is punishing the children (and me) by not contacting them.
I have explained to the girls that it really needs to be him that contacts them, not the other way round, because he was in the wrong and he needs to be the one to apologise and not the other way round. If they contact him, it will make him feel that he is in the right, and that his "punishment" has worked.
They were so so brave in confronting him. We are all scared of him, and they had the guts to go to the judge and say enough is enough, help us. Just to be clear I took the case to court, but the judge agreed to hear what they had to say on the subject, which was not a given in view of their age, but because they had written letters to her she took them very seriously. The saw the judge one by one with their court appointed lawyer. They never actually had to confront their Dad in the flesh.
So my question is what can I do to make this easier to bare (or is it bear) for my DDs. How to explain that it is more important to their Dad to be "right" rather than to talk to them? I am not certain, but previous experience tells me that he wont want to see them again unless they say that they were wrong and they apologise to him. And that would be so wrong, and so mentally damaging after everything they have been through.
He is NC with all his family because he has fallen out with them one by one. His brother had contact with him when their Dad died on 10 July, and then after the court case to say sort your behaviour out.