Partners ex making our wedding difficult

[user1498556293]

I don't know if I'm on here for advice but maybe stay just to rant really.

Me and my partner get married next week :-) my partner has a daughter from his last relationship who is 3.

We are getting married in a hotel. We had arranged for partners ex to pick dd up from the hotel between 8 and 9pm. This was going to be great so she gets to experience the full day with us and then she would get picked up and go home with her mum. We know by the time it's 8pm she will be absolutely shattered and ready for home.

However now dps ex has changed that, she wants to pick her up at 5pm. She says this is the way it has to be. Her words were 'why should I spend my night waiting around to pick her up from your wedding, I'm getting her at 5 and that's that.'

So basically dsd is going to miss out on the whole evening reception with a bouncy castle, fireworks, food and cake, the disco - our first dance was going to include her.

Dp doesn't really have any family she could stay with as to be honest he isn't that close too them so the only option is dsd stays with us in the bridal suite on the night of the wedding. Which obviously isn't what we had planned. And it means that one of us will have to leave early to put her to bed.

Dps ex has just recently split with her most recent boyfriend - I think. And ever since then she's just been horrible with us. It's a jealousy thing for sure. She's started putting kisses on the end of texts to my dp. I've never done anything to her and helped her out quite a lot with childcare to be honest. We always have dsd when we are supposed too and more when we can. He pays his maintenance and to be honest, dp is still paying off some of her debt from when they were together :-/

She picked dsd up from us the other day and dp asked if we could have her an extra day so we could get her bridesmaid dress fitted properly. The exs response was (right in front of my face) 'you know her size, you don't need her for that so no you can't have her any extra time' she then literally shoved dsd in her car seat, slammed the car door and drove off. We could see dsd in tears.

I knew she was going to make his difficult for us. I knew she would change the plan we had which worked so perfectly for us. At the end of the dad we will happily have dsd to stay in our room on the night of the wedding and do whatever it takes to make sure she doesn't miss out on anything. It's just so frustrating that the ex is like this.

When we told her the date of the wedding months and months ago she said 'dsd can't go, I've made plans for her that day' lol. Always trying to make things difficult.

Anyway rant over

@2014newme - give it a rest

What a div.

It does seem like a jealousy thing. She's not happy so doesn't want anyone else to be.

It's lovely you're including her in the your first dance. I think your partner needs to be assertive and tell the ex that's she's staying for the whole do and alternative arrangments will be for childcare. (If available)

I love how bitter ex wives/girlfriends aren't flamed on MN like ex husbands are. This is exactly the type of thing my husbands ex cunt of a wife would do. She's emotionally abused two children into their teens just to spite me and DH. She's still doing it now even though she chose to be NC to the one who lives with us full time. Bitter twisted spiteful bitches like this exist. Sadly there are many of them

I would let the nursery know they when their systems are down, they need to communicate with the other parent via external mail, as a letter in the bag isn't good enough.

There will be other instances like this, so he does need to get it sorted out... And it would have been courteous and in the best interests of their DD for her to tell him.

It's sour grapes on her part and her attitude is the reason no man will want to marry her.

Messaging other guys and now acting like a bitter woman.

Try not to let her jealousy get to you... And TBH why would you want her at your wedding anyway.

Her attitude is probably making your fiancé think, thank God I'm not with her anymore.

Make sure you enjoy your day and get that nursery thing sorted out. Even if he has to tell the nursery that his Ex doesn't communicate on things, so he needs the info directly.

Isn't jealousy such a nasty trait in human beings.

isn't jealousy such a nasty trait in human beings

Second that. It causes so much drama.

2014newme

If the nursery email is down then it's not the ex responsibility to inform him of letters sent his communication should be direct with nursery

I hate this nonsense^. Any decent person would pass on the information, especially knowing he needs plenty of notice from his job. You are making it very obvious that you're a jealous, trouble-making ex.

OP if I were you I would let the ex collect DSD at 5. I know you said you would like to keep her overnight, do you think the ex will allow this?

Sigh

Empathy free zone here

You don't really care about the 5pm really

She is In Your life and clearly struggling

Kindness , empathy and appreciating this is hard for her will go a long way OP

Kindness , empathy and appreciating this is hard for her will go a long way OP

Nah. She's being a pain in the rear and can't expect empathy behaving like that.

When you behave obstructive at every given opportunity, people aren't going to be empathetic.

What do you mean I don't really care about the 5pm????? Of course I care about it, we have arranged our wedding reception around our children, there are things that we've hired especially for this little girl and now it's looking like she may miss out on it all.

You expect her to pick her DD up at a time to suit you?
She either picks her up at a time to suit her or you ask if she can be dropped off at a time to suit you

lol every Saturday she is picked up at 7.30pm. Sometimes later to be honest. Half the time we have her over night so the ex can go out and her absolutely wasted that we don't do handover until Sunday tea time when she's sobered up and is out of bed. We have no issues with this as dp gets extra time with his daughter. Saturday is my partners day to have her. We have her Friday afternoon until 7.30 on a Saturday. Then one or 2 nights in the week.

Our wedding venue is a shorter drive for the ex than it is to our house - so distance is also not an issue here.

She said from the start she would pick her up between 8 and 9. She was happy to do that. She didn't want her staying in the hotel. We did want her to stay (we wanted her to stay with dps mum/possibly mum mum depending on how dps mum was feeling and were willing to book an extra room for them - now there's no bloody rooms left so we can't do that now) however she kicked up a fuss about it so we backed down just to make life easier for everyone involved. I never wanted her turning up at my wedding venue but what could I do? Nothing really, I am not the child's mother so therefore I can't say what is and isn't allowed. I also felt this was best for dsd. She will of had a long day and will probably be better off on her own bed.
I don't feel comfortable knowing she will be parked in her car outside however I do know that dp will literally be 10 seconds handing her over because he cannot stand her either at the moment and will want to get straight back inside - we've already discussed this many times.

Now she's split with her boyfriend, turned bitter and is trying to change the plans 9 days before our wedding. She will be aware of what our evening reception involves because dsd will no doubt of told her as she is very excited.

She's been messaging dp putting kisses on the end of her messages, ringing him in tears because 'he should still be there for her when she is upset'

I'm starting to feel quite insecure about this whole thing now. Today isn't going to be a good day

Empathy.

It's obviously going to be a difficult day for her. The day your ex/other parent of your child gets married is always a weird or emotional one, regardless of the circumstances.

I have never said I don't have empathy for her. If you read my previous posts I've said I do. I really do. Its clear she still feels something for him. And this is why we've gone along with whatever she wants. However she has a very devious mind - she's done countless things to us and others and continues to do so. And to be honest, if she hadn't of been texting other men in the first place, she would probably of been the one marrying him

I'm surprised at the posts suggesting op isn't showing empathy to a struggling woman.

It's op's wedding day, and the whole day has been arranged around this little girl and her mother, who wanted to pick her up at 8-9pm rather than allow her to stay overnight at the hotel.

She's changed her mind at short notice for no obvious reason. You'd have to be a saint to be sympathetic with that level of twattery.

And remember although you can't stand her, your dp loved her enough to have a family with her

This was funny.

Silly cow will not win

Don't turn it into a battle - no one wins then. Let her DM pick her up at 5. Thank her graciously for helping you out and enjoy your wedding.

I collected my two DCs from their DF's wedding. We were quite amicable, his DW was the OW but I liked her and she loved the DCs. I still found it so difficult --especially not drinking all day so I could drive- Really brought home how we had failed and hadn't kept to the promises we had made to each other

Have a lovely day.

It's a hard one to be honest, if we let her pick dsd up at 5 then I just feel like we aren't putting dsd first. If we let dsd stay then it's obviously going to be a different night to what we would had planned.

To be honest, I'm just going to let dp deal with it, whatever he thinks we will do.

I'm not just in the best of moods today so I think it's best I just stay off here. I can't deal with the empathy comments. I've shown her empathy. We've both shown her empathy and look where it's got us. She's ended up with us wrapped round her little finger.

I have a feeling DSD is going to have a sickness bug on the day.....

OldDear - lol me too. When we first told her the date months and months ago she said 'we've got plans on that day, suppose I'll have to change it' lol. Then dp got a text from her later saying 'I've changed my plans, hope you appreciate it' lol. We always have dsd on a Saturday so why make plans on a day you don't have your child? Honestly, we could of said we were getting married on the 20th November 2037 and she still would of said 'we've got plans that day' haha

Having experienced an ex like this, I would agree to the 5pm so she doesn't get any satisfaction from knowing she might have impacted your plans.

And I would put money on her turning up later anyway - like she usually does on a Saturday - then you can just enjoy the extra time with dsd

C'est la vie with people like this

Ignore the empathy comments op and don't be put off posting - there are plenty here to support you.

She made her bed, and she should lie in it. She's just using her daughter as a pawn, the nursery thing was pathetic.

The only way to deal with this and get to a rational place is to ignore the histrionics, and have a plan B for awkward situations.

But get the pyjamas

People are being beyond ridiculous. This place has become a sanity free zone on occasion.

Piss off all you empathy botherers. Ex cheated on OPs DP. She's the arsehole here. OP and DP are being kind, considerate, thoughtful and putting up with a load of fucking hassle while trying to sort wedding plans and include DSD.

She might be the mother, but OP is going to be the wife and is already doing a good job as a step mum.

She's kicking off because she didn't want DSD staying in a hotel? WTF has it got to do with her when it's DPs contact time? She was fine with the arrangements till her relationship ended (maybe she got caught texting other men again!) and now she's bitter and being obstructive.

Try and rise above it where you can, but don't let DP get into the habit of appeasing her for an easy life. That way lies the life of a doormat and won't bode well for the future. They're equal parents. Apart from discussing any changes to DSD arrangements there's no need for any contact between them. It's only amicable if both parents are being fair and sensible. She's not, so he should back slowly away and only engage with childcare stuff.

Don't let her do the 5pm pick up. If she's always been saying "I will come and get her" you don't know why. She could turn up in a black wedding dress and chuck herself at the groom for all you know! If she turns up she could make a scene with your DH, especially if he thinks he's "just nipping out" out to drop his DD off to her.

He needs to tell her that their DD will be staying overnight and to ignore responses to this.

I think it must be quite hard to watch your ex husband get married- feel a bit sorry for her. It's Not always easy to handle situations with a level head.

Well they weren't married just to point that out. And also to point out - I was never the other women. We met after they had split. And she won't be watching us getting married, or coming into the venue or anything like that. She won't be seeing me or any other guests.

I think this is where the matter lies to be honest. I would have no problem going to my exs wedding if he was getting married. I have no feelings left for him (obviously because I'm getting married myself lol), I've never felt any sort of jealousy towards his new partner, I'm just over it. I'd let them do whatever they wanted at their wedding regarding my children and wouldn't get in the way.

I dunno, who knows, I'm just take advantage of the free drink and go with it 👍🏻