A awkward Question to single mums

[Issy777]

How would you trust meeting another man when you have kids?
This will sound a horrible, uncomfortable question but I recently was witnessed to something my best friend went through a few years back
She was a single mum to her 9 year old daughter, met a guy in a restaurant we went to (a waiter) he was way too fast with her
To leave out the gruesome details, she caught him stroking daughters leg. Was horrific
She's now scared of meeting someone again. I'm in a bad relationship n think I only stay because i have two daughters n I just wouldn't.. couldn't trust another man, not just cos of what happened with bf but because it's something Iv always feared
What if u meet a guy he acts like Prince Charming, u become close so you're ready to introduce him to your child ? How can you trust his intentions? What he'd be capable off?
Just something I want to know as I know it's holding me back I know there's obvious going to be no way of knowing but for instance when and how long would u introduce your dc to new guy?

Tammy

Exactly. SCR are not full of women saying ‘I knew he was a bit weird’ or ‘I’ve only known him a year’ they are full of heart wrenching stories of fantastic husbands and fathers who have been discovered to have been grooming and raping children for years. Children who often don’t even know it’s wrong for the first 14 years of their lives or in their immaturity enjoy the attention.

Those stories are absolutely heartbreaking. Devastating. I NEVER want to be one of those women so I will make really sure I won’t be.

Obviously that doesn’t mean following him around the house every second. It means listening in to his relationship with the kids, it means being aware of subtle and unsubtle reactions between him and the children.

It means him sleeping on the couch when he’s drunk.

Etc etc

There are way to mitigate your partner being around your kids. As a bio dad he is far, far less risk and hasn’t given me any reason to think he is deviant but I will never fully trust myself to objectively assess that. I love him too much.

Again, at no point have I said 98% of men are abusive. However if the biggest risk to your children is one you have the real chance of mitigating, why wouldn’t you?

I wouldn’t leave post pubescent males with pre or post pubescent females. If that answers your point
If you've got a son and daughter I really think you should think about giving your son up. Being raised to belie e you're a paedophile in waiting because you have a penis is abusive

Again, at no point has anyone claimed you HAVE said 98% of men are abusive. Stop suggesting anyone has.

Obviously that doesn’t mean following him around the house every second
You leave him ALONE in a room with your kids? How utterly irresponsible.

I don’t leave MEN with CHILDREN

Oh Camel you're such a liar. You left your baby and two children with your husband in a tent one night at a festival in May while your snuck off to your car to put the heater on and get warm:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3261258-I-m-at-a-festival-in-wales

Or is your husband not a man then? And if you don't trust him 100% - which you admitted earlier - why on earth would you leave him alone in a tent with a baby and two children. Oh, hang on, in that thread, he brought the baby down to you in the car in a sling. Which presumably means he left the other two children alone where any other man could have got to them at this festival? Presumably you have left your DH for this? I mean, that's putting them in even more danger than you leaving them alone with him!

Guys, with all due respect. How you decide to organise your own family is your own choice. Mine is mine.

My choice is one based on making sure my children don’t have to go through anything horrific.

I’m not sure why that is the subject of such vitriol from you, nobody is harmed here.

If nobody is harmed, we don’t need to be abusive to each other and whereas I am happy to discuss and defend my choices, if people are going to deliberately misrepresent what I’m saying, or look for harm, then I’m simply not going to discuss it. Which is fine.

Op you asked how to protect your children. That is my answer. Never have them around men, Ever.

Never have them around men, Ever.

Then why don't you follow your own advice, Camel?

Again. Not allowing bio fathers full access to children does not involve following them around all the time, or following their every move but keeping a reasonable question mark re their motives and assessing how they react to your kids.

But what percentage of children are abused and what percentage of men are paedophiles?

NSPCC reported that 1 in 7 primary school children are abused and 1 in 4 primary school girls are abused. Mostly by non-bio fathers.

Camel, I'd disengage from this thread if I were you. YOu obviously feel very uncomfortable with the criticisms being levelled at your beliefs, especially as you're choosing not to engage with most of the questions being asked about how you'd treat a son, and I think you need to seek some real life support.

What haven’t I answered?

It means him sleeping on the couch when he’s drunk

How does that help anything? Surely if you’re worried he’ll start paedophiling when he’s drunk, the best place for him is in your bed so you can keep spying an eye on him.

Whilst your sleeping and you think he’s on the couch, god only knows what he might be getting up to.

Have you thought about installing nanny cams in every room of your house Camel? Then when you get in from work you can spend your evenings watching every interaction your husband has had with his own kids. What a stressful life you must lead. Can you not even go for a pee without imagining that your H is downstairs fiddling with your kids the minute you leave the room?

You really need some support to help you put the horrors of your work around the tiny percentage of paedos into context with the millions of dads who DON’T abuse their children.

You were asked what sex your kids were.

You said it was irrelevant.

Many of us would think it quite relevant if you had a boy and two girls, presumably you will ensure they are never, ever left alone together as they grow up?

Oh dear camel.

,You left your baby and two children with your husband in a tent one night at a festival in May while your snuck off
How could you?? You know he can't be trusted and is just waiting for a chance!!

If nobody is harmed well I'd consider raising any sons or grandsons to know they are likely to sexual abuse their own or someone else's kids to be harmful.

Not allowing bio fathers full access to children does not involve following them around all the time, or following their every move
Never have them around men, Ever.
You can't have it both ways.

Sleeping I think with Camel it seems to be "do as I say, not do as I do"

This is a bloody depressing thread :-(

I was a single mother for 5 years, I met my now husband when ds1 was 7. We didn't live together for a few years, but had plenty of overnight stays in each others homes and holidays etc with my son.

I hate to think of what my son would have missed out on had I waited til he was grown before having a relationship, but here's and few:

A brother
The chance to see a functional relationship modelled daily, where adults who love each other communicate well and respect each other
A lot of laughter
A two income household
A less stressed out mum
More extended family
More love
Someone to talk to when he can't or won't talk to me
Someone who will fight his corner
Someone to give advice
Someone else to laugh with
Someone else to play with

The list is endless... not all men are abusers, although if you are currently in an abusive relationship your perspective is possibly screwed

@CantankerousCamel
Do you have any documentation to prove your claim 98% of abuse is committed by men?

Or even that 98% of people convicted for abuse are men?

Or even 98% of reported abuse is committed by men?

I hope you can see there is a difference between those three sets of statistics.

In response to what I said earlier CCamel, most people would consider not allowing a chikd’s Father to have unsupervised acces to their children (in the absence of any issues) bizarre. You won’t convince me that it’s good, safeguarding parenting to teach my children that their dad is potentially very dangerous. By your logic when I’m away I should ship my kids off to a female relative rather than have their perfectly lovely daddy look after them. I’m sorry but I do consider your views harmful. I have sons and your ideas could lead to all kinds of issues. I also think bringing up daughters with this view really impacts them negatively too. I don’t say any of this unkindly. Please get support, what you’ve been through is terrible.

You can structure your family however you want Camel but I pity your sons being raised by a mother who thinks thry will grow up to sexuality abuse any kid they're left alone within their own and whose own mum will advise future partners never to trust them alone with said kids.

marco

This is not difficult information to find. Why don’t you start with google? Or the NSPCC reports over the last 5 years?

Honestly you don’t need me to research this for you, I really suggest you do so for yourself.

Shatner, that’s probably true. I am pretty comfortable with my own ability to distinguish harm to my kids. However I cannot know other men, I can only know statistics. Especially when speaking to women who are thinking of engaging in relationships with non related men, my stance will always be ‘never’

No, I won’t be leaving my boys as teenagers with my much younger girl. Why would ANYONE do that? Why would you feel the need to do that? Why is it so shocking that someone wouldn’t want to do that?

Mynydd and yet by Camels logic all you've done is give an probable abuser access to a new victim and your probable future abuser older son access to a new victim in your baby