Nasty ex and visitation rights to our child?

[thegirlracer]

Hey all!

It’s me again. Some of you may have seen my other thread? Basically I found out my partner of four years has been cheating (one night stands) throughout the duration of our relationship. This happened a few weeks ago. We have one DS who is 1.

He’s moved out although the home I live in with DS is jointly owned by the pair of us.

Since it’s become apparent that I’m not taking him back, all the guilt mr. let me make it up to you I’ll be the perfect boyfriend attitude has disappeared.

He’s been around today to see DS and got into a huff about something or another at work and taken it out on me because I “didn’t look interested” in what he was saying.

After seeing DS he’s stormed out, slammed the door on me and didn’t even say goodbye.

Up until now we have been civil. Now, he is very childish, a typical man child and acts like a child to gain a reaction from me. My reaction was to do and say absolutely nothing whilst he was ranting on at me. Just nothing. Because I’m genuinely sick of trying to validate why I said x, y, z to him so I’ve kept quiet. When I do this he goes on to punish me because he is frustrated he’s got no rise out of me (hence not telling me he was leaving and slamming the door in my face).

All the while I completely ignore this type of behaviour, I feel like I’m doing the right thing by totally not engaging in it. However part of me feels like I should not have to take crap like this from him any longer and I still deserve to be treated like a human being. A “I’m going now, see you later” and closing the door normally etc.

I do not want to beg him to respect me. I’m not desperate and I couldn’t give a toss what he thinks of me. But I do want him to act like an adult around our DS and I feel like saying to him if he carries on like this, we will have to make alternative arrangements around him visiting DS.

Just to make you aware, non of us have any family for at least 300 miles away. If we did I would have done something like dropped DS at his mums and let him see him there or something but I don’t have that luxury!

Has anyone any ideas or thoughts of how to approach this? I’m absolutely fed up of this moody, miserable, narcissistic, man child and his mood swings. I have had four years of his shit and the cheating has just nailed the coffin.

But unfortunately I’ve got him for the rest of my life or until at least DS is married with kids himself!

I really want to get this right!

(He’s on a friends sofa and his friends are as awful as he is so I’d never leave DS there alone with him, so it’s our house or nothing at the moment).

Anyone?

Meet at a soft play or cafe or somewhere neutral where there are other people around .

The housing situation jumped out at me.

What are you guys planning to do about the house?

You’d obviously have to sell at some point but in the short term.

If he had his own place that would be good

You need proper legal advice, but my broad understanding is that your DS has a right to a relationship with both parents, no matter if one is an utterly rude dick to the other.

You are probably safe from overnights for another year or so, but any court is going to take a dim view of you blocking your ex from taking DS out of your home. Unless his flatmates are unsafe in some way - convicted sex offenders, drug addicts who leave their stash laying around, multiple convictions for violent crimes - then you're going to have to accept that when your DS is with his father, then his father decides who is allowed contact with him.

(In the same vein, if your ex suddenly decided that you "weren't allowed" to take your DS to see your parents, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't be happy, right?)

I'm sorry your ex is a dick. So many of them are (which is why they are exes, right?) You may catch more flies with honey than vinegar here. Ask him to sit down and talk with you (not when DS is around) about how you can both make sure DS is happy and secure. Tell him you'd like to work together to progress towards him having DS overnight so they can have quality time together. If you have specific concerns about his flatmates, then be specific - "I'm concerned about Tosspot Tommy's habit of getting blackout drunk on the weekend and then projectile vomiting everywhere. What are you thoughts on how to shield DS from that?"

I know it's really frustrating, but unfortunately being a rude twat to you does not mean he is an unfit father (just a rude twat.)

Really good points there thank you guys!

And yes we do plan to sell the house eventually but it doesn’t happen over night unfortunately!

You need to set some strong boundaries and keep to them. Unfortunately unless you have strong evidence of abuse the courts won't be interested in your opinion of his friend's. You have no choice but to encourage contact and just hope that he puts your child's needs first.