Ex husband's bitterness towards having to pay maintenance

[Autumnnights2022]

Long story short - married a long time. Husband had an affair and got OW pregnant within 3 months of knowing her. Needless to say, he wanted to end the marriage. I did not.
He dragged me through the courts at eye watering costs and has been made to pay a percentage of his salary as maintenance until he retires. We have two kids together.
Move forward 6 years (since we divorced) and he continues to be an utter arse about money, however, he does this via our children as he and I have no contact. He's forever telling our now adult kids that 'he's skint' (then OW posts photos of them on yet another holiday abroad) and yesterday, he told our daughter that the birthday money he promised for her birthday 10 days ago ' would be late, as I have to pay your mum money... so I'll have to ask work for an advance'. Note that 3 weeks ago he had enough money for a deposit on a 4-bed house.
I just don't get it. He used to be the kindest and most generous bloke who loved his kids dearly (he now has two more tiny kids and an extended family in the Philippines).

Youre essentially suggesting that OP should be paying for his new children!

Whatever she gets, she deserves. She earned it. He can afford to pay for his new family, he just wants to not pay her as well. Well, tough shit.

Why does the money stop when he retires? Surely it should be until he dies? Otherwise there's nothing stopping him going self employed for cash but pretending to be retired?

Oh, I can see the bitterness alright. 🙄

The children are adults and don't need to be telling you what he says and you should be putting a stop to it.
If I were him, I'd retire tbh. Stop your gravy train and then find another job. 🤷‍♀️

Why does the money stop when he retires? Surely it should be until he dies? Otherwise there's nothing stopping him going self employed for cash but pretending to be retired?

good question.

if spousal maintenance was deemed necessary, why only until retirement? That would leave o/p in the shit financially in her old age. Surely he should be paying a % of his pension too?

Also he can't be paying you THAT much if your working two jobs so your lawyer probably fucked you over a bit in terms of amounts

It's cruel that 6 years later he's blaming you for not having any money.

He's court ordered to pay you maintenance and they still get the "your mum is the reason I can't afford to xxx" just an attempt to play mum and child off against each other.

Perhaps in his mind, your children will convince you to stop the court ordered maintenance?

You have no dependents
you need to work two jobs

this maintenance must be peanuts or your outgoings must be enormous

I imagine a lot of his bitterness is down to fact that he wanted a divorce, you didn’t.
So he had to spend many thousands taking you to court

WRT to the birthday money... was he hoping that your dd would tell him that she didn't need money from him?

Well, when you cheat on your wife and get another woman pregnant, sometimes the wife doesn't feel like making your new life any easier.

It’s not. He’s not going to be nice about it, he is going to resent it.
If your children are all adults they’ll have to deal with it. If they repeat it to you in a “oh poor dad” way just shrug and remind them of the big house he’s buying, or the holiday he’s booked. He chose to have more children, his lookout.

If you are working two jobs, why do you need his money - he sounds toxic --wouldn't it be better to have a clean break from him?

If your children are adults it's for them to manage their relationship with him, including any financial support he might give them - but they should bear in mind that he's not obliged to support them financially.

Why do you care if he's happy about it? If he's toxic I'd secretly be quite happy he's annoyed

I wouldn't be happy with his comments to dc but if their adults they'll be old enough to understand and hopefully see through his digs aimed at you

This.

OP, please ignore the hostile comments. Some people only come on here to insult women.

Because he’s an arsehole. Some people are.

Spousal maintanance is often in place too if regular income is high but assets not sufficient to be a fair division and both get by. Can happen when there are big debts, no owned houses, all kinds of reasons. I know a family who had a business go bust so everything had to be sold, the guy was still on £100k plus a year, but couldn't mortgage- so the spouse got spousal maintanance. Unless you know the details then you can't judge.

Why?

This isn’t about child maintenance.

Presumably kids ate old enough to tell him that his comments make them uncomfortable and they don't want to hear it.

He is unreasonable to bring them into your legal / financial arrangements.

But it's spousal maintenance, not child maintenance. The children are grown up now.

It’s not child maintenance.

If you have no contact with him and he only makes these comments to the DC, why not ask your dc not to mention it to you because it is upsetting? It's what I would do.

As pp say, the dc are adults and can make up their own minds about their involvement with their father. No need to involve you in any of it.

I don't agree with spousal maintenance either.
We still have to pay for my husband's ex who has worked a few years in her whole life. It's ridiculous. Meanwhile the ex just moved house with money provided by her mother. He gave her the house too and paid huge amounts of child maintenance.

Presumably, she only worked few year's of her life with the agreement of her partner, raised their children and supported his career. She worked within their family. She made sacrifices for her family.

No agreement woops
Which is partly why they divorced.
Imagine if the roles were reversed here?