Hi there,
This will probably he a long post as there is so much to this and I dont want to miss anything important out.
In September my partner walked out on myself and our then 11 month old baby, a few days before his 1st birthday. It was completely unexpected in that the day before we'd had a lovely family day and evening out, wed been excitedly preparing for our child's birthday and he seemed like such a devoted and loving dad from the second he found out i was pregnant. He moved 5 hours away, to a town hed got a job at around 5 months earlier. Very soon after he left I discovered hed been flat hunting with a young, female work colleague (as in weeks) so I presume he was cheating on me, though of course he denies that and says he never spoke to her outside of work before he left me, but you can imagine how much I believe that. Anyway, the cheating is by the by really, though it does hurt.
Since then, we rarely hear from him. He has seen the baby 3 times in 4 months and the visits were fleeting and he seemed to spend as little time here as possible. He doesnt check in, he doesnt ask how the baby is, he doesnt ask for photos or to video call. Its already 3 weeks since he last came and I havent heard from him, only an excuse over text as to why i havent received my first CMS payment in full (I didnt reply and I have reported him as hes had months of knowing when the payment is due and how much, it has taken so long as he chose not to engage with CMS until they threatened him with collect and pay) i didn't hear from him at all over the babies birthday and the baby was hospitalised twice days after he left with croup and I barely heard from him at all.
He left me in a lot of debt i knew nothing about, he wasnt paying any of his share of the bills, unfortunately it was things that were in our joint name (council tax) and the water was in my name only, though they had his number and email address as their contact and they advised he had the app on his phone. I am therefore liable and am in the process of obtaining an IVA, I had bailiffs visit before Christmas (I was out) i genuinely had no idea until I opened all the letters days after he left and immediately contacted Step Change for help. He still has debts in his own name registered to my address, I probably shouldnt admit to this, but I do open them to contact the sender to tell them he no longer lives at this address as I am terrified bailiffs will return. Theyre all his debts only, but I still dont want that. I dont know what he was spending his money on, but when our relationship ended I approached an old friend of his who did admit to using drugs with my ex (I did ask this friend at the time when I was suspicious but he denied it) I would also ask my ex as hed behave bizarrely at times but I stupidly believed him when he denied it. He still denied it even when I had proof, he will never be honest with me. I dont know how much he was using and at what points throughout our relationship, but when he left I bought drug testers and there was no evidence of drugs in his office, so I have no idea.
When he last saw the baby he arrived with a black eye (and some ludicrous story that cant be true) and on one visit he was quite insistent he had to leave randomly in the day he was here and he left for 4 hours. I dont know if anything dodgy is going on. I dont let him see the baby alone and I supervise, I spoke to a solicitor who advised this also. When he first left he was asking to have the baby for weeks at a time 5 hours away from me and I found out he even contacted a nursery, he was also threatening court at this time but thats all stopped now. He has no family or friends. I did actually contact his ex fiancé, and she was left in similar circumstances (though without a child), he cheated on her with a work colleague (despite telling me she cheated on him) and he left her in debt too, and was in a lot of debt himself. When he left, she found copious empty bags of drugs in an old phone case. She also told me her versions of events, which i believe, with evidence, which basically just highlights all the lies he told me from the day we met.
Obviously my life has all been a lie and I dont know how to process this. This post is probably as jumbled as my head as I'm sure you can imagine. I cant actually describe how shocking it has all been, for my family too, as we thought we knew this person. He was always fun and enthusiastic, he seemed to care deeply about us (he obviously didnt), his life seemed to revolve around us and we die everything as a family of 3. Our baby slept between us every night, he seemed to have endless patience with him and really was so good with the baby, everyone said it. He was very, very charming.
Did he ever care about his son and its now out of sight out of mind, or did he just never care? Is he ever going to realise what hes missing out on? I know i cant allow him to come in and out of our child's life as he gets older and hes either in or out. He goes 6 weeks without seeing him and like I said, has seen him 3 times since he left in September. He isnt reliable or consistent and I know in the near future I will have hard decisions to make, as its fine while I'm the one sat waiting for him to arrive, but its not okay when its my child waiting for him. Its all just so hard to deal with alone, I dont know how to process the shock and also be a single parent and do everything.
Sorry for the long post, my head is truly battered. There is so much more to this, there always is, but I could type forever!