Help, I just took a beating in 'Am I being unreasonable'

[Bebo1980]

I posted the following in 'am i being unreasonable' and after a LOT of abuse a kind person suggested I come here for more balanced advice! please be gentle I'm still recovering!

My dh has a daughter with an ex, they currently have an amicable relationship although it hasn't always been so. We have his daughter frequently, take her on family holidays, she has her own bedroom/clothes at our house etc etc. My dh used to give his ex money informally until several years ago she involved CSA and actually ended up receiving less money than she was originally. Since then my dh has been very conscientious in sending pay checks in voluntarily and making sure he is making the correct payments. What I am trying to say is that he wants to support his daughter and is in no way a 'deadbeat dad'.
When he dropped his daughter off yesterday his ex mentioned that she had started taking her to ballet classes and 'is he going to contribute to half?'. The money is not a massive amount (although I've recently gone back to work full time after having a baby and we are in no way loaded!). The problem is the principle. Is CSA meant to just cover basic living amounts or does it include extras?is she going to continue to ask for more contributions? In my view she took him to csa to ensure she received an adequate amount of money a month and now she wants more.Don't get me wrong I believe that she is entitled to the money she receives but how far should this go and is it worth rocking the boat by saying no?

Incognito ? I agree it wasn?t your fault that your DH and his ex made a huge financial mess between them, but sometimes you inherit that legacy when you get together with a man with ?baggage.? However ??? it?s never right that a man should have to pay disproportionate maintenance to his ex, no matter what sort of hash they made of their lives together. Everyone has a right to move on with their lives when a relationship breaks down, if you screw someone for every last penny, then you essentially control their life. It sounds like your DH?s ex is a nightmare.

Sadly, many men fear they will lose contact with their children if they don?t give in to the bizarre financial/practical demands of the ex ? and that?s a really knotty issue to deal with.

Petal02, I think it isn't only as extreme as DFs fearing they will be refused contact with their DCs, although that is certainly a big - and real - issue.

Three is also the fear - sometimes very real - that the exW will simply say: 'if you don't pay for your DC to do ballet/swimming/violin lessons/insert what you will, then they won't be doing it.' Or: 'if you don't give me more money to buy DC new shoes, DC will have to go without and wear ones that are too small with holes in the sole.' And in the face of such blackmail, it is very difficult to say: 'I have already given you the money for that, I suggest you spend it on that,' and even if the DF does say that, he can't actually force the exW to spend the money that way.

Obviously, if the exH is only giving the exW a small amount of maintenance, the argumant that he has already paid for these things may not hold water, but plenty of women with large and generous monthly payments still make these demands even when the exH has made it clear he feels it is unreasonable. I think sometimes it's about control, sometimes greed, sometimes just because they can and they haven't actually thought about whether or not they should...

"I think sometimes it's about control, sometimes greed, sometimes just because they can and they haven't actually thought about whether or not they should..."
Good quote..

Interesting opinions... Everyone's story is different. I am on the side of the children, & that imo is the right side. I had & have no interest in screwing my ex for money. I could of got away with far more, but im not motivated by money in any way, unlike the ex who begrudges every penny he sees that he has had to give to me to provide the shoebox I live in with our kids.

As far as im concerned we should be working together for the best interests of the dc & everything else is long gone. I have my life, he has his. It's a pity there's always one (pretty much always the one who f**d things up to start with) that finds it impossible to move on in an amicable way, & insists on twisting the knife & making things more difficult for the one left to pick up the pieces of the mess they made. :(

3 years ago today I got my life back. :) I moved into a house where my nasty control freak abusive ex wasn't allowed (by law ) to come in & abuse me whenever he felt like it, even in front of the dc.

The dc should always come first in everyone's eyes. Anyone who thinks otherwise should not of chosen to be a parent in the first place.

Such an interesting thread, thank you! I can identify with a lot that has been said.

My DH is not a 'dead beat dad' either and, over the years, similar situations have come up. On one occasion DSD1 lost her jumper while we were on holiday. Her mum demanded we pay to replace it. We've always given extra for school trips, but have drawn the line at what we believe are 'nice to haves'. After all, we cannot afford to buy them ipads, iphones, laptops etc etc like their mum and stepdad apparently can. I believe my DH's contributions are funding an awful lot of material luxuries that we have no intention of spoiling our DS with. Fundamentally we disagree with her on how to raise children and, to put it bluntly, that is why she and DH split in the first place!

It's hard, but it does get easier i think. DH and his ex are much better at talking these days, even if they disagree. DH doesn't like how she 'parents', but he has had to swallow his pride and get on with it as there is little he can do to influence things and it's important my DSDs don't pick up on ill feeling. We now tend to draw the line at 'essentials' which, for us includes educational school trips. We do pay for things separately without prompting as well, which is often not taken into account by 'guidelines'.

This is a very interesting thread. The situation is reversed for me as I am the resident parent and recieve regular payments of maintenance as set out by the CSA from my exH. He will not contribute towards anything else.

However, I do think every individual case is different. DH and myself have found it a real struggle at times to be able to afford all the extras for the DC (I have 2 with my ex and 1 with DH). ExH and his wife are considerably better off than DH and I, which I certainly do not begrudge them for, it's just at times when DC's 1&2 for example have school trips we have really struggled to scrape the money together and exH won't pay a penny towards it, it's times like this when I feel like it's not fair.

When exH and his wife had their DD, I had to take a cut in the amount of maintenance he paid for our DC's which knowing their circumstances certainly was not fair to our DC's as they were the ones affected.

At the moment I am faced with exH moving away as his wife has a new, very highly paid job which comes with a lot of perks. A fantastic opportunity for them but unfortunately for my DC 1&2 not only will they not be able to see their DF on a regular basis he is giving up his job to be a house husband and look after his other DD (they have another on the way also) so he then won't be legally entitled to pay maintenance which will mean I am going to have to say no when it comes to school trips and extra curricular activities that cost money as DH and I just will not be able to afford it.

As I said before it does depend on the individuals circumstances. I have only ever asked my ex twice for money other than the maintenance. The first time was when I was a single parent and I asked him for some money towards a sheep costume I was making for DS's nativity at pre-school, he said no. Years later I asked him to pay half of DD's extra curricular activity as DH's hours had been cut in half and we really couldn't afford to pay it all (was the start of the credit crunch), at first he said yes then after I'd paid it myself never gave me his half of the money. My mother ended up giving it to me instead.

On the other end of the scale I agree that there definitely are women who just ask for way too much. My brother pays his ex maintenance, buys his 2 DC's their uniform, shoes etc, pays for their clothes and school trips etc. Pays for them to go on holiday with their mother and she once even asked him to give her spending money, think he drew the line at that!!

Bebo good luck for the future

What seems to happen in these cases is that the RP expects contributions from the NRP as they would if they were still together (reasonable) but none of the typical conversations of together couples take place (unreasonable).

If my husband came to me and said: "I've bought DD a new coat, it was £40, also new trainers £45 and I've signed her up for ballet lessons which are £60 a term - you need to give me half the money for all these things" I'd ask him why the bloody hell he had done all of that without discussing it with me and tell him how flippin disrespectful he was to profess to know that I had budgetted for all that for that month and ask me for money for things that I hadn't even seen!
In a relationship you budget together at the start of the month and decide together what things each family member needs. If you expect your ex to pay for these things then you need to give them the respect of discussing it first.
We don't know how much CM he pays. My Dh pays £500 a month CM which is more than enough to pay for half of the needs of a 13 year old. Yet his ex is always buying things for their DD (usually in the last week of the month when budets are tight) and asks for half of the cost of things he hasn't seen nor beleives their DD needs.

I should add that I am also a seperated parent. I receive CM from my ex at exactly the rate that CSA suggest. It is £200 a month. With childcare costs for our DD being £350 alone I don't feel that this is enough and would like a contribution towards some of the extras. I always ask him, with advance warning of what she needs, how much it might cost, and when I might buy it. I'm always met with a no.
So I can see for the other side too.