Refused contact and DP family

[Binglet]

Hi. I'm preparing to be told I'm being unreasonable however I need a bit of clarity. We are currently at the beginning of a court case trying to reinstate contact with DPs DD (7). Contact was suddenly cut in August, we have no idea why, and we've not seen her since. DP has repeatedly made contact with his Ex who ignores him or tells him DSD doesn't want to see him. (I do have another thread about it). She's ignored solicitor letters, three mediations etc. So now it's court sadly as we have no choice.

So we haven't seen DSD since Aug last year. DP family see her every so often we've discovered. They don't tell DP when they've seen her, and never mention DP to DSD when they see her. I find this really hurtful. He dotes on his daughter and no one seems to care that he doesn't see her as long as they do. Found out today that DPs DM has text ex this morning to arrange delivering Easter eggs. DP had text this morning with no reply. Ex replied to his DM and their eggs were delivered. We found out this afternoon.

Am I wrong in thinking that in that position I would have got an egg, given it to DSD and told her that was from daddy and that he misses her. It really upsets him as he knows that as long as they get to see her they don't even give him a second thought. I know they are relations too. And they miss her. But not mentioning him, not helping to arrange to deliver presents etc is really horrible. Especially as it now looks to DSD that her dad has ignored her and her dads family are there for her. We've still got all her Xmas presents wrapped up in her bedroom waiting for her, which is just so sad. They saw her Xmas day in the street (live very close) and no one mentioned DP at all. On Christmas Day when he had tried and tried te her Ex to let him see her. Are we wrong in being upset about it??

Court date in a few weeks so fingers crossed something happens and contact is initiatied again. I just hate seeing him so upset.

I find that really weird. What reason could his family possibly have for not supporting his relationship with his daughter?

It seems to be that as long as they get to see her it's ok. It's infuriating.

Does he get on well with his family?

He's spoken to them before when we discovered they had been texting. And his mum was really upset and said that Xmas was an oversight and she was just so glad to see her that she didn't even think. So we gave benefit of the doubt. But now it's happened again.

Really well. His mum has our DD after nursery every day, fabulous relationship. She's supporting us with court costs. Which is why it's just so infuriating that they can't even mention him when they see her or think about him.

I could have forgiven it once. As I'm sure they were just excited to see her on Xmas day! But now the lack of thought again had really upset us both.

Perhaps they are only allowed to see her if they don't mention him? Have you asked them?

I didn't even think to ask that to be honest. Xmas day was a chance meeting as they were all getting into the car. So no planning by either party.

I don't think that's the case though, ex has been off with all the family for months and refused to speak to them (inc on Xmas day, DSD just ran up to her DGM). Today DP mum was very matter of fact about how she chanced a text to her and was met with a yes to taking the eggs up. DPs step dad actually took the eggs over. But I just thought that a quick "I'm taking our eggs over, shall we take one from you/bring yours over quick and we will deliver" wouldn't have gone amiss.

It is very, very odd. But I am trying to see this from your MILs side. She has been allowed to see her dgd probably on strict instructions not to talk about her own ds. She may well feel terribly torn but be putting on a brave face.

She obviously supports her son as shown by the court costs. But she is in between a rock and a hard place. This situation is not of your MIL's doing and she may be desperately worried that if she says or does the "wrong" thing then none of you will see the child for a very long time.

Cut her some slack. Be relieved that someone you trust is seeing your dp's dd. The battle is between your dp and his ex. Let the courts do what needs to be done.

We are probably overthinking it. It was probably another oversight. But I jsut know how much it hurts DP knowing that no one even mentions to DSD that her daddy misses her, every chance anyone gets to see her. He's so upset today knowing that his step dads seen her today and we found out on the off chance we popped in.

I know MIL is absolutely in bits that she doesn't see her DGD. It really upsets her. I think we are jsut being over sensitive. Court date is two weeks away and I think it's all just building up now.

Thanks for advice.

Yes but there is a massive difference between the MIL making sure she doesn't say the wrong thing and not actually telling her own son.

It's just the way we only find out about it when we see them and it's brought up in a very breezy way. I would have thought a phone call immediately the second they've seen her would be appropriate. But I suppose we should be glad she's safe and someone sees her. I just don't want it to make DP look terrible in court, his family got gifts etc to her but he couldn't. Even though he's text her every weekend since August to try and see her.

Under the circumstances you cannot expect your MiL to take this fight on for you. If she did it is highly likely that she would be stopped in her tracks from any sort of contact with GD at all.

It is going to be interesting when you get to court as to why contact stopped

I just get the rage about it. Which isn't fair. But I know my mother would be so over the top about it if it was the other way around. She would probably produce a pre-prepared PowerPoint presentation to make sure DSD knew that her daddy was there for her.

He doesn't want to fall out with anyone as it's hard enough for him already. quite We have had a chat about it and he thinks his mum is scared that if she mentions him, the little contact they do have will just end. Which I understand.

It's such a difficult situation. We have no idea. We know her mum had a new boyfriend around the same time. She's blamed DSD anxiety, that she doesn't want to come to ours anymore. We've had a difficult few years as ExW prevented DSD from doing overnights, telling her dogs bite (we have a dog), having DSD sleep in her bed so she is upset in her own bed at ours. We've worked so hard for over 3 years to get her to a stage where she comes to ours happy to sleep over and had been aleeping over regularly and happily. Maybe that was a problem, she was finally happy to sleep over. (I just want to add DSD would cry/moan for about 30minutes at bed time then be fine and go to sleep, we wouldn't force her if she was distraught)

The thing is you can't expect your mil to fight this battle. Even wanting her to tell dsd that daddy loves and misses her is unreasonable at this stage as it is placing emotional responsibility on a child who does not have the maturity to deal with it.

To be absolutely honest, I would be very concerned about what could cause the mum to cut contact to the point she is prepared to be taken to court rather than go to mediation, especially as she is prepared to let dsd's extended family still maintain contact.

I have asked my ex-IL's to not mention their DS to my DD's. For a year there was a non-mol in place due to his EA to them and once it ran out they were passing on messages from him which started to become distressing. I had to put my foot down and tell them either stop or I would stop contact with them as well.

Now I don't know the background to your story but my ex would question my youngest constantly about what I was doing, where I was going and then tell my DDs that I was a bad mum, that I was useless, lazy, that he was a better parent and it escalated to a much worse degree. I got a non-mol banning him from contacting me or my DDs or approaching their schools or our home. His parents STILL rang and said 'oh your Dad says .....' which breached the order. It took me exploding spectacularly and getting the police to call them to tell them it stops now or they will never talk to them again. Their son is utterly toxic.

Ex was offered supervised contact at the Court hearing. He refused. He hasn't seen my DD's for 18 months. It's bloody lovely.

DP family see her every so often we've discovered
How so often then and are you only referring to MIL? It sounds like it was only twice and both were random. The first time in the streets and the second, your MIL didn't even actually see her? What can they possibly say? She probably is worried that anything she says, which is nothing much at all is going to upset your OH even more.

I think your OH needs to be patient and accept that court is going to be his salvation. It's horrible it's been so long, but hopefully the judge will have sympathy for him and restore visitations.

Why on earth has your DP not done to court and established a regular patter of contact via a child arrangements order. ? Not to,do so is simply negligent.

We had a regular pattern of contact. Albeit not many overnights to begin with. But we kept at it and persevered with DSD and before contact was stopped we had her overnight EOW for a good while. We've got a court date within the next few weeks.

I think I was just upset yday and needed a vent. It's stressful and I see how upset he is that others have seen her and he can't. But like a PP said, I'm glad someone is seeing her. Thanks for advice. I'm off to get a grip!

I hope that things work out in court OP. In the meantime, I know it's (much) easier said than done but do try not to stress out.

There's nothing that either of you can do just yet so focus on keeping it together for the court date.

Just a thought - maybe nobody mentioned her Dad because they don't want to risk upsetting sd (and therefore her mum).

Honestly, I think your MIL is doing the right thing.

If the ex is implacably hostile to your DP, then she will cut all contact between MIL and DSD if he's mentioned or involved. If she allowed MIL to drop eggs off and MIL included ones from DP, how likely do you think it is that this contact would ever be allowed again? It would be a crazy thing to risk when her own contact is so new and so tentative. It would clearly piss off the ex hugely and be a massive incursion - however unreasonable the ex may be, it's still very plainly a way of showing loyalty to her son and reproaching DSD's mum if she sneaks gifts in that way, and there will be only one outcome: both barred again.

MIL is paying for the court costs. To ask her to sacrifice her own relationship with DSD out of loyalty to her son, which in effect this would be, seems really unfair. She's doing all she can.

Sorry, pronoun soup there! V tired I'm afraid.