This is a really interesting thread for me. This week I have proposed living apart during his contact times to my DH. I just don’t think I can do this any more.
So much of what people say here resonates with me. My DH’s other children are difficult in various ways. But the thing that makes it impossible is my husband’s attitude to them and everything else. He has an enormous sense of entitlement about them to the extent that he will not consider or care about the effects of his wants on anyone else. He wants me to facilitate (or just do) everything to accommodate his wants, but with no say in anything. Inevitably when they behave poorly, I end up scapegoated because it’s somehow my fault for doing what he asked/expected me to do. He transfers his annoyance at them on to me.
I hate how it affects me too. Like @LatentPhase, I have no emotional bandwidth. I’m burnt out. I try to withdraw and I’m in the wrong for being ‘separatist’ and ‘creating a weird atmosphere’. But interacting with them (and him with them) makes me so resentful. I’m always in the wrong and I feel that I have to (but fail to) protect my children from this crap. I’m at the point where even hearing their voices makes me feel physically sick. As does hearing the weird tone DH uses with them.
On top of all this, DH seems to require so much of my emotional and practical labour. In general and particularly with regards to his children. It dominates everything and drains me. It also causes him to neglect my needs - even at really big moments - and even to be horrible to me.
The thing is, he’s so inconsistent about his children. Both in parenting and emotionally. The ambivalence he feels about them drives so much of the dynamic. He feels like he should desperately miss them and adore being with them. So he performs to pretend this is the case. But actually he doesn’t enjoy spending time with them much (tbh, I can’t imagine anyone would with the way they’ve been allowed to become). And he prefers having time without them. But he then feels guilty about this. And it makes him act weirdly. He projects it all on to me (it’s me, and my fault, that they behaved badly and were rude and ungrateful all weekend). And he overcompensates by being even less willing to do anything about their behaviour and claiming that he is devastated that he misses them.
Added to all of this is his interfering ex. And he jumps to her tune. Then tries to hide this (from himself as much as anything) by projecting it on to me. Apparently my ex dominates everything that happens in this house and I’m scared to do things he doesn’t like. But my ex literally never comments on my parenting. And maybe we are just intrinsically on the same page about behaviour expectations. In contrast, last week his ex demanded he change something so (without so much as informing, never mind consulting, me) he rearranged the furniture in 5 rooms of the house (to a greater or lesser degree) and completely altered the dining arrangements. Then told me that he was ‘just trying something new’ and I ‘shouldn’t even have an opinion on that’. But it’s my ex that’s driving things. 🙄
I don’t see how I can ever win or be happy in this situation. I’m miserable and I don’t like what trying to live like this is doing to me. I don’t enjoy the feeling of dread or even revulsion at the thought of another weekend of this.
In the end, I do wonder if it’s a stepping stone to full separation. He won’t like being a PT dad to all his kids (we have a baby who will be coming with me). He’ll resent that I am with the baby all the time, and he will blame me for the situation (because I’m an inferior person who just can’t be an adult and cope with some kids). He’ll have to face the fact that he’s got no company or support for contact and he still doesn’t enjoy it. He’ll resent the fact that my son lives with me and the baby and is there when he’s at my house (he already resents him for being here more than his children). It’ll be my house too, so he will be the visitor not DS.
But I don’t see where else we could go. He is not going to change his attitude or come to terms with his ambivalence about his children.
In fact, a good example of his weird attitude to it all is that, when I told him I can do it no longer, his proposed solution was that we move abroad with the baby and leave the other kids with their other parents. Then he almost mocked me saying ‘but you wouldn’t be willing to do that’. In fact he claimed I needed to basically abandon DS to ‘prove you’re not weirdly obsessed’ with him. His actual words.
Yet he’s terrified his ex will stop him seeing his kids so he rearranges the furniture in our house to accommodate his ex’s wishes. And he needs constant sympathy that he doesn’t live with them all the time.
How is anyone supposed to navigate that?