Alienating baby mum making our lives hell!

[TheLilacViper]

My partner and I have been together 8years and have 2 daughters together, he also has 2 kids 11 and 10 from a previous relationship. She is extremely high conflict, controlling and impossible to compromise with. She moved away 4 years ago around an hour and 30 minute drive away and refuses to do any travel so was forced to cut contact down to every other weekend and half of the holidays. During our weekends we had noticed that contact between baby mum and step children was ALOT it was continuous texting asking what they were eating for every meal telling them what time they should go to bed or making comments that it’s too late or too early if we were out it was asking where we were going. It escalated to a point that the kids were never putting their phones down as they were constantly having to update their mum and if they were pre occupied they would be bombarded with texts telling them that she is worried about them and then my partner would get a text asking them to check their phones and that she needs to have constant communication with them. She is always promising them to give them things when they get home (example, sleepovers with friends, presents ordered from Amazon, surprises, days out) which I feel makes them itch to go back home with their mum I don’t feel it’s fair when we only get the 2 days with them. My OH has had enough and has said the kids are not having their phones so that they can be in the moment when they’re with us and enjoy the 48 hours that they get while they’re here that they can tell her about their time when they get home. She has since blocked all of us from their phones including my 5 year old daughters iPad so she can’t FaceTime with her siblings! And has encouraged SD10 to call OH and tell him she won’t be seeing him anymore due to not being allowed her phone and that it’s her property to do with as she likes. This conversation was super awkward and out of character for my step daughter and she sounded uncomfortable and withdrawn. She absolutely loves coming to visit and hates any kind of confrontation so I’m certain she has been made to make this phonecall to her dad. Any advice on this. There is already a court order in place and this isn’t the only time she has stopped contact it happens every time my partner doesn’t ’do as she says’ we won’t be getting court involved it’s not fair on the kids and she’s already convinced them that it’s all their idea. I’m not sure if contacting their school maybe is the best course of action to get them support?

If all you can take away from this post is a pedantic swipe at the choice of words then it might be you who needs to grow up.

Never going to win with a bitter ex.

Could you not set up a group chat that you are all in and can use that to communicate when the children are over so someone will always see a message if she need to contact the children, and its not on the children.

Personally I would be encouraging a 10 & 11 year old to be on their phone all the time, you could maybe get him to use that as an argument to her - trust me when they hit the teens they will be on it none stop.

Send her an itinerary, I know it sounds pathetic but it could help if she knows what you are going to be doing, doesn't have to be too detailed, but you could put bed times on their too.

You will never be able to please this woman but there are ways around it

I hear you OP. DPs ex is very difficult. I resonated with earlier pp who said be careful about doing all the emotional Labour for this. I was doing far too much and it was impacting my mental health when really it’s between them.

I think saying no to phones for the whole weekend is too much. At that age their phones are important for them to stay in touch with friends and I think it will build resentment / make them not want to stay in future. I’d maybe put boundaries in place of maybe an hour in am and hour in the evening. Or put them away if out the house…

Yes, funny that.

This is a great reply. The assumption that taking phones away is tantamount to a terrible punishment is awful, and very telling of our modern times. These kids are 10 and 11 - they shouldn't really be on phones at all, certainly not having to be glued to them to carry the weight of pacifying their toxic mother. Their Dad has done exactly what he should have done - parent! He's taken a decision to protect his children's best interests in this situation.

I'm not making up any narrative. The facts are in the OP. Kids are 10 and 11. OP and partner have been together 8 (she originally said 9 years). So clearly theyve got together when the kids were babies. The wife was so abusive and controlling that he settled down with her, had kids and only realised her this during the hardest years, when the kids were babies hmm? And then took off? Yeah.....

Exactly the same thing in our house. My DP ex gave their 9-yr old her old phone, “in case of emergencies” while at our house - because clearly the 9 yr old shouldn’t trust the grown ups in this house to deal with emergencies. 🙄

So partner plans a scheduled time of when is convenient for him to call his mum and have a video chat and check in. Usually sometime before bed. He does it in the privacy of his own room.

And, his mum would absolutely blow up his phone if he was allowed his phone all day long. We make sure plenty of distractions and opportunities to make nice memories for him and his dad, and all of us whatever the day may be.

@DoTheDinosaurStomp she also said the wife was unfaithful but I suppose that's ok too.

Either way the relationship is irrelevant. Her kids are entirely separate from that and she needs to control her own bitterness before damaging them anymore.

Another mother who was controlling and abusive in the marriage, continues to be so and is validated and championed by other bitter women on Mumsnet because she can't possibly be held accountable for her appalling behaviour.

' if contacting their school maybe is the best course of action to get them support? '

Good grief ! it's not an educational matter, leave the school out of it.

and yes it's the girl's mother, not baby mum
just like you are the girlfriend / partner, not step mother as you are not married.

I would step back and allow him to deal with his problems/issues with his former wife.

Yet he isn't interested in going to court to fight for his kids. Because school won't make the kids think differently to their abusive and narcissistic mother, he's honestly just going to not see them again?

Leaving sex aside, if two people settle down and have kids and the control and abuse, as it does, steps up after the wedding and after the babies, when there's more to control and easier leverage, you're saying it's the victim parents fault for not knowing and therefore they shouldn't be allowed to leave the relationship? And if the abusive partner wants to end it, they should uproot their life to follow their abusive ex and beg to be taken back?

Don't get me wrong, I think ops do needs to do more but you're post is massively victim blaming to the thousands of women who also find themselves ensnared in an abusive relationship they thought was loving.

What a nightmare. I mean they will need to learn to manage their Mum but they're very young to be doing so yet.

DSD's Mum can inundate her with messages one minute, block her the next. She's getting better at not letting it bother her, but she's an older teen.

So no advice, just given how the thread descended I just wanted to say there's loads of us who can relate and you have our sympathies.

Op, your DH will not win this. Their mum will be with them the majority of the time so they won’t see the harm in what she is doing. At their ages, they maybe feeling protective or guarded about her and anything dad does to conflict with that will be seen as trying to get at/hurt their mum. Unfortunately, it’s likely whatever you do in these situations will be seen as awful and mum is likely to be pointing out any faults he/you have and magnifying them to suit her own interests which presumably is to have them 100% of the time.
We are going through this and it’s been going on for years. SC are a bit older and it’s been more complicated that what you’ve stated here but DH has now stepped away - the ‘tug of war’ is emotionally damaging and he’s done everything he can to get help - courts, social services, school and education authorities etc. Despite the damage to SC being obvious there’s very little help. DH is now at a point of hoping SC will realise what happened when they are older and come back but at the moment there’s nothing else we can do.

Fight how? Force her to move closer? Or move closer to her and then prevent her moving away ever again? Remove the children from her custody altogether? I'm sure people would have a lot to say about that sort of tactic from the dad.

I think it's fair enough the dad does the travel when the mum does rehearsal ferrying around every other day of the fortnight

She CHOSE to move...

This sounds awful for the poor dc, but it is not the remit of the school to mediate between conflicting parents outside of school. Go to a solicitor and get something drawn up legally.

@Oqqq probably to get some help with the two toddlers she was looking after full time. I did the same when I was left by my fiance when pregnant

She is not ‘baby mum’. She is your partners children’s mother and she deserves to be respected as that by the person she created children with.

You have absolutely no idea why she did it. Just because that's what you did doesn't mean anything!

People deserve the respect they earn. Not because they have kids. As far as I'm aware birthing children doesn't give you a blanket pass at being an obnoxious, entitled, spoilt brat.

Once you have birthed someone’s children, you have done enough to earn their respect.

I don't understand why her moving an hour an half away means he only sees them every other weekend?? My horses are hour and 15 mins away and I see them every day either before work or after that 🤔

Rose West birthed children. So did the mother of Peter Connolly. Ruby Franke and Jodi Hildebrandt birthed the children they abused.

Probably not examples of people who have given birth that we'd say are deserving of respect. Being a parent is far more than giving birth.