I left :(

[mrshibbins]

Sorry - this is incredibly long ...

I've not posted on here for a few months, the reason being that I just couldn't take it any more and I left home, my DP and my SD (9) and it's been an awful awful time

DP and I are trying to work it out but this is hampered - and our relationship has always been hampered - by his child and by his inability to not treat her like she is a precious little toddler to be carried, spoonfed, wrapped in cotton wool and be the centre of daddy's world and for her to behave accordingly

when she WAS a toddler, he did have to rescue her on many occasions from her drunken mother, and I think they have become locked into this pattern, so that she actually needs to be rescued, and he needs to rescue her ...

Flame me all you want, but she is not a very healthy child emotionally and does all she can to get between me and her dad and demands his constant attention as soon as I am with them. I know it's not her fault, because of her upbringing but that doesn't help me - I just can't take it any more.

She is at 9 already totally neurotically attention seeking and already has a massive victim complex in which everyone is mean to her or trying to hurt her and she is terribly ill. in reality she is a terrible bully and even scratches herself to make herself bleed and makes herself fall downstairs to get attention she is having friendship classes at school and nobody will play with her because she is just too bitchy to other kids. i fear for her as a teenager if DP doesn't get this dealt with now. I tell him I think she needs counselling but he won't listen.

I have tried so hard over the last few years to be solid and sensible and be there for her and him, to give her a good example, and to provide the boundaries that DP is seemingly unable to provide her. but she constantly pushes situations where I end up having to tell her off, and then she immediately runs to her daddy to snitch on me and daddy then tells me to leave her alone and that i'm too strict ... while she listens, looking smug

It all got too much, the rows got too much. I started feeling like I hated her. I left at the end of November and for a few weeks our relationship was totally over

But then DP wanted me back. Started coming to see me again. But just for quickies in the daytime - just an hour in bed for sex and off he's gone to pick SD up from school. Not good enough I said. I want proper dates with you. Is that too much to expect?

So ... DP says he and I will have a date on Saturday - first time in a month - and that he has organised a play date for SD with a local girl, but it gets called off for some unspecified reason although I would be surprised if its because SD has been so mean to the girl (I've heard her on many occasions when she thought i wasn't listening and it's not nice). So DP turns up on my doorstep with SD, who has a face like sour milk...

So we go out for a nice walk plus packed lunch along the seafront. SD walks at zimmer frame pace, clinging to her daddy, complaining and moaning and claiming illness, pain, bad legs, you name it. i walk at normal speed (not fast, not slow) and when they have fallen around 50 yards behind i tell them to buck up. DP scolds me and says i must slow down to SD's pace the poor little dear cannot walk any faster. to which i say nonsense i walked her to school for 18 months and i know how fast she walks, and it's a lot faster than that. DP shoots me daggers, picks SD up and carries her, she gloats at me.

i am so irritated i pick up speed. towards the pier i wait for them to catch up. they do. i head across the beach to where we will sit. i look behind me. DP is 10 yards behind. SD is 20 yards behind. she can see both of us clearly. 10 secs later i am sat down. by the time DP reaches me, SD has disappeared and is nowhere to be seen. she has turned around, run off and hidden and will then tearfully claim to have got lost. she has pulled this stunt before and i know her style.

DP immediately become hysterical. shouts his baby has gone. swears at me that it's all my fault because i walk too fast and she cannot keep up. goes running off, cannot find her (suddenly her walking speed has picked up dramatically) and calls the police, who pick her up some minutes later skulking behind a concession ...

cue me being irritated beyond belief, a huge row and DP and SD depart, with DP swearing at me and SD looking smug and being carried again. we have not spoken to each other since....

I can't handle it any more, and think that I really do have to now completely sever all my ties with them

but I am heartbroken. If only DP could get a handle on parenting and not let SD rule the roost and manipulate him we'd have a chance. But he can't and when he does try SD won't do a single thing he tells her. when DP and I do manage to get proper one-one time, it is wonderful and we are wonderful. As soon as SD gets in she cannot even bear to see her dad peck me on the cheek she muscles her way in between us acts up, and if I tell her off (he never does) she immediately bursts into huge hysterical tears and wants daddy to pick her up ...

what do i do ... ? just brush my hands and walk away?

advice please!

she is already on the school's radar because she has no friends and is ostracised by her peer group who think she is weird. they are giving her both friendship classes and storytelling classes for kids with emotional problems. she is in the office a few times a week for bullying and if she's not been sent there she takes herself there feigning illness.

this is not about revenge, this is about getting her the right kind of help when she needs it. why do you think childline put so much money into school counsellors etc

she is the next generation and i am very worried about her. i might not live with her any more and she might have driven me bananas, and all my help to her might have been completely undermined by her dad, but I STILL LOVE HER AND WANT WHAT'S BEST FOR HER

he has told me his friend still has baths with his 9 year old daughter. please can someone tell me - is this normal? i am very very confused by this whole issue

OMG mrshibbins, so sad for you and really shocked by what's going on.
I'll ask DP for his thoughts. He has a very close relationship with his DD7 but nothing like this. Very weird.

This thread has taken a rather weird turn hasn't it?!

Even if it is a case of co-dependancy rather than anything more sinister, I do think it needs highlighting to someone as it is all very innapropriate.

Having just quickly read through.

If he only got custody because you were there, then I think you must report that you are no longer there, to see if they want to observe how he is coping? on his own.

Perhaps?

and it's so not easy to move on. i have known him since he was 14 (family friends) and her since she was born. but our relationship only came into being with he left SD's BM because of her alcoholism.

okay, so now he's backtracked and said he is not letting her sleep with him but just said it because if that's what he wanted to do then he would do it - because she belongs to him and he'll do whatever he wants with her... now i don't know what to believe.

i'm still going to have a word with the school about my concerns for her. they've already had him in last week to offer him parenting classes and he turned them down. i told him he's a fool, they are politely saying 'work with us' and they might not be so polite about it next time...

i do think though that while i keep a concerned eye on her, my romantic relationship with him has to now be over.

'because she belongs to him and he'll do whatever he wants with her'

He really said that?

yes

i told him she does not belong to you. she belongs to herself. you are her parent and her custodian and your job is to help her grow up to be the next generation

i tried and i failed

i am very confused

Look if it were me, it might be weird about sleeping in the same bed
might depends on the maturity and people (I don't actually know since I don't have a 9 year old)

I find it more weird about bathing together -- though here in MN world I believe there are mums who think its fine and natural in reverse (Mum and Son).

On the owning part - I feel its probably just a taunt at you, rather than "I own her"

I understand if you've been a part of his life for this long, then it is more difficult.

I am sure part of his behaviour and reactions are do with his responsibility to feeling of priority to his daughter vs a feeling that you are saying enough, me first. -- Believe me its very easy to come across that way.

I hope that if you really are going to speak to the school it really is for the right reasons and not a way at striking back.

i hear you wildfish - but I have moved 30 mins drive away to a houseshare (feel too old for this) and I only get to see him once a week for a precious few hours (I won't go back to the house, too many bad memories there and too easy to slip into old patterns) while his DD of course lives with him all the time.

And if he spends the whole of those few hours giving all his focus to his DD when she demands it from him, then ... well what's the point?

It was him who wanted to get our relationship going again, not me, claiming to be totally heartbroken and that i am the love of his life. so I am very confused ...

no i have no desire to strike back at him. but there is so much help there for him should he decide to accept it and she so desperately needs it she is not thriving, not playing with the other kids, bullying, lying, feigning illness and injury to get attention, falling way behind in class and the growing self harm thing which is such a worry.

the school are already giving her extra help friendship skills and emotions but i wish that he would accept that he needs some help too and that knowing how to parent is not something that just happens to you when a kid is born but a skill to be learned and that having extra help is nothing to be ashamed of.

in the olden days we all lived in big extended families and all the elder women took part in childcare and so the skills were easily passed down from generation to generation. but his mum is dead and there is no extended family to help or give him any advice or tips. and he thinks my advice is rubbish because i have no kids of my own.

I am going to sleep on this. i have such a very bad headache

You're in an impossible situation.
On the one hand it could be argued that it's not your problem, but of course it's so much more complex than that. As you've known them so long and been part-and-parcel of their weird family setup for a while, it would be difficult to wash your hands of it.
If you've previously been involved in discussions with the school and SS about her welfare (and custody was granted in acknowledgent of your presence in the home) then I think you're within your remit of letting them know the situation - as you see it.
But your DP is probably going to hit the roof if he finds out about it. But your relationship with him is dead anyway, unless he takes steps to rectify all this and respect your contributions and motives. Not sure why he's so defensive with you about it.

Good luck.

By the way, I don't think it's appropriate for a dad to bathe with a 9 year old either. And it's nothing to do with accusing him of being a pervert. It's just something that I think most dads would have intuitively stopped years beforehand.

I agree it is an impossible situation.

I'd like to say that if both of them didn't feel you were pushing the DD out but if they felt that you accepted her as if she were your own, things would get better ..... but that's another simplistic solution and besides you would know better about that.

I guess I've come to the point where it either right or not right about relationships, and feel you'd be fighting a futile losing battle. Hence why I say leave it and move on.

You are right on about extended families of old would have been of help in many many ways. Alas now it so much more nuclear. His DD problems could be down to many things and reasons. Do you really want to push along for another x years?

I can only say this about me, if I felt that you were trying (even reasonably) to push out my DC and you were irritated and annoyed by them, I probably would push them back in more as a test or on principle . I'd feel if you really can't accept them in there, then its not the place for me either. So I wonder if there isn't an element of that.

Maybe he really does have deep feelings for you, but is conflicted by the conflict.

Sorry I was trying to give another view, but find I am now just rambling. I'll say again though unless this is really special, you'd be better out of it ... or accept it and put up with it for another period of time, until things change or calm down .... (a lot of help!!!)

wildfish i did fully accept her as my own and for more than two years after she moved in with us i did all (and i mean ALL) the childcare, school runs, domestic work etc etc while my DP worked. And when it was just me and her, we got on fine, everything ran smoothly, and she behaved herself and started to do better in school.

BUT her absent and drunken mother (who despite not being able to give up the bottle desperately wants her DD back) tells her that i am not her step mum I am just her babysitter and she is to take no notice of me.

AND DP has undermined me in front of her so many times (in an I OWN HER I'LL SAY WHAT GOES sort of way) and her behaviour around him (which is largely down to him working so much I think) has become so extreme, that our three way relationship has broken down.

I agree though this is never going to work

Are you now having difficulty letting go?
You say you love her but it doesn't sound as though you like her much and it sounds as though she resents you. There seems alot of jealousy there on both sides and I wonder if your ex enjoyed having 2 females fighting for his attention.
If the school already have an eye on the situation I think there's not much you can do but withdraw.

I hope things work out ok for you - maybe after time he'll see things differently, maybe not. After all in the heat of a situation ....

Either way save your own sanity. You know she's probably turning into the teens, and well I've seen a few family members turn from sweet to ..well..uhm different ...., and perhaps he is ill equipped to deal with it.

But if you are not valued enough (sorry) then look out for self --

The problem is him. And he is, in my opinion, toxic.

Her behaviour and the consequences of it are his fault.

He is not allowing her grow up. He is controlling her and it needs to be stopped.

How it is stopped, I don't know.

Maybe you do do need to go into school.

Maybe you need to call SS.

Only you can decide what you can actually do, and it takes balls to do any of it.

Best of luck, this must be very hard.

Ok I am gonna to summarise the behaviour between this dad and his 9 year old DD for you

• SS were about to take his DD away and into care and only stopped doing so when you came on the scene

• he carries her

• he bathes her (or is present as she bathes?)

• she is self harming

• she has run away purposefully leading to her dad calling police in panic

• she is falsely accusing others of injuring her at times

• she is bullying other children

• they kiss full on on the lips (he allows this)

• she used to try to tongue kiss you ... and used to talk about her friends at school kissing with tongues (aged what? 6 or 7?)

• she has mentioned sexual things to a friend's DD

• she lies on top of him on the sofa

• she is now back sleeping in his bed again age 9

• he has told you 'she belongs to him and he'll do whatever he wants with her'

If I were you I would be contacting SS and telling them all of your concerns, that you are very worried about the dynamics of their relationship and the behaviour she is exhibiting, not just towards you when you were in a relationship with her dad, but in general. He is obviously not going to put boundaries in place or discipline, or evens eek counselling for her so I feel you have little choice.

When my kids were 9 I was often present as they bathed. I still kiss my teenage kids on the lips, and kiss my dad and sibs on the lips (no tongues though). At about 9 I used to play with my kids that sometimed involved lying on them and pretending to squish them and they did the same to me.
I presume if this behaviour made the OP think the man was abusing his daughter she'd have mentioned it when they lived together. It sounds as though she mainly moved out because he wouldn't back her up v the daughter.
He sounds a poor parent, but if the mum is alcoholic is probably alot better than foster care as he clearly loves his daughter, just isn't good at being a disciplining dad.
I wonder if contacting SS is going OTT.

Yes I was not even sure about the bathing thing (I mean, what the situation was), but agree these things vary from family to family (some are very relaxed, others less so). I only add it in as part of a bigger picture.

I kiss my DS on the lips, but he would not try to kiss me with tongues, or talk about tongue kissing with friends.

I am not saying her dad is abusing his daughter (she may have picked up the kissing thing whilst at her mums, or even just seen it and been fascinated.....), merely that the big picture is concerning and that there seems to be no personal boundaries in place, this young girl is very unhappy and insecure - I think this girl needs more support than she is currently getting and that that should be remedied.

you are right 2rebecca. i do love her but i find it very hard to like her right now because she is so affecting my life

i'm finding it hard to like him right now either. how can i say this and still love him?

i am so sad for her because i think he is setting her up for such relationship misery in the future

i am so sad for me because of her behaviour it makes it impossible to spend any quality time with my DP

i am so sad for DP because pride prevents him from accepting any help from any source in improving her future and giving our relationship a chance

i am sad for both of them because i think he is in for a nightmare ride through her teens

we all lose

How is he going to cope when she hits puberty?

When she has a boyfriend?

Or when she is still living at home as a virgin at 40?

She will not be able leave and go to university.

Or hold down a job and deal with office politics.

He has to see that he is screwing up her future by not giving the tools to stand on her own two feet.

He is not nuturing her and allowing her to grow up.

It might not be abuse but it is not right.

good post bigbadmummy

poor kid.

dad is enabling this behaviour.

I don't envy in this situation either father or child. Taking it on first face, the dad really needs to put distance between him and child, he is treating her a as a toddler. And believe me I can sympathise with him, having been through separation, and fighting tooth and nail through the family court system to establish and maintain a meaningful relationship with his daughter.

... the child sounds like she is really seeking attention, it appears to have stretched beyond that and he is overcompensating. He probably can't see it.

As the child emotionally manipulates things more (probably not intentionally. She is surviving after all), she gets what she wants.

She is a 9yr old child after all and not an adult and we should be wary of putting our adult view of matters.

You must really be going through a lot, but I think to emotionally survive you should really take an emotional step backwards... could you take a bit of advice from some sort of children's services?

It's not a child welfare issue, I agree there are lot of odd things - kissing on the lips/bathing etc. This IMHO is really seeking attention behaviour that has overstepped a "normal" parent-child situation - and this must be examined in the context of the background of the child. It really does sound like striking out for attention by the kid.

Ultimately the child needs some form of therapy and dad needs to seek parenting therapy. This may sound trite, but it's better that's it's addressed by "soft" services such as family services rather than anything even approaching social services....