I went to court this morning to put in stone custody and support. I have an attorney,he doesn't. He had paid an attorney for about 4 hours of service.I got to see all the paperwork for the first time. He refused to turn anything in until the 11th hour.So I'm reading a "report" he had his attorney,I suppose,write up. First paragraph...my wife left the Mormon church and I was stunned. Does he think anyone cares? I had to laugh,but that is where his mind is. Not on cleaning up his act so he can have overnights with the 2 kids. Because of the CPS report he only gets 5 hours on Sat. Every single time he screws up. Last week the kids were fighting in the car. So he stops the car(he's already yelling at them) gets out,and tries to open their door. So he can do what??? Scared them to death. They knew he would have hit them. He said it was the right way to handle it.

The report was so full of lies I was in a panic. He made our son out to be a violent,disturbed,trouble maker,poor student etc. It made me sick. Totally threw his own son under the bus to make him self look like the caring father. My attorney had to keep calming me down. But the judge went with the mediators recommendations of 5 hours on Sat. Plus he has to pay $1000. more a month than he wanted. My only happy moment.

He listed our daughter with a different middle name. Not even close. He said it was a type-o.Listed their date of adoptions 2 years later than they were. Where has this guy been?

We are doing great in our apt. Kids are in therapy and doing well. Ds is starting to tell me things his father did to him. He feels safe. What he tells me makes me sick. He has told his therapist much more than he told me. I mentioned the car incident (it had happened 2 days before therapy the week before) and she said "that must be why he wasn't doing well in our session.He was very distracted." The kids never ask for him. When he comes their is next to no physical contact. Ds won't even sit by him.

Which leads me to a question. How do I get the 3 of them to be more open with each other? To actually be able to hold hands and talk. I knew I needed to let them know it was okay with me that they love their dad. Didn't change anything. I want them,at least for now,to have some kind of relationship with him.I don't even want to look him in the eye,but I want something for them.

Glad to hear that things are looking up.

I wouldn't push for any type of relationship that isn't there. your Ex sounds like a horrible person. I wouldn't suggest that you have your kids "open up" to him. Why? If it develops on its own thats fine. Otherwise leave it alone.

+1.

I wouldn't bad-mouth him to the children, but neither would I try to force them to have a relationship with him. Just my thought.

I'm sorry to hear about what you are going thru. I have been in your shoes, as far as going thru a hard divorce, with children, an ex who made up things to the judge, lied to the kids, tried to bring the church into the middle, etc.

This is what I tried to do. I tried very hard to never say anything bad about the kids father in front of the kids. Even when things were at there very worse. There were times I failed. But they were few, because I promised myself in the begining that I would try to never say anything bad about him to his children. AND the result was........he literally dug his own grave with his relationship with his kids. AND it did take awhile. As the kids got older and they saw what he was really like, they thanked me for my effort. That meant a lot to me, cause this was and still is not easy to do.

Say what you want about him to your atty, friends, strangers. But keep it positive to your children. He will pave his own path with them.

And it really does make me sad that my children look so poorly at their own father, but he really has only himself to blame.

I don't think you can get your (ex)husband to do anything. You will just frustrate yourself trying which will have a negative affect on everything.

Don't push your kids to create any sort of relationship they're not developing naturally. Let them create the bond and openness at a level they're comfortable at on their own.

To try to steer them into a relationship will usually backfire and cause a LOT of resentment on their parts.

Sounds like he has got the kind of relationship with you and your children that he worked so hard to create and that, sadly, he deserves.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 07/23/2011 10:23AM by matt.

...was going overboard trying to make sure my kids still had a relationship with their dad. Unless that is working both ways, it can really backfire. My kids are all adults now and my relationship with them is strained at the least and very up and down. That's because all that time I was thinking I was such a good parent by not trying to put them in the middle, trying to keep their dad's and my problems away from them, trying to let them see him as often as I could arrange it, he was busy making up all kinds of lies and shit to put me down to them. When I finally figure it all out and try to combat it, I get "if that were all true you would have said that a long time ago." Um. No. A long time ago I was trying not to go there. But even though they start seeing things for what they really are and were as they get older, I don't think I'll ever repair the damage to our relationship that dear daddy caused.

Anyway, let their relationship with him take its course, but don't push it and keep your antennaes up at all times. There are other adults who can give them the kind of mentoring and understanding they will probably never get from their dad.

but was been careful not to talk about the problems of her emotionally abusive ex to the kids.

It has taken years for her children (now adults) to recognize his weird and destructive behavior for what it is. In the meantime, he has done some damage to the self-image of at least one of the kids.

*****
It's okay to take the high road and not "badmouth" the Ex. But the kids need to be taught what kind of BEHAVIOR is acceptable/normal and what is not. And it's okay to protect them from the bad behavior.

Keep in mind that having an emotionally abusive relationship with a father sets kids up for being abused in the future.

Just differently. :D

NormaRae,I can't believe how closely your situation is like mine. I have 7 adult children,5 of whom I had an excellent,extremely close,relationship with. Because of dh and his lies and bad mouthing me,I have very strained relationships with 4 of them. One won't even talk to me.We were as close as a mother and son could be. It still breaks my heart,BUT, just yesterday my adult dd I am close to called and told me my son (her bro.) had called her and they had talked about the situation. These are the 2 dh calls the most,and tells them everything that is going on with he and I. He called my ds 4 times in one day. But ds is now ignoring a lot of the calls,and both he and my dd have called their dad and told him to knock it off. So...hopefully things may start to look up.

One thing I am very glad about is that I haven't bad mouthed dh to my kids. I want to,so badly,but I just can't. He is digging his own grave.And I have to stop being bothered by the way he characterizes me,and especially my son,to anyone that will listen. The kids have found out things he has done. A birthday party at our old house for a family member (20 invited),a BBQ on Father's Day at a daughter's house,a vacation, trip to San. Fran. with some of the adult kids....we were not invited,or even told about any of these things. We only found out about them by seeing pictures posted on Facebook. I did not stop the kids from telling me they hated their dad and never wanted to see him again,after they say the pictures. I asked dh what the hell he was doing, Father's Day??? He said the older kids didn't want me there. End of story.I can only shake my head and wonder what stupid thing the man will do next.

Thank-you for all the feed-back. I will take your advice and just let things develop as they will. Lots of kids only have 1 parent,right? And I am 100% devoted to these 2.

"How do I get the 3 of them to be more open with each other? To actually be able to hold hands and talk."

You can't "get" them to do anything. This is something that they have to work out themselves. You can't control it, and - if you try - it'll likely backfire.

Ask him/her to help the children to realize that it won't hurt you or your feelings if they have positive feelings for their father. Ask him/her to also use their best judgement and to not encourage them to be unsafe with their father. And then just continue to keep your negative opinions of him away from the children. (Not, however, any negative opinions of things he may have done to them -- you need to support them in realizing it is NOT okay for father to use fear, intimidation or violence to control them.) It's a tough road you're on. My guess is that he's going to give up soon because it's too much work for him and he isn't being believed in his lies. I'm sorry for you and your children that you have to go through this. I hope things continue to improve. Kudos to you for having the strength to put your children and yourself in a much better place. :)

loveskids Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> Which leads me to a question. How do I get the 3
> of them to be more open with each other? To
> actually be able to hold hands and talk. I knew I
> needed to let them know it was okay with me that
> they love their dad. Didn't change anything. I
> want them,at least for now,to have some kind of
> relationship with him.I don't even want to look
> him in the eye,but I want something for them.

Your ex "earned" the relationship he has with the kids. The fact that CPS gave him only five hours of visitation means that is much as CPS feels is reasonably safe for the kids to be with him. The kids don't feel he is safe, either, and it is reflected in their behavior. If you push the kids to be closer to him, you are in essence telling them to override their internal warnings about their dad.

Your right robertb. Thank you.

You are amazingly brave and I'm happy and relieved for you and your kids.

I "guess" everyone has to do it their own way. My kids were abandoned by their dad for several years. Should I have just not said anything? We talked about it. We discussed it all the time. They were 9 when he left.

Now--at the age of 26, they both have good relationships with their dad and I have a good relationship with him, too.

For me to pretend that what he was putting ALL OF US through would have been wrong--as far as I'm concerned.

It worked out well for us. I think everyone has to do it in their own way.

Like others have said though--I gave him access to the kids (we still aren't divorced) if he wanted it and IF THEY WANTED IT. He could see them any time, call them any time. BUT someone told me I had to teach them to respect him and I told her bullshit (it was his sister). I told her he has to EARN their respect. He has NOW--but it took him about 8 years to figure it all out.

I've gotten some good tips from a couple of books - "Siblings Without Rivalry" and "Loving Each One Best" (sorry I don't remember the authors, but the books are on amazon). Each book has some good ideas for helping siblings to create relationships with one another without a parent being the intermediary.

Thanks everyone for all the advice. I just love my 2 kids so much and hate to see any hurt come to them. Especially from a man that is supposed to love them unconditionally. I might never understand why he is the way he is. I guess it doesn't matter.does it.

He had the kids today. They called me 9 times in 4 hours.He showed up back with them an hour early,I was out grocery shopping. They were crying hard by the last phone call.I just had the ex bring them to me at the store. The kids said they had been fighting alot,and their dad was really angry at them. He also asked dd why she wasn't going to church. We are working on "it's not your business.it's not your business" I told him to cut the crap out.

My son is the monitor for our neighbor's son's visits with his mother. She's got a drug problem. Today was her second attempt at a visit and she got upset when my son explained to her that "monitored" doesn't mean we watch while she drives off with the boy. Monitored means my son has to go with them. Poor little guy was stressed and worried sick that his mother was going to have a huge tantrum. She had a small tantrum but he and I went out back to my garden to see how awesome my pumpkin plants are doing. :)

It's so sad, though. She decided it was "too much" for her and left -- blaming the boy's father for the whole thing. She's going to lose all visitation rights at the rate she's going. I hate to see the poor little guy stuck in the middle but he cooled down pretty quickly. I don't think it ended up being as stressful as he'd been afraid it would be. I just don't get parents who don't really care about their children.

Neither do I Rebeckah. Especially when they are such great kids. Ex told my brother about 3 years ago he never even wanted to adopt them. I wish I would have known then-My brother didn't tell me until recently. I would have left him then and we would have avoided so much.

Thanks for the update. I'm so happy for you and your kids. I'm amazed at what you've been able to accomplish in such a short period of time. That was so brave.