dealing with the husband's ex-please help!
I am new to this site, and am thankful to find a place full of people in my shoes! A little background info-DH and I have been married for 3 years. We have one child together-20 months old, and are expecting a second. My husband has 4 children from 2 previous relationships-1S(9) 2D(10&12) with his ex-wife, and 1D(5) with an ex-girlfriend. We have custody of his 3 oldest from first marriage, with no involvement from their mother. My relationship with them is great most of the time, with some issues from my SS.
However, the topic of this forum is advice on handling my husband's ex-girlfriend, the mother of his 5yr old daughter. My husband pays child support, exercises visitation every other weekend & Wednesday nights for dinner, and calls 2-3 times per week to speak with his daughter. He has visited her school, and is very involved in her life. None of this, however, seems to be enough for her mother. She is constantly accusing my husband of shirking his responsibilities, not having time for her daughter, and being too concerned with building a family over here that her daughter gets left out. She is constantly scheduling activities with her boyfriend and his family on our weekends, changing plans at the last minute (you have to come pick her up, I can't bring her; i need her this weekend; etc.), and disregarding SD's relationship with her father, but encouraging one between her daughter & her boyfriend. On occasions when she changes transportation issues at the last minute, and my husband is working, he will ask me to pick SD up from her mother's-this sends the ex into a RAGE. More accusations of not taking responsibility for his kids follow. I feel like the only thing that would appease her is if DH tried to fight her for custody-a battle we don't want to enter considering the fact that we don't want to take her from her mother.
How do we deal with this? DH is by no means a dead beat-he has custody of most of his children, and is very involved with his 5yr old. He pays support & exercises parenting time, and is willing to babysit while his ex works (something she will not offer DH, but sends her to her boyfriend's house, with whom she has a child). Is this really about SD, or more about the ex- jealousy, anger, resentment, etc? What is the best approach to this relationship? Please help!
If he has a custody
If he has a custody agreement then his weekends are clearly laid out and if she schedules her own stuff during DH's time she is in breech of contract and you can get in front of a judge and get a court order to get her to fulfill her obligations. DH should firmly warn her via e-mail (so it's documented) and tell her that if she fails to honor the contract then he will get a judge to slap her and she will be asked to pay for his legal bills as a result.
I would also document everything. Make sure you have tons of "evidence" of her anger, jealousy, resentment and general stupidity. You need to show a pattern of behaviour.
It sounds like she is
It sounds like she is speaking out of both sides of her mouth--on one hand, DH is shirking, on the other, she cuts into his time with his daughter at her own whim. Typical control freak wanting to call the shots with DH. What was it like for them before you came along? That may give you insights into this situation. Was he at her beck and call? He could turn it around on her and ask, OK what would satisfy you that I'm doing enough? Just to see what she says. This constant insinuation that he is a worthless father will eventually undermine his relationship with SD. It's call parental alienation syndrome, and many on here can attest to it!
I live in Oregon. I can
I live in Oregon. I can tell you this: overall judge's here in Oregon could care less about game playing between parents. They usually will do nothing if there is a contempt of court due to a parent violating the divorce decree. So basically it breeds parental alienation. I feel strongly that until judge's start doing their job and slapping considerable contempt of court fines to the offending parent that more and more children/young adults will be totally alienated from their parent. Speaking from personal experience, I have watched my S.O. go through so much including his ex-wife violating the parenting plan continually, talking crap about him continually to his kids, not allow individual or family counseling to try to help the situation (she is custodial parent and therefore, in Oregon he does not even have the right as a father to take his own child to a mental health counselor). When he talked to several attorneys they advised him that it would be a waste of money to take her to court because judge's will do nothing at all. Not even fine her for contempt of court for violating the parenting plan and talking bad about him (which is a violation of the divorce decree) and he had documented. Why many things are written in divorce decrees baffles me, as it is a waste of time. Good luck but at this point, my SO's kids are totally alienated from him. First it was the oldest (he hasn't spoke to in almost 8 months) and now it is his 2nd oldest who hasn't spoke to him in a couple of weeks. Popular "head game" played through both of the kids has been: My SO and one of his kids will plan something fun and at the last minute, his kid will tell him....oh, I have a change of plans....me and Mom are going to go do something together or me and Mom and Mom's BF are going to go out to dinner or I'm going to go spend the night at a friend's house (even though the kid has not been with my S.O. in a couple of months). It sets my S.O. up to look forward to spending time with his kids, then at the last minute it's blown out of the water. I hope you don't live in Oregon and that whatever State you live in, the judge's pay attention to when someone violates a divorce decree. Isn't that breaking the law and ultimately snubbing the judge's that signed the divorce decree? It's too bad judge's don't want to look at it that way.
I came into the situation
I came into the situation shortly after their relationship dissolved. Their daughter was less than a year old when I met DH. When his ex found out he had entered into a new relationship, she refused to allow DH to see their daughter for a number of months. After a while (i.e. when she was ready to go out and party & realized her mother would not care for her child), she started to let him see her. It was usually dictated by her schedule and when she wanted to go out and do things. I would not say he was at her beck and call, but he wanted to see his daughter, and would say yes when she needed a babysitter.
I don't think this has
I don't think this has anything to do with SD. It sounds to me like she's completely jealous.
"If I turn into another, Dig me up from under what is covering the better part of me" -Incubus