My partner was sooooo bad when we first got together! I asked him why he would just give in to ehr all the time - she was such a psycho if he said no, she would call him every hour at his work and ask over and over again, then yell at him when we would go to pick up ss until he gave in. I told him he needed to re-grow his spine and man up to her lol!
In the end, she threatened to not let him see ss (great loss...) if he didn't do what she wanted and that was it for my partner. He went on the govt. website for father's in his position and also a site called 'Dads in Distress' and he went at her. He wrote up a parenting plan and gave it to her to sign, they went to mediation to resolve all the issues around the parent plan and they were only allowed to talk to each other about ss in a 'communication book' so that all of their issues were documented.
It was awesome!!!! Tell him to look up the sites because they are out there and they made my partner feel like he did have power in the situation - I think that's half the problem, they don't know their rights exactly and this woman has their child.
Of course now we have behavioural probs with ss and he won't talk to her about them because he doesn't want to fight - so over one bridge only to be stuck at another.

Nabrow... yes, for some reason, they seem to know just how to knock a girl up that they don't want to be with then become a doormat. And you're right, they only have a set when it comes to us!

My DH had just been divorced when he decided to go back to school and finish his degree. Well, he met a girl... and she gave him the old, "I can't get pregnant" line... yeah, right... she already had one kid. Stupid of him for believing her! She gets pregnant and he finally gives in due to family pressure and other things and marries her 4 weeks before the kid is born. 11 months later... they become separated.

Today... he absolutely caters to her regardless of how I feel about it. She always threatens to take him back to court or to keep DH from seeing his kid, so basically, what you have here is a woman who is using a child to manipulate a man into having a "friendship relationship" with her even though he would prefer to never talk to her again (or so he says.)

This woman has no respect for me or my marriage to him... calling and texting all the time even though it has nothing to do with the kid. She calls DH to talk about her marital problems, family issues, that she just lost 18 pounds, that it is their wedding anniversary, etc. etc. And he just rolls with it... encouraging it is more like it in my book. But he says that being overly nice to her is what is going to keep him out of court. Did I mention that she ruined my rehearsal dinner and honeymoon with all her phonecalls? What a bitch!

I just can't stand the conversations that I know are going on behind my back because he doesn't want me getting upset. But what he doesn't realize is that it's not just the convos that upset me but the fact that he feels he has to wait until I leave the house to talk to her. Plus she will text him and ask him if he's alone!

Yeah, wish I could get my hubby to grow a set with her, but he's an alpha male with a strong personality so you will never convince him that he's not handling this correctly. I just hate to think that all this is going to ultimately come between us. He'll figure it out then I guess...

I hate to be the bringer of doom and gloom but even after they learn to stand up to BM we are still left with the resentment of all the times they didn't. Depending on your personality, not being able to let go of that anger will continue to eat away at you and your relationship with SO. That's where I'm at now. H has finally gotten a handle on not rolling over for BM but it's too late because I am still just so damn angry about all the times my wants and needs were overlooked to keep peace with her. As much as I want to I just can't seem to let it go. Their kid is a constant reminder of all that pain. I look at her and it's all I see. My marriage was doomed before it even began.

AMEN STEPASIDE!!!!

The bottom line is.... HE CREATED THAT MONSTER! When our BM got pregnant my hubby told her straight up he did not want a baby with her, of course that was her way to "trap" him so she said too bad, I'm having the baby.. So he tried to make it work. Felt like he had to give into all her demands "for his son" and she played on that. Finally he said enough and realized the game she was playing and as much as it broke his heart to leave his son, he left HER. But the the years of manipulation had taken their toll.... so he still plays the game... she gets what she wants because hubby would rather do what she wants than have an all out battle with her, which of course leads to her withholding visitation of SS, her telling SS that dad is a POS, and playing her stupid games.

Here is a recent prime example of her games... she called 1 week before school was to start and tells hubby she needs him to buy school clothes for SS. Hubby says no, she gets CS and she certainly knew school was starting... this turns into an all out war (because she didn't get what she wanted) she tells hubby what a horrible father he is, throws in all kinds of personal assults and then bingo don't hear from SS for a week. Then the day before school, BM conveniently needs hubby to babysit (knowing full well that hubby will ask SS if he has school clothes, supplies etc) of course SS tell him that he does NOT, so hubby takes him to get clothes, sneakers etc. So after he put his foot down, got into the all out battle with her, he caves and does what she wants anyway. He says it's because he doesn't want his son to go without (which I can understand) but BM KNOWS this and uses it as just another manipulation tool.

My perogative on this ...speaking from what I deal with...BF feels he owes her for giving him his only child...he has the child full time and BM doesn't rock the boat about wanting to have custody of her...he was severely P***y-whipped when they were together so all she has to do is whine, bitch and complain about something she wants and he jumps because he doesn't want to deal with the conflict. Truth is BM knows exactly how to manipulate...she NEVER has any intention of wanting her daughter to live with her. Hell she doesn't want the other daughter she has that lives with her (not my BF bio-child). Kinda funny...BM acts exactly like BF 10 yr old daughter and they get whatever they want. Both achieve their goals of manipulation by being difficult, whiney, needy, greedy people. I really don't understand at all. Being a mean, hateful, greedy person gets you what you want...but you know I can't help but think that will bite them in the ass one day.

I think it is b/c most men don;t think they have any power and on top of that most have been neat down by the ex for a long time. I know mine was he was so low and thinking of himself as nothing that he really thought he was a bad father and nothing of a human being. I gave him is ball back! It takes a while but once he got it bm hasn't been in the middle of us since! Dh really thought that he wasn;t good enough and never brought enough money in the home when in fact he was making pretty good money. It was just that bm was telling him all those years that he was nothing so he got to where he believed it. But in my case bm was hitting my dh while they were together. Yes I know she was she straight up told me.

Do you remember that episode of Friends where Chandler can't bring himself to go on a second date with a woman because every time he looks at her he thinks 'Big Head Big Head Big Head'? This is how I feel when I see BM. I can't work out whether she really has a large head, or it's just that her craziness has assumed such proportions in my head that when I see her she seems magnified.

We have a had a long lull in which BM has had little opportunity to create friction between DH and I, but unfortunately since SD14 decided to move in with us 4 weeks ago we now have a lot of practical and financial issues with BM which means that your 3 questions: Why does he bend over backwards for the BM? Why cant he stand up to her? Why is he so afraid of rocking the boat? are seeming very pertinent to my life at the moment. I have rediscovered resentment and anger I thought I had put to bed quippers01. My DH had no problem fronting up to BM when they were married, but since they separated he has avoided rocking the boat on every possible occasion. BM really is a very manipulative loose cannon and he is justifiably wary of provoking her. This is partly because his ultimate fear is that she would damage his relationship with his children, and partly because he always tries to minimise contact, so he'd rather not stir things up and have an easy life. My sense of justice is often offended. I have spent 3 weeks pursuading him to reduce BM's CS from next month now we have SD14 in residence. He wanted to continue paying BM for another month or so in order to avoid provoking her, in case she did something to prevent SD moving. Given that it was SD's decison this is madness but he won't see it, however I have put my foot down and told him there is no way I am paying That Woman money she is not entitled to and which we need to support SD! We're in similar dispute over collection and drop offs. DH has done 99% of the collecting and dropping off while BM had custody, I absolutely refuse to ferry SD back and forth to BM's house now. It is up to her to collect and return SD for her visitation. But again although DH agrees in principal, in practice he's already ferrying about rather than make an issue of it with BM. And how can it be that I often end up looking like a crazy demanding woman because I'm trying to stop him appeasing the crazy demanding woman?!

For us the reason was that DH wanted to take the high road so one day the kids would see that all the PAS BM inflicted was not his doing. He didn't want the conflict. It is also the reason he parents by guilt and ego: being the nice guy will counter BM's evil fairy tales. Sounds admirable, right? Wrong, DH now sees the unintended consequences. And reversing 13 years of false beliefs and unacceptable behavior is going to be quite the task.

I can get over all of BM's psycho crap she pulled over the years... For one, I do not take it personally-- she treats everyone like a pawn, even the SKIDS. Two, even though she has tried many times to get back with DH... I am secure in knowing that the feeling isn't mutual. Three, I don't think she hates me, just what I represent. I do think she hates herself for screwing up their marriage.

I do wish that DH would get over his anger and hatred for BM. If he were indifferent there would be no more competitive parenting.

My FDH is a fully tenured professor, and when he was given his last promotion, the BM didn't take him back to court for more CS, even though she could. SO as a result, he rolls over whenever she snaps her fingers. As others here have said, he doesn't want to "rock the boat." He also tells me he doesn't want to be a dick. What it amounts to is he feels guilty if he says no to her for taking the kid, because he didn't want to have the kid to begin with, so he feels guilty about not wanting to deal with him (on "our" weekend). So as a result, BM will text or email ("Can he stay with you overnight, you take him to school, and I'll pick him up?" "Can he stay an extra weekend with you?")

Then we find out, she's so scatterbrained, half the time she has been asking FDH to get the kid, its because she booked a bellydancing event and forgot to ask ahead of time. I finally made him lay down the law about not rolling when she says roll. That I come before her now, and if that is a problem, well, I can go find someone else who doesn't have a kid and ex who has organizational problems. He put his foot down.

I agree that it is soooo frustrating when they roll. Not only in the case of the DH/SO and the effect that it has on the marriage/relationship and you. Then look what this behavior is teaching the kids? If you are belligerant, pushy, mean, vindictive and disrespectful to people that you get rewarded with what you wanted. Then we wonder why the skids are spiteful and manipulative, right? What a vicious circle. Ugh!

It's very simple.

Women have all the power in the court system that our society has set up. The general excuse, and there is validity to it, is that women are the care givers in the species. You have practically got to prove she's the devil herself before you'll get custody away from a mother.

Also separated men live in dreaded fear of hearing their kid(s) say "I don't want to visit you anymore". They know full well that their ex-wife can start a campaign that is almost always successful (at least until the kids grow up) and unproveable in court that Daddy deserves to be hated.