Separating but child advice needed badly.

[Deleted User]

duchy wrote: »

Did you make your plans with your ex or did you just assume ?

My ex used to drive me nuts with his assumptions that we had nothing better to do during school holidays than wait for him to let us know his specific plans. It simply didn't occur to him that he was stopping us making plans.

A casual -"I'll be around half term week" is NOT making plans.

Your wife works so presumably has to plan her annual leave in advance if she wants school holidays off to be with your daughter too. You may feel that she sees her every day so should be glad to defer to your wishes but the reality is in termtime she gets all the graft and none of the fun so a week off is time to spend quality time rather than school pick up, tea, homework, bed which leaves little time to enjoy time with her .

Learn from this week - work out which school holiday weeks you will be home for the rest of the year and TALK to your wife. Ask her what her plans are - if she has holiday booked or if you can help out those days. School holidays take more AL than most people have and planning ahead can mean she (and you) can get the most ut of time off. For example if your daughter is off for Easter and you are home your wife could have some days she could work and others she has days with your girl- but if she knows that your week home is the second week of the holidays and not the first she may choose to book her time off differently.

As she also works she needs downtime with your daughter too and if you can work co-operatively you both win.

A vague - "We could do a couple of days out" is NOT making plans- you need to be more specific and plan ahead to make it work well.

Instead of getting cross or passive aggressive use the experience of this half term and say to her it has made you realize that you need to make definite plans well in advance and ask her how she thinks you could both make it work better for future school holidays.

Use this as an aid to learning how to make future holidays work better for all of you rather than let what happened become a problem - and you will benefit long term - and long term is what matters as your daughter is so young. What you do now sets the tone for the next fifteen years of co-parenting and access. -

It's hardly casual me being around, i live here and she has my rota and knew i had made plans for half term weeks before, i was trying to be civil when she said she would take the week off and agreed to the family days out, which yes we both agreed to and had things set up, such as swimming, adventure place near us, indoor play centre etc etc. Its the fact that when i get home she has already changed the plans with her family and my daughter and told her so if i had said something i would be the bad guy for changing anything.

heuchera

duchy wrote: »

Instead of getting cross or passive aggressive use the experience of this half term and say to her it has made you realize that you need to make definite plans well in advance and ask her how she thinks you could both make it work better for future school holidays.

I think the passive aggression is coming from the wife. Why would she go to the trouble of booking a week off work and using up a weeks holiday when she didn't need to?

Employees get what, 22 days holiday a year? She's just taken 5 at short notice, knowing full well that she doesn't need to and her husband will be around to look after the little girl.

She's playing power games and using the child as a pawn. Plain and simple.

[Deleted User]

heuchera wrote: »

I think the passive aggression is coming from the wife. Why would she go to the trouble of booking a week off work and using up a weeks holiday when she didn't need to?

Employees get what, 22 days holiday a year? She's just taken 5 at short notice, knowing full well that she doesn't need to and her husband will be around to look after the little girl.

She's playing power games and using the child as a pawn. Plain and simple.

Thank you, she knew i was around months before this week and all the time she goes on about saving holidays to take when i am away at work and the daughter's school is closed.

Like i said i sacrificed all my plans to accommodate her this week only to see how its panned out.

heuchera

Deleted_User wrote: »

Thank you, she knew i was around months before this week and all the time she goes on about saving holidays to take when i am away at work and the daughter's school is closed.

Like i said i sacrificed all my plans to accommodate her this week only to see how its panned out.

I don't wish her any malice, but it could well come back and bite her on the bum at some point.

For one thing she's used up holiday days and is leaving herself potentially short of days off, should she need to take any, and for another it won't be long before the daughter realises that mummy is trying to prevent her from seeing daddy.

I would make plans for Easter now, if you haven't already, and maybe even the May holidays too.

Mojisola

Deleted_User wrote: »

So this week she booked her into a all day fun camp at the local school

heuchera wrote: »

I think the passive aggression is coming from the wife.

She's playing power games and using the child as a pawn. Plain and simple.

That's what it looks like to me, particularly booking the 'fun camp' when she knew that the child's father would be available all day to look after their daughter.

heuchera

Mojisola wrote: »

That's what it looks like to me, particularly booking the 'fun camp' when she knew that the child's father would be available all day to look after their daughter.

Yes, especially as she took the child to the fun camp and then went into work! It's not like she even wanted to spend the whole day with the child, - she just wanted to prevent him from doing so.

duchy

Deleted_User wrote: »

Thank you, she knew i was around months before this week and all the time she goes on about saving holidays to take when i am away at work and the daughter's school is closed.

Like i said i sacrificed all my plans to accommodate her this week only to see how its panned out.

What did you sacrifice ? Wasn't the plan to spend time with your daughter.

Listen - You can let people stir you up and think your wife is evil and spiteful OR you can take the view that there could be another reason for your wife changing plans. The marriage is over but every few weeks you are back in her life fulltime and she too probably feels she has to accomadate your wishes. Truth is having you still in the house probably meant too much togetherness and days out together too was just not what she wanted.
She might be finding it hard to say that to you -understandably as she knows she shouldn't have agreed to days out as a family without thinking it through (incidently why did you want family days out - surely it's your daughter you want to spend time with- how did family days out even come up?)

Once you have seperate homes plans will have to be less fluid -it's this awful limbo that is blurring lines,

Tel her how disappointed you are (not angry- disappointed) and see if you can agree some ground rules to avid this happening again.

Mojisola

Deleted_User wrote: »

We have agreed that when i am home and we have our own homes then i will see her 2/3 nights during the school week and every other weekend, holidays can be split.

Unless your ex changes the way she's behaving, get this sorted out in writing and start keeping a diary of plans made and whether they go ahead smoothly or get changed.

Are you in contact with any of the support groups for fathers - http://www.separateddads.co.uk/supportforseparatedfathers.html

[Deleted User]

What did i sacrifice? How about my 5 days going out with my daughter while my stbx wife was going to be at work. Then seeing how it panned out this week where pretty much i will get to spend Friday with her.

Family days came up after she kept going on about having birthdays together, family days out etc etc, her words from the start not mine.
Deep down i don't want to spend a lot of time with my stbx wife but i am trying to protect my daughter.

With regards to people stirring things up i have my own thoughts but the all day camp then her turning round to go into work just knocked me sideways, she knew i had plans all week to have days out, i changed all those as she changed her plans with taking the week off.

I do agree on one thing the sooner the better we sell for all concerned.

Person_one

Deleted_User wrote: »

What did i sacrifice? How about my 5 days going out with my daughter while my stbx wife was going to be at work. Then seeing how it panned out this week where pretty much i will get to spend Friday with her.

What about Saturday and Sunday?