What do I do?

Louk

In brief; my ex has an addiction to gambling and I now suspect alcohol. I ended the marriage 4 years ago and left the family home with our Son (now 6) three years ago. Maintenance has been sporadic and he has often gone for many weeks without seeing our boy. His choice not mine; I have always been very aware of keeping money and access as separate issues and continue to do so.

I started a claim with the CMS in February which hasn't got very far as he has refused to respond to them. He also stopped contacting our son at this point and we haven't seen or heard from him until last night (3 months) when I got the following message "Can we sort out this CSA thing because I am now working and I need to see **.I have not been in contact because of this please let's sort this out". I note the lack of concern about sons welfare and lack of apology. Timing of the message wasn't great either as our son underwent surgery yesterday.

His absence has had such a profound effect on our Son. He feels rejected by his Dad and takes the smallest playground riffs with his friends really badly. He spent the first 5-6 weeks tearfully and had lots of questions but has become much more settled recently. My ex was made aware of these effects the last time he went awol for 8 weeks at the end of last year.

I can't keep having my child upset in this way but I also don't want him to be blaming me in tge future for keeping his dad away. I really don't know how to proceed with this....

summerlady_2

I'm no expert - no kids, no husband - but could you simply reply saying that you would like the situation to be resolved (don't say that you would like to resolve the situation as it is of his making) and what does he propose to do?


He now needs to show some kind of good intent, backed up by action. The first thing that he should come back with is an assurance that he has been in touch with the child maintenance people.


If your son is still recovering, you probably won't want to unsettle him. A caring father would acknowledge this and put his own wishes aside for the time being, but he could send a get well card perhaps?

TBagpuss

you could respondto say "I'm glad you want to sort it out. You'll need to contact CMOS to arrange to sort out the maintenace side of things. Let me know once you've done that"

Tiddlywinks

Family mediation - to get communication going between you.

He needs to understand how the lack of contact is impacting on his son and you need to understand how his addictions are being treated and their effects on your ex.

It may be that he wasn't in a good place to handle contact and thought he was doing the right thing by staying away.

Guest101

If the child is the priority, drop the CMS for now, agree a fixed amount per week / month and contact.


That's got to be the priority here

pigpen

I'd refuse contact at the moment due to son being faffed about constantly and his surgery and set up mediation and see if you could sort supervised contact..

Unless you will allow ex to visit son at your home? He would not be taking him anywhere if I suspected alcohol abuse.

noone will do anything until you have tried mediation so you do need to start there. The local social services people can offer group counselling with a mediator so you could all go and your son too and tell ex how his disappearing affects him etc..

No way the CMS should be dropped.. the money is separate to the contact and he has admitted it needs sorting out, which it does.. he has a duty to provide for his child.

summerlady_2

pigpen wrote: »

No way the CMS should be dropped.. the money is separate to the contact and he has admitted it needs sorting out, which it does.. he has a duty to provide for his child.

Exactly. He says he wants to sort things out. He could start by sorting things out with these people so that his child is properly provided for.

Louk

Thank you for your advice so far.

No way am I dropping cms. I don't trust him to maintain a private arrangement.

Mediation is something I hadn't considered and actually I think would be quite beneficial, at the moment I can't stand him and that's not healthy.

meritaten

I wouldn't refuse contact BUT - would need to know that ex is serious and sober! your son deserves to know his dad - but he is still very young and the risk of being 'rejected' again is very real. If your ex has been 'clean and sober' and working for some time - then allow limited access, such as a couple of hours on Saturday or a Cinema Date midweek? see how things go before increasing access?