by Abaddon 27 Replies latest jw friends
Being the Devil's advocate here:
I see the kids regularly, even though I now live in a different country.
It seems she may have another reason for denying the holiday, is that possible? Other than depriving you of seeing them, as you said the above.
Pat
Abaddon
I am so sorry your ex is making it difficult for you to see your children. Even though you may see them as much as you can to have YOUR plans always quashed must be hard. My ex-husbands ex used to do the same with him. No matter what he wanted to do she always found a reason why it was not convenient at the time.
I found at the time it was another way to control that which she did not have control over and never rightfully did. For whatever reason she feels the need to control your relationship with your children. This may stem from feelings of i nadequacy on her part or that of her believing that they may only see you as the 'fun guy' who comes once every so often and is not there to server as a disciplinarian. This was the case with Diane.
Until she saw that unfortunately this is a product of divorce especially one where a partner is so far away she felt the need to assure her role was not established at the bad guy?yet she constantly made it worse for herself by not allowing the kids to have fun with the ?fun guy? making her job even harder and gaining title of ?bad guy? from the kids because Daddy was not allowed to have fun with them?by her own decision.
Diane finally grew up, but a little too late and the children do not forgive her to this day for interfering with their father?s relationship and not allowing them to learn and grow with a father who wanted such.
Hugs
Cassi
: My ex-wife is a psycho bitch...
: I want to have my two daughters there for a week.
I'm assuming that your ex-wife is the mother of those two daughters. If not, ignore the rest of what I say in my post.
If your ex-wife IS the mother of ANY of your children and she IS a "psycho bitch" what does that tell you about YOU? It tells you that YOU are a majorly big incredible FOOL. You married her, and you chose her among ALL the women in the world to be the mother of your children. It is an indictment against your own judgement of women: you picked a "psycho BITCH" you loser fool! What kind of crappy judgement do you have, anyway?
The only reason I think I might be able to get away with this and not get sucked into your sadness is that some 18 years ago, I said the VERY SAME thing about my ex-wife! Actually what I said was far more harsh than what you said. A good friend of mine said (after I ranted for ten minutes), "Do you realize you are talking about the MOTHER of YOUR children who YOU chose to be that mother?"
I slapped myself upside the face and realized my foolishness. Ever since that day I refer to her as "my former wife" and "the mother of my children" and I do this without any negative energy. We have great children, and she is and was a great mother. We have been friends since I slapped my self upside the face and realized that among all the women in the world I chose HER to be the mother of my children. If I was wrong, then I am the fool. If our children turned out ok and our marriage didn't, then I wasn't such a fool after all. Our children turned out well.
Farkel
My advice to anyone whose spouse fails to respect court-ordered visitation rights, or to live up to anything in a divorce decree is simple:
GET A JUNKYARD DOG LAWYER AND HAVE HIM REAM THEIR ASS
Most men get a raw deal in divorce decrees. Been there, done that. If your ex is that much of a bitch, then you should give no quarter. You might well lose your kids. Sure, some kids are smart enough, in the long run, to figure it all out, but a lot aren't. My brother failed to do this, thinking he'd just "be a nice guy" and he hasn't seen his kids in a long time, and they're both well in their 20's. JW indoctrination can be powerful.
AlanF
What a cow...
Respectfully,
Abaddon, you don't sound so very kind, fair, reasonable or emotionally even yourself. If you harbor these extremely negative emotions for your ex, then of course she is going to avoid dealing with you like the plague. How can you ever expect to have an amicable relationship with the mother of your children if you despise her so much that you call her things like psycho bitch?
I always, always remember there are two sides in every marriage and divorce. When one ex mate resorts to calling the other things like psycho bitch and cow and so on, it's kind of hard to take him/her seriously as a victim in a one sided horror story. I understand you want to see your children, but think about how you sound and what kind of vibes you are giving off. You can catch more flies with honey and a good attorney than you can with vinegar.
Flyin'
Purza, thanks... like I say above, my kids are smart, and the elder (14) is a perceptive one for sure... I don't think I was capable of quite such an objective character analysis of my parents at that age.
Elsewhere... that's more like it... is there a smiley for pissed off ex-husband with chainsaw chasing psycho-bitch x-wife with no intention of physically harming her but every intention of making her piss herself in fear?
unbeliever, I suppose it's better that she be as she is than be a full-on Dubbie. My parents have been quite okay about my departure from Dubdom, but I'm lucky.
ohiocowboy; Thanks, they're great!
CHEVYSNTATS, that's exactly what I hate the most, she's using them to get at me...
talesin, I know I must be doing the right thing because my girls do love me, and I think they cherish I'm not as wound-up and uptight as their mum is about EVERYTHING. She's not let me give the kids a PC and set up an Internet connection at home because of Internet deeeeeeminzsss...
flower, intelligence and wisdom are two different things. She's smart, but incapable of any extent of analysis of situations or actions. Thanks!
Corvin, we were married to the same woman?! You have my symnpathy!!
patio34, a good point, but there are International accords that mean if I did run off with them I would be liable to arrest in most parts of the civilised world, as most countries have signed up to an agreement whereby custoby is determined by the country of legal residence of the children, precisely to address abduction fears. And she doesn't think that; last year, when I wanted then to stay at our house for a week, it was SARS/terrorists, you name it, any reason under the sun as an excuse why not. Then she went to Italy with them for two weeks.
We're talking about a woman who considers herself and her father as the only safe drivers for the children. The impact with the builders skip she hit whilst drunk must have affected her memory...
My dad, who's driven over 50,000 miles a year on business for four decades and never had an accident, she considers unsafe... and at Easter she made an issue out of me driving my children around when I had them for a few days because I'd be using a European car on British soil!!! (the steering wheel's on a different side).
Cassiline, good point to remember. I've never spoilt or indulged them in our time together as I don't want to be an absent daddy who bribes. But inevitably she feels cast in an unfavourable light as the 'bad guy'. Getting over to her that such actions as these (read the update below) only serve to reinforce her as the bad guy might help.
Farkel, If you think I'm gonna dispute I was young, dumb, ill-informed, horney, clueless, in a cult, and with no experience of any other relationship with a woman when I married her, you're wrong! I was so much dumber then, I'm smarter than that now! (to paraphrase Dylan).
You are also (surprisingly) wrong. I didn't choose her from all the women in the world... which part of being in a cult don't you get?
This was labelled RANT. To give you the contrast, my girlfriend can't understand why I don't get angry about it. Perhaps you mistake vehemence in a textual outburst for lack of control or reason in real-life.
I always make sure I give credit where credit is due, even in this thread. I tell my daughters (when they complain about the petty restrictions she puts on them) that their mother is a good mother and looks after them well, and cares for them. And my 14 year-old makes rather jaded observations about her mum having a problem with pride, as the child-minder incident shows so well...
AlanF
My kids and I have bond that she can't break. They are too old now (14 and 11) and too much their own people.
The 11 year-old, when she was 7, answered her older sister's question about why I didn't believe anymore with "I know why Daddy doesn't believe anymore, it because he thinks it's silly".
To my x's credit, she's not really tried to attack my relationship with the girls directly; it's the indirect "making things more difficult" that characterise her behaviour.
And if push comes to shove, yes, I'll go to court and not scruple at using her own behaviour and beliefs against her in a very aggressive fashion.
FlyingHighNow
You seem to assume I talk to her like that, or treat her in a way liable to make her react.
I haven't raised my voice to her or insulted her in any way in over ten years (nor did that characterise my behaviour beforehand).
I really don't provoke her; it's not in my interests too, and where seeing my children are concerned I would be willing to eat shit and pronounce it tasty if I could see my kids without such a song-and-dance.
This was labelled RANT. That's what it is. Although it might be the exception (as I've already said I think usually the guys are more likely to be at fault), there are time when a women, for no real reason, turns what could be a completely civil post-marriage relationship into one where the most important parties (the children) suffer more than they need to.
UPDATE
Okay, I tried three times yesterday, and after the last attempt at calling her I rang her parents. Now, understand whilst my parents have to negotiate for weeks to see their grand-daughters, her parents don't.
Anyway, I spoke to Peter, her dad. Said I'd not been able to reach her and wanted to check if everything was okay.
He said they were okay. and basically said she was very busy with work (implying this was why she's not answering the phone). THEN, very interestingly, he said something about he and Thelma (my ex-mother-in-law is called Thelma -- hahahah) wanting to take the girls on holiday this summer and that they were finalising arrangements
Now, either she is getting her parents to arrange something on the dates I have asked for to foil my plans with a valid reason, or she is delaying speaking to me so her parents can finalise their plans and she can see if they're free or not.
As there is no reason in the world she couldn't say "oh, well my parents are having the girls for a week too; lets look at the dates and see who will have them when", and because I know this woman, I am afraid it's the former... and her parents might not even know of her agenda.
Either way, if she doesn't answer the phone again today I'll simply call her dad and discuss the issue of dates with him this evening.
I have similar issues and have found the following useful.
1/ If she is playing games, you will never win, best just refuse to play the game
2/ Do not bad mouth her in front of the children, they will see for themselves and form their own conclusions, this will be more powerful in the long term.
3/ Do use the courts if you are able, this may not cost too much and you can do a lot of it yourself, The courts have worked really well for me.
4/ Keep contact with your children, build a good relationship, play the long game.
Hope this helps.
Good luck Abaddon!
