I've changed my name although I regularly post but feeling very odd with this situation and for some reason wanted to keep some anonymity if that even makes sense
My ex-h and I split up when my ds was 2 years old. There were many reasons but I knew that if I didn't split the care between us, my ex-h would never spend any time with ds (he was always too busy with work whilst we were together and I feared he would make excuses). My Dad left my Mum when I was a baby and I never saw him until I was 26 so I think I was worried the same would happen to my ds. It broke my heart but we have shared care ever since with him spending the weekdays with his Dad and his new partner, step-brother and sister and then comes to us on Fridays after school and spends every weekend.
He is 8 now and he has always had a challenging relationship with my ex-h new partner. I have no doubt that she found the situation difficult but ds is an incredibly sensitive boy and feels left out.
This weekend he burst into tears when I went to take him home and he said he didn't want to go home but didn't really know why. He said that he didn't know what to do and wanted to be with us all of the time but also see his Daddy and step-siblings but didn't want to say anything to them because he didn't want to upset his Dad.
His dad sometimes works quite long hours so sees ds infrequently (sometimes for breakfast and maybe for an hour at tea time but not every day and sometimes not at all for days).
I have offered to have ds during the week to allow his Dad to have him for longer at a weekend if he could get time off but he says that he tries to get home to see the children whenever he can (which ds is always hoping for) but more often than not it never happens.
Essentially this means ds spends most of his time with ex-hs partner even though I collect my other ds from the same school and am at home with my other children every day after school.
I want to say that he should be with either me or his Dad rather than our partners as I am sure that if my dh looked after him all of the time, ex-h wouldn't like it. however, if I force the issue, I don't think ds would end up seeing his Dad at all.
I hate to see him upset as we wanted to do everything we could to ensure that it was us that did the hard stuff and he spent equal time with two families that love him but I clearly failed.
Not sure I think anyone has an answer but wanted to unload - sorry
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DS cried that he didn't want to go home to his Daddy's house . . .
13 replies
Upsetds · 14/11/2006 17:38
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