Is it abuse, I’m doubting myself??

[lonelypolarbear]

Hello everyone, thank you for reading my post and thank you to those who take the time to respond.

My husband I’ve been separated for sometime. We have two children in their (detail removed by moderator) and we live separately but (detail removed by moderator). We organised a coparenting arrangement between us and this seemed to work, Until our (detail removed by moderator) daughter opened up to me that he had been saying horrid things to her. We have been apart for a few years when I started seeing somebody new, needless to say this went down like a bag of bolts, and the children were being brought into things, Such as he would tell them if my new partner was at the house, they were to (detail removed by moderator) and not spend time with them, and if they Did then he would (detail removed by moderator) and they would never see him again. If we had things planned, he would tell the children, but if my partner was there, then they were to phone him and he would come and collect them immediately. He once refused to have anything to do with my sons past times because I dared to have my partner with me when I collected him from (detail removed by moderator), our poor son watched for months as he took our daughter to her past times and completely ignored his, blaming me.

The worst part is this would really upset our daughter and she would talk to me about this but if I dared to approach him about any of these issues he would nod and agree, but as soon as the conversation was finished and I left,  he would blame our daughter for getting him in trouble and tell her she was a grass.

The only other member of family I have who lives close by, is my god, awful mother. I haven’t had a relationship with her in roughly (detail removed by moderator) years due to what I now realise to be domestic abuse during my entire childhood, I’ve had enough and walked away from her nasty behaviour. sadly though my ex has maintained a close friendship with her, They are like witches round a cauldron, conspiring to be as nasty as possible to me. Our daughter approached her grandmother a few weeks ago to ask for her help and getting her dad to stop saying nasty things, my mother’s response was that it was her own fault and she shouldn’t be telling me what her dad has been saying.

This is been going on for a couple of years, I’ve many many examples of the awful things he says to the children, mixed with the fact that he’s not looking after them properly he’s involved in drugs. They’re allowed to be around drug dealers, etc. I’ve spoken with Domestic abuse charities to seek some help, but when I’ve sought advice from the police and social services, they don’t seem remotely interested and simply tell me is a family law matter and almost dull it down, Saying I should seek solace in the fact that social services are not overly interested as this shows that this isn’t considered a high risk case.

I feel completely trapped. I don’t know how to keep my children safe as although I have withdrawn the coparenting agreement, because it isn’t something which has been formally drawn up, he simply tells the children to ignore me and that they can come round and see him whenever they choose.

Please can someone confirm I’m not going crazy, yes this may not be high on the list of social services things to deal with, this is abuse of our children isn’t it?

 

[Lisa]

Hi,

Thank you for your post. I’m sorry to hear about your situation. Abusive men will often use child contact as a way to continue the abuse and control. That must be really upsetting for your daughter and your concerns are valid. If he is saying horrible things to her – this will be having a negative impact on her wellbeing- you also mentioned that he is involved with drugs and not looking after them properly.

You have a right to set your boundaries around this. The Coram Children’s Legal Centre provide free legal resources with advice and information on all aspects of family, child and education law, including relationship breakdown; parental disputes, duties of children’s services; child protection. They can be contacted on 0300 330 5480 (10am-4pm, Mon-Fri) and through their webchat service (8:30am-5:30pm Mon-Fri)

Best Wishes

Lisa

[lonelypolarbear]

Thank you Lisa, this is helpful x

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