Any competitive sports/divorce parents on here right now?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is not your job to keep reminding this guy of stuff. Not one bit.

I’m sorry he is ignoring the kids.

+1

[Anonymous]

You don’t need to remind him about the competition or tell him the details to attend.

But you also absolutely should not take on the role of telling him not to attend.

[Anonymous]

Yeah, OP, don't say anything. Don't tell him when and where they are - he can look them up. But don't tell him not to come. It's not your role to relay messages like that from the kids.

[Anonymous]

Regardless of your feelings and what happened, he will always be their dad and the worst thing you can do is alienate them. Encourage the relationship.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

It sounds like their father is alienating the children all on his own. You can't dump their mom and break up their family and expect their love and respect to be unchanged.

OP, protect yourself legally by doing what you think is best, but honestly he's going to make it difficult regardless.

We don't know the situation. Some one cheating, abuse, bad arguement, she threw him out?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You don’t need to remind him about the competition or tell him the details to attend.

But you also absolutely should not take on the role of telling him not to attend.

Nor should you be attributing, implicitly or explicitly, concerns with your child's athletic performance to your ex and their presence or lack thereof. This feels manipulative, even if not intended as such.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

It sounds like their father is alienating the children all on his own. You can't dump their mom and break up their family and expect their love and respect to be unchanged.

OP, protect yourself legally by doing what you think is best, but honestly he's going to make it difficult regardless.

We don't know the situation. Some one cheating, abuse, bad arguement, she threw him out?

OP and please see my post above. Lots of stuff happened that he instigated and then he bailed out. Mental break, prescription drug abuse, just crazy midlife anger? I can’t explain what triggered him but something snapped the past few years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You don’t need to remind him about the competition or tell him the details to attend.

But you also absolutely should not take on the role of telling him not to attend.

Nor should you be attributing, implicitly or explicitly, concerns with your child's athletic performance to your ex and their presence or lack thereof. This feels manipulative, even if not intended as such.

Gymnastics mom/coach here but mental blocks and loss of acquired skills are common in times of duress. We see it a lot when kids lose a parent or there is a divorce. It’s one of the reasons we stay in close touch with our team parents. I need to know if there is stuff going on at home to keep my athletes safe in the gym. I can’t have girls attempting a new vault or dismount when their brain feels a subconscious threat from other parts of their life.

In sports with high-risk skills and a big mental component I think it is pretty common so it shouldn’t be surprising that there would be a link between these girls having setbacks on the ice and their father’s treatment of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If he's going to be difficult, he's going to be difficult. If it's not this, it'll be something else, because attacking you is how he alleviates his guilt. You can keep your communications with him very flat and boring. If he asks when it is, respond with a link to the club website. If he asks if the kids want him to come, say "Well, you could ask them" or "I'm not sure" or something.

You need to accept that your kids will be upset, they will be angry, and they will be very much off their game in every aspect of life. You can't fix it. They're maybe going to lose their jumps for a while. Be at peace with it and stop trying to fix it. Your kids will be better off with you accepting that things are what they are, rather than trying to optimize it by overthinking every little thing. I said on another thread, dumped wives tend to do this "salvaging" behavior where they're trying their very hardest to minimize the impact on the kids, and it just doesn't work very well. Do everyone a favor and accept that they'll be impacted and may have a bad year skating. Divorce is damaging and the best thing we can do is see it clearly.

As a person in a very similar situation to OP who is running myself ragged to salvage, I needed to read this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

It sounds like their father is alienating the children all on his own. You can't dump their mom and break up their family and expect their love and respect to be unchanged.

OP, protect yourself legally by doing what you think is best, but honestly he's going to make it difficult regardless.

We don't know the situation. Some one cheating, abuse, bad arguement, she threw him out?

OP and please see my post above. Lots of stuff happened that he instigated and then he bailed out. Mental break, prescription drug abuse, just crazy midlife anger? I can’t explain what triggered him but something snapped the past few years.

(Hugs) OP.

There's a couple books out there on what you do and don't have to do when trying to be the reasonable parent with a high conflict ex. Interested in any pointers?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Regardless of your feelings and what happened, he will always be their dad and the worst thing you can do is alienate them. Encourage the relationship.

It is almost like dad is not doing a great job alienating the kids all by himself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

Most judges don't care at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

OP and yes, that is why I am being so cautious. On the other hand, this is a man who has broken into our house since he left and filed multiple motions but struck hearings at the last minute after I’ve arranged for days off work and drivers for the kids.

Prior to the divorce he (apparently) stole enormous sums of money from our joint accounts, verbally abused me, and screamed obscenities at the kids for “making him” do things…like break their toys or miss their practices.

It is for the best that he left us, but it is also a really fragile situation legally and I’m all too aware that someone with this amount of screws loose is looking for things to flip on to me.

Take the money out yourself. He isn't breaking into the house if its where you both own/rent it and the stuff is shared.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re off to a very bad start by participating in efforts to turn your girls against their father. That is not cool. At all.

Yes. Judges do not look kindly on alienation. You are the parent. Tell the kids they need to welcome their father.

Why the need to make kids eat their feelings? Why does dad gets to hurt them and be shielded from the effect of his actions on them? Why does dad gets kids need to be performing monkeys for him?

[Anonymous]

Regardless of your feelings and what happened, he will always be their dad and the worst thing you can do is alienate them. Encourage the relationship.

She is absolutely NOT alienating him by refusing to be his admin and not managing his relationship with his children. He is an adult and he needs to do that himself. It is NOT her job to make sure he parents, she just needs to stay out of the way when/if he tries.