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LovingGrace1
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
My children's father - Am I devaluing myself by associating with him?
HI, Im new here. I NEED some advice.
My childrens father and I broke up 2 years ago. I broke up with him because he stopped helping and started drinking A LOT. All day, and I would come home after a long day at work to find him passed out in a drunken slumber. He didnt help with our 2 children who were very young at the time. I got fed up and moved in with family who live 3 hours away.
The problem is he has not came to visit us in 2 years! The kids are 3 and 4 and the youngest doesn't remember him. He doesn't pay child support, or send any gifts on birthdays or holidays. Even though he works and makes good money.
He recently started calling me often and we reestablished a friendship. He made promises to be a parent and contribute. He said he wants to be back with me and misses me. We started talking daily and finally upon my own interrogation he confessed that he lives with his new girlfriend and her 3 kids! I am heart broken and disappointed.
At Christmas he got her kids gifts but didnt send our kids anything. He still calls me and says he loves me. We talk every day and sometimes he calls me when she falls asleep...He has even talked about how he would cheat on her with me if I were closer. I feel horrible like I'm the "other woman". He said the only reason he started dating her is because he thought we were completely over even though he knew he still had feelings for me. So, now I feel so confused. He said he knows he should break up with his girlfriend because its unfair to her that he still has feelings for me, BUT he says breaking up with her would be mean and he wouldnt want to do her like that.
Am i demeaning myself by still talking to him??? I say I am gonna stop talking to him but he is my childrens father and its SO SO hard. I have this hope that somehow it will work out... or maybe somehow I can make him do right by me and the kids...... He wants me to move near him but Im so afraid that he will just be trying to have his cake and eat it too....
This is so embarrassing for me , and I thank u all for taking the time to read it.
Re: My children's father - Am I devaluing myself by associating with him?
If he's not - this is so NOT about the kids. It's about stringing you along.
He showed himself to you before and now he'd CHEAT on his girlfriend if he could. Really? THIS is the man you want in your life?
Accept that you made a poor choice in who you had kids with and move on and focus on you and maybe, eventually, finding a GOOD man who will love yo uAND your kids.
Change your number if you need to, file for child support, and if you must interact with him it is to be for co-parenting purposes only (though I fear you don't need to worry about that).
Stop communicating with him -- and get an attorney for child support.
Any communication you will have iwth him is in regard to the child support and that will be done via your attorney.
you are using this bum to fill a void. Don't go down this path. Change your phone numbers and everything else that he has and if he sends you a snail mail letter, shred it or mark it "Return to Sender" and put it back in the mailbox.
I agree with the PP regarding good job for making the difficult decision to leave him when you did. On another note, do I think it's good that you have been able to put things in the past & start talking to him, yes I actually do. It will make things easier when it comes to your kids. Now when it comes to the GF, if he's not happy he needs to leave her & not use you as an excuse. I think if I were in your position I would tell him your happy that he is cleaning up his life and that if he wants to develop a relationship with his kids you would be happy for that & that he is welcome to come and visit them on weekends. And that if he wants to move closer to you he needs to do it to be there and have a relationship with his kids and not for you.
I get you guys were probably best friends at one point while you were together & with him being sober you find it very easy to talk to each other about things in your lives. So basically it's like getting your best friend back. But unfortunately I don't think he's being 100% fair to you or his current GF. He hid her initially from you and my guess he's hiding you from her. You need to try adjust this friendship to being about you being able to trust him as a father & him developing a relationship with his kids & nothing more then that. I'm not totally against you two being friends because having two parents that get along & can stand being in the same room with each other does make things easier for the kids. But that's as far as it should go, being able to call each other, update each other on the kids and talk about problems the kids are having and how to handle them.
If he isn't currently paying child support I would look into getting that taken care. Even if you don't really need the money, then put it away for the kids for college. And for falling off the earth so he can't contact you, I'm not sure I would do that. The reason is is that if I were in your position and my kids asked me someday why their dad was never around, you can tell them honestly why you left him & and you moved on from there leave it at that. But if you cut off all forms of him being able to contact you, I would hate for him to come back years down the road if your kids find him & they go "Dad, why didn't you ever call?" and he respond "I did talk your mom a few years after you left but then she stopped talking to me & changed her phone number & she returned all my letters to you, so bascially she stopped me from seeing you." Then you look like the bad guy that kept their dad away and not dad being the bad guy.
I think you should feel horrible for talking to him every day. He does NOT appreciate you or what you can or will do for him and certainly does NOT appreciate your children because instead of him worrying about seeing his kids he's more interested in getting you to be his side chick.
You are devaluing yourself immensely and you need to put a stop to this asap! Don't speak to him unless it's about the kids and not everyday either and take him to child support. Tell him he needs to show with actions that he cares about his kids by visiting them because 3 hours is not a bad drive or bus ride for him to go see them and he needs to spend time with them.