You hurt our children by pretending to be ‘No. 1 Dad’

Raising children is the hardest job in the world. There is no handbook, no second chances. You have to hope you teach them all of the things they need in life before they actually need them. Being a parent is exhausting, but also the greatest job in the world. I love my children. They are beautiful, loving, funny, intelligent & curious. They can also be a massive pain in the ass; they can be rude, ignorant, and mean. They are children, and all children can be a challenge. But what I didn’t sign up for was the constant battle with their father, the mind games, and the controlling me through them. The extreme lengths he would go to in order to try to make the boys dislike my new partner. The looks on their little faces when they were torn about who to believe, what to feel, what to hide and what to open up about. My youngest son, who has just turned eight, doesn’t express his emotions in the best way. He was such a mummy’s boy before I left my ex-husband; he only wanted me. He loved me, his Dad, although we lived in the same home, he was rarely at home, he was at work, or with his bit on the side, or both. Our children and I were not a priority in his life. Since I left, he pretends to be number one Dad. The sad thing is, people believe it. He tells people that the children mean the world to him. He takes them on holidays, buys them gifts, and always takes them out for dinner. They never want for anything; they now expect everything. They have no rules, and he lets them do whatever they want. But this is not a sustainable reality; this is showtime. And when the money runs out and the showtime stops? What happens when he stops using them to give the image of the perfect father and role model?

His perfect image is created in part with my help. Not because I give him my help but because I want a structured life for my boys they have rules at my house, routine, a sensible bed time, they are made to shower, brush their teeth, all of the usual things that are expected of you when you are young and that your parents impose so that you are in the best mindset for your day. Routine is good for children and is always recommended. However, despite it being what every school liaison officer, social worker, etc. has recommended, this has turned into my house being boring, too strict, and we don’t have fun. Whereas Dad’s house, where they can go for 4 days without brushing their teeth, their average bedtime is 11 pm, and they watch whatever they like on YouTube, is a perfectly acceptable way to raise the children. So, by my partner and I doing everything we can by the book, we are giving him the ‘glory’ while we are left doing the actual parenting. My current situation is supposed to be 50/50, but he has the boys every weekend so we never get the free days or the fun days, we get the, get up early,  before school routine, homework after school, bed at a reasonable time routine and it is so hard to show your children that what their Dad is saying to them is utter shit when you don’t have the physical time with them to show that.

Suffering emotional abuse from their Dad, I know how he can manipulate and change stories to fit what he wants them to be. Repeat them to you so many times, in such a casual manner, that you now believe that his story is the truth. Put ideas in your head that you disagree with, and then they turn around and make it out like it was my decision in the first place. I was a strong young woman who fell weak to him, allowing my mind to be taken away from me, my thoughts not be my thoughts, my choices not be my own. If this is how I became, after 24 years of being my own person, how on earth do children stand a chance of defending themselves against this behaviour? How do we stop it? How do we prove to the authorities who are questioning everything that the children are at risk of emotional abuse? Especially when they visit his house, he, the perfect gentleman, no. 1 Dad, puts on his special little show. Brings out wonderfully cheery family photographs and pretends to be hurt that the relationship ended the way it did and that it was all my fault. That’s why the children prefer to be with him. I ruined the family. Those perfect little pictures that display that version of us, which was entirely fake, should not count for anything. A smile in a photograph can be a lie. It can also be used as a weapon. It can be used twice, it can be, “Look how happy you were in that photo, look at our amazing family”, to “Look at you smiling in that photo, now all you are is miserable, maybe if you were more like that again, I wouldn’t have to spend so much time with (bit on the side)”.

He throws them a birthday party every year. Invites loads of children, ensuring all the parents at school see how much fun he is and how much the boys love him. Before, he didn’t want any birthday parties; he wanted them to be at home. And, the last birthday party we threw for my youngest, he woke up in the morning and decided that was the day he was going to run off and leave me to deal with everything, cook, greet, presents, etc, and then text me all afternoon threatening suicide. I want to point out that he would never have gone through with it; it was just a tactic to try to get my attention, again. Yet my attention was never enough. There was always another woman, yet it was my fault as I was too miserable, or too busy with the children, or not supportive, etc.  

The children are old enough to remember me crying at home, they remember me being sad at home, they have told me as much, but over time, now I am not with them every day, that story is slowly changing, they now say they can’t remember me being sad much, that in all the photos they have at Daddy’s I am happy. He even tells them when he sees a picture of me smiling with them, now that I look happy, like I was when I was with him.

He constantly puts my boyfriend down in front of them, telling them not to listen to him and that they do not have to do what he says. Every week is a battle. They have previously told my boyfriend that they love him, saying things such as goodnight, and, I love you. But now, they have been told they aren’t allowed to say that to him as it hurts Daddy’s feelings. I feel so sorry for my children that they have to grow up in an environment where they cannot trust their feelings, doubt their choices, and are unsure what is good for them, instead worrying about whether their Dad will approve. We do what we can to support the children. We show them a loving relationship, we laugh, we joke, but we also do the serious stuff - the discipline, the homework, and the consequences. We do it together, we show a united front. Despite his insistence that my new partner should have no say in what the boys can or cannot do, or how they should or should not be punished, his new girlfriend is fine to act however she may want.

He has gone to the extreme of accusing my boyfriend of abusing our youngest son. For incidents such as holding his wrist when he was being violent towards me or trying to run off down the street. It’s even got to the point where he has accused two teachers at school of abuse when they have acted in the same way my boyfriend did. Clearly showing that the way my partner behaved was what all adults would do in the same situation, however, they have gone home to their Dad, and he has exaggerated the situation and labelled it as child abuse.

When do these men, and in some cases, women start to believe that everything they do or say is 100% correct? Surely they cannot believe the words that come out of their mouths. Surely they cannot believe that the ‘parenting’ they are doing is beneficial to the children? Why do we constantly battle with him? Are we hyper aware of their behaviour because we suffered at the hand of it for so long, or is he just that ‘good’ that he easily fools everyone else into falling for the same shit that we did in the beginning?

All I hope is that when my children grow up, they see him for what he is and what he has always been, rather than the fake version of himself he is being now.