How far will a parent go to see their child?

Question

My fiancee has a daughter he hasn't seen in 8 yrs. Well he now has visitation rights. but only 1 hour once a week. How far will a parent go with the ex as far as being nice so not to make the other parent mad. The other parent if you cross them will make your life h**l...

So how far would you go as far as being nice to see your child.

Would you say nice things, buy them flowers just to keep them on your side. What would you do?

Answer 1

till they r 18-

Answer 2

Short of sleeping with them most will do anything to make nice with the other parent.  My ex bro in law's ex gf who has primary custody would love to take him to court saying he is a horrible parent.  She's taken him to court for almost everything else.  Not enough child support, starting to work nights instead of days, she wanted more custody and I'm surprised she hasn't said he doesn't have a proper care giver for her.

I used to go stay at his house since he had my sister's kids there too and watch the lot but it got to be too much.  He'd let their daughter together run the show so she wouldn't tell mommy he's being mean.  We weren't allowed to yell at her, punish her, take anything from her etc.  Finally I just s***w it and ignored the tantrums, sent her to the room if she started crying while someone was asleep and in one case she fell asleep under a table because she had a tantrum and I refused to give in while he was at work.

Later we found out (or I did) that the same thing was going on at her mom's for the same reason would be my guess.  Children also learn to manipulate parents so both of you need to watch out for this.

Answer 3

I would be civil, but never try to do special things for that person.  Considering it would be my child too.  I would never talk badly about the other person in from of or to the child because it isn't there fault they are in this situation.

Answer 4

One hour per week?? Man, I think that would mess with a kid's head more than not seeing that parent at all!!! (mom of five)

Answer 5

This would never happen, to me, but, IF it did, I would do whatever it takes; I can con a con, if need be. ;) I may hate it (being so nice), especially if the other parent was being a butt, but my children are more important than my pride.

Answer 6

I know you may feel threatened by the situation and feel that he may still have feelings for his ex by his actions that is why you need to sit down and have a friendly and mature talk about it.  He may be kissing her butt so that he may get more than one hour a week with the child.  The child has missed 8 yrs with his/her daddy so there is a LOT of catching up to do, he probably wants to be on good terms with the mother so that that time can be increased.  Just talk to him about his goals and ask him if there is a chance he may still have feeling for her.  Say that you just don't want to be in the way and you want to be supportive but have some fears.  This situation is not about you and tell him you know this but you also don't want to hang onto someone who still has feelings for someone else.  Giving flowers to the ex is sending a mixed message to the mother of the child, the child AND to you, so he need to make sure the signals he is giving everyone is true and not deceitful.  

A parent will and should go through great lengths to see their child and I think when you discuss the situation with him you should start the conversation by saying "I think that is it so admirable of you to be making efforts to spend time with your child, I am so proud of you and are very very happy for you.  How does it feel so far about it?.." etc, ease into askig him where you stand in the whole thing and what his feelings are towards the mother...If you ask nicely and don't come into the conversation attacking and accusing him and he gets defensive, blows up or wants to avoid the issue then that is a red flag, don't ignore that.  You are about to marry this guy so make sure HE is sure he wants to spend the rest of his life with you.

Remember the child is the MOST important person in all of this and as you have displayed you realize that already, just don't lose sight of that, and if everyone gets along then it creates the healthiest and stress-free environment for everyone.

Good Luck!

Answer 7

I would kiss d**k Cheney on the lips if it was necessary in order to see my children.  I would clean the bathrooms at a major league baseball stadium, on free beer day, if it was necessary in order to see my children.  I would eat meat (and I haven't eaten any in 25 years) if it was necessary in order to see my children.

My husband would walk through a barrage of swearing & insults from biomom & biograndma, smiling at his daughter the whole time, buckling her up in his car, then driving away with the BS still flying at him, to see his daughter for his weekends & weeknights.  Then, get the same when he dropped her off.  Ignoring it all.  

He gave in to shortened weekends, missed weekends, missed months, being polite the whole time, in order to have that time with his daughter, whatever he could get - giving up a lot of what was actually his, in order to keep things as peaceful for his daughter as possible.

He faced the barrel of a gun, one Christmas morning, when biomom's brother tried to build drama where none was necessary.  He faced it as calmly as possible & ended up driving his daughter back to his mom's house that morning, making cheerful conversation the whole way, then, after making sure she was settled, driving the hour back to the police department to file a report.  

Overall, he would let mom have her say, not engaging or replying, then move on with his time with his daughter, valuing every second of it & not wanting to waste any of it on negativity at all.

Answer 8

I would be as friendly as I could force myself to be in order to be able to spend time with my child.  I would also always act civil and adult-like and never speak ill of the other parent in front of the child.

Answer 9

I am also married and hopefully will not ever have to deal with this. But I am saying I would do ANYTHING to be with my child. Of course nothing illegal but I would be kind of my ex even if I hated him in order to see my child. My child is the most important person to me on earth. I would swallow my pride to be with my child.

Answer 10

A GOOD parent will go to any lengths to see their child.  I would do whatever I had to do to ensure I saw my son as much as possible if for some reason I didn't have custody.....

On the other hand, an irresponsible parent wouldn't care.  In my case, my son's father took me to court for visitation rights, which was fine... I had to take off work several days to meet with lawyers to get the visitation schedule worked out... And then when the court established visitation, they also ordered him to pay child support.  Yeah - he hasn't seen his son in almost 2 months now.  He said that gas is too expensive for him to be running around to visit Johnny.

I plan on taking him back to court very soon to get his visitations revoked.