No Say
We've had a long road with my SD15. To give some background, DH and BM were divorced when SD was 6, DH remarried and divorced when she was 10 and then we married when she was 12. SD's BM has always been a control freak and has never involved DH in the decision making process for anything, particularly extra curricular activities and medical. As SD went through the start of her teen years, she and DH had a falling out, which resulted in her staying away for a little over a year. We found out that BM was taking her to a psychologist (which we found out from the insurance company benefit form) so we charged her with contempt. After much back and forth, DH and BM were able to come to an agreement for visitation (since we lived in OH and they in PA). We since moved back to PA so visitation agreement is a little out of place. So DH has been operating on whatever time D is willing to spend with him. So far we've seen her at least once a month since we've been back so there are no complaints as far as that's concerned. However, DH sent BM an email asking what activities she was going to be in during the Fall and was told that she would be taking a camping trip with her in October, playing Fall softball and that D was going to be getting a job so visitation depended on this.
I guess I have an issue with this for a number of reasons: 1) BM has never supported a relationship of SD and DH; 2) BM has always given SD control of situations that aren't hers to control (i.e. visitation); 3) SD is 15 - she cannot drive and BM is pushing her to get a job which would require driving. There are more reasons i know but for the sake of reading, those are the top 3.
I'm not sure what to do - i'm obviously disappointed with the response that was given and i think it's just one more way for BM to undermine DH's fragile relationship with D. Grr.
Here's my thoughts a a mom of
Here's my thoughts a a mom of teens. This is not a battle you want to fight. Extracurricular activities, jobs, dating....all that stuff is really important to teenagers. It's not fair to expect a teen to drop everything for visitation. She can't schedule the softball games. If she has a job, she can't always take off.
I know I may take some heat for this position. But I think you need to work your visitation around her schedule when possible. My bios have a good relationship with their dad because he has always been respectful of stuff like this. When we were non-custodial to my stepkids, there were plenty of times we didn't get to see them because of church or school stuff. We have custody now. And their mother is really good about being flexible with their schedules as well. Last summer, she only got to spend a week with my stepson because he was working. And she only gets to see them during the summer and at Christmas because we live in different states.
If y'all force your SD to give up extra-curricular stuff, sports, her job, trips,...stuff like that, you're going to end up with an angry teen who will eventually just stop visiting at all.
Kids shouldn't have control of visitation...I agree with that. But once kids reach the teen years, you have to respect at least some of their decisions. And honestly, if she decides to stop visiting y'all are going to be kind of stuck. Even if you take it to court, it could easily take a year to get the case in front of a judge. By then she'll be close to 17 years old, right? I've never seen a judge force a 17 year old to visit a parent. I'm sure it happens, but I don't think it happens very often. And even if you did get the courts to force the child to visit, you'll have an angry, resentful teenager in your house. It's not worth it.
I would have your DH tell her how important the time they have together is to him. And that he understands how important friends, school, extra-curricular, job,.....are to her. They should be able to work together on this.
Thanks for your thoughts.
Thanks for your thoughts. I've encouraged my DH to be a little more open with his thoughts and feelings with his D but i believe the BM needs to be a little more supportive in encouraging the D to have more to do with her Dad too. My DH has been very passive on the visitation, just kind of going with the flow, but the BM takes advantage of this and uses everything SD is in as excuses not to come. We are trying to make plans for the fall but the extra-curriculars, in BM's eyes, will take precedence. I don't want SD to miss out on quality family time because of out-of-order priorities set by her mother. Maybe it sounds selfish but just venting my frustration as the person on the outside looking in.
It doesn't sound selfish at
It doesn't sound selfish at all! Family time is important. I hope your DH will be able to work directly with his daughter to find out what HER priorities are and not what her mother's are.
Thank you all for your
Thank you all for your comments. I believe the possibility of their relationship becoming non-existent is a good one because he does not want to push her. Yeah, he calls her about once a week but she's pretty much given complete control over everything she does, except when she needs a chauffer, (which BM or BM's mom or aunt happily oblige). While i'm in agreement that she is a young woman and should start making decisions, there are some things that should be enforced. My DH is MORE than willing to sacrifice his time with her so she can do what she wants, but my fear is that all of his sacrificed time will come back to burn him. The line BM came across recently was that they (DH and BM) needed to decide on dates of visitation so D could plan around it. While I agree to a point, the other point is that visitation has always been scheduled and is pretty simple...every other weekend. There are things coming up, especially since she's in high school - i've taken it upon myself to write down the major school activities in my planner so i can tell my DH what the best dates would be. But the bottom line in that point is to plan on bi-weekly visitation and then when something comes up, ask. I would think BM would want daughter to grow responsibility by pre-planning activities and requesting permission to skip out on visitation rather than lying and throwing a fit to get her way. I know DH would be okay with surrending some of his time with her so she can go out with her friends or whatever, but she won't ask. I just think there's a lot of immaturity in BM and it's flowing over to the SD.
I think the text-book answer is for DH to talk to the D and express his concerns - unfortuately, that book's been thrown out the window a long time ago. SD might listen but BM has overall control and he might as well talk to a block of wood.