Hello,
I am a 25 year old single mother, and have been the only active parent to my daughter since conception. I had origionally baddly wanted my daughters father to be moer of a part of things, but after so long an absence of effort o his part I am really put off of the idea when he actually does bother to visit or contact her. Of course I alwyas encourage it and knowint is the absolute best thing for my daughter, but even then is is seldom really about her so much as getting my goat or flexing his rights as a father even as he primarily does not care to use them.
My big concern is that his parents are heavily involved in his decision making proccess, they where the ones to originally decide he would stay where he was when I was pregnant, they pay for his visits to her and suggest when those should be, they gave him several books she was born about how to obtain custody of your child as a father and how to discredit a mother in court to win custody, and how to be an urban single dad, etc. They are both lawyers themselves, and head over heals for their granddaughter, and I am afraid they will decide what is for the best NOW (as they are frequently intrusive becasuse it's "best") will be for daughter to go and live with her father and for court action to be taken.
I had terrible postpartum depression and her father and I where romantically involved at that time, and to say the least it was not a good situation for my mental health. I have NO intention to bring up the mental abuse, which was reallyvery severe, incourt as it does not pertain to my daughter, just o myself, and I don't want to be unfair to him or to his rights, and I know that bringing something like that out eoul really hurt my daughter later, especially if her grandparents wanted to tell it differently and make her feel like she lost her father in her life becasue I said something about it. ANd I'm comfortable with not saying anything, it's my hurdle now. BUT, I reacted to the abuse and postpartum togeather very poorly when we broke up and sent many hostile angry or scared e-mails to him. My biggest fear is that he wants to exploit that time to obtain custody and I don't know how to go about defending myself against something like that. It was really bad, but I have a therapist and am quite frankly a steller mother and have doen it all on my own save for the one month I stayed iwth him. i'm so afraid this is going to come back to haunt me and cost me custody if he decides that is what to do, and the fact is he simply isn't fit to have a child, he's abusive to romantic partners, an alcoholic, and despite his age, not really an independant adult.
When I first got here it suggested I post my problem here, so here it is. THnk you in advance sorry it is so long.
Oh, some stats too: in January we are going to court to establish child support and visitation--he lives in NY and I am in IN. He is absolutely wonderful in the area of child support, only arged about it once when intoxicated (though for an audiance, which is the sort of thing I worry about: it's as if he is building up a case against me socially already? The truth is I wasn't talking about child support at the time and he yelled autibly "I'm not ginving you any more money!"). TO date no visits have bene denied to him at all, ever, though one was from his parents (they where coming to minitor me, and I said that they could not come to visit daughter in that fashion, monitering would be welcome by an apropriate neutral party like a cop or social worker only--they could only visit if it was about daughter soley), and so he too declined, but came a couple of weeks later and was very good and kind and agreeable. He has signed an affidavid of paternaty, and we are just now establishing that in court.
Again, thanks in advance!
I am a 25 year old single mother, and have been the only active parent to my daughter since conception. I had origionally baddly wanted my daughters father to be moer of a part of things, but after so long an absence of effort o his part I am really put off of the idea when he actually does bother to visit or contact her. Of course I alwyas encourage it and knowint is the absolute best thing for my daughter, but even then is is seldom really about her so much as getting my goat or flexing his rights as a father even as he primarily does not care to use them.
My big concern is that his parents are heavily involved in his decision making proccess, they where the ones to originally decide he would stay where he was when I was pregnant, they pay for his visits to her and suggest when those should be, they gave him several books she was born about how to obtain custody of your child as a father and how to discredit a mother in court to win custody, and how to be an urban single dad, etc. They are both lawyers themselves, and head over heals for their granddaughter, and I am afraid they will decide what is for the best NOW (as they are frequently intrusive becasuse it's "best") will be for daughter to go and live with her father and for court action to be taken.
I had terrible postpartum depression and her father and I where romantically involved at that time, and to say the least it was not a good situation for my mental health. I have NO intention to bring up the mental abuse, which was reallyvery severe, incourt as it does not pertain to my daughter, just o myself, and I don't want to be unfair to him or to his rights, and I know that bringing something like that out eoul really hurt my daughter later, especially if her grandparents wanted to tell it differently and make her feel like she lost her father in her life becasue I said something about it. ANd I'm comfortable with not saying anything, it's my hurdle now. BUT, I reacted to the abuse and postpartum togeather very poorly when we broke up and sent many hostile angry or scared e-mails to him. My biggest fear is that he wants to exploit that time to obtain custody and I don't know how to go about defending myself against something like that. It was really bad, but I have a therapist and am quite frankly a steller mother and have doen it all on my own save for the one month I stayed iwth him. i'm so afraid this is going to come back to haunt me and cost me custody if he decides that is what to do, and the fact is he simply isn't fit to have a child, he's abusive to romantic partners, an alcoholic, and despite his age, not really an independant adult.
When I first got here it suggested I post my problem here, so here it is. THnk you in advance sorry it is so long.
Oh, some stats too: in January we are going to court to establish child support and visitation--he lives in NY and I am in IN. He is absolutely wonderful in the area of child support, only arged about it once when intoxicated (though for an audiance, which is the sort of thing I worry about: it's as if he is building up a case against me socially already? The truth is I wasn't talking about child support at the time and he yelled autibly "I'm not ginving you any more money!"). TO date no visits have bene denied to him at all, ever, though one was from his parents (they where coming to minitor me, and I said that they could not come to visit daughter in that fashion, monitering would be welcome by an apropriate neutral party like a cop or social worker only--they could only visit if it was about daughter soley), and so he too declined, but came a couple of weeks later and was very good and kind and agreeable. He has signed an affidavid of paternaty, and we are just now establishing that in court.
Again, thanks in advance!