I have an objection to the things you wrote. Maybe I'm off base, but the reasons you stated for visitation not being over four hours sounds more like revenge and spite than because it's in the best interest of your daughter not to see her dad. He doesn't let you see the girls so you'll be damned if you let him see your D more than 4 hours.
He's jerked you around and acted like a control freak with the children. But someone has to be the bigger person and break this cycle. Is he such a bad father that he doesn't deserve much visitation? Is the limited visitation in your D's best interest or is it in yours? It all comes down to what is best for your D. My bias is that seeing both parents is in the children's best interest.
I know how it feels to be jerked around with visitation. My ex used it as a weapon every time she was mad. I'm just concerned your anger and "tit-for-tat" may be using your daughter and visitation as a weapon or a lever. You are the bigger person and the better person. Don't stoop to his level by withholding his daughter because he's an ass to you and is doing the exact same thing or worse. I know it's not fair, but it also is doing something unexpected. You never know...maybe he'll lighten up in response.
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years. Abraham Lincoln
It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. Theodore Roosevelt
(((Jo))) I hope you don't take any of your friends advice negatively. We really just want you to be with your girls on "your" terms rather than the unfair terms that your XH imposes on you. I wonder if you would want him back if "you" had custody of all of the girls. Do you want him back because you truly love him or because he's holding your girls hostage? Maybe holding them hostage is the only way he thinks he can keep you in his life. Just some thoughts....
I pray that your sit. will get better. Maybe if he wants more time with your youngest dd, you can somehow negotiate some more time with other dd-s. Nothing set in stone, but just see if he will let you have them a bit more once in a while. I don't think saying if you are going to have dd more then I want the other dd-s more will work. Instead if he wants to see dd, let him politely, compliment him on wanting to see her. Then a few days later see if he will let you do something with the other dd-s.
Make sure your PMA is up before you ask him, so you can stay upbeat and positive no matter what the out come. I just know in my situation the more I refrain from being negative with my XW the better we get along. Many times I have to bite my tongue to keep the peace and it doesn't seem fair.
This is difficult because the WAS-s don't have a sense of what is fair, so we always have to be very careful on how we approach our wants to them.
Jo, we are all pulling for you to have more time with your dd-s.
Please read my posts properly. I said the court order said he got four hours on that particular day, not in total.
He also gets Saturday from 11am till Monday 11am every other week, AS WELL AS the four hours on alternate Fridays, which is about 4 days a fortnight.
He also takes her on holiday and I agree to nearly everything he says with her.
As well as this 8 days in June, he is also taking her away for another week in July and then having her again for another few days in August when I have an operation.
He also has her 4 days over New Year, that I offered him.
The only day I say no is Christmas Day because then I would be alone and we go on holiday then.
He was looking to up that particular day from 4 hours to about 9, and he already has her loads, much more than he ever let me with the others.
I also offered him joint-custody of dd4 in exchange for my joint custody of the other 3.
He said no, and when I agreed to go to mediation with him, he phoned me and told me he wasn't prepared to compromise with the mediator, so I didn't go.
I have asked him to involve me numerous times and he just said when people separate they don't parent together anymore. The absent parent has whatever visitation the custodial parent says and the custodial parent makes all the decisions to do with raising the children.
To give you an example, last March when it was dd1's 9th birthday, he organised a birthday party with all her friends and their parents. I was not invited and I only found out because dd1 told said
'I'm having a party but dad says I can't invite you'
I challenged him about it and he just said he didn't think I would want to come because he lives in a different town. This was when the dating was going great, too. It's on one of my old threads.
He also refused to let me know where dd3 was going to pre-school and wouldn't allow me to go there, so I am sure you understand now why his remark about going to dd4's pre-school made me so angry.
I know already he kept them to keep me. It was blindingly obvious from day 1. I have always known that. DD1 looks exactly like me, as well. She's like a smaller version of me and even he says that all the time.
He could never make up his mind and his heart was never in this separation (I had to divorce him, he wouldn't and he didn't sign) which is why I keep trying.
Also, he has my girls and I'm lonely. I do try to GAL but it isn't the same. When we were together I had a H, 3 girls, pg with 4th, a house to run and 2 businesses. I feel like legally there is nothing more I can do and improving my communication with H is the only way, whether that leads to reconciliation or not.
My problem is, he isn't truthful with me so I am scared of trying to communicate in case it isn't genuine, and I'm scared of taking on time with the girls in case he behaves like I described in a previous post. I got very upset by that and don't want to feel that bad again.
I do love him but I'm not madly head over heels, IFKWIM, we did have 8 really wonderful years and we were friends 6 years before that, so I can't erase history. He was a fairly good H before he left - all the nasty stuff came after. Sometimes I think I am in love, but that usually after sex so I reckon that's the sex talking, rather than my brain. The rest of the time I know I love him but not in love with him.
If I had the girls, I would have given him less chances, but he would have been round here trying to reconcile because he couldn't have lived without all of us. It is easier to be separated if you still have your family. I don't know what I would have done.
I just think that I can't have another family with someone else as I've had 7 pregnancies and various health problems and then being disabled, it's kind of more difficult to attract male attention anyway.
Even if I did start from the beginning again, the new baby wouldn't be my dd's anyway and H would probably still do what he does, so it seems easier to work on his obvious feeling for me and try to reunite this family.
I'm having a downer because the 'on', 'off' is difficult to deal with and I was looking at photos for my website so that set me off too.
Tomorrow is another day. My PMA will no doubt go up again soon.
I DID divorce him. On grounds of 'unreasonable behaviour'.
He left me, but I divorced him.
I phoned him a few days after he left and told him I was filing for D. He flipped out and accused me of throwing our M down the drain even though he left. So I didn't file.
Then we had dd4 so he told me not to file. He said he wanted to reconcile when she was 5 weeks old. Changed his mind a month later.
I filed in October 02 but heard nothing for weeks. My lawyer then wrote to him asking where the D papers were. He said he had them but didn't want to return them. He was then threatened with criminal prosecution because the papers were property of the court and they classed it as stealing. He then returned them but unopened and unsigned.
I asked him again, did he want a D and he said 'let's wait and see' so I stopped the papers.
January 03, after court involvement, I re-started D papers. Told him, expecting him to be pleased. He flipped out and said I 'stabbed him in the back'.
Papers again get served at his house, he again sends them back unsigned. I asked him again, do you really want to end this R and he said, I never said I wanted a D, you did. But generally you live together if you're not having a D, don't you?
So I left the papers again. Then his mother emails him and tells him to D me - he goes mad and tells her we are not getting a D, we will move to the sea.
We reconciled and made plans to move house to the sea, like he said. Several months later after the loss of a baby, he changes his mind again so I file for D again.
He still doesn't sign but it goes through because of 2 year separation. Decree nisi is through in August 04, decree absolute in December 04.
That is why we weren't divorced until last Christmas.
