Boundaries & Picking Battles

You have quite a few posts on this topic, and I think the majority of opinions will continue to be that you cannot change what he says, does and thinks. You can only change what YOU do. Yes, it would bother me too if he asked our daughter about my activities, but I can't control that and I would know full well not to engage him on that level.

You have a visitation agreement and schedule. Use it. On his visitation days/nights, he TAKES your daughter to his house for their special time. He does not spend any of it in your house. Period. He picks her up at the door. You either tell him you have people coming over or that you are going out (and then you go!), but this is his special time with her and it's not to take place in your home. You have her at the door when he shows up, with her stuff or her coat or whatever she needs. If necessary, you have your keys and pocketbook in your hand, and you get into your car and leave when they leave. Better yet, have her sitting in your car or waiting next to it, with you in the driver's seat. And off you go. If you just drive around the block, that's up to you. But you leave.

Do not tell your daughter what you are doing. Do not tell her you are going to Baltimore or to a ball game or to a Springsteen concert or to the grocery story or anything! She is 7. You must assume that she will a) tell her father and b) think she's SUPPOSED to tell him! Do not put her in the middle by giving her any info on your plans. You have a cell phone and can be reached in an emergency, but the deal with your ex should be that someone better be bleeding or on fire if he calls you. So although you don't feel the ned to hide things from your daughter - you DO have the need. It makes you the subject of conversation between her and her father, and that's not right. Yes he is pushy and probing, and he shouldn't be. But you know he's going to do it, and you don't like it. So your only option is to just tell your daughter that "Mommy has stuff to do" and leave it at that. Your daughter is a child and she should be focused on a child's life - not the job of keeping track of her parents and what they are doing and whether the other knows what's going on. Whether you expect her to do this or not isn't the point. The point is, she's doing it!

If you want to be flexible with a visitation agreement, that's fine. But that means for certain occasions, not for your ex to be coming over every night and not for you to re-negotiate every single time there's something going on. That puts you and your ex on the level of discussing who has what plans and which ones are most important for your daughter to be a part of. If you don't want him in your business, then you don't share it. Once in a while, if you have something really really special and you want to swap out some dates, then you negotiate. But your problem with him is boundaries - so you have to establish some.

Moreover, your daughter is in school and has homework (or will have homework), and you and your ex are doing her a huge disservice by not having her on a schedule with her father. This is going to blow up in both your faces when he gets bent out of shape because she has work to do, and she's in the habit over a few years of having her father there every evening. She's going to be close to not understanding divorce - she thinks Daddy comes 'home" every evening - just like every kid with married parents whose dad works long hours. She will not see her father as a separate person with a separate life and a separate home.

If your visitation agreement is not specific enough, then have your lawyer rewrite it for your ex's review. Again, it would be nice if your ex would participate. But if he doesn't, the responsibility falls to you.

I agree 100% with Diane B. The longer you wait to establish specific visiting/parenting times the harder it will be. I specifically add that the way this is happening is also very difficult for your daughter. She needs boundaries even more than you do.

It's best to start to start out with close boundaries so that you can somewhat relax them as experience shows that you can do so and still be comfortable. You started out with what sounds like hardly any boundaries which is why you're having difficulty making boundaries. If you have a specific parenting schedule I urge you to enforce it. Tell her father that when that schedule is honored you will be willing to renegotiate but not until then. Give a date at which you will decide if the time he spends with her is going well. I'd make that date at least 4-6 weeks out.

I see that you and your ex wrote your own parenting schedule. If that schedule does not list specific days and times I urge you to rewrite it with the help of a professional. Your ex has shown that he is unreasonable in his expectations. I also suggest that both of you need a specific schedule so all of you are able to make a clean break. As it is now he is obviously still holding on to you as an important person in your life. You can be friends only after you let go of each other and move on. Once you have boundaries you can change them.

I urge you to get counseling to help you with making and enforcing boundaries. What you have now is not working.

Be prepared for him to push back big time. Know that you are right; that your daughter needs this sort of consistency, and hold firm. This will be difficult with a lot of tension and angry words but once he realizes you mean it and will stick with it life will get easier. The fight will be worth it. If you don't take a stand now your life will continue on with a constant level of difficulty.

You have been more than generous with your ex and he has taken advantage of you. Yes, it's important that your daughter have frequent contact with her Dad. It's equally important that she know where the boundaries are. He no longer lives with you and you're no longer an intact family. Your husband is making it seem otherwise. This is not good for your daughter.

Why are you letting him hang out in YOUR house? If you don't want to make small talk with him - don't. It's that simple. You don't need to communicate face-to-face with him. Tell him to just shoot you an email to figure out schedules so its all in writing. You're getting something out of him being at your house and talking to him or you wouldn't allow it to continue in your space. Figure out what that is and either embrace it or change it.

Before the divorce was final, my ex would walk into my house whenever he felt like it and there was nothing I could do about it. After it was final, that ended immediately.

Darn right you need to call him out. And you need to enforce boundaries. Don't just TELL him what the boundaries are...put your foot down and actually enforce them.

You need to use your custody agreement. Is it in the custody agreement that he gets to come over to see your daughter every night? I'm sure it's not. So stop allowing him to come past the threshold. If the doorbell rings, open the door and ask "do you need something?" If he just wants to see your daughter, let him know when his next day is and that she'll be ready at whatever time she needs to be ready. When he comes on off days, stop letting him in. It's not his day, it's yours.

Also, be careful that you aren't involving your 7 year old in adult discussion that she will repeat. I see a lot of this when couples divorce. Mom and dad talking about and asking about situations that shouldn't even be on a 7 year old's radar.

Your ex is creepy. I'd put a stop to that nonsense ASAP. This nosy, stalkerish, borderline personality behavior is not tolerable.

You and he need to get a formal visiting arrangement so that he's not at your home every night and you are not feeling like you have to explain your time with your child. You are no longer married, so your time with your child is yours and not his. Likewise, he no longer owes you details (beyond things like in/out of state, overnight, etc) on what he does with her on his weekends. I would work with him on a formal arrangement for time with your DD, with some flexibility. While it's commendable you can get along, I wouldn't want my ex in my house nightly. It would prevent both of us from moving on.

It is one thing to ask your DD what she did with Mom. It is another to grill her with the intention of knowing all your business. His business starts and ends with your child. I wouldn't make everything you do a Big Secret from the child (if she tells him, so be it, it's part of her life). The issue here isn't that you went or even that he knew, but that there's not yet a boundary between his life and yours.

ETA: I don't think he feels in his heart that it's over and I think if you do (and you and he went so far as to divorce) then you need to revisit the schedule. Just HAVING a schedule and then a routine for changes (like 24 hours ahead whenever possible, in writing, or shifting when you know a work gig will keep you late) will be beneficial. Having a schedule didn't mean we didn't ever change it. It meant that we changed it as needs came up, like when SS had a football game or the kids had a 3 day weekend and wanted to spend another day with their mom. But by and large they could look at a kitchen calendar and see when they would be here and when they would be there, and the visits did not otherwise involve us. They had their own rooms and pets and routines with their mom and likewise with us. I realize you want to be flexible, but I think you need a new starting point from which to flex. Even if you are not dating now, you may later, and it's none of his business til it is his business (like when you introduce the BF to the kid), if you follow. But right now you have your ex in your home nightly and not much has changed except a few details and the paper. I hope you can get him to realize that a routine schedule is a good thing, ultimately.

No it's not just you. That would make me angry too but by the same token I wouldn't be sharing so much with my kid about my where abouts if I didn't want him to know.

You know your kid. Kids can't tell what they don't know. My son had very loose lips at 7 which made me angry often and frequently but just as soon as I learned not to be so forth coming with him he would have nothing to share with others. The other piece of the puzzle was teaching him about how to respond to such matters without getting into trouble.

Long road ahead but it does get better and while you could call him out about it to what end? He seems like he wants to keep the drama going between the two of you. Why do that? Why give him the satisfaction. The divorce is final and you can't control him just yourself. Limit the things you give your daughter privy to. Get her out of the middle where you can.

Wait. You are divorced but he uses you as a sounding board? Um, why did you divorce? He's acting like you are still married.

My ex-husband NEVER came into my home after we divorced. He would drop our daughter off or I would pick her up. I NEVER went into his home either. Well, let me clarify - NEVER WITHOUT being asked to enter.

Why do you not have a custody/visitation order set up?
Sounds like he's still in love or feeling like there's a chance for reconciliation?????

Neither of you should use your child for information or as a pawn. She needs to be the priority and you two should have a parenting plan in place.
I would state that my plans, unless it involves me being late to pick up my/our daughter - is NONE of his business. He should NOT ask or use OUR child as his personal information assistant.

Don't get mad. Be matter of fact. You've allowed him to be cozy with you in your home - he's taking advantage. You need to tell him NO MORE.

Good luck!

my dear, you've posted about this before, yes? and my reaction is still the same- of course things are tense if your ex is in your home EVERY night, and you are allowing him to bs with you and be his sounding board. the problem is less about his attachment to you (which really is a big problem) or your daughter telling him what you're up to (you can't stop him from grilling her, and don't want to put the burden on her to pull in the reins on him when you haven't yet been able to) than your reluctance to be firm. this is way easier said than done when you've got a history and are trying to establish new ground rules, but you've let it go on for WAY too long. enough already.
if you two aren't able to meet in the middle vis-a-vis when and how he sees his daughter, go back to the courts and get an ironclad visitation agreement. and it should never involve him coming to your house if you're not able to shoehorn him back out. it might be inconvenient to take her to him or meet him somewhere every time, but until you're strong enough to say and mean 'okay, guys, time for you to be on your way' you just should not open the door to him.
he's a schmuck for milking your daughter for info on you, but you can't broach this with her. she's too young. keep scraping him off the outside of your impenetrable boundaries until he gets the message.
khairete
S.

I say - let it go. My husband's ex knows more about me, our home and our boys than we have ever told her. She chooses to interrogate my stepdaughter for the information. Whatever. If we say anything at all, the fallout will rest completely on my stepdaughter. No thanks. I'm an adult and I can handle the unwanted prying. If she needs to know what color my kitchen towels are, then power to her. It's aggravating but only if you let it get under your skin. Good luck.

You need written visitation. It sounds as if your daughter is pretty young since he asked if mommy, instead of "your mom", has plans so I guess it could be more lenient. Once she's in school she needs to be home with you every day by 7 or 8pm so she can get some down time then get ready for bed.

He needs to pick her up from child care, I assume you work and aren't wealthy enough to stay at home and not have a working income, and then he needs to bring her home at a set time. And leave.

You are allowing him to stay attached to you. He's trying to find out if you're dating.

This actually sounds like a nightmare to me. Having to see a man I divorced EVERY NIGHT? In my house?

You need to tell him that things will have to change, or you will go back to court and get it changed in court. You need to tell him that you don't want to see him every day.

I don't know if anyone else has brought this up, but your ex MAY actually be stalking you. You may not think that this could possibly be the case, but the proof will be in the pudding if he refuses to leave you alone.

If he balks when you tell him that what is going on is not working, then get your lawyer involved and sit down with a court appointed arbiter. And you need to be prepared to lay it ALL out on the table - that he is wanting to know YOUR schedule, where YOU are going, who YOU are with, wanting to see YOU everyday, talk to YOU everyday, and that you are considering it to be stalking instead of just wanting to see your daughter. AND he's also using your daughter to try to find out your business.

Time to stop being so nice...

..umm sounds like he is trying to weasel his way back into your pants , by playing the concerned parent routine..you would think a guy with a hard on could be a little less transparent.you are divorced from the guy, yes you have a kid together, but he shouldnt be on your doorstep every day trying to charm his way into inviting himself along..he has his days with the kid, you have yours..next time he 'just happens to drop by" ..tell him, "sorry, but, we are headed out the door..call me later.." he is not your problem anymore, and he shouldnt be asked your kid if you have "other plans", you dont ask him if he has "other plans", he should be giving you the same courtesy K. h.

Hi, Boss Fan:

You did not set boundaries while you were married, so why should it be any different now?

Had you thought about finding a Co-dependent Anonymous support group in your area? CoDa.org

You know he hasn't let go of his family. You and the children are all this man has. Boundaries and Compassion are in order for you to learn.

Let me tell you, once you get older and alone, you will wish you had learned some skills in relationship building.

Good luck.

D.