Why has he changed?

Me and my sons dad split up when our son was 6 months old. Our son is now 3. we are both in settled stable relationships, i have our son mon to fri and he has him fri night to sun. This was regular but just lately hes started having him saturday afternoon to sunday morning, hes started to teach my son swear words and to call mommy a b**ch. This has been happening since about october. I cant think of anything that has caused this change we have always maintained a good friendship. Everytime i see him he anounces something nasty about me, about the way i dress or look or have dressed our son etc, which i find embarresing especially as i dress well , take care of my apperance an my son is always beautifully dressed. Every time i try and talk to him about it he just makes excuses that he is to busy. My son no longer wants to see his dad but at 3 i dont know if this would be best. i really dont like him seeing his dad at the moment but i dont know what to do what is best for my son?

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Problems with relationship with ex

You are so right to think

Submitted by kate on Tue, 2008-01-08 14:57.

You are so right to think about nipping whatever is happening here in the bud.

As I understand it you have done a great job of bringing up your child together from an early age and have managed to be friendly co operative and on an even keel which has clearly been a success all round and you should remember this and try to regain this.

I would bet my bottom dollar that your ex is unhappy about some part of his life that has nothing to do with you and is redirecting some thing totally not to do with you your way, by trying to start fights all the time, by teaching your son swear words and picking at you he is trying to get a reaction. If it IS something that you have done or not done then you need to know .

The fact that your son doesn’t want to visit would suggest that all is not sweetness and light when he does .You must discuss this with your child's father before there is an explosion or your sons visits stop which not be a good thing.

Ask to go out for a coffee politely ask him when is convenient for him, write him a letter send him an email. And then go down the you don’t seem to be your normal nice easy going self, is everything OK? does he need more time for himself (more time now to sort out a problem is way better than cutting off contact) to sort out whatever is bothering him ,and so on .If I was you I would go for the full sympathetic route .Rather than say you are horrible to me now, I would say we used to get along OK I don’t like the undercurrents and the comments. You don’t want to get involved in the ins and outs of his problems but you do want him to know that if he does have additional pressures that you can help by relieving him of his child a little bit. It is best for your son to maintain a relationship with his Dad, so you do need to understand why it is going wrong and as he is so young you have to do it for him. You do need to explain that your son doesn’t seem happy and how can you work together to improve his time with Dad , maybe a whole weekend every other weekend is better than sat pm to sun am ?? . Reassure Dad that he is very important, that your son loves him to bits and that you want to do everything you can to help get things back on track.

This is not me letting bad unpleasant behaviour off, as we are often accused of, but playing a canny long term game. It is so easy for a situation like this to degenerate into a spiral ending up with agro, fighting and not seeing Dad again just by lighting the touch paper. Our suggestion that you pour water on a potential bomb and diffuse the situation by being nice and sympathetic is really made to avoid such an outcome.

But you do need a proper communication about this bad mouthing you to his son is just not on , critising you and teaching your child swear words is also not on , but most of all it is not on from your sons perspective . Why not have a look at the co parenting form and the code of conduct that are on the web and suggest that you work through some of those principles together