Going halves on Christmas gifts?

[warhar]

I received a very brusque text from my recently-seperated BPDw demanding my half of the Santa wish-list bill. Under normal circumstances, would seperated couples share this bill or would they do their individual Christmas shopping? In my situation I am loathe to give her the money as I'll have no input into the gift choices, also she is taking the children out of the country to her brother for the full holiday period and I am already paying a significant amount of money towards that as pocket money for the children. It's just a typical no-win scenario, if I pay then I'm a sucker, if I don't pay then I'm a bad father! and as always, money is such an efficient weapon. Any thoughts?

[livednlearned]

I received a very brusque text from my recently-seperated BPDw demanding my half of the Santa wish-list bill. Under normal circumstances, would seperated couples share this bill or would they do their individual Christmas shopping? In my situation I am loathe to give her the money as I'll have no input into the gift choices, also she is taking the children out of the country to her brother for the full holiday period and I am already paying a significant amount of money towards that as pocket money for the children. It's just a typical no-win scenario, if I pay then I'm a sucker, if I don't pay then I'm a bad father! and as always, money is such an efficient weapon. Any thoughts?

If you don't pay for half the gifts, you are not a bad father. You are a divorcing dad with boundaries. How old are your kids? I would say to them, "This is our first Christmas apart and I'm going to do something different this year. Christmas is an exciting time because you guys love getting gifts, and this year, I decided that I'm going to give you gifts separate from your mom because I want to be involved in picking out gifts for you. I'm glad I can give you some pocket money for your trip to see uncle guy, and there will be some extra stuff for you when you get back."

Is that something you can imagine doing?

[warhar]

Hi L'nL! Your thoughts mirror mine exactly. When I first heard of the planned trip I spoke to all the children and explained that rather than buy them gifts, I'd planned on giving them money to spend on their holiday instead - they all agreed enthusiastically (naturally there are a few small things I've spotted that I know they'll like and that they'll get on their return   ) I also understand that the demand for money from the other party is part of her game-playing. BUT, coming from a country where until recently seperation and divorce was extremely uncommon, I was just wondering about the 'rules'. I am putting as much space between her and myself but of course with children involved that space is necessarily rather elastic at times!

[GaGrl]

Your instincts are correct.  The sooner you begin to separate the holiday proceedings -- including gifts -- the better.

[livednlearned]

That's great that you talked to the kids already! One thing you might want to do... .is get a copy of ":)on't Alienate the Kids" by Bill Eddy, and Divorce Poison by Richard Warshak.

Parental alienation tends to go hand-in-hand with high-conflict divorces when kids are involved. An example would be your ex telling the kids you don't love them because you aren't helping her pay for gifts. Learning techniques and tools to help with parental alienation goes a long, long way. These aren't normal divorces, so "putting the kids in the middle," which we all know is hard on the kids, is difficult, because usually there is a BPD spouse who isn't able to put the kids first.

I found Power of Validation and the other two books really helped me navigate the parental alienation stuff. You want to model healthy behavior, while also be proactive and assertive with the truth, and then validate your kids about how they feel so they learn to trust themselves. As kids, they are more susceptible to what grown ups tell them, and it's hard for them to tell what's real, not real.

Anyway, sorry to go on a tangent here. But your ex asking for money for the kids, and you not giving it, is likely to create a backlash, and she may try to hurt you through the kids. Fortunately, there are some tools written by others to help us figure this tricky stuff out.

[Matt]

Yeah, I think your approach, and the ideas from LnL and Gagrl are excellent.

If my ex wrote me, "I think a really good gift for Child would be such-and-such, but I can't afford it - would you pay half and it will be from both of us?", and if I agreed that would be a really good gift, I might say OK.

But if she wrote me, "I spent $100 on gifts for Child, so you owe me $50.", I wouldn't even respond.

We each give the kids gifts.  I usually write my ex e-mails from time to time, telling her what I have ordered for them, so she won't get the same things.  In 5 years, guess how many times she has responded in kind, and told me what she is getting them?  Zero.  But... .by doing this, the kids don't get two of the same thing.  The communication actually works... .

[scraps66]

A tough one, another potentially fabricated win-and you lose proposition.  I'm almost inclined to just say ignore and do your own shopping.  In the long run this may be a better boundary to build.

I gave up any type of collaboration on gifts a few years ago.  When I would tell ex what I was buying, she would use that information to one-up me.  I say I'm buying the DSi, she buys the 3-DSi.  Or, depending on who had the kids first, she would buy THE SAME thing I said I was buying.  She has also done things like, give gifts as much as two weeks in advance for fear of someone else "gifting" before her.  This kind of invalidates the whole idea of anticipation of gift giving.

   

In my case I've found it more beneficial to reduce the amount of communication without prejudice.   

[Matt]

So I gotta share this here - not exactly on topic but kinda.  And you guys will understand... .

I moved with the kids to a medium-sized town a few years ago, and told their mom I would pay for her to move too, if she wouldn't fight me over the move.  After some fighting, that's what happened - she moved too a few months later.  She lives on the other side of town, in a pretty bad neighborhood (although she has a good job and makes as much money as me).  I got a small but nice house in a very safe neighborhood near the kids' school.

So I got a note from her this morning, with an Amazon.com receipt attached - a pair of shoes for S15 for Christmas:

"I had this shipped to your address because we already had a pair of boots for D17 that was delivered UPS stolen from our doorstep.  They will just leave it at the door apparently, even if no one answers.

Please just let me know when they arrive - thanks!

Ex"

She's right - the shoes will be delivered to my door and they'll be safe there, and I can send them to her with D17, and so she'll have them for S15 on Christmas.

But... .she didn't ask me if this was OK.  She just did it.

My response:

"OK - should be fine.  I'll send them over with D17 when they arrive."

Not a battle worth fighting, and what's most important is that S15 gets the shoes he wants for Christmas.

But... .it would have been so easy for her to ask... .