boundary

[VIDEO: "What is parental alienation?"]

My exwBPD exchange our daughter at the police station. That is the only time we are face to face. He refuses court ordered mediation. When he speaks at the exchanges he is so jumbled up I can't even understand what he is saying half the time. The other half of the time he is rude, sarcastic, laughs at my mom, degrades breastfeeding, etc. So a couple of months ago I told him that I would not have parenting discussions or discuss legal matters with our daughter present. I would text him. Well every single text from him was the same, I would text him a 2 sentence question, he would text back 20 sentences of jibberish and insults. I then told him I was not going to be bothered by abusive texts ( I would get the beep for a text, and open my phone and can't help but see what he is saying. )  I told him my communication would now be via email( so then I can just check it once a day and not get stressed by constant texts). Well that worked for a while, but same thing, name calling, degrading jibberish in emails,  now he insists that we need to talk about anything at the police station. I have emailed him and said I will not do this( I don't want our daughter subjected to his rants). I have been practicing BIFF, short, not responding to insults, etc. Well now if I email him he ignores it and actually tries to respond to me at the police station. Last week I emailed him and said that I had an appointment to bring d to at the time of our exchange next week, could he please drop her off 15 minuted early. He did not respond via email at all so I just let it go. Told my appointment I would be a little late. Well our last exchange he walks into the police station with d and says" I can drop her off to you a half hour early on Monday" then starts in with his jibberish. I just didn't respond. When I got home I simply emailed him and said" thank you for agreeing this morning to drop d off early, I appreciate it'. Is he just testing my boundaries? Should I email him and state that I don't appreciate that he is overstepping my boundaries? Or just keep the BIFF email communication? Our daughter is just a baby, I really don't want to set us up for 17 more years of him blowing off anything I say and exposing her to any conflict. I feel like I have to make a stand now that I am not going to involve her in our communications.

[rarsweet]

My exwBPD exchange our daughter at the police station. That is the only time we are face to face. He refuses court ordered mediation. When he speaks at the exchanges he is so jumbled up I can't even understand what he is saying half the time. The other half of the time he is rude, sarcastic, laughs at my mom, degrades breastfeeding, etc. So a couple of months ago I told him that I would not have parenting discussions or discuss legal matters with our daughter present. I would text him. Well every single text from him was the same, I would text him a 2 sentence question, he would text back 20 sentences of jibberish and insults. I then told him I was not going to be bothered by abusive texts ( I would get the beep for a text, and open my phone and can't help but see what he is saying. )  I told him my communication would now be via email( so then I can just check it once a day and not get stressed by constant texts). Well that worked for a while, but same thing, name calling, degrading jibberish in emails,  now he insists that we need to talk about anything at the police station. I have emailed him and said I will not do this( I don't want our daughter subjected to his rants). I have been practicing BIFF, short, not responding to insults, etc. Well now if I email him he ignores it and actually tries to respond to me at the police station. Last week I emailed him and said that I had an appointment to bring d to at the time of our exchange next week, could he please drop her off 15 minuted early. He did not respond via email at all so I just let it go. Told my appointment I would be a little late. Well our last exchange he walks into the police station with d and says" I can drop her off to you a half hour early on Monday" then starts in with his jibberish. I just didn't respond. When I got home I simply emailed him and said" thank you for agreeing this morning to drop d off early, I appreciate it'. Is he just testing my boundaries? Should I email him and state that I don't appreciate that he is overstepping my boundaries? Or just keep the BIFF email communication? Our daughter is just a baby, I really don't want to set us up for 17 more years of him blowing off anything I say and exposing her to any conflict. I feel like I have to make a stand now that I am not going to involve her in our communications.

[whirlpoollife]

MHO do not tell him he his overstepping your boundries.   He will just do it more.   I dread having to communicate with kids dad becasue THERE IS NO REASON FROM HIM.    One sentence from me turns into a page long rant  from him, still after two and half years not living together and with teenage kids.   

Give yourself time to respond.  Draft it , look at later. Soon you will be able to see that no response from you is the best.

I avoid any appts or kids activites on his time/time.  Not all is possible but majority, I keep it that way so as not to have more confrontation with him.

Print out all the emails, yours and his. Keep them in a binder or file. It can show later that you are the resonable parent .

" Our family wizard "is a mutual website for communication, yearly fee.    Xtbh does not use it but it helped lesson the garbage from him to me. 

[rarsweet]

I did ask him to do OFW even offered to pay his half, no response from him. Yes exactly a 2 sentence email from me gets 25-50 sentence responses. But now there is no response, he just tries to answer at exchanges. And you're right I should not say anything to him about overstepping.

[whirlpoollife]

But now there is no response, he just tries to answer at exchanges.

Manipulation from him to you. Is that what you want. No.

Say, exchange only,  email the rest, thank you good bye. 

Let him rant in front of police.

If you give in to be nice then it will only escalate to each and every time you exchange.

[Panda39]

Keep the email boundary don't engage in discussion at your daughters exchange.  He is testing your boundaries... .don't back down.  My SO's uBPDxw... .give an inch she will take a million miles!

Hang in there 

[rarsweet]

Panda my thought exactly. And really exchanges are about the kids saying goodbye to one parent and hello to the other, it should be hugs and kisses,not trying to make a 7 month old baby sit through a parenting discussion turned ugly while the sex offenders walk in and out to register and people are walking in off the street. Its a tiny lobby, 3 chairs, and at least two or three times a month I share the lobby with a sex offender because the ex is always late, creeps me out.

[Rubies]

Arrange to have an officer present to document this behavior and take it before the judge.  Let the judge define appropriate visitation exchange behavior and set the boundary for you.

[Eco]

my ex does the same thing, if you ask her what time it is she will dance around the subject and take 2 days to tell you what time it is and insult you 6 different ways.

when we were in court and she was on the stand and could not answer a simple question from my lawyer, what should have been a few words turned into a novel on each question and it was pure non sense

at exchanges i wont speak to her because she starts out civil but if i say one wrong thing in her mind she snaps and the verbal abuse and shouting starts. many times i have drove away with her still trying to talk to me, after a few times of that happening she quits trying to talk to me.

Arrange to have an officer present to document this behavior and take it before the judge.  Let the judge define appropriate visitation exchange behavior and set the boundary for you.

sounds like a good idea, also what helped me was i started recording my exchanges and i let my ex know i was recording because of her behavior and the nonsense stopped because my ex knew it would be shown in court.

good luck i hope it gets better for you .

7 months is really young so i think its good that your trying to nip this in the bud before she gets older and knows whats going on. It should be about whats best for the kids but they don't seem to care about that.

[rarsweet]

The police dispatchers are there and the lobby is recorded. I pay $10 each time I want a copy but its worth it. The problem is he really thinks his behavior is OK. One time I was trying to tell him she had diarrhea, he said" I don't have to talk to you I just want my daughter" and he lunged and tried to grab her out of my arms. I have that disc audio and visual. He really thinks its OK. Another time he was telling me he would give me formula even though I breastfeed. Another time my mom came with me and when he saw her he started laughing and rolling his eyes " ya I know this is funny Cindy, its all a joke isn't it" my mom and I were flabbergasted, she had just walked in never even said a word. He thinks its OK. And I had started smoking again when we broke up, I never smoked inside, and had maybe 4 or 5 ultralight cigerettes a day. He is a former smoker too, he quit the day our daughter was born, switched to chew. He will literally lean in and sniff me at the police department, I assume to see if I am smoking. Really pisses me off. I have tried to like extend our daughter out to him so he can't get close. Now he just insists on kissing her after he has handed her to me. So he leans in and seriously sniffs while he kisses her cheeks