Ok I need some outside perspectives on this situation. I’ll try to keep it short without leaving out too much of need to know info. I have three kids with my ex husband. He’s 33, I’m 27. I divorced him years ago because he quit his job, stole all of our money for bills (we had two kids in diapers and I already worked two jobs) and spent it all on heroin. I lost my house, car everything because of this. My kids didn’t see him for almost 3 years while he was doing drugs, my kids are only 4,6 and 7, this took place 5 years ago. So he wasn’t an active parent until my oldest sons was about 4/5. We tried to work it out but he couldn’t stay sober and be a full time parent. He’s in Recovery and is sober and has done alright for a couple years. He’s dated here and there and I’ve always given everyone a fair chance… I have two boundaries 1) don’t be on drugs or have drugs around my children 2) don’t put their fathers sobriety at risk… this directly affects my kids when he’s doing drugs and can’t be a parent. So when he started dating ppl more seriously we discussed guidelines because he always dates others in recovery. We agreed that 1 year of sobriety is reasonable to be involved with the kids.
Well he started dating this girl a year ago now. She was early on in recovery when they met… 4/5 months in, nice enough but after I met her I brought up concerns to her stability. She’s emotionally very unstable and extremely insecure. Flash forward 3 months and he moves her in to his apartment. This was a big issue with me as he then was just taking the kids to his parents house every visit, they were sleeping on the floor in the living room and while that’s cool for a visit or two it’s not ok long term… every visit for months on end. Especially when they are in school. They need proper sleep and privacy. So I voiced that it’s an issue with me that he moved her in knowing his children wouldn’t be there. So at this point he just said he didn’t care what I wanted and brought the kids around her. So at this point his GF has the reasons the kids can’t be there on visits (she works from home and needs the quiet, she’s not feeling well… etc etc) obviously rubbed me the wrong way because that’s my children’s second home, who are you to decide if they can be there or not.
So they live together about 3 months like that. They sign a year lease this past may, by July she had relapsed on drugs and was doing drugs in their apt. She was around my kids multiple times (in fact the only time she was “active” with the kids was when she was high) so obviously I’m infuriated because I only have two rules that I thought were pretty low bar honestly and she broke them both, after looking me in my face and agreeing. My expectation was that if she relapsed she was honest with my ex right away and get help so it didn’t cross those lines.
So she went to rehab briefly and sober housing for a couple months. So yesterday my ex calls and says they are discussing her moving back in next month! I’m really pissed off and feel really disrespected as a my kids primary parent. I don’t feel I can control his life but we discussed these boundaries together a million times and agreed they were in the best interest of the kids and now he just expects me to change my expectation about all of this because “he loves this girl” you guys help. Am I being unreasonable here!?
Thanks in advance mamas
No you are not being unreasonable. Your rules are totally okay & reasonable. I would tell him you will no longer bring your kids there if they move back in with each other. Not only does she make excuses for them to not be there, she also did drugs after agreeing she wouldn’t around the kids. Drugs are a very very serious thing & a small thing like her dosing off and leaving a baggie on the bed, table, floor, anything will get the attention of a toddler and there’s a high chance of them eating it like normal kids try to do. I understand he wants more freedom since he’s sober but he really needs to think about his kids. It’s about them & mending their relationships, not her. Also isn’t one of the rules of rehab or AA that they can’t date each other until a certain amount of time has passed?