Newbie

Hello. Im new at this so thought id just introduce myself...

My ex and i were together for five years when we seperated for a number of reasons. At the time of seperation i was pregnant with our daughter who is now 10 months old. We were not married, but co-habited for a while.

After our daughter was born we had a few issues but these were eventually resolved amicably without geting lawyers involved. He has now returned to university to do an MA in London while i am employed part-time as a primary school teacher in Cumbria.

Mostly, i feel generally annoyed at how things turned out. I still have feelings for him, but he went off and persued a relationship with someone else while i was pregnant when he claimed he 'needed space' and 'wasen't ready for committment' after the five years we were together.

Although we are now able to get along with eachother when he has access to our daughter, i find it hard to go back to being friends and pretending nothing 'bad' happened. I feel that he has the life he wanted, while i am left behind doing all the hard work. I try not to talk to him unless it is absoltutely necessary as i find constant contact (even by text) difficult.

I often think that i need a Clean Break, but it is not possible given the age of our daughter and the fact he has access to her (even if it is sporadic). He does not look after our daughter on his own mostly through his own choice which does not help the situation as i am effectively forced to sit with him while he has acess. How do other people deal with this?

Hi and welcome to wiki

You do not have to be friends with him and pretend nothing has happened. You can be polite but still keep converstaion to a minimum.

Why cant he take your daughter out? Or maybe you go out when he visits her? You cannot be expected to to babysit him while he spends time with his child. He has to take some responsibilty for her care even if just for a few short hours. Same goes for the sparodic access, your daughter as she gets older will need order in her life, this will include knowing when daddy is coming to see her and knowing it will be regular.

I think you need to get a bit tougher with him. If he wants to see his daughter ( in no way am i suggesting you stop him from doing so ) he has to make the commitment to set times and take resposibilty for her care in the time he has her.

completely agree with izzyben, you should be able to enjoy some time and space of your own during "contact" , it sounds crazy that you have to be there, re-opening your wounds as you are healing, who needs kicking in a broken leg. he made choices, you are doing the hard work. does he have parental responsibility ? you need to know what is best for your child so that may be him seeing her in your home but actually i doubt it in fact it might make him work harder if he takes her for a walk , to a park , leisure centre whatever especially if it is only occasionally. make it work for you though as well as for your daughter. cheers rhi