My ex and I share a 12 year old child together.
We have been broken up for about 8 years.
Currently my child is at their dad’s Thursday afternoon to Sunday afternoon. And I have them the rest of the time. And it has been this way since we broke up.
Normally on the weekends I have things planned as this is my free time. I have no other children. My ex has one other child with his partner.
Is it fair that my ex now wants to change the arrangement and only have our child 3 weekends out of the month so he can go out and party or do things with his friends?
I feel he should be spending time with his child not friends.
Am I being selfish for wanting free time?
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I normally do not comment, and I do not agree with one parent having care every weekend that is unbalanced for all parties, the child should spend recreation time with both parents on weekends, esp at this age kids can be fun and do cool more 'adult' stuff like adventure activites or even just movies and chill. If you had said you are scheduled to work weekends or something that might be more understandable but it does read that you want to have your weekends free for recreation and he should not.
Parent posting has the child 208 nights a year
Other parent (the dad referred to in OP) has them 157
Moving to one weekend a month would mean primary parent posting would have 232 nights a year and other parent is 133. This does shift the balance of care considerably.
Instead perhaps looking at alternatives to maintain similar amount of nights but shift some to a weekend, or allow time for discussions with a boss if you are working to rearrange the schedule. One parent should never have to have full care on weekends in a split family, everyone has a right to some free time away from their kids on the weekends if they want to. If they have another partner perhaps they would like to start a date night once a month if their other child is old enough and that is healthy in a relationship and you should not begrudge them that., or perhaps they do want to go out with friends, that is their right as well as not all adult activities are suitable for children to attend and there may be an instance that their other child is being babysat by its maternal grandparents who are not comfortable caring for your child and it is hard for them to go out.
Once a month is more than reasonable.
Wow you are extremely selfish!! So you get every weekend to do whatever you want while dad HAS THE 12YO EVERY WEEKEND and here you are putting him down! He has done the hardest as I'm guessing your child is at school on your days? How about saying you will do 1 week on and 1 week off? Poor dad! Give him a break
Also he is probably wanting to spend time with his other child alone while he is home! And you are just worried about your free time!
Yes you are. It's one weekend a month. You get three others for You.
When the child reaches adulthood, has no close bond and eventually just fades away to minimal/no contact, then you will know just how selfish this was.
Do either of you have siblings? Maybe the child could stay with them and their cousins regularly to give Dad a break if you don't want to spend that time with them. Better that than dreading feeling like an imposition every month with you.