How do I protect my daughter?

I feel like I’ve hit a wall. I separated from my daughter’s father almost a year ago.

We separated for a number of reasons but mostly because I couldn’t trust him anymore after it had started coming out that he had been lying about a lot of things - little things, big things, petty things, anything - and even when confronted with the truth, he would swear he was being honest and say things like “why would I lie to you? I have no reason to lie. I love you too much to ever lie to you”. He wouldn’t help out around the house, even when all of our kids (8 in total) were with us at once. He never helped out with our daughter, apart from occasionally volunteering to put her down for her nap, which was an excuse for him to sit on our bed upstairs on his phone for an hour while she played and then eventually settled herself to sleep. (He sat on his phone and/or in front of the tv every day. He wasn’t working for half of our relationship, and not for the last 8 or so months leading up to our separation - by choice, not due to covid). My older kids from a previous relationship started to hate him but I felt guilty for his older kids, who I saw were getting emotionally/psychologically damaged by both biological parents. My kids would beg me to leave him, where his daughter in particular would tell me if her dad and I ever separated, she wanted to stay with me. I had tried to end it a number of times before he finally left but he would refuse and cry and make promises and I felt guilty because he would use his father’s passing when he was 16 as his reason for being the way he was.

I tried to also get him help many times during our relationship, which he also refused, apart from one couples counselling session but we never returned because he didn’t like the way the counsellor spoke to him. The final straw though being when he shamed and accused his daughter of lying when she told me things he didn’t want me to know, even after his 2 sons confirmed the truth.

Initially, he only came over to see me. He wanted “one more chance” and told me he was getting help for his issues (his sister is some form of counsellor). Once he realised he wasn’t getting anywhere with me, he started asking to see our daughter and we went through mediation to work out a parenting plan.

We initially agreed that I would supervise his time with our daughter at a park, each weekend. It initially worked out okay, aside from receiving emails from him saying our daughter cried and didn’t want to leave him, which wasn’t true, or emailing me to say he was preparing to take me to court and listing things that he was going to say about me in court (all lies and I can prove most of them with hard evidence). He wouldn’t allow me to stay close enough to supervise, and for the first few weeks, he got annoyed that I was the only one bringing water/snacks for our daughter and she had to come to me for those (even when I gave him the bag, she would bring those items over to me before he finally started bringing his own bag). It became extremely stressful and I was advised to move to externally supervised visits.

The first week after I advised I would no longer be supervising and would not attend unless a credited supervisor was confirmed to be attending, I got an email stating that he had shown up for our planned meeting at the park and his kids were devastated that I did not show up to bring their sister. I had clearly stated I would not be there, as well as the reasons why in multiple emails.

For over a month, he refused to organise an external supervisor and then I agreed to supervise again as a one-off on her second birthday (early November) and then again, he refused to organise a supervisor until my solicitor and I offered him a supervised visit for Christmas and he agreed due to the assumption it would be supervised by me again. When we stated this wasn’t the case, he did organise a supervisor.

He has now seen her twice with a credited supervisor, with a scheduled recurring time for every second weekend.

The problem now is that the supervisor has stated in the 2 reports so far that he has stated on one occasion “is that a black eye?” (It also states that the supervisor saw nothing of concern) on my daughter and has taken photos of bruises on her legs.

On FaceTime calls, he has constantly asked to see what shoes she is wearing today and, without thinking, I show him her shoes (she has a bit of an obsession with shoes). I’m now thinking he’s been trying to take photos of her body for bruises.

Our daughter is a super curious, super friendly, cheeky but super sweet little girl. She is the youngest of 8 children between her father and myself. She climbs things, she bumps into things and generally, like myself, she unfortunately bruises easily. She has also had some reactions to mosquito bites recently, which have caused her legs and arms to have hard lumps on them at the site of the bites (I have seen our gp about this previously also).

It’s making me a little anxious that he seems to be trying to build a case that I am abusing her?? I feel like I need to clarify here that I am absolutely not abusing my children. But just the thought of having to justify it and potentially not be believed is stressful because I know how much he lies and manipulates.

The other issue is, one of the reports from the supervisor came back with relevant details missing about the drop off time being delayed, and words I spoke to the supervisor at the end were not portrayed correctly. It is implied that I was late and then in no rush to pick up my daughter from her father, when I actually specifically said I allowed a few extra minutes to make up for the supervisor being late in the morning.

Also, when I arrived for pickup in the car park, I saw that the supervisor was sitting on a bench a few metres away from where my daughter and her father were, and he was on his phone. He may have been making notes, I don’t know but it didn’t seem right, based on the fact my ex could potentially be taking any other secret photos of my daughter while he’s not watching. He could pick her up and start running? It just didn’t seem right to me.

I advised my solicitor and emailed for a report amendment but the amended report is still not accurate, so I’ve requested another supervisor moving forward but I’m just feeling like seemingly “simple” cases, like this one are not taken seriously.

My older kids have an emotionally/psychologically abusive father. 2 of them are now in counselling at school because of this and we all struggle due to my ex’s behaviour. I can see the same signs now with my daughter’s dad and I don’t want the same for her.

My ex has also moved over an hour away since we separated, which also makes it hard.

When I talk to solicitors, mediators, advice lines, etc, I’m told this is mental abuse and that I have to protect my child/ren. I’m offered help line numbers, counselling, support etc for myself but told nothing can actually be done unless there are signs that this type of abuse has started to affect my daughter in the future. Why? She is so young. By the time the damage starts to show, it will be too late. Can it not continue to be shorter and/or supervised times with him that gradually increase until she is a little older and can at least communicate if things are affecting her, upsetting her, worrying her? How do I prevent my daughter being affected when she ends up in his unsupervised care?

I understand there is worse out there. I have been through worse when I was a child and adult but the psychological, emotional side of all of it is what never fades, no matter how much counselling I’ve done. I’m in my 30s and still affected. How do we protect our children? What can I do?

At this point, I keep getting told the outcome will fall in the hands of the judge we get in court but the closer that gets, the more I worry for my little girl :(