Divorce Support Forums: take her to her mom's if dad's not home?

You're not being silly, but I don't kown what to do about it. My husband's ex plays the same games. On spring break, during my husband's time, I stayed home with the kids. The ex was furious, saying she'd rather thay stay ALONE at HER house during the day, rather than with me. But she coulnd't figure out how to do it. If the kid was not with the other parent for 6 waking hours, there was supposed to be right of first refusal to babysit. SO, one day, she made certian he got called to be awakened at 9am. She confirmed that his father was at work (so was she). She worked till 3, then took off the rest of the day and came to our house, called him & told him to pack his bags, he was going home. Now, my husband was due home in 2 hours, but the kid had been without either parent (just me, a step-parent) for 6, so she felt she had the right to order the kid to go home. I'd been suspicious about what was going on, because he was being relatively surly & secretive, taking a call every half hour, and refusing to do anything, none of the things he enjoyed, nothing... it was strange. He wouldn't let me take him to a friend's hosue to play, or invite a friend over, or take him to the mall or a movie or the gym. NOTHING. And at 3pm it became clear what the game was.

Well, my husband was scheduled to get off work at 5pm, so he called to say there was no "packing" needed for this babysitting time, that she couldu pick the kid up, take him home (in the rush hour traffic that had started, it'd take till 3:45 to get there), and he'd be there at 5:10 to pick the kid up.

Just a little exercise in power & control (she was an abusive spouse, so this is no surprise to us), and using the child as a weapon (she is narcissistic, so it shouldn't have been a surprise, but we're learnign more & more about this as we go along).

The therapist reamed her out for it. But she didn't care, she'd "won", and forced everyone to do as she wanted at that point. We now have a new little clause in the parenting plan to account for her telling the kids not to do what I say when they're in their father's house. And makeup time for the spring break that she interrupted (my husband eventually allowed her to keep the kids for the whole break as she had demanded, to minimize the effect on THEM of her attempts to turn them into little weapons.

The mothers who do this are absolutely unjustified, and our therapist handled it well, but I have no idea how to advise you to handle it. I know when it happened to me, I was just appalled by the extent to which this woman was willing to go, JUST to hurt everyone involved (including the kids & their relationship with their fahter & new stepmother). How awful.

In your case, you are even more justified, as the relationship you ahve with the child is a whole lot longer-standing than mine with my own stepkids.

Good luck & let me konw how it works out. I'm DYING to hear how others respond to this type of nonsense.