Dear Prudence: Clashing With My Wife's Partner Over Our Daughter

[minoanmiss]

Dear Prudence,
My marriage ended because my wife had a late-in-life epiphany that she was gay. After we separated, she and her friend “Carole” began dating. It’s probably pointless to speculate about when they actually got together, although I can’t help but wonder sometimes. I try to concentrate on our 9-year-old daughter (we split custody fifty-fifty), but Carole keeps sticking her oar in. She calls me directly and tries to tell me how to raise my own child. They’re vegan, so I can’t take her out for pizza; I can’t take her to the fair because they’ve grounded her; etc.

I’ve told my ex I only want to speak to her about our kid, barring emergencies, and have reminded them both of our custody agreement. It works for a little while, then Carole starts up again. I recently bought a two-seater sports car and went to pick up my daughter from school, only to find out Carole had told another parent that I would be picking up her daughter as well as my own. This was news to me, I couldn’t fit both girls in the car, and Carole ended up having to leave work early to take the girl home. Everyone was irritated. Carole told me I needed to grow up and that my car was “ridiculous.” If the girls weren’t there, I would have lost my temper. I told Carole she needed to learn to stay in her lane, as she wasn’t the parent here. I ended up fighting with my ex over the phone later. I ended the conversation by saying I was done dealing with this, and next time I would be getting in contact with a lawyer. We have not been to court because I didn’t want to make my daughter’s life more difficult. My ex doesn’t make much money. I want at least to be a civil co-parent with my former wife, but Carole is making that impossible.

—Failing Civility

I don’t think it’s just Carole who’s making a civil co-parenting relationship difficulty. Your ex-wife seems perfectly happy to let her girlfriend interfere with your custody agreement and you deal with the fallout. It may seem less obvious because her passivity is less visible, but your ex is at the very least choosing to overlook Carole’s involvement. And without demonizing Carole, it’s fair for you to object when you receive after-the-fact, contradictory information about your daughter’s needs, limits, or punishments from your ex’s girlfriend. As long as your ex and Carole are together, it’s probably unrealistic to think you’ll be able to avoid Carole completely. But I don’t think your idea of getting in touch with a lawyer is necessarily a bad one. Your previous informal custody agreement is no longer serving any of you well, and it might help to get everyone on the same page and make sure that all of your obligations are laid out clearly.

That doesn’t mean you have to be maximally combative. You can reach out to your ex, see if she’s willing to meet with you and a lawyer or mediator, and ask for her cooperation, rather than saying, “I’ll see you in court and Carole in hell.” For the present, whenever possible, politely disengage whenever Carole tries to get in touch with you. You can at least decide to be calm no matter how much she frustrates you. She can’t keep you from being a civil co-parent—that will always remain within your power.

Comments

[angelofthenorth]

My advice is to talk to your daughter, LW, and see how she feels about what's happening. Be guided by her, a little. Obviously you're the parent, but without asking leading questions get an idea of the wider context. Divorce is difficult for children at the best of times, no matter how amicable. She may benefit from a couple of sessions with a counsellor, just to talk.

I say this because it sounds like she's in a bit of a warzone, and all the adults need to step back, and look at the effect that they're having on her. She is the most important person in all this.

If you can afford a new sports car, you can afford some mediation as well. I know it's hard being the bigger person, but a positive relationship with your child is worth a few bucks, surely?

[lavendertook]

I agree with you--foregrounding the daughter's well being is prime, but I'd leave the sore spot of his car out of the advice. Carole had to have known it was a 2 seater when she invited the other child and she did it to show how irresponsible and inadequate to serve his child a 2 seater is, a critique which is none of her business, even if it were accurate, and he probably got it so he wouldn't be able to accommodate Carole and the ex, which is his right.

The less LW allows his ex to pit Carole against him by being water and letting Carole roll off him and focus on his daughter and not his own chagrin, the less he'll have to contend with her. The ex needs therapy to help her grow a spine of her own, and then she'll be done with Carole, and maybe daughter will get a choice as to whether or not she is vegan. But ex is probably getting too much satisfaction watching the wrestling match she set up to change anything except what she puts on her popcorn.

[azurelunatic]

This mixes reasonable co-parenting expectations and unreasonable ones.

To me, dictating a school age kid's diet beyond medical mandate, allergies, intolerances, and aversions is usually over the line, with an exception for religion. (I would not sit well with forcing a Jewish kid to eat pork pepperoni and cheese pizza, for example.) I think non medically mandated veganism should be a personal choice.

I don't hold with not enforcing just and proportionate punishments. If the kid does something that warrants grounding, keep the kid grounded. This is setting the stage to play one set of parents against the other. (If the punishment is unjustified, that's another situation.)

Signing someone up to do something out of routine without asking or at least notifying them is an asshole move, and Carole should not have done that.

[conuly]

I don't hold with not enforcing just and proportionate punishments. If the kid does something that warrants grounding, keep the kid grounded. This is setting the stage to play one set of parents against the other. (If the punishment is unjustified, that's another situation.)

Yes and no. If Carole and Mom knew in advance that Dad had planned to go to the fair when he had the kid, then Mom should've discussed the issue with him before issuing a punishment that would keep him from doing that. Taking away pre-planned outings, especially when that hits the other parent more than you, is not something to do lightly or unilaterally.

[kutsuwamushi]

I think non medically mandated veganism should be a personal choice.

I think it's reasonable for parents who are in agreement to have a vegan household and to only buy or prepare vegan food. I don't think that religious reasons to have should have special privileges over non-religious moral reasons. It kind of irks me when they are treated as less important or worthy of respect. I'm not a vegan, but many people are because they legitimately believe that it is the right thing to do. And done right a vegan diet can be healthy for most, so it's not like the child is being neglected/deprived.

(I guess it irks me as a lifelong atheist because the implication is I can never have any moral principles that are as important or as worthy as respect as religious ones. I don't think that's true, though.)

At a certain age children do have the ability to make their own choices about their diet and decide that they want to eat animal products, but unless they come to the conclusion that they're morally obligated to eat animal products, I don't see why their parents should should be expected to prepare them. They could eat animal products when someone else makes the meal.

The parents aren't in agreement here, though. You have one vegan parent and on non-vegan parent and there is no reason that either should enforce a change at the other's household.

[conuly]

Unless it's the child who's the vegan. I don't think that's the most intuitive reading of this letter, but it's certainly possible. If that's the case, though, and Child didn't want to tell Dad about it directly, then Mom should've been the one to intercede.

[kutsuwamushi]

I don't get that reading from the letter but yeah, if the child is vegan then the dad should respect that.

[lilysea]

I recently bought a two-seater sports car and went to pick up my daughter from school, only to find out Carole had told another parent that I would be picking up her daughter as well as my own. This was news to me, I couldn’t fit both girls in the car, and Carole ended up having to leave work early to take the girl home. Everyone was irritated.

Volunteering someone else's time like this is ONLY ok if there's an emergency like
a) a parent is in hospital or
b) a parent has a migraine and can't safely drive.

[conuly]

Wow, Carole's behavior is... wow. Even accounting for a little grain-of-salt, I still... wow.

[lemonsharks]

I see a lot of LW's bruised ego here, and his comment about his ex's salary sets me on edge. I don't necessarily believe he has his daughter's best interests at heart.

Some information I would like:

- Has Carole been in the daughter's life as a quasi-parental figure before Ex-Wife left LW for her? If so, Carole's involvement is not actually a big change.

- Does LW have any history of homophobia, and/or is he any flavor of conservative/Republican? If so, that's an instant cannot-be-trusted.

Advice I'd give to the ex-wife and Carole is: See a good lawyer immediately and prepare for ex-husband to go nuclear.

Advice I'd give to LW: suck it up and start acting like an adult.

ETA Preemptive response to we-don't-have-that-information-from-the-letter: LW is a cis man whose wife left him for another woman, who he thinks was her affair partner during their marriage. That's enough information for me to mistrust him, and urge caution to his ex wife. I have absolutely no sympathy for this guy.

[xenacryst]

I'm with you.

"I don’t think it’s just Carole and your ex who are who’s making a civil co-parenting relationship difficulty."

There, Prudence, I fixed that for you.

[jadelennox]

We don't know he's cis.

And late-in-life epiphanies of queerness happen in all kinds of happy marriages, like late-in-life epiphanies of transness, and even the best of intentions and the bestest of friends can't always save a relationship when that happens. Nothing about being a person whose partner leaves you after they discover they're sexually or romantically incompatible makes either the leaver or the leavee untrustworthy.

[lemonsharks]

I strongly disagree.

[jadelennox]

I'm glad Pru said it's not bad to call a lawyer. I'm a big fan of contracts and formal agreements to make things less combative, if entered into in the right spirit. It's good to acknowledge that making less money can screw over his daughter's mother in court, but having a casual agreement can screw over everyone.

I mean, a formal arrangement will formalize LW's responsibilities, as well as his rights. Does he have to pay tuition? Medical bills? Can he bail on his custody days when his girlfriend is over, or his boss schedules a sudden business trip? Does he have to do PTA meetings or doctors' appointments? It's not clear from the letter if they're really doing joint custody or if he's trying to be Fun Dad with flying visits to pizza and the fair; a formal agreement can get Carole off his back but equally means he has to take his daughter to the orthodontist.