My Daughter's Reaction to Her Gm's Presence

Classic. Don't you love it when others get involved? My husband's ex used to put her brother, her 2nd husband, anyone else on the phone or in the room.

Your EH was childish - he needs to be a father first. If he really couldn't face you, he could have emailed you that he'd pull up out front. I think 2.4 is a little young to have to walk from the mom's front door to the dad's car by herself, but it would have been preferable to a surprise visit from Grandma. Still, advance notice was too much to ask? And how chicken is he that he's annoyed so he calls in his mother?

Kids often have trouble with transition. Secondly, your daughter was expecting Dad, not GM. Third, the woman went on a tear about you in front of her granddaughter. Obviously, she's less concerned with the child than with anything else. So of course your daughter didn't want any part of it.

I'd suggest that you contact your EH if that's permitted (phone, email, letter) and say that this was really negative for your daughter. She needs stability, as others have said. Reiterate the agreed-upon "exchange" - at your front door or whatever it is. No substitutions unless discussed in advance AND AGREED TO. If that isn't possible or if it doesn't work, then have your lawyer call his lawyer.

I would try to find out if something specific has cause your daughter's reaction, but it could also be that your daughter is very sensitive and picked up the super-pissed-off vibe your ex MIL was giving off.

As a child of divorce, I want to let you know that your daughter more than ever needs stability.

This means the same drop off and pick ups with the same person. It needs to be as calm as possible. The adults involved must suck it up for your daughters sake.

If anyone participating in this cannot control themselves, they need to be told they are not to participate.

Your child in her mind is thinking.. "I am leaving mom and I am going to be picked up by dad. I am going to spend time with DAD."

Unless your husband calls ahead and I mean the day before and speaks with daughter and explains.. "I will pick you up tomorrow and then WE are going to go and see grandma," then your child will not expect to
1. be picked up by grandma
2. know they will be spending time with grandma..

This does not in ANY way mean your child does not love or enjoy spending time with her grandmother.. it means your daughter needs to have a heads up about what is going on.

This is an extremely stressful time EACH and every time for your child, until it is a routine AND the child is mature enough to know they are safe and are going to be returned back to their home. And yes, dads house can have your daughters room too.

Some parents just take their children all over the place without giving them the heads up on what to expect, what will happen next etc.. I know I was never like this.

I liked knowing what the day would bring. If it was the usual schedule, I was fine, but if there were going to be changes, I did a lot better having the heads up. Our daughter is the same.. My husband is ADHD, so every moment can be a surprise to him, Hee, hee..

IF your MIL cannot ho;d her tongue. you could always get a restraining order.
Remind her that whatever she has heard from her son about anything going on with this divorce is between you and your ex.. She is not to mention it to anyone else especially your daughter. also she is only hearing his side and I would doubt she would want to hear your version of the whole thing.. from your perspective.

Hang in there. I HATED this stuff as a child. It made my physically ill. It made me nervous, sad, and helpless.. I just wanted my parents to at least pretend they could speak with each other without the awful drama.. I still get upset remembering, I also still have bad dreams about it and I am 51.

1. I think your Ex was being a bit of a child pouting in the car over something the court decided.

2. It appears as if G'ma has a chip on her shoulder the size of a mountain and really doesn't like you. Your little one could be picking up on this.

When you bring this up at the next court "thing" make sure you tell them you want the right to cancel your Ex's time with your daughter should he not be the one to actually come pick her up. I'm not sure if you can ask for this, but you can try.

Good luck.

call your attorney and explain the situation. It is probably you both you and your child that GM is NOT involved and since you and your eh seem cordial he doesn't need to get his mother involved. Unrest in front of the child is harmful and not necessary. If he continues with this behavior then unfortunately you might need to go back to court. Good luck............it's hard as I know and remember!!

Of course, I completely agree with you that your ex-MIL was completely out of line, yeesh! You didn't mention what the other GM melt-down was about, but, the my first thought while reading about your daughter's reaction at pick-up was that at her age, any type of shift to the routine or HER plans can cause a melt down. She was expecting her Daddy to come get her and have "their" time together, and here comes GM and ruins that! She might have thought that she wasn't seeing daddy at all, the plans have changed, and she melted. Just my thought, hopefully that's all it was.

I'm on my phone so forgive me in advance for typos, but you do not by law have to release her to the grandmother under any circumstance except if the court orders it. The order is for custody between you and your childs father, grandma has ZERO rights to her under a typical custody order, unless otherwise specified. Also, most court orders require you to not speak about the proceedings in front of the child, or allow any other person to either. I would not allow your daughter to be in contact with the grandmother at all in your presence. If your ex allows it, there's not much you can do but I would put an immediate stop to that.

I would make it clear that for right now, only HE is to pick up your daughter, and you don't need any contact with his mother whatsoever. If you have to go back to court to make that happen, then so be it.

However, I wouldn't jump to conclusions that something negative must have happened with the grandmother because of how your daughter reacted. My daughter went through a phase where she couldn't stand even the sight of my mother and would freak out whenever we were around her, and I have no idea WHY she had the reactions that she did - there was simply no logical reason for it. We actually lived with my mom for a period of time when we moved back to my home state and were waiting for our house to be built and DD was fine with this (it was from when DD was 13 months to 20 months old). My mother regularly took care of her when I had to work. Then we moved into our new house, and right after that, DD would flip out whenever she saw my mom - at our house, in the car, anytime. This went on for about 6 months and finally DD just came around on her own and was fine again.

Your daughter might have been reacting to your ex's mother's demeanor, she might have been expecting her father and not her, she might had just been having a typical random toddler moment where she decides she is going to freak out and cling to Mommy. Whatever the reason, I would just stipulate that the only person allowed to pick her up is her father - if it cannot be him, the visit doesn't happen until he can be there.

I don't know, but she is...without a doubt showing you signs of distress. Since things are already bad, I would have mentioned it to the grandma. Like, "Susie" is afraid to go with you right now. Has everything been okay when she's with you guys...? Mention that she isn't handling the divorce well and if we could just treat her with a lot of kindness and sensitivity...not raising voices or arguing around her, controlling tempers, etc.

I had to decode your post...In all the years I have been posting, I have never seen the abbreviations "EH" or "GM"...learned something new.

Good luck.

Can a court order specify exactly which people are and are not allowed to pick up a child on the parent's behalf? I don't know myself, but I would assume that you can have the court order on visitation amended legally so that it lists which people are allowed to pick up your child -- and no others. If I were expecting the ex to pick up our child, and another person (even one I knew) turned up, I would need to find out before letting the child go, whether the ex were sick? Out of town? Who would be taking the child where?

It makes sense to me that the court order could limit who does pickups, because in situations (not yours) where perhaps one parent has a parent or sibling or girlfriend/boyfriend whom the other parent feels is toxic, or who has a criminal past or other issues, there should be ways to specify that only the parents - no one else-- can pick up the child. It does not, however, change the fact that once the child is in either parent's care, that parent can expose the child to anyone the parent chooses.

Since you and your EH seem to have positive and calm interactions regarding your child, I wonder if his mother is working on him to let her be the pickup person and spend more time with your daughter? It seems as if he might have let her do the pickup in order to calm Mom down or give in to Mom's hounding him to let her do it. This is a slippery slope; will Mom eventually turn up without him at all and say, "He told me to pick her up"?

How would he react if you very calmly and without harshness told him something like: "I understand your mom wants time with Daughter and I want you to know, I do believe Daughter needs to know her grandmother. But I would appreciate your being the one to pick up. Daughter was very resistant to going with your mom until she saw you were really there. It is probably just a toddler phase of wanting just mommy or daddy, but it would be easier on Daughter if you picked her up -- she will go in a calmer and happier state and can see your mom afterward. Also, at the pickup your mom, whom I wasn't expecting to see, used that time to try to talk to me about the court proceedings, and I felt that it was not the appropriate time or place to do that, especially with Daughter standing right there between us. Could you please ensure that you do the pickups yourself? If there is any change to that, please e-mail it to me in advance so I can prepare Daughter and she is not resistant." Plus -- e-mails mean you have a written record of everything. Important to keep permanently.

If he is balky about this, makes excuses for his mom, says his mom is going to be doing regular pick-ups, or if his mom starts coming on her own (without him there at all) saying she's doing the pick-ups -- time to get your lawyer on the phone fast and inform your ex that if he can't do pick-ups, you need to work out a new routine where he CAN do them himself. None of this is happening yet, of course, and it may all never get that far if you can calmly work it out with him now. It sounds like he might have an overbearing mom who talked him into letting her do this -- perhaps partly just so she could have a chance to harass you verbally without him there.