I’ve always said I never want to shittalk JDawg to Isobel. And I don’t. Her visits with him, it’s all about “have fun with Daddy!”
I will occassionally let out some stuff about the situation or choices he is or has made while she is in the near vacinity and I figure I can get away with that for a little bit longer – not much, but a bit – until she puts together that his name=him. And once she does get it, I will no longer do any talking about him outside of the perfuntorily announced visit times or the positive. Where she can hear it.
But I reserve the right to shittalk him, to some (fair) extent on this blog.
So here’s the deal:
We split up again and I didn’t let him see her until after our first court appearance – almost three weeks. Then, he had her for a bit of park time on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and from 3 to bedtime on the weekends. This past week, we changed it based on his request for more “me time” and Isobel’s lack of routine. So he got to visit with her from 10 to 3 yesterday and today.
All in all, she comes home from the visits happy enough. She’s not really upset when he leaves and she’s happy to see me and relax. But issues exist from my perspective, which I want to share with you in the hopes that you’ll give me your opinion on what I should do (if anything) about today’s visit.
- Out of all of the visits they’ve had in the past five weeks, she’s come home without a soaked diaper twice. I give him diapers and wipes. She often says when she wants to change her bum and will announce when she is/has to poop. It doesn’t seem like a huge issue to me to change her, and given her proclivity for diaper rashes, it’s kind of a necessity.
- She’s never come home clean. She’s usually covered in dirt, has been eating it, her clothes are filthy and her shoes are wet.
- She’s usually unfed. Apparently, she will not eat. Except for all of the times he fed her McDonalds – then she would eat. I pack a kid’s backpack for her, filled with snacks and drinks every visit, and especially since I was told that it was unfair for him to have to spend money to feed her when he’s already paying so much in support. Kinda makes sense, regardless of how exasperating it is.
- She usually has come home with skinned knees and elbows and once had a wood chip stuck in the bottom of her foot. Kids fall, sure. But you know, cleaning the gravel and dirt out of her knee after it’s already been in there for two hours? A little frustrating.
- There’s some stuff that I don’t think is safe enough that he’s told me they do. Like him letting her go down a 10 foot high slide by herself while he waits at the bottom for her. She tends to walk off the edges of shit, so that’s something I wouldn’t chance, personally, and he told me once that she decided to jump off the side of it around the seven foot point – but he caught her, so I should stop worrying.
- After we appeared at court again, we took the elevator together. I had Isobel’s stroller and he was carrying her. Then he put her down and stopped paying attention and I was trapped in the corner by the stroller as I saw him not noticing that she was about to get her hand stuck in the door of the elevator. I said, “watch out!” but he wasn’t close enough apparently (she was three inches in front of him) and when the door opened to our floor, her hand and wrist went with it. I had to throw the stroller out of the way and grab her arm and pull it out while she screamed and people outside of the elevator stared at us in horror. As he gasped and talked about watching it in slow motion.
Then there was today, when he brought her back and said she had a burn. A sunburn, I figured. “What kind of burn, from what?” I asked.
“A cigarette, ” he shared. And went on to explain that he had tossed it on the ground and she’d jumped down from something (a bench, I’m guessing) and picked it up. “I burned my hand, too, getting her to drop it, if that makes you happier,” was how he ended the story. I asked where they were and how it had happened, trying to figure out if he was really that much of a moron that he wouldn’t put out a cigarette fully in a place where children play.
He yelled at me that it was an accident (which could have been a lack of accountability, or guilt and embarassment). And I gave him the look of death and told him that he was not going to yell at me about this. I asked him why he hadn’t cleaned it. He didn’t have the means, he said.
And hadn’t iced it either since he was no where near any ice. I asked again where they were and he told me. I pointed out that he could have gone to any of the surrounding by restaurants, concession stands and the ever-present Starbuckses. And he excused himself about it by saying that he didn’t want her to be late getting home.
So now, my baby’s finger is swollen and she won’t let me touch it. This is what it looked like when I took a picture earlier in the afternoon. See that poor little middle finger?
Now I know that I will automatically be looking for things he’s doing wrong. I know I will see a lack of parenting (but really, isn’t there one?) and consistency and safety. And sure, it could have happened with me, I suppose.
Except that I would never throw a smoke on the ground beside my daughter, especially without putting it out. And even if I left a lit smoke on the ground beside where my daughter could jump down and grab it, I would have stopped her from picking it up within the three seconds it would have taken her to do it, even if it meant knocking her on her ass in the other direction.
I have these fears that she will not be safe or taken care of while she’s with him. This is the major reason why she has never had an overnight visit with him. I used to think it was all owing to alcohol and weed, which is why we put the sobriety for 12 hours restriction on his visits.
But now I’m thinking that he’s just negligent.
And he wants overnight visits. Or did two weeks ago, anyways. And I’m still having a bit of a heart attack over that concept.
So, this is where I open the comments to you and ask what you would suggest I do, knowing that any action I take will be non-reversable in JDawg’s eyes.
