Dealing with a Difficult Ex as a Single Mom

How do you deal with a difficult ex, and his family, when you have kids?  I’ve been trying to figure that one out for ten years now!  From accumulative experiences, I’d like to be able to say I have discovered the perfect solution on how best to handle a difficult ex, but I don’t have one. I also realize for many of you reading this, the impact your ex may have on you, depends on so many different factors.  No magic wands here.

What I think can be said for all of us, is there is a reason why our ex, is our ex.  Our reasons may differ, but if you’re now a single mom, like me, you may be feeling extremely frustrated, hurt, and hopeless, in your attempts to co-parent. 

After ten years, my ex is still bitter, and is verbally abusive to me, with his insults, and accusations, and I wouldn’t put it past him to try to hurt me, if he thought he could get away with it.  So how in the world have we been coping for ten years!

How do you remain civil, and be able to co-parent, with someone, who despises you openly, regardless of what any court papers may spell out in the way of not talking bad about the other parent in front of the kids? My ex has made it his personal mission in life, to undermine my role as a parent, and he has repeatedly attempted to enlist our kids, to be his soldiers, in his ongoing war against me, contributing, if not causing, our firstborn, who is now 18, to lose her faith in God.

What I’ve chosen to do when I feel like I can’t be civil to my ex is to keep my distance from him, as much as possible. ‘Professionally civil’ is the best way I know to describe how I’ve mostly acted around my ex, when circumstances have forced us to be together, circumstance like a school event. What I’m calling professionally civil is when I remain calm, and selective in my choice of words, so as to not make matters worse for myself, or my kids.

There’s been many times when I felt good about the way I acted during one of my ex’s many attacks on me. Like the time he demanded I change my last name from his, he threatened to sue me if I didn’t comply. He made a scene about it during an open house at our son’s elementary school, after our son’s teacher addressed me as ‘Mrs. Garrison’. From this experience, and other experiences like it, I believe you will always look like the better person for trying to be friendly, even when your ex is being hostile. To me, there is a big difference between being someone’s friend, and being friendly.

Early on in my attempts to be ‘friendly’ to my ex, and his family, I’d go out of my way to show that I recognized them as my kids’ family. For example, despite a tight budget, I’d purchase extra holiday, and school photos, for them, only to have my kids’ tell me how they heard, while on visitation, their dad and his family complaining about me not sending enough pictures for everyone.

Another attempt to be friendly, on my part was to make my ex, and his family, aware of church and school functions, for my oldest child, only for them to show up in herds, purposely excluding me, and trying to capture my youngest child’s attention, at my exclusion.

Many times my circumstances have been bigger than me. Realize that some circumstances are bigger than you. So don’t be too hard on yourself, if you do end up getting caught up in a verbal tug-a-war. Learn from it, and remember you’ll have another opportunity to take the ‘high road.’

In addition to what the court may have written in our divorce decree, I have continually struggled with him, and his family, to recognize practical, and reasonable, boundaries for me, and my kids.

I’ve had to continually remind myself that they no longer control me. I DO have a choice in matters involving my kids! During my nine year marriage, I allowed my husband, and his mother, to control much of what went on in our household, and with our kids, in order to keep the peace. It was a mistake.

Another mistake I made, is not obtaining a temporary restraining order against my ex, early on in the divorce. I was too emotional, and intimated to do it. Temporary restraining orders are to document any stalking, and trespassing from your ex.

At first it seemed like an odd coincidence for my ex to keep popping up next to me, when I was in the car, driving with the kids in the backseat, soon after our divorce. Hadn’t ever happened in nine years of marriage, and then all of a sudden it was happening several times a day. I realized he was stalking us, and boldly! He’d begin waving emphatically, once spotted. When I threatened to call the police, if he didn’t stop following me, he responded, “Go ahead! They’ll just know you’re crazy! I’m just driving, I can’t help that you happen to be going where I’m going.”

Around the same time, my neighbor witnessed my ex placing a ladder on the side of the house, and climbing through my bedroom window, and carrying out stereo equipment, and DVDs, I called the police, and the policeman advised me not to press charges, and to drop it, because he told me that since the house was in both our names, even though we were in the middle of a long, drawn out divorce, that my ex wouldn’t be considered a ‘trespasser.’ The officer made me feel like I had done something wrong by calling the police.

Shortly after that experience, I moved the kids and me into an apartment, signing over the house to my ex’s mother, as she showed up at the door one day, with pen and paper asking for my signature to let her take care of the house. Three addresses later, and ten years since the divorce, my ex still gives out my address as his own, to bill collectors, and sales people, and blames me for the foreclosure on the house I signed over.

Early on, I did beef up my security system, and changed my locks. I also changed all my phone numbers, so if he were to listen-in on my calls, he would be committing a crime, since my new phone numbers, had never been in his name.

Over the years, whenever something has happened on my property, like spilled gasoline, or scratches on the doorknob, I’d change my locks again, just to be on the safe side.

I’ve tried to follow, co-parenting strategies, I’ve read about, only to experience failure, after failure, in my attempts to create only an ‘in the now, about our kids communication, rule.

One thing I’m proud of is that I refused to fight in front of our kids after the divorce. I’ve tried to demonstrate to my kids how we can be calm, and positive, even with difficult people. Many times, I’ve put up a good front, for my kids, knowing they pay attention to my words, and actions. I’ll admit, I’ve felt ashamed, more than once, by not filtering my speech completely. Kids are perceptive, and they remember what we say, even when we don’t.

I’ve reminded myself numerous times that not all battles are worth winning at the expense of losing the war. I tell myself all will be made right, in time, and I believe that taking the high road, no matter how difficult it feels in the moment, positions us better in the future.

Remembering that whenever I’ve been sucked up in the toxic game playing, it has only lead me to more pain, and agony, then what compelled me to fight back in the first place.

I will say there is something to saturation therapy. The idea, that if you over expose yourself to whatever it is you fear, you’ll no longer be affected by it. In theory, if you’re afraid of spiders, than lock yourself in a room full of spiders, until you’re no longer afraid of them.

My skin is definitely thicker, and I can turn a deaf ear, when I need to tune out. Most of my ex’s threats have not come true.

To avoid fighting in front of my kids, I’ve used e-mail, as a means of communicating with my ex. My ex consistently used the phone to berate me. So I told him that he needed to communicate about the kids in writing. There became a pattern, he’d refuse to use the e-mail communication, by ignoring mine, or he would use the e-mail as another platform to criticize me. But when I finally succeeded in limiting all communication to e-mail, it kept me from feeling like a victim, who had to listen to his verbal ranting and raving every time something needed to be communicated about the kids.

Now I have pages, and pages, and pages, of yuck, that he’s written about me, to me, that have nothing to do with our kids immediate issues, at the time the e-mails were written, for example:

My e-mail:

Re: Children

[child’s name] has an extra ball practice on Tuesday. Is there any way you could come to the gym and pick [child’s name] after practice for your visitation, rather than the usual meeting place?

His e-mail:

Re: Fwrd: Fwrd: Fwrd: Fwrd:Fwrd: Re: Children

You are a horrible mother! And you were a horrible wife! You don’t know what is best for children! How could you force [child’s name] to play ball, just because you want [child’s name] to play! I won’t be any part of it! You meet me at the Shell Station, and not a minute late, just as the legal papers dictate, need I remind you. You never were very good with following instructions! Read Section 6; Paragraph c & e, that is, if you still have your papers!!!!

…And on and on and on, leaving me saying, ‘what?’ So many times, I’d respond to his pages, and pages, with a question mark, ‘?’

Some well-tended people have told me I should delete all of my ex’s angry, hateful, spiteful e-mails. Although, it’s true that to read his insults, and accusations, does put me in a bad mental, and emotional place, I have kept all of these e-mails, and his own words has proven helpful in a court of law.

From my experience, you must be able to weed out what is legally relevant, and what just makes you feel bad. For one, do not expect your attorney to read through a box full of these accusatory e-mails.

Remember most divorce attorneys are paid between $175 and $500, per hour. Do you really have the money to pay an attorney that much money to read through all that yuck? From my experience, they won’t do it, but they will use relevant content, if pointed out for them, for example, my ex wrote “I refuse your request to meet me half-way for my visitation visits, and there is absolutely nothing you can say or do to make me change my mind! You’ll just have to take me to court!” So when he said in a court of law, months later, “I didn’t know she had a problem with the drive.” His own written words clearly said he did know, and refused to compromise, without involving the expensive courts.

I learned a long time ago, I can't control my ex’s words, and it doesn’t matter if the divorce decree clearly states for neither of us to talk badly about the other in front of our kids. When your kids are out, with their dad, he can say whatever he wants to say, and if his words are brought before a judge, he can deny he said anything. For me, I’ve tried my best to teach my kids my opinions, and truths as a way to contradict the lies there dad says about me. Over the years, any other actions I’ve taken to make my ex stop speaking badly about me, have left me broke, and more frustrated.

There is only one thing we can do for sure, and that’s control what we do. When our kids are old enough, they will make their own decision about their relationship with their dads. What we consider emotional abuse can be debated, and is very subjective. I’ve tried hard not share my opinions, or thoughts to my kids, about their dad, or about any of his family. It has been so difficult at times, to not badmouth my ex, in front my kids, especially when my kids have parroted horrendous accusations that he has made about me, to them. I’d give myself a B- on how well I’ve done with this, over the last ten years.

Over the years, my greatest fear is my ex succeeding at taking my kids away from me, with his lies about me being an unfit mom. What has helped me most in dealing with his malicious accusations is coming to grips with the fact that my ex has to prove the very lies that he is telling. So think! How is he able to do this?

Unless proven, his accusations are hearsay evidence in court, and he can’t prove to the courts all the lies he is telling. That was liberating when I began grasping this truth. It took a long time.

I’ve had some dark times through his character assignations, and it has helped, during these times, to remind myself of all the positive things about my life, and to not start believing his lies about me. Don’t begin to believe your ex’s lies about you! No matter how many times he repeats them! Or who he claims believes him!

So what tips can I leave you with from my experiences?

First, hindsight being what it is, if you are dealing with an unreasonable, empowered man, and you are dealing with limited, borrowed funds, I recommend hiring a detective, and let the detective hunt down some dirt on your ex, rather than pay an expensive attorney to shuffle paperwork. Most divorce attorneys are paid between $175 and $500 per hour, and many of them require up to $10,000 retainer fees, to be paid full, before any service is provided.

Also, tape your conversations with your ex! I wish I had done this! I’ve heard, many judges will allow tapes to be played in court, and be used as evidence.

Another recommendation is to figure out what is the worst thing that can happen? Then mentally prepare yourself for that circumstance, should it occur.

You may want to consider the worst of what has happened, checking yourself out. Is there something you are doing that’s sparking the fire? Not to make anyone feel bad, but to maybe help you know what to avoid. I’ve questioned myself, this same way.

The hardest part for me

The hardest part for me was giving my children over to my ex, for visitation, trying to convince myself that I was doing the right thing because he was their dad, telling myself that regardless of my experiences with him, he would be different with them, because he was their dad. Taking the advice of my attorney, I agreed to legal visitation for their dad, in spite of my personal fears.

I knew the odds were good that he’d be abusive to them, especially since I’d already seen evidence of his abusive behavior towards them. That is putting hot sauce in the mouth of our nine month old, or putting our baby underwater, as an infant, to prove that babies automatically hold their breath when put under water, or holding our toddler over a rock wall. Some of you reading this may be judging me. “How could you let him take the kids, if he did all those things?”

The attorney asks at the time of our divorce, “Why did you stay in the marriage for so long, if you felt like your kids were in danger?” When I told my attorney that I was trying to make my marriage work, he also told me, “No judge is going to believe you stayed with him as long as you did, if you really believed your children were in danger. He could end up having your kids more, rather than less time, if you push the supervised visitation notion.”  So according to my attorney, I had little hope for supervised visitation with their dad, even though our kids were rarely left alone with their dad, during our marriage.

It disturbs me greatly the struggle between wanting to protect my kids, and not wanting to exclude them from a having a dad. I know he’s been irresponsible, and harmful, with our kids. Yet, he is their dad, and if he claims he wants a relationship with them, and that he loves them, then wouldn’t there be a limit to his ability to harm them? As a mom, it takes a huge amount of courage either way, whether you choose to protect your kids from their dad, by separation, or whether you make your kids leave you, and go with their dad, for extended legal visits.

I’m not alone

I do realize that I am certainly not alone in my struggles dealing with a difficult ex.

No matter how bad we may feel about our ex, our kids our worth the effort to figure out better ways of dealing with a difficult ex. It wounds are kids, when they do not have a good relationship with both their mom, and their dad. This is not to guilt, it’s just a fact. Joyce Meyers said on her TV program, “If you heal a child, you won’t have to repair an adult.” So how do we heal our kids, when we cannot control our ex?

As similar or different our situations may be, all of us need to maintain boundaries, and we all need safe people in our lives.

So my last tip is to encourage you to cultivate positive relationships with people who want what is best for you, and your kids, and who are not attracted to drama, and aren’t hasty in their recommendations for your life, and the lives of your kids.