Childrens Father Being Hateful

Okay, quite honestly, this is clearly a one sided description. Frankly, it sounds like you were overreacting and nagging them. Is there a reason they can't be trusted to resolve the situation to their satisfaction? I doubt chores were more important than the child, but rather that they felt comfortable with the situation and irritated that you felt the need to be in charge.

Your children's father did get back to you. He said it didn't sound like the teacher yelled at them. He has the responsibility of several kids it sounds like so probably does have a lot of dishes and laundry to do. You don't say why you let your kids live with him but you did and do so this is the downside of that. Your son didn't say the teacher hit him. Say the teacher did yell at some of them. Maybe they deserved it. You need more to go to the school with anyway than a teacher yelled. But in general, your ex did respond but likely is a lot busier than you and you are letting him raise the kids in a way so you have to let him or take the kids back. You can't really have it both ways. If you don't trust him, then your kids should live with you.

how is this 'hateful'? it sounds as if he's busy parenting and doesn't have time to give you minute-by-minute updates. also that he's sensible and doesn't immediately jump to 'bad teacher' because a first grader comes home with a tale.
if you trusted him enough to let him raise the kids, stop nagging.
khairete
S.

You said you never trusted your children's father, yet you let your children go live with him? I'm confused.

Also, the day to day stuff is on the shoulders of the responsible parent at the time. Since they live with him, it's him aside from when you have visitation.

If you want the full story, go talk to the teacher. Email, phone, in person - any of the three might work here. But it's not up to your ex to fill you in on everything, unfortuntely. He does have his own house to run with what soudns like 3 kids and 2 adults. That takes a lot of time and effort. The chores were not more important than the kids, the chores were more important than a conversation with you when he felt the kids were fine.

Your kids live with their dad. He is the primary parent. He handled the situation as is his role. You let them live with him and therefore you have to live with him being the primary parent. There's no point in getting worked up about it unless you're going to have the children live with you and take on the primary parent role.

He has custody. He cannot possibly keep you abreast of we very little thing. If you do not trust him, change the arrangement. He is not being hateful.

I speak from experience. I let my daughter go live with her dad when she was 12 and now she is an adult. My daughter and I have a good relationship. She is a responsible girl who is in college. Here is my advice to you:

Once your kids move into your ex's home full time, a majority of the parenting falls on your ex. If your kids wanted to live with him, then they have to live with the consequences. It sounds like he handled the situation. I would leave it alone. A previous poster mentioned that you don't want to be labelled the Looney ex--I agree. Stay neutral as much as possible.

If your kids see that you are questioning your ex's authority, they will play you against each other. Not only is that expensive financially, not to mention an emotional roller coaster for the kids.

You want your kids to remember their childhood fondly. As hard as that is to do sometimes, believe me, I know, you have to support your ex's parenting skills.

"He replied, saying it didn't sound like the teacher was yelling."

You really are going to need to learn to let go. Also, most teachers aren't crazy, and don't go around abusing kids.

This has nothing to do with "chores are more important than your son," and if you start acting like this, your, your ex's and your kids' lives are going to be miserable.

Trust your son's father's ability to handle this. Also, in the future, there probably be many things your kids' father will do that will be different than what you would have done. There is no one right way to parent, and kids can survive and flourish in many different types of parenting. Even when two parents live together, they don't parent exactly the same. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Let go.

Well, I'm of 2 minds. You are letting kiddo live with them, what rights did you keep? Custody but with them living there? Split? Gave up custody to them?

I guess I'm getting at that you let kiddos go live with them but you jumped on the first thing that might have happened and aren't letting them handle it. Not saying you shouldn't be involved, not at all, just asking if you gave them the responsibility to do this but aren't letting go.

I would have a super hard time letting go even if I needed to. If a kid told me something that had happened to them and dad wasn't doing something about it I'd be at the school the next morning getting to the bottom of it right then.

BUT if you gave dad custody to do this it might really make you look like a looney tune if you go up and are getting upset over this and dad plays it differently, like you're crazy and that's why he has the kids and so forth. You don't want to hurt your future relationship with this school so tread lightly.

Speak with the teacher yourself. There is no reason to talk to your ex about it, as he wasn't at school anyway and this is something between your son and teacher. So get the teacher's side of the story and proceed from there.

I can't imagine how tough a decision it must have been to let your kids live with their father and would imagine that you came to that decision after a lot of soul-searching and determined that for whatever reason, it was the best decision to make for them. My step-daughter's mother made that decision too when her daughter was younger and she was in crisis and I can assure you that my husband and I did our best to make sure that SD felt loved, secure, and part of our family.

That said...this doesn't sound "hateful" to me, it sounds like a miscommunication in expectations, so that makes me think that your emotions are guiding your (over) reaction here. Also, you say that you don't trust your ex, yet you sent your children to live with him, so you must trust him then, right?

I think that you need some time to adjust to not being the primary, day-to-day parent anymore and yes, you have to trust that you ex and his fiancee are taking good care of your kids. If you don't trust them, you wouldn't have been able to decide to let your kids live there.

If I were you, I would talk to your ex or even his fiancee if you two are on good terms and just let them know that right now, it's really tough for you to not be on the front lines of parenting and ask them to please be a little more sensitive and accommodating for a while until, as time passes, you get used to this and truly know that they've got this covered. I think that any compassionate parent would be able to empathize with you. I know that when my SD lived with us, we really bent over backwards to reassure her mom that everything was OK. She was dealing with much bigger stressors in her life so she didn't need much from us, but we would have been happy to do whatever it took to reassure her that we're taking good care of her child, but we would have needed to be asked that, kwim?

Instead of taking it personally, try to change things around. If the roles were reversed and the kids were with you, and your son relayed this story to your husband but after talking with him (and perhaps a buddy in his class) you determined that this was really nothing, and you were in the middle of evening chaos with 4 kids, dinner, laundry, homework, etc. would you have dropped everything to communicate back to your ex that everything was fine? Or would you have replied quickly if he followed up and have expected that to be the end of it?

It sounds like he already asked about and considered the situation. Please step back and calm down. Allow your ex to manage things.

If you don't trust your kids dad, why in the world did you let your kids live with him? For your own sanity, I think you are just going to have to trust that he handled the situation.

Honestly, I am not sure why you think you need to address the issue of a teacher yelling at your son and his classmates. I try to give the teacher the benefit of the doubt as much as possible and would not see this as an issue that must be handled. Was your son uncontrollably sobbing about the incident? What was he doing when the teacher started to yell?

Since your son is in 1st grade, I would think he could tell you all you need to know.

You are out of some major loops more or less by your own choice.
This isn't about your rank with regard to dishes and laundry.
You want a place in your children s lives that you just don't get unless they are living with you.
What ever the reasons were that decided who they live with I assume are still valid - so you need to make your peace with it.

I think you have to let go. Your ex is raising 4 children, it was 8:30 at night on a school night, and he determined that there was no major problem.

The teacher apparently "yelled" at several children (if there was any yelling at all) so it wasn't all directed at your son. I disagree that anyone should have been involving the other child in the issue at all! You should not be telling your ex to interview or question another 6 year old in an issue that affects your son. She's 6, she lives in the same house, and she's not qualified to evaluate.

You do have to let your ex handle the bulk of the everyday activities. That's what you gave up when you let your kids live there. You have to find a way to trust him (which you did when you agreed to let the kids live there), and let them establish a daily routine. You should not be talking to the fiancee if you can avoid it - this is between you and your ex as parents of the 2 children you share.

Sometimes kids just don't report accurately what goes on in a classroom. I don't know if people have different expectations of male teachers - sometimes the deep voice alone is surprising to children accustomed to the all-female atmosphere of most elementary schools. Let it go. If there's a problem with your son, you'll find out about it at the parent-teacher conference (which you should attend with your ex, and his fiancee should attend the one for her daughter). If there's anything urgent, the teacher will contact you. If another issue comes up, you can contact the teacher via email but you have to stay calm and not explore every single thing that your son says or doesn't like.

I think you may be concerned about your children's new home and school situation, and you may be a little more vigilant about issues that most people get used to more easily when they are there and seeing the child's reaction overall. Sometimes kids on the phone over-emphasize things to a parent who wasn't there (same things happen when kids talk to non-custodial fathers or parents who travel on business). And it was 8:30 at night so the child had to have been exhausted, so maybe exaggerating. Sometimes kids don't like to be corrected by teachers - so they call it "yelling" when it just wasn't.

I think your ex and his fiancee might have gone overboard in saying that they had dishes and laundry, and you felt disrespected. But maybe they were frustrated because they have 4 kids between them who need to get to bed, and they themselves need to get up early to make lunches and get 4 kids ready for the day. They expected you to respect their answers, and you didn't.

Your problem is you don't trust your ex. That's something that needs work. Maybe he will step up to the plate more now that he has the kids so much. He can't be a horrible person or you would not have let the kids go there, right? So you made some decision that he's capable and that this can be a healthy situation for your 2 children. But both of you need to get used to this new arrangement. I'd leave his fiancee out of it entirely, frankly.

I think, as you get more used to first grade and the kids get more settled in with new teachers, these issues will work themselves out. Kids also have to learn to deal with teachers who discipline them, and even with teachers they might not like all that much. Looking back over my son's school years, I can see some great teachers and some how weren't so hot - but he survived and he learned how to work with difficult people. That's a valuable skill.

The best things you can do are to show your kids how to handle things calmly, talk them out, work as part of a group, and see that parents can split up and still work together to care for the kids they share. You need to have a good working relationship in case something urgent comes up.

If you've never trusted their father, why are they living with him??

IMHO, you allowed your children to live there, so you must have SOME trust in him. At least I'd like to think so.

I think you need to let dad handle it. If you want to be involved in every detail of daily life, you shouldn't have let them move in with dad. I doubt that you called him at every drop of the hat; now show him the same courtesy.

Pick your battles with your ex carefully and this does not appear to be something worth arguing about. Your ex determined that the yelling teacher was not a big deal, so I would let the matter drop. If you still have co-custody of your children, request that the school send you information regarding your children so you have a better idea of what is going on on the campus and the classroom. There will be much bigger issues that come up that need to be discussed - please keep a good line of communication with your ex and his fiancé regarding your children.

Awww Mama, your pain comes through in your post. It must have been so hard to allow your children to go to live with their dad. I think most of your reaction about the teacher and your ex has to do with the guilt you are feeling. Maybe it would be good to talk to a professional to work on finding peace in your heart, mind, and soul. (((Hugs)))) and blessings!

Are you allowed to contact the teacher? If so, contact him directly. Do not go through two 1st graders and then their parents' second hand version of the story. Also, if you decided that this living arrangement is the best, then give them some space. Do not call every night for a play-by-play. Evenings are hectic in most homes with homework, dinner, bed time, etc. Also, FWIW, I don't think your son and his step sis should be in the same class, unless there is only one 1st grade in the school. They need to be their own individuals at school and they need their space from each other.