So I have a 15yo son half time. I have always been friends with his mom. When I asked for a divorce, it wasn’t because I hated her. Our romantic connection was over and our co-dependence was imbalanced. I was doing my job, part of my ex’s job, 90% of childcare, 90% of housework, and my ex was always lost in her work. She was a bit narcissistic in her ways. She was pretty absent from my life. The divorce was 9 years ago.
My current GF, who may have something like BPD, has always been jealous of my ex. My ex has a masters degree and is somewhat successful. I think she feels like she isn’t as good as my ex and that someday I will get back together with her, especially since we remained friend. I promise that will never happen.
I try to explain to my GF that she is the one I choose, that she can’t compare herself to my ex. I try sto explain that there is so much evidence that I love her (I am autistic and this is what I do.) My GF lives 190 miles away and I drive there at least once a week and often twice. Among the evidence that I love her, I try to explain that I wouldn’t drive so far to see her if I wasn’t in love with her. Why would I drive 780 miles in a week to spend time with her if I didn’t want to spend time with her.
My GF was unhappy that I was still friends with my kids mom. I would think normally this would be a plus, but for a few reasons this makes my GF unhappy. My GF met my kids mom early in our relationship and it was fine. A few hours later, my GF started telling me that she knows woman and that she wasn’t comfortable with my ex. She asked if I could back off. I did. She asked that I not hug my ex. I was okay with that.
A couple weeks later, my ex had some bad things happen and asked for a hug. I said no and my ex made a big deal about it. I stood my ground and relayed the story to my GF this was over 2 years ago. I few weeks after that, my ex confronted my GF about making things difficult for my son because my ex and I didn’t talk or text as much. This didn’t go over very well with my GF either.
At this point, 2 years later, my GF hates my ex even though they don’t cross paths. My communication with my ex is at most 10 min a week on average. It is 95% about my kid and maybe a few things about work or family.
My ex has always been narcissistic and is the center of her own world. She doesn’t really take the time to think about how her actions affect others. My son and I have a dog which I let go with my son to his moms most weeks. My ex gets upset that I “withhold” the dog from her. It isn’t her dog and I let my son take the dog. This dog exchange pisses my GF off because it usually means that I have to go to my ex’s house once or twice a week after I pick my kid up from school. My ex isn’t even there half the time but my GF is still jealous.
My ex also plans work trips that are partly for her to have fun. This week she is in Spain. During the summer she will be taking a group to Amsterdam for two weeks. I feel I just need to accommodate work trips and in return she will do the same if I need it, which has been the case in the past. My GF feels that this is me doing whatever my ex wants. I can understand why she thinks this way, but I have worked back and forth with my ex for years now. Admittedly, my ex probably gets the better end of this arrangement.
I will say that my GF is a very sweet woman with so many good qualities. If she could just see herself accurately and see what I see in her, she wouldn’t be insecure, but that doesn’t happen and she is terribly insecure about us. Part of that are the manipulative lies my GF’s mother puts in her head. My GF also looks for someone to tell her she’s great in some non-productive ways.
My GF’s and her son’s dad don’t get along at all. I think this is what my GF expects between co-parents. She also had a family model where both of her parents cheated all of the time.
So I feel like I have cut communications to a minimum. I think that the only way to cut things further would create a hostile situation which I don’t want my son to have to deal with.
So this all boiled over this weekend. On Saturday my GF was given a huge guilt trip by her mom in the morning. That night at 8pm she was texting her son’s dad on my phone with her kids dad telling her he was taking her back to court. While this was going on, my ex, who was working on some project, sends a message: “Overwhelmed, please send a picture of the dog.”
This was the last straw for my GF and she told me that either I get rid of my kids mom or she was gone. She told me that I should be good enough with the attention that she give me (I am) and that I should need to look for attention from my kids mom (which I am not.) I wish my ex wasn’t so clueless at times. Texting at 8pm on Saturday was not really okay. My reaction would have been to ignore it. Clearly my GF had a strong reaction. She isn’t able to just ignore anything from my ex.
I tell my GF that there is not a person in the world who thinks about my kids mom more than she does. I think that’s true. I don’t think about her at all. I just hate that this makes my GF so uncomfortable and would make changes if I could think of something. I just don’t want this to devolve into a hostile co-parenting situation. I won’t declare war because I can’t see how that makes anything better and I don’t want my son in the middle of it.
My GF is serious about her threat and I don’t really know what to do to comfort her or explain that my ex isn’t worth worrying about. Please, any ideas would be so appreciated.
32 comments
Your kid and your co-parenting should come first.
Your girlfriend has some serious issues and her being in your life will only negatively impact the relationship with your son.
Let her make good on her threats – you don’t need that kind of drama in your life.
Your child comes first, and he needs his mum. I hate to say this, but you should let your current GF go. She doesn’t seem very mature and she isn’t great for you or the relationship that you NEED with your kid’s mum.
Also your ex doesn’t get to text you and demand pictures or your and your kids dog. So weird.
Obviously you can’t legally “get rid” of your kid’s mom. When you procreate with someone you’re either tied to them for at least until your kid is grown, or you’re a reprehensible deadbeat who’s set a kid up for a disastrous life. There is no other option. Never be so desperate for sex/companionship that you stab your own blood in the back. If this woman couldn’t handle the reality that you already have a family she should never have started dating you. Maybe “get rid” of the girlfriend so your son has a shot at a decent life.
You said you son was 15?? So there is really no reason for you and his mom to talk when it can be done through him no??
I don’t understand her jealousy as you don’t communicate much.. but the ex text at stupid times about a dog that ain’t hers would piss me off too.
Tell the girlfriend her jealousy will be your downfall.
Kinda feel like you tend to gravitate towards bossy and needy women, fawn over placating them, and when you realize they are non-placatable, you hold up your hands and wonder why. You have two very demanding and in some respects unreasonable partners. And in the middle is your kid who had zero agency in choosing either.
I think you need to exert stronger boundaries with your ex regardless of her disorders. You aren’t her emotional support ex, you are her ex. Being friendly, doesn’t mean you have some quasi emotional flirtshit going on where she feels comfortable demanding pics of a damn dog from you. Gf obviously does not like being lower down on the totem pole and is totally jealous of ex, and with good reason perhaps if you cater to ex like this suggests and have to be told things like don’t hug ex and don’t overshare and don’t have an emotional affair.
I think the person who could benefit from the most help…is you.
*GF Jealous of Co-Parent: says she will leave if I don’t change things*
Let her leave. Being held hostage by someone is not a good place to be.
For your sons sake, having a decent and even friendly relationship with your ex is fantastic, and I don’t see anything out of line here. Just because you weren’t good romantically doesn’t mean you have to become enemies. And its especially important to have a decent relationship when kids are involved.
If your girlfriend can’t accept that you are not going to stop cooperative coparenting and being a generally decent guy to your sons mother, then maybe she’s not ready to date someone who still has kids with an ex.
OP,
Its good that you have that relationship with your child’s mother. You have your boundaries but I know your ex pushes them to taunt your GF. This is actually normal.
Your GF’s actions and words are harsh because of how she split up with her ex, I think you need to sit down and tell her nothing is going to change, then what changes you have already made with your Ex-wife. I would tell her if she doesn’t like it, then you can see no other way around then to split up.
Your child should always be your first priority in life now. Its to bad that your GF is being immature to you situation. Like I said earlier, if you son is near you and he overhears you two fighting about his mother, and she asks your son questions. She knows she is renting space in your GF’s head and will use it to her advantage.
Plane, you’re describing a GF who seems to have a very strong abandonment fear. That would explain why, a few months into your relationship, she started showing strong jealousy over harmless events involving other women — and may have tried to isolate you away from your close friends and family members.
She would view your spending time with your friends/family as your choosing them over her. It also would explain why she’s unable to trust you — and why she probably hates being alone by herself.
This strong abandonment fear — as well as her abusive and controlling behaviors — may be due to her having very weak control over her own emotions (i.e., a lack of emotional skills she had no opportunity to acquire in childhood). My exW has this problem. If that is an issue for your GF, you likely have been seeing 3 other warning signs.
***First***, you would be seeing her rely heavily on black-white thinking, wherein she tends to categorize some people as “all good” (“with me”) or “all bad” (“against me”) and will recategorize them — in just a few seconds — from one polar extreme to the other based on a minor infraction.
Because she also uses B-W thinking in judging HERSELF, she would rarely acknowledge making a mistake or having a flaw. Doing so would imply, in her mind, she is “all bad.” She thus would blame nearly all misfortunes and mistakes on you and view herself as “The Victim.”
Further, to validate her “victim” status, she would keep a detailed mental list of every infraction/mistake you ever did (real or imagined) and would not hesitate to pull out the entire list to defend herself in the smallest, most insignificant disagreement with you. Moreover, this B-W thinking also would be evident in her frequent use of all-or-nothing expressions like “you ALWAYS…” and “you NEVER….”
***Second***, you would not see her expressing her anger to casual friends, classmates, or total strangers. She usually gets along fine with them. Rather, her temper tantrums almost exclusively would be expressed against a close loved one (e.g., against you or her parents).
***Third***, you are convinced she truly loves you. But you often see her flipping, on a dime, between Jekyll (loving you) and Hyde (devaluing you), frequently making you feel like you’re “walking on eggshells.” Such flips would occur in a few seconds in response to some minor thing you say or do.
Plane, have you been seeing strong occurrences of these 3 red flags?
190 miles? Multiple times a week?! I live in England and that would take me halfway across the country. Are you always going to her or does she ever go to you.
Listen dude, you’re 60. You’re too old to be putting up with this shit show. Your sim is 15. He’s able to see that your relationship is a mess so stop using him as an excuse as to why you need to stay in it.
A friendly and amicable coparenting relationship is worth its weight in gold and is the best possible situation for your child.
Your girlfriend’s insecurities are causing her to demand you create a less positive environment for your child to sate her paranoia, which is already bad, and as you’ve noticed the paranoia **never goes away no matter how many concessions you make.** That’s because the problem isn’t you, or your ex, or your kid. The problem is internal to your GF and that means no matter WHAT you do at her demand to damage your coparenting relationship it will never be enough. You could surrender all custody and parenthood of your child to your ex and never see her or him again and your GF would just switch gears to get insecure and paranoid about some other woman you interact with regularly, like a doctor or a coworker.
You have to put a stop to this before it damages your parenting arrangement. Your number one priority should be what’s best for your son, not what **temporarily** reassures your girlfriend.
Tell her she needs therapy to deal with her insecurities or the relationship is going to have to end. You should not be risking your child’s relationship with his mother to try (and fail) to soothe the paranoia of your girlfriend.
I mean since you are so adamant to make this work, your gf is obviously not OK and very insecure
Your ex is probably doing that on purpose to get the other one going
The distance between you and your gf probably drives a lot of her insecurity, have you two considered idk, moving her closer to you?
Dump your girlfriend she will go after your relationship with your son once your ex is fully out the picture.
So let her leave.
I couldn’t even read this. Tell your ex to grow up. If she can’t accept your family, which includes the mother of your son, let her go. It’ll save everyone some difficulty in the future rather than constantly being told off
Do not disrupt a decent co-parenting relationship to appease a jealous and insecure girlfriend. You can’t get rid of your ex anymore than she can get rid of her son’s dad so your girlfriend’s demand is beyond ridiculous. Your son and what is in his best interests comes first. Your girlfriend and her behavior are not in his best interest so let her leave.
I think it is good that you have a decent relationship with your ex for the sake of your son. From some aspects I think the GF may me jealous of that. Maybe it would be a good idea for you and the GF to take a break for a while and she can work on her issues. Then the two of you can reevaluate the two of you.
Dude. I mean really? My partner hates my ex (for good reason) but he doesn’t interfere in our coparenting AT all. Your gf has issues. Major major issues. And those are on *her* to sort out. If she won’t then she’s not worth it. And your son is a teenager, not a moron, he can see your gfs behaviours and attitudes. That is NOT showing him what healthy loving relationships are like. That’s setting him up to be abused.
there’s nothing wrong with texting at 8pm on a saturday, especially just to ask for a pic of the dog
really i think you should never have given in to your gf’s demands in the first place and it sounds like they have made everything a lot worse. I’ve always found it’s a big mistake to allow a partner to dictate the terms of my friendships with others.
she’s being unreasonable. Personally I’d let her go as it sounds like a lot of hassle for someone you only see twice a week max.
My dude. You can love someone.
But anyone who gives ultimatums are bad news. She is actively manipulating you to do what she wants.
That means her way or the highway. She doesn’t care what you want.
She sounds like a narc type too.
You can do better.
Nothing good for you gf had to go, you need to be a parent and that means you have to deal with ex as much as required.
Let your gf leave. Your kid comes first but do yourself a huge favor and avoid dating people with BPD. Go to r/BPDLOVEDONES and read the stories of people who made that mistake, it’s terrifying.
You need to prioritise your child and not this mad woman you’re allowing to dictate things. It’s far more important for your son that you have a good relationship with his mother – as his mother and not your ex. Your girlfriend is unhinged.
Wow. Your girlfriend is not the one with no clue.
If you want to keep your girlfriend then you need to do what makes her happy.
Trying to “explain” why she doesn’t need to worry about your ex is not going to do a damn thing.
Chose one woman and stick with it.
“Co-parenting”? That’s not what this is.
This is catering to an ex, KNOWING it hurts your woman.
So honestly, without even having to read your entire post, you have a co-parent, and will continue to co-parent for at least 3 more years. Your gf is the cancer here, trying to create a wedge between you and your co-parent and that is wrong. Your gf needs to understand that if she is going to date a single parent, that she has ZERO say in the way you co-parent. Being on good terms with your co-parent is the absolute best thing you can do for your child’s well being.
You may need to make the ultimatum so keep that in mind, but you need to tell your gf that while you respect and always value her opinion, this is a matter that she cannot dictate because for your child’s sake, you need a civil and friendly co-parenting dynamic and she is not in charge of that. If she had am issue with that, then maybe you are not the right person for her
What If you lose your son because of her insecurities? Seems she’s more important
I’ve dealt with your situation. I will not mistreat my children’s mother to make someone else more comfortable. That said, that relationship needs more and stricter boundaries when you have a partner. Open phone policy and you have to let your ex know that if it’s not about parenting, she should not do it. Ignoring it works sometimes but she should not be sending it.
GF needs to chill and accept that you have to coparent. It’s not always going to be perfect where she can police your thoughts and speech, but she should have input on boundaries. That you initiated the divorce is an Ace for sure.
Finally, you need to come to peace with the idea that you may not be successful dating until your boy leaves home, but even then this kinda stuff is still going to come up.
Friend. I think you have a pattern in who you choose. I suggest you put space in both those relationships and find a therapist instead.
Hello?!?! Are you 19??
Wake up!!
If you stay with her and cut your son’s mom off, then you are doing the following things:
1. Showing your son that he and a healthy relationship with his mom are NOT your priority
2. Denying him a good example of what a healthy, loving relationship looks like
3. You are not showing your son what self respect is.
Ultimatums are not okay. I was doing shit like that to men I was dating back when I was like 17. I grew out of it. I was not fair to any of those men I was dating and it took a lot of self work to see that.
You have to show your son that’s not okay.
Otherwise, you’re opening the door to a whole shit show if you go down the path you’re thinking of going down.
You are modelling a relationship with an unstable, jealous woman to your son. Is that the kind of role model you want to be?
You’re 60, dude. She’s 46. She’s acting toxic. You have a child with your ex. She’s always going to be in your life in some capacity and she needs to get used to that. Let her go. She isn’t going to grow up. If she can’t handle you being cordial with the mother of your 15-year-old, she needs to exit. That has to put a strain on your son’s relationship with you. How does she treat your son? I can’t even imagine how she treats him when you aren’t around.
Edit: some words
You keep saying you want to show your son a loving couple but all you’re showing him is that love is controlling, insecure, issues unrealistic ultimatums, and doesn’t show mutual respect all parties involved. Your girlfriend is unhinged and you’re only hurting yourself and your son by staying. I know you love her but sometimes you have to learn that love is not enough.