Dear Bossip: I'm Trying To Co-Parent, But He Keeps Bringing Up The Past

Dear Bossip,

I need help co-parenting with my daughter’s father.

My daughter’s father and I were in relationship for fifteen years. He was the love of my life. We haven’t been together for five years and we still can’t co- parents. My daughter’s father has cheated on me three times with three different chicks and I tried to forgive him. It’s hard to forgive someone who you loved such much and for him to disrespect me so many times.

He made a video tape having sex with this one chick. I tried to forgive him, but I decided to walk away from our relationship. Before I called it quits I can remember early in the relationship several people would ask him when we were getting married. On several occasions he responded he would never get married to me. Why would I stay in a relationship with a dude more than fifteen years who cheated on me one time too many and he doesn’t plan on marrying me?

He brought me a promise ring like it’s supposes to keep me waiting. I have my own apartment, career, car and money and purchase everything in my apartment by myself. My daughter’s father always complains about paying bills. He wanted me to take him out to a restaurant and movies and wanted me to pay for it. I come from the old school where dudes are supposed to take a chick out and wine and dine her.

My daughter’s father never came home after work. Sometimes he would come home at 7pm or whenever he feel like it, which could be at 11:30pm sometimes. He felt like just because he paid the rent and he was a man he had the upper hand. He felt like he didn’t need to help our daughter with her homework or see her before she went to bed. Every time I went food shopping he would get upset because he had to help me bring them the groceries in the house. What the heck I look like sitting around waiting for him to change his mind or decide if he wanted to be in our life.

My daughter’s father was livid at me before I called it quits. I started hanging out, going to clubs, and drinking and having fun. After I was tired of partying I started working 10 hour shifts six days a week because I didn’t want to spend any time around him. Saturday after work I would travel to another state and stay the night over family member’s homes with my son until Sunday night because he refused to leave. Why should I stay in the house or relationship with a dude who doesn’t plan on marrying me?

Fast forward to now, my daughter’s father and I can’t talk on the telephone without a screaming match. I tired communicating directly with his girlfriend, whom he has been in relationship with for five years. She is sick and tired of being in the middle of our mess and she changed her telephone number. My daughter has her own cell phone to talk to her father directly, but we have to communicate.

I can’t have a conversation with him unless he reflects on the past. He gets too emotional on the telephone and he is always making up an excuse to hang up the phone. One time, my daughter’s father said to me, “Eventually I would have married you. You were impatient.” We never resolve the issue at hand when we talk on the telephone. I pray to God to heal our relationship so that we can co-parent and to learn how to communicate again.

The judge is tired of us coming back and forth to court. The judge said we need to learn how to co-parent and communicate with each other. The judge asked us what happen in our relationship and why can’t we come to an agreement. But, neither of us wants to reveal what happen. I come from a two-parent home in the suburbs and he comes from a single-parent home in the inner city.

I don’t like the fact that when I talk to my family members about my daughter’s father they always respond he doesn’t know how to be a man because he didn’t have father around when he was a child. I’m tired of people giving me the same old sorry accuse. Problems between my daughter’s father are real deep. I can’t write the things down to share with anyone because I am too embarrassed. I get too upset with myself for putting up with BS for so long.

In the last five years I feel like I’ve been on a rollercoaster ride with my daughter’s father, and it’s not over. We can’t come to an agreement on anything. It’s been five years and he’s moved on, yet, he still has resentment towards me. I was in a relationship with a guy for 2 ½ years, but we are not together. My ex was sick and tired of me and my daughter’s father arguing all the time. Every time me and my daughter’s father see each other we always smile and laugh. My ex was upset. I believe we smile at each other because we remember all the good times we had together. But, on the phone we fight like cats and dogs.

I apologized to him and asked him to forgive me if I’ve done anything wrong to him and he apologized to me as well. But, we always end up back at the same place. When I meet a dude who has kids with their exes and they say that their child’s mother and them is best friends I get jealous. My daughter’s father and I would never be friends or cordial. I don’t want to bring my new dude onto a rollercoaster ride to see him jump off.

I need help communicating with daughter’s father. He doesn’t take me serious and always take my kindness for my weakness. My daughter turns thirteen next year and she graduates from the eighth grade. We can’t sit next to each other and have decent conversation. Everybody is looking forward to daughter eight grade graduation, but me I terrified daughter father going to cause a scene. – My Nightmare Daughter’s Father

Dear Ms. My Nightmare Daughter’s Father,

I don’t understand how and why some of you women fall into these situations with these men that you have chosen, and you cohabitate with them, and then create children, yet, only to break-up and you are unable to be cordial with one another and communicate effectively to at least co-parent for the sake of the child. I don’t get it.

Then, you were in a relationship for 15 years, he’s cheated on you with three different women that you know of, but, you are the one who stayed after he cheated the first time. You had an out, but you stayed. Why? What’s sad is that you took him back three different times before you decided you were fed up. You left him because he said he would never marry you, but it took 15 years before you walked away. I’m sorry, but who the hell is waiting 15 years on someone and there is no progress in your relationship? You are not moving forward, you are not growing, and you are not maturing. Fifteen years with someone, and then all of a sudden you get fed up! I’m sorry, but you chose this man, and you keep choosing his behavior and allowing him to do what he did, so why would expect his behavior to change after the relationship ended?

He is not going to change. He is not going to be the father, dad, or co-parent you hope he will be for the sake of your child. He’s shown you his a** for 15 years, and you refuse to believe or accept who he is. Girl, I’m so tired of saying this, but, WHEN SOMEONE SHOWS YOU WHO THEY ARE BELIEVE THEM. WHEN SOMEONE TELLS YOU WHO THEY ARE BELIEVE THEM.

You and he keep running back and forth to court and you want the judge to handle it, but you and he are dishonest and don’t want to reveal the real reason why you two can’t get along. If you keep playing this game, then you’re not serious about wanting to co-parent with him. I feel that you like and enjoy the drama. It gives you the opportunity for you and he to continue to argue, fight, and have this ‘other’ sadistic relationship that no one wants to be a part of. Hell, his own girlfriend changed her number because she doesn’t want to be in the middle of it. And, you’ve lost your ex-boyfriend over it because he didn’t want to be around your incessant need to be in drama with your daughter’s father.

So, therefore, it leads me to believe that you and he enjoy this sick game and all this back and forth that you two are engaged in. There is something that the both of you are getting out of it, and until you’re really ready to let him go and move on with your life, then you and he will continue this soap opera drama you two seem to enjoy.

Why do you two continue to talk about the past? Why are you holding on to it, and what you had? Why are you and he arguing on the phone, and it has nothing to do with your daughter? As a matter of act why are you even engaging him and it has nothing to do with your daughter? Why are you doing all this grinning and cheesing up in each other’s face, and you’re talking about it’s because you and he remember what you once had. It’s over! Let that –ish go!

Ma’am you gave me all this back story of your relationship with him, what he did, and how you shouldn’t have to wait on someone who wasn’t going to marry you. But, you chose him. You chose to stay 15 years. You chose to produce a child with him. You obviously kept choosing him to stay with him after he cheated on you three different times. So, was the back story an attempt to paint him as the bad guy? Honey, I don’t do voluntary suffering and misery. You stayed, so you got what you got.

If you want to co-parent, and you’re serious about it, then you and he need to be in therapy. You need to let go of your past, and your relationship. It’s over. It’s ended. It’s done. It’s no longer. However, you and he are holding on to some unfinished business. So, go to therapy with a mediating third party and let them help you decipher through this bull-ish. Let them help you resolve this game, and end this back and forth. You two can’t seem to do it yourselves, and it’s obvious that you don’t want to the judge to handle it. Therefore, therapy with a professional counselor will help you get to the root of your issues, the underlying tension of your drama, and end this torrid love/hate relationship you have with one another, and this ongoing relationship that you two don’t seem to want to let go. – Terrance Dean

Photo source: Shuttershock

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