Home discussions Children HELP please -what to say to a child when ..

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  • #5497
    pam-c
    Participant

    they tell you the saw a “picture of dad’s butt” on his phone.

    please don’t tell dad.

    ok, so once my head came back on from spinning off, we made light of it. said omg, that is so inappropriate? what was he thinking, it must be a joke. my daughter was laughing and saying omg — dad is so inappropriate.

    now. what to do. i want my daughter to keep telling me and confiding in me. do i mention to dad, to clean up his phone?

    i am positive he must be advertising on craigs list again. i found pics of his ass in ads, shortly after d day. it was really charming. but thats not the point.

    what do I say to her? also, she told her bff she saw pics of dad’s butt on his phone. her’ bff’s mom is a friend of exH and I. she also, has a social services background. she can report. i wish she would. actually. ain’t nothin on my side. she said her friend told her to delete it.

    but, i just don’t know–what the right call is here.

    what do you guys think? what’s best for Jacqleen? my six yr old.

    i told her i would not tell him. i want her to continue to trust me. keep confiding in me. i don’t want to blow that. perhaps his butt pic, is not worth communicating to him.

    Gawd. He is such a loser. how did i ever in a million light years pick him

    #50021
    lisak
    Participant

    jesus. six years old.

    do you have a therapist? i would get the therapist’s advice for two reasons

    1. to actually get their advice if you trust them
    2. to have a record of this, that you can use if you need to. ask the therapist to make detailed notes.

    i have no fucking idea. i’m so sorry pam.

    ok, let me try. i think children should have some form of the truth that is appropriate to their age.

    i think telling your daughter it was inappropriate was a very good idea. perhaps have a very short, somewhat serious talk with her, about private parts. i think at my son’s school they define it for the kids by what parts are covered up by a bathing suit. these parts should not be shown to other people.

    perhaps explaining it that way to hear will make it clear.

    now i don’t know your sa and how fucked up he is. but i think openness for the child’s sake trumps everything. i would personally, if your sah wouldn’t turn into an asshole, ask him to own up and apologize to her.. but i don’t know if that would make it worse for your daughter.

    your child should not have the responsibility of seeing or reporting these things. dickwad needs to straighten up, and this needs to stop. he needs to know he can really hurt her with this kind of shit.

    just my opinion

    #50022
    liza
    Participant

    In a perfect world, ALL of these dickwads would straighten up and fly straight. We all know that ain’t happening anytime soon. 🙁

    #50023
    harmony1
    Participant

    You can have a straight talk with him but if he mocks you or becomes defensive I would report it to the lawyer and if you have a social worker, I would report it too,
    He has to have serious consequences to his acts that might stop him from exposing his own daughter to these indecent acts.

    What an awful thing, it makes me want to throw up yukkkkk

    #50024
    teri
    Participant

    Pam-C- I would see an attorney. See what you need to do to get an injunction against him having electronics around your child. Usually, they don’t want to amend/change divorce proceedings for at least a year, but they will if the child is in any danger. Start keeping a journal now. Who knows where this will go? My STBX’s ticket just lost custody and has only supervised visitation well before the divorce was final for a year. Is your daughter still going to dad’s after school? I would shut that down, seriously, if she is.

    If you don’t do anything, that means you are tolerating it. That you are okay with it. I don’t think you can overreact in this situation. What kind of message does that send to your child that her father has a picture of his ass on his phone?

    You can also go the CPS route. That takes a lot of the control out of your hands, so I don’t know how comfortable you are with it.

    Pam, I am really concerned for your daughter.

    #50025
    972
    Member

    Do NOT betray that child`s confidence if you ever want her to trust you again. Document the incident with therapist and/or attorney. You could encourage her to just be honest and ask Dad about the pic ( tell her you will be present). Let him explain his butt pics.

    Does ANYBODY think pictures of a guy`s ass is a turn on????? WTF is wrong with these pervs????

    Sorry Pam…

    #50026
    972
    Member

    I agree with Teri too.

    #50027
    march
    Participant

    When you’re talking about sexual abuse (which is how I see this), confidentiality is down on the list of priorities. If your child came to you and said, Grandpa or Teacher or whoever put his hands in my underpants, but please don’t tell anyone, you’d tell. And do something about it. It’s a lucky thing it was only his ass–if indeed that’s all she saw. Who knows, she might not be sharing everything out of shame. He is infamous for his carelessness. This hasn’t changed. He can’t even give her his full attention during the times he has her, even though he’s got gracious PLENTY time to “do his thing” when she’s not around. Where the fuck was his head when she was going through his phone, or looking over his shoulder…? I wouldn’t trust him with a hamster. (Poor choice. DEFINITELY not a hamster)

    #50028
    972
    Member

    When I mentioned confidentiality, I was referring to running to asshole and telling him and leaving the kid to fend for herself. I was in no way condoning his behavior or suggesting that you do nothing about it!! March is right, it is abuse.

    #50029
    kimberely
    Member

    Keep in mind she’s six. The butt she saw could be anyone’s and in her mind she may assume it was dads. Could’ve been another mans or woman’s for all she knows. How did she know it was dads? Either way it’s wrong for his recklessness to be seen by his child.

    I would tell her sometimes people do inappropriate things like take naked pictures and then make it a teaching moment and tell her that pictures like that be it adults or kids needs to be brought to your attention because that’s what mommies do. We try to keep kids safe from bad stuff like that.

    #50030
    teri
    Participant

    Whether or not it crosses the line into legal abuse depends on the state- but I doubt it would. But it definitely fits the psych definition for covert sexual abuse.

    Pam, do you have a child therapist yet for your daughter yet? I would get her in to someone ASAP, and I would cite this as the reason to get her in. Make sure they know about his attack on you, his SA, etc.

    #50031
    march
    Participant

    I’d go straight to asshole and tell him that it has been reported and that he’d better not say a word to the child about having told me. And I’d think again about that whole tape-recorder in the teddy bear idea…Can’t be careful enough around that motherfucker.

    #50032
    pam-c
    Participant

    Thank you so much for all your responses. I have found a child therapist, appointment next week. This will help me in documenting. This will be good. and most importantly, she will have an advocate. her voice in this mess, needs to be heard.

    But oh, how to handle from here. He still has custody of her after school. This makes it complicated, as it is legal custody via the court. And, It is crucial that my child keep trusting me. and tell me things. I am going to talk to her, about going to Dad together. or me talking to Dad, and assure her she wont’ be in trouble. but i need to earn her trust, that it is ok to do so. I know she is six, but if I go straight to Dad, she will clam up. that camera in the house first. she is afraid of him. that he will punish her and not let her do things. if he knows.

    March, I agree on the camera. I have been too slow. It needs to be in there, like today. anything that resembles a threat, makes crazy, become crazier. i can’t trust a psycho not to say a word. he will do it out of spite. he’s that guy. all about him and his “precious image”. i guess his ass on his phone kinda blows his image —

    this is my daughter. her innocence cannot be chipped away it w/his shit.

    I am going to get legal counsel on the matter also.

    for now, — document with therapist. and strategize plan to confront dad.

    #50033
    pam-c
    Participant

    WTF is it going to take to get supervised visitation– and an acknowledgment from the court, that he is not ok to parent on his own? what is it going to take???????

    Teri, how did you do it? what evidence helped you?

    #50034
    pam-c
    Participant

    keep in mind here, I am my child’s confidant. she is trusting me with important information. I need to keep that coming…there may be more to come out. how i handle this, is crucial

    #50035
    silver-lining
    Participant

    Like March suggested…. A butt today, a penis (barf) tomorrow….

    These stupid fuckers! And Bev- RIGHT! A picture of a man’s hairy ass on the phone is Sooo unappealing! Gimme a break!!

    This really makes me think back years ago when my son and his friend would peek in the windows and see Dum Dum looking at porn on the computer when I wasn’t home!! I think they were about 10 years old or so…. Gawd… Why didn’t I just leave THEN??? It would have saved me about 14 years of grief!! Not to mention, speak volumes to my son that this is NOT ACCEPTABLE.

    Thank God for all the “normal” people in his life otherwise so he managed to be a well balanced adult. (He’s 24 now)….. We are VERY close…. I need to ask him about the impact of that. I know in a nutshell that his experience with this idiot as a step Dad for 17 years just showed him exactly what he didn’t WANT to be…. So I got pretty lucky….

    But now that I see things so clearly- I should have left YEARS ago!!! 🙁

    Good luck with Jacqleen! (pretty name!) You got out, Pam! Hopefully you will have your day in court and have some control over the situation!! XO!!

    #50036
    silver-lining
    Participant

    And March- the hamster remark made me LOL! 🙂

    #50037
    march
    Participant

    Richard Gere didn’t think it was funny.

    #50038
    kmf
    Member

    Oh good grief….what is that about Richard Gere and hamsters?? I am afraid to even ask…..

    Pam…I agree you have to keep her confiding in you UNTIL you can somehow get her away from him. And get that camera in there…God knows what he is up to. 🙁 You are smart with good instincts. Trust yourself because I think you do a bang up job of dealing with that lunatic. Karen xx

    #50039
    lynng2
    Participant

    So glad you got a children’s counselor and attny. Moving in the right direction. So glad your daughter came to you. I hope that’s not just her way of testing the waters and she’s got more to share. Camera, recorder, document. My gut says he should not have unsupervised visitation. I hope that ends soon, without incident.

    #50040
    pam-c
    Participant

    i appreciate everyone’s input, each of you have helped me. what would i do without this place, to post and run things by? I just don’t know. perhaps my daughter will come to thank you also.

    yes on the instincts & gut. when I listen to it, regarding my daughter, I believe she has more to tell. I am sorry to say. I think there are other things, or other accidental viewings, that have happened during the course of that marriage. his carelessness and lifestyle, and junk, were not well hidden from her.

    i want to her to get it ALL out. i hope we can achieve this

    #50041
    teri
    Participant

    Pam, I don’t have supervised, but my attorney is going to push for it at the next mediation due to new evidence.

    But STBX’s wife lost custody and only has supervised visitation. Dad had documented her not being involved with homework, not showing up for teacher conferences, school performances, etc.- basically leaving all parenting to him. She had custody but basically only wanted her kids when my STBX had our son (2 hours 2 nights a week and 5 hours every other Sat). So he pretty much had kids full time. On top of that, we had the key logger showing her talking about masturbation with her 8 year old son sitting beside her (she mentions it), she and STBX masturbating for each other online- then she mentions the kids are up. She also talks about leaving the kids alone so she can go to his place and make him a cup of coffee (4 kids age 6-12). So he could show negligence and inappropriate behavior. She complains in emails about not having enough money to buy food for the kids, but then we had keylogger about her paying for hotel rooms, alcohol, etc. for swinging. Key logger rocks.

    So with all that, he filed an emergency order of protection and then mediated a temporary settlement. They will mediate a final settlement in 3 months.

    It is ridiculous what it takes to get supervised visitation. If she had money and representation, it might not have turned out so well. But now she is in trouble with the visitation supervisor for her behavior (she threatened to tell the kids that daddy was doing this to her because he thinks she is an unfit parent). The supervisor called her and told she was going to lose all visitation if she kept it up.

    He also considered getting a forensic psych eval. Goodness knows he had plenty of evidence of erratic behavior and impaired judgement. But it didn’t come to that (that would have been costly and time-consuming).

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