My teenage daughter (13,F) no longer wants to spend time with her father (31,M) and I (30,F) am having a difficult time communicating with him regarding what needs to change.

Long story short, I had my eldest young and her father and I didn't make it as a couple past high school graduation. Fortunately, we were able to remain civil and have been fairly decent co-parents (in my opinion, at least). In the past, he has had 2 weekends of custody time per month, but in the last few years that has changed to one 3 day weekend where he picks her up from school Friday, she spends the weekend with him, he takes her to dinner after school on Monday and drops her off Monday night. This has worked out fairly well until the last 6 months.

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My daughter has been complaining about spending the weekend at her father's more and more. Some of the things she complains about are things she just has to deal with and I don't really hold it against him for various reasons, but there have been a lot of valid complaints. For instance, she tells me that he has been dating casually (he got out of a LTR last year) and the women that he brings over while she's there are a mix of rude, overbearing, or just surprised and unsettled to see he had a kid he didn't tell them about (wtf!). I think it's completely unfair to her to have to have those interactions, especially because she is only there for one weekend.

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She really liked his ex-girlfriend, who in my opinion seemed like a really nice person, but since they broke up her father has been bad-mouthing her and saying some hurtful things that my daughter is having a hard time processing. I talked to him about this and reminded him that we agreed to never talk badly about each other to her and that should also apply to other relationships we may be in/out of and he agreed, but anytime she mentions his ex he still gets angry. This happens even if she's just answering a question (ex/ "who bought you that bracelet?" "Kelly did" cue anger)

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Another major issue is that he wrecked his car and cannot currently afford a new one. This is not alone an issue, as we live in a metro area and there is adequate public transit for the most part. He picks her up from school on the bus, which she hates, but that is one of the things she's just has to deal with. The real issue comes into play with her weekend extracurriculars. A lot of her events are well within an hour's drive time, but by taking public transit it's unfeasible (as in, 2.5 hours with multiple busses/trains). She has had to miss multiple events, and the last weekend she spent with him I ended up spending almost $200 on Uber for her to get there and back. I've talked to her dad about short term car rentals (again, we're in a huge city and there are Zip cars and the like everywhere) but it comes down to the ultimate problem here: he seems super depressed and unwilling to change.

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They have been fighting more and more, which my ex completely chalks up to her being a teenager. I call bullshit because I think for the most part she is very reasonable and capable of analyzing a situation. Nobody is perfect, even my kids, but I cannot imagine her just starting fights with her dad over nothing. She seems to hate it, and convincing her to go for the weekend is exhausting for us both. I have talked to her father about a dozen times over the past few months about their arguments, his issues, etc. This is more than we have ever talked, literally in the entire time I've known him. They got along well when she was younger, we would text each other pictures occasionally, and that's how we kept things so civil.

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Any advice on communicating in this scenario? I feel like I try to remain as dispassionate as possible when I talk to him, but he comes across as so arrogant like he couldn't possibly be doing anything wrong and it's very difficult. For example, the last time we spoke I asked him if he felt that it was possible to not have any women over on her weekend until he gets to know somebody a little better and he makes sure that they get along with our kid. He just started laughing and said that our daughter needs to get over his break-up and he's not going to let a teenager run his dating life. It's like he has no ability to be perceptive. I really don't think my daughter gives a shit about his dating life, I just think she doesn't want to be forced to be involved with it.

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Unless things get significantly worse, I'm not going to pursue changing the custody agreement. My daughter wants to have a good relationship with her father, I want her to, and it seems like he is the only person who is not motivated to make this happen. That and he already has so little time with her. He seemed like a much better person while he was in his previous relationship, at this point I'm really hoping he meets another nice woman and this just passes like a hiccup, but I also have a feeling his issues are more subversive than that...

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TLDR: 13 yr old no longer wants to spend time with her father because they argue and she doesn't feel comfortable at his house. I am somehow failing to communicate the issues to him as nothing has changed and many things are getting worse.

Submitted August 29, 2019 at 02:26PM by CapableStandard https://ift.tt/2LuiPt9