Popping this under a spoiler so as not to clog up the thread.
During the last couple of months, my ex subtley started undermining me with his kids. It started, looking back, when they really started describing their affection for me, and making a point of voicing that I actually listened to them (their mother is also a narc, and forces her own wants onto the kids to make herself look good, for example buying the eldest a pony she never wanted and putting her under pressure to enjoy it, or the middle one - 7 years old and apparently a “brand snob” that will only wear certain brand trainers. I figured out it was brands that tended to be wider fitting and got her properly fitted for some school shoes, as she’d been kicking off about her shoes, he told me not a chance would she wear any, she would kick off etc and his jaw dropped when she walked back through the door smiling in shoes that weren’t squashing her feet width ways).
The last time my kids were present there, a couple of days before the incident I talked about earlier, my eldest and his eldest (same age, both 8 at the time) were in the bedroom looking at something on YouTube my bed on a table. His eldest had long hair and mine had gone to get up and leant on her hair. Because she was tired, she burst into tears and insisted my son had purposely pulled her hair, as kids do sometimes. Normally she was well behaved and honest, and a silly outburst like that would’ve passed within 20 minutes.
He seized on the outburst and supported her statement. Which then escalated into my son having dragged her around, by the roots of her hair, to the point it pulled her skin and eyelids taught (?) like a rag doll. Within half an hour he had turned this child, who I loved, who was normally an angel for me, into a raging, hate filled demon. The venom with which she demonstrated the above description was awful.
I have full sympathy for Michelle. It is horrendous to go through and I seriously hope kipper is lying completely and the accusations aren’t being taken seriously whether she threw something or not. within a couple of weeks, I felt like throwing his actual kids out of the window never mind a bleeping pie. Which then only adds to guilt to your depression and exhaustion, because it’s not the child’s fault - and it’s easy to say that objectively. As an adult we can choose to not act on our feelings, but we still have to feel them, and you have to constantly replace the feelings the child is making you feel back onto the adult that is behind it, which we are capable of, but doesn’t stop that initial feeling
I sent my boys back to their Dad that weekend (we had 50/50 shared care) and told him I needed him to keep them there, that I didn’t feel safe having them over and that I planned to leave when I could and it would be very soon (my boys dad saw him for what he was and already hated him) All I could think about was that, had they been older, accusations like that could land my son in a cell. We resumed shared care once I’d left and got myself sorted.