Need some outside views please

LegacyUser

Ok....where to start. So for obvious reasons I am going unregistered for this post and would just like to thank ye in advance for reading.

Some myself and my boyfriend have been going out for three years. We have a 15 month old son. We had not been together long when I got pregnant and it was unplanned. After much deliberating, I knew that I could not go through with an abortion and decided to have the baby, and he stuck by me. We were madly in love. I thought this was the man I was going to marry and throughout the pregnancy he was brilliant.

I was in my third year of a four year degree course so I continued going to college until the day I went into labour....took a week off and then went back. I am just about to sit my final exam this week coming. I did it!

During the time I was going to college, our child was minded by my parents in my hometown which is on the other side of the country to where I attend college. My boyfriend had been working in my home town and that's where we met. But when our son was 2 months old, he was relocated to the middle of the country.

So for the past year and a bit, our lives have been manic. No other word for it. Our son is minded during the week on one side of the country, I'm on another side and my boyfriend is half way! We both head over to my parents house at the weekends and this is the only time we have together as a family.

The first few months after the birth were pretty mad. Having the stress of college, the guilt and upset of leaving my baby behind, the brief spell of antenatal depression and feeling very alone down in college, I found it tough. Our relationship took a bit of a knock, well, more like an almighty blow! The only time we had together was in a house full of my family (I love them to bits and am eternally grateful for their support) and we had the stress of being new parents, not really knowing what we were doing but just trying to do our best!

He is a fantastic father and his son loves him. No matter what may come, I will never deny him or my son their relationship together.

So during the past year and a bit, I think we both really neglected our relationship - or maybe it was that we just did not have the time or space to have a relationship. We have come so close to breaking up about twice or three times. A few months after the birth, it was my boyfriends birthday and I drove up to him with a cake that I had made. I was asked 'what are you doing here?' Things had been rocky for us, but that kinda floored me.

There are many things that stick out in my mind but for the sake of brevity and sanity, I'll only mention a few. Do keep in mind that this is only one side of the tale. So early on in the relationship I discovered that his father sends him pornography. Now I thought this was pretty strange and as one email popped open and my boyfriend nervously laughed it off, I told him that I thought this was odd. Am I alone here? What do other people think? So anyway, I asked him if his mum knew that his dad sent him those emails (about four everyday) and he said no and that she would not be happy with it if she knew. So anyway, I forgot about this for a while until we were in his parents' house at Christmas a couple of years back. It was late at night and I was up (heavily pregnant and baby kicking! ) and was on the family pc. His mother is a complete tech-phobe and cant even turn the thing on so his father is the only one who uses it. So while I was on it, I decided to check the extent of this porn fascination and went into the history where I found a website of videos of girls aged between 6 and 18. I was dumbfounded. I wish I knew more about this because I was thinking it could be a popup but do things like that popup? Is that not highly illegal and also stomach turning?

So there I was, pregnant with child and having discovered this. Obviously I will never leave that man alone with my child and having renewed angst about the porn sending, I took the matter up with my boyfriend. I did not tell him what I had seen but i asked him to tell his dad to stop sending his those emails, which he says he did. Fast forward 4/5 months and I asked my boyfriend if he had received any more mails to which he replied no. A few months later, my boyfriend's laptop was open and I checked his mail to see if this was true. (Wrong or not, I have a child to protect, reason to doubt my boyfriend's truthfulness from past incidents early in relationship, and a damn good motive for doing so). So I found that his father had in fact been sending him more mails. I hit the roof. I was so angry. My boyfriend had barefaced lied to me and I felt that his loyalties lay elsewhere. He had no excuse for lying and said that he would tell his father again. To the best of my knowledge, nothing more has been sent to him.

So the reason I am posting now, may seem minor in comparison to that but at this stage I dont know what is going to come of our relationship. It was my boyfriends birthday again recently and once again, I was planning on driving up to him for the evening. At about 5pm I got a text from him saying that he was heading out with his friends (all work with him) for a few drinks. So while a little sad, I told him to go for it and enjoy the night and I would see him in my parents house that weekend. Honestly, I was expecting to be asked as he knew that I would be driving that way anyway that evening en route to parents' house and I was a bit disappointed when I wasn't asked.

So the next evening he arrived over and I kissed him and said happy birthday and gave him some of the cake I had made for him (I love baking!) My mum was chatting to him and he mentioned that his brother and sister in law had come out for his birthday drinks too and hearing that, I was really upset. Fair enough if it had just been his mates but if his family were there too, and he didnt invite me........I was just so upset.

So the other night myself, bf, his brother and sister in law went for a drink and we were discussing where to head next. His sister in law was talking about the night club and mentioned it was the place where 'the girls were all over you the night of your birthday.' I said nothing and tried to hide my shock and sinking facial expression and said nothing more of it until tonight when I asked my bf what had happened. He said that they were all out and his friends had said to some girls that it was his birthday and they gave him 'birthday kisses' and they were chatting. Now I know that nothing would have happened when sister in law was there but they left early apparently. I am just so upset by this. The only person who should have been giving him kisses is me - his girlfriend - and just the thoughts of him chatting up other women sickens me.

So at the moment - the ways things stand is that I have told him that I am not happy with this and he does not understand why not. He is nearly thirty so it's not your typical eighteen year old fella looking for a few pecks off a good looking girl.

He has gone out a few times with his friends who are all single and while I am not entirely happy with this - I let him at it. I know that having been lied to before has damaged the trust i have in him but I think part of it is also that while I am fighting to get through college (nearly there!), seeing my baby for a day and a half per week and just feeling like general ****, he is out enjoying himself and living the single life. I know that my education is so important and it is up to no one but me to do it and I do not have the power to tell him what to do - but I guess I'm just sad. I dont think that he understands the crap that I have gone through.

I'm not sure if this is relevant and I dont want to say it in an attempt to fortify my stance, but I fell pregnant again this semester and I cannot ever explain in this box, the hell that has been the past couple of months. He did not want to have the baby and the only justification for having an abortion for me was that our relationship was not going to last. That is still my reason today and always will be.

Thank you so much for reading this. I'm not looking for people to tell me to stay or to go. I guess I just needed to talk and get things out and any support or advice you can offer is genuinely appreciated.

Curry Addict

u guys need to move in together asap and as a family. you wont really know how compatible you are until you do so. living like you are now is very complicated all round and stressfull.

LegacyUser

Ok. Two or three seperate issues.

Firstly. His father is a pedophile. He has been looking at child abuse with children as young as 8 involved. I would anonymously report him to the Guards. People who look at children being abused are complicit in the crime and deserve the full weight of the law thrown against them. Don't worry about 'breaking up the family' or what the Mother would think. The poor woman would probably be horrified to know she is sharing her bed with a pedophile. Report him. He is a sick pervert.

Second. He is sending porn to his own son. Sorry but that is sick and wrong. The sons boundaries must be all messed up with this happening. It is actually a form of grooming to share sexual imagery with members of your own family. It is wrong on so many levels.

Three. You don't trust him. He kept you out of the way on night of his Birthday so he could flirt with other girls. Alarm bells ringing all over the place. And I wouldn't necessarily believe nothing happened. He's lied about the 'porn' so he is a proven liar. You don't trust him and you're correct in that.

I understand you probably can't get your head around the child abuse imagery. But I don't think you're actually really getting it. It is so serious. Really serious. Has your BF been looking at the underage stuff as well?

Look, you sound young and this is messy. I would advise you to talk to someone. I wouldn't let the child abuse thing go though. You have a child yourself. Imagine when he is 8 someone filmed him in such circumstances, it is a nightmare.

Your BF is a product of this family, he could possibly have some very wrong ideas. You need to get that out in the open. Your number one priority is your child. Report that sick man and see how the cards fall then.

Curry Addict

+1 on the anomonous reporting of the suspect paedo. you have a moral obligation to do this. it may also help down the line in awkward moments when u dont want to leave your child in his company.

greenprincess

I think you guys really need to live together!! You said he is nearly 30, he needs to grow up. Your just finishing up in college can ye move in together when you finish?

Ya very suspicious about the father to, I would be very P/O'd

Ickle Magoo

Can posters avoid using textspeak or acronyms/abbreviations that other posters - including the OP - may not understand.

Many thanks.

LegacyUser

Thanks for the replies.

I do agree that we need to live together. Work just is not allowing it at the moment though. When I finish college, I am lucky to have a permanent job lined up which is near my home town and my boyfriend is due to be relocated again down the far south of the country. His job is on a contract basis so that's why they move around so much. His commute would be 3 and a half hours! So it's looking like we will get a house around my home town - I'd have my parents nearby to mind my son when I am working and about a half hour drive to work each day. So my boyfriend will be up at the weekends and during the week will be working and I presume going out once or twice a week as he is now.

I dont know what to think about the night of his birthday and it makes me wonder that if he does this when his brother and sister in law are out - what does he do when its just him and his mates? - But thinking about that will drive me mad and I need to start trusting him again if this is going to pull through at all.

I'm 24

With regard to reporting his father - that's where it gets a little complicated. They live in a different country and I dont speak the language. Also - I was there again about a year after seeing it the first time and I checked again and found nothing. Counld it have been a popup? I really hope so. I told sister in law what I had seen one noght as she has young children too and needs to know. She was shocked but not hugely surprised. She said about some time that she was out sunbathing at their house and the father came up and starting rubbing suncream on her back and she had to call for her husband. I know he would never dare try anything like that with me as I think he gets the feeling that I'm not happy go lucky with him.

I do love my boyfriend. He is a good man. But if I were to ask him about anything that had ever happened on a night out, I would not be able to trust he would not lie to me. There have been about three other instances where I found him to lie to me and only for the fact that I knew for sure - I would have believed him. Am I a fool?

seenitall

Hi OP,

no, you are not a fool for loving the father of your child and wanting to trust him. It is only natural.

What I can tell you is that I disagree that you should move in with him, but my reasons are pretty drastic, I'm afraid. For me, if there is no trust, there is no relationship, simple as that; and someone having repeatedly lied to me means - I don't trust whatever they say anymore.

It is very sad and stressful, but somehow, the tone of your posts indicates to me that there is a part of you that knows the end is on the horizon (especially with the view of the choice you made with your last pregnancy!).

Now, I am writing this as a single mother of one, and therefore from the position of knowing it can be done, and that the life goes on. At this point in my life, I would rather be (and at times am) lonely, than be in a bad relationship (for example one in which I'd feel unappreciated and/or lied to);

so you need to consider what would make you happy; you owe it to both yourself and your child, as your current situation is deeply unsettled and you will have to make some decisions soon. Perhaps you will decide that you can live with someone who disrespects you by lying to you. Whatever you do in life, though, don't sell yourself short. It's not a dress rehearsal.

Best wishes.

Zen65

Hi Op,

I read your post and it certainly has plenty of issues in it.

There's something missing from it though, and that's critical to understanding where this story is going. Have you and your bf spoken about setting up a home together? I don't mean just spoken fancifully about it, I mean do you ever spend time as a couple planning in detail to live your lives together? Where have you identified that you would live? Near your home (for the support of your family) or near his workplace? Who is going to be the primary breadwinner (do you have higher earning potential with your degree?) or will you share the task of earning income?

He's nearly 30, so at this stage he should have made a life-plan, even if it is just a rough draft! You're possibly young to be thinking about a fully settled life but you have a child and that changes things. Being "settled" at 24 is not really unusual, indeed I was married myself by that age.

Without some sort of agreed and openly-spoken plan I think you may find yourself just drifting along as the mother of his child. If the discussion has not happened, have the chat with him ASAP. You need to know what he's planning before you commit to a plan that isn't shared.

A couple of other thoughts:

There is no need to feel guilty about being away from your son during the week, he is being well cared for and you have the long summers with him. If you work during the summers you can probably still see him daily. In any event you will be finished college next year, he will still be young, your relationship can still be very close and very strong throughout his life.

About the father sending porn e-mail, that's just disturbing!! I assume this is all "legal" porn that he sends?? Still, it's a most unusual thing for a father to do. On the other hand he may have been a lousy communicator and sees this as a way of staying in touch with his son. Hopefully it really has stopped, but your bf may simply be deleting the e-mails after reading or diverting them to another e-mail account.

You mentioned that there were links in the history to a website which had videos of children as young as 6. Of course you cannot be sure that the father actually viewed the material; it is possible he simply opened a link on a dodgy e-mail or other website (the sites where he was accessing the "legal" porn that he sends to your bf). I'd be concerned in case your bf has also clicked on this type of link, but you have not found evidence of this. If the opportunity arises you could check. Look in the cookie folder to see if you recognise a cookie from this sick website.

Now, as for the nights out your bf goes on..... I think the issues here are directly related to how he sees your relationship. Either he's serious about you (in which case the nights out might be nothing more to him than a bit of "harmless flirting") or you're just the mother of his son (in which case his nights out may be much more serious) and he does not see the relationship going anywhere. It's undoubtedly hurtful to you that he goes out and mixes with female company when you're not around, but this feeling of hurt is not enough to say that what he's doing is wrong. He does not stop you socialising at college (even if you don't actually do much socialising), does he? Indeed if he's mature enough then his socialising might be a coping mechanism for when you're away.

So I would restate my opening comments: the two of you need to talk and agree explicitly where this relationship is going, whether he sees you as his life partner, or whether it's all a little less serious to him. If he says he sees you as his partner you should start making plans to live that way (even though you have another year of college) because it does seem to me that your bf finds it easy to say things to you just to appease you, but if you start to get into the planning and he starts to disengage, then you will be better able to judge whether or not he really means it.


Be at peace,

Z

metrovelvet

I decided to check the extent of this porn fascination and went into the history where I found a website of videos of girls aged between 6 and 18.

This is enough to make me have nothing to do with this family EVER. The rest of what you say just builds a case to avoid like the plague.

You will get through this.

sbsquarepants

Am i the only one who thinks it strange that a father and son are emailing porn to each other? WTF!
And added to this the father at least is watching kiddie porn! Are you simple or what? Don't let these people near your child - Jesus how many alarm bells need to sound before you realise all's not well in this family.
And report that sick fúcker while you're at it - im amazed that you haven't done that already. There is no way in hell that i would leave people like that around my kids.

reitseal

sbsquarepants wrote: »

Am i the only one who thinks it strange that a father and son are emailing porn to each other? WTF!
And added to this the father at least is watching kiddie porn! Are you simple or what? Don't let these people near your child - Jesus how many alarm bells need to sound before you realise all's not well in this family.
And report that sick fúcker while you're at it - im amazed that you haven't done that already. There is no way in hell that i would leave people like that around my kids.

OP please read this and the anoymous post above again. I honestly cannot believe people are skirting over the major alarm bells in the op's post to advise her to shack up with this guy?! WTF! Are you crazy?

OP report the father anonymously then break up with this guy, seeing as how the two of you can't really be said to be having a relationship with other anyway, not by my definition of relationship anyway. There's a kid in this and that kid was brought into the world and is now your first priority. Do the right thing here.

Esoteric_

Hi OP, I hope nothing I say comes across as too blunt but here goes -

Firstly, it is EXTREMELY rare to get a child porn pop up, unless you have previously visited child porn sites. Normal porn pop ups are extremely common, child porn is not common at all. I would honestly say that as a mother, you have a moral obligation to your child to report this man. I know you said language barriers and the fact that he's in a different country make this hard, but if you call the Gardaí and explain the situation and the language barrier, I'm positive they'd help you.

Him sending porn to your boyfriend. Honestly I find that more than a little disturbing. I mean, what parent wants their children to watch porn? I know loads of people watch it, but it's very odd to send your child something that you KNOW he or she is going to masturbate to. That's just beyond the boundaries of acceptable parent/child relationships IMO.

The fact that you said your boyfriend has been caught out on lies 3 times before, and now the porn lie, worries me. If he's been caught out three times, how many times has he ACTUALLY lied? 20? 100? You can't know. He doesn't seem to want to make any effort to see you. I mean, this whole post makes it sound like you're doing all the running and chasing and he's just sitting back and having a chilled out time. The birthday kisses thing - I'd have hit the roof. No matter how innocent the kisses are, there is bound to be somebody that came on to him because let's face it, it's USUALLY only single people that get birthday kisses from loads of people.

I definitely don't think you should move in together. If you're being treated this badly in what is essentially a part time relationship, how much worse will it get when you move in together? When doing the long distance thing, the time apart should make you miss each other and basically cherish the time you have together, not treat your girlfriend like dirt and lie to her. If he's treating you like this now, moving in together will make it worse, not better.

I know you say he loves his son and is a good dad and that's brilliant, but for you and your baby's sake, get out while you still can. I never normally advocate break ups where children are involved unless there is a really good reason but you have more than one really good reason to end this. Get out before your child gets old enough to be hurt by it.

LegacyUser

Thanks Lynda, your post was very helpful and that's what I wanted to know - whether or not child pornography pops up

I honestly dont know what to do but I know that nothing drastic is going to happen until my exams finish which is in a week

Taltos

Let me put it like this.

If you did not have a child would you be wasting your time with this guy and his family???

Also - his dad is a right freak - no better term. Do you really want your infant being anywhere near that?

Maybe you are afraid to end it or just don't want to be alone - but from the sounds of things this relationship is quite a bit south of normal.

Your call - but I think firstly I would report the father and second I would put your child and yourself first.

Motley Crue

Hi OP, you seem like a bright and intelligent young woman, and I think you will go far in life and achieve a lot.

I'm sorry things have been so hard on you the past few years with the struggle of college and not being beside your child or being able to bring him with you (don't understand why most major colleges and Universities can't have crèche facilities for mature students, staff, single parents and young mothers and fathers)

You need to ask yourself some tough questions, and doing it here on an Internet forum will not help, we can only give advice - it is you who needs to ask yourself whether you can trust this man. You might love him, you might like him, but can you trust him - and if the answer is no, then you need to leave him and look after your child.

Yes, it will be hard, but you will get through this and one day meet someone who respects you and your child and shares a trusting relationship with you.

Daved_XB

Just to add to what LyndaMcL said about child porn not popping up...

People who get caught distributing & possessing child porn tend to be sent to jail for a long time... as such these child porn rings go to a lot of trouble to conceal who they are & where they are.

They would NEVER use pop ups to try & invite new members to the ring, that would be counter productive for them trying to hide like the disgusting vermin that they are... if the father had links to child porn on his computer then he went to some lengths to find it.

Contact the Guards, tell them what you told us... child porn rings are something that luckily police forces globally will happily work together on fighting