My girl

[HMG]

My daughter aged 39, has confided that she thinks about suicide nearly every day now.   She has had a marriage break, sold home, only child withheld from visiting, quit job because of the stress of X 's constant demands and threats.  I have been supporting her in every way I know how but the contact from the X  and the use of threats of not seeing the child seems to start her thoughts of suicide.  I wondered if it would be better if she completely cut off the contact while re establishing herself would be better for her mental health.  At this pointI more about my daughter than the gdaughter.

[White_Rose]

Hello HMG

Welcome to BB.  I wonder about your granddaughter.  Is she old enough to make her own decisions about contact with her mother and/or is she being coerced in any way to not visit?  It seems to me that this is a situation for the family court to decide and if X is using threats then should you or your daughter contact a lawyer and/or police?

Excuse me if I am stating the obvious and your daughter has already done this. 

The other avenue is the one frequently recommended here.  Get your daughter to talk to her GP, especially if she has a good relationship with him/her.  For her personal well-being it may be useful to have additional supports such as a doctor.

It's difficult to offer anything specific as I do not know the full circumstances, and I hastily add, I am not suggesting you should make any disclosures here.

My suggestion for you is just to be there for your daughter and support her as well as you can.  She must make these decisions which is why I have mentioned the GP, family court and lawyers as these people can give valuable and factual advice.

I would love to hear how you are both going.

Regards

White Rose.

[HMG]

Thanks White Rose.

You have the picture perfectly.  As in all marriage breaks, the relationships within the family are complex and I have tried to not upset the positive connections between X, mother & only child.  The basic old life was a bit unusual.  

Both parents worked killer night weekend full time before marriage & birth of child.  Mother worked until 2 weeks before birth, then re commenced full time night, graveyard shifts 20 weeks after birth.  My mind boggled at that time and noticed the change and stress levels falling.  X then decided that he would quit work and take up "working" from home.  What work was my question?   So for a year I watched my daughter turn into a nervous stressed young woman, and then be told that all is wonderful because we can keep up the life style using credit cards.  

When it became too much, my daughter talked with X several times to say she cannot cope with working the constant changing of shifts and then not sleeping proper hours.

e.g. Home 4 a.m. Sleep to 7am up to see to child until someone could take over, nap from 7pm up 11pm, go to work until 3 or 4am. This went on for her for 12 years.  She became worse as time went by. In there X insisted medication was to best solution to keeping the "life style" he thought they should keep.  The credit card debt came to me a couple a years into this. I did help them. My daughter came to me because she knew that they would not make it.  Sadly it was then a bandaid only.  By the way my daughter had only 7 weekends off per year to spend with family an involvement in the growing child's life.  X was more than happy to be the shining light in the child's life.

So, when my daughter eventually crashed,the only place was to come away to me. I live 2 hours from her old home.  The X says that meeting half way is too much to ask and is now refusing to abide by agreement unless wife pays all his cost for half ,OR the mother has to drive all to have any visit.

Since last week, my daughter expressed that she is so tired of it and now will let X cut her out completely. She cannot do it any more with X.  

I have explained to my daughter that at this point. I only care about her and want her to have a happy calm life, the way she wants it. The child is 13 and a 1/2 and moving to young adulthood.  She is emotionally crippled with the manipulation of the father.  I feel his demanding pressure of the child is unhealthy. But what do grans know.

i surly wish he was balanced for the child. It surely is  control and punishment behaviour toward my girl. He wants to punish her for upsetting the "life style" he liked so much. There has been a lot more of this type of behaviour throughout the years. Very sad.

i better stop, but I can say that it's good to put it out there.