Family Forum / Parenting / Single Parents / December 2004

My son is only 19 months old and has 2 half sisters ages 9 and 10. If my
son's father doesn't "pick up" the girls, he usually doesn't bother to
visit. I live in Texas and we were never married so 2 months after
delivery we got a Modified Visitation Plan in the child support order
(which we both agreed to at the time)It works in phases. Phase one is 17
supervised visits from 1-5 p.m. He has visited our son 8 times in the past
year, and suddenly wants to keep him on weekends. I do want them to have a
relationship but I know too much about his lack of parenting skills. For
example, I can count on 2 hands the number of diapers he has changed for
our son since birth. He has no room for a carseat in his work truck if he
also has his 2 daughters that weekend. His youngest broke her arm playing
in a shopping cart in a vacant lot during one of her weekend visits. Guess
who put her in the cart? And no he didn't see it it happen, he was next
door tending to the bar b que. I could go on but it's about what's best
for our son. I have suggested that he start bringing a diaper bag to the
visits so that he can tend to our son's needs and he laughs. Most recently
I found out that the girls have been spending the night at "daddy's
girlfriend's parents house on friday when they are picked up from school
because daddy and girlfriend have to work early in the morning. Now why
would our son need to stay with total strangers overnite when they won't
even be visiting until Saturday anyway? Lastly, when it does come down to
overnite visits; the two daughters share the couch and I am supposed to be
okay with our son snuggling in between daddy and his girlfriend? There has
to be something I can do to stop this from happening. Any help would be
appreciated.