He’s stopped making any effort to wake up

[Poison Ivy]

I know you know this: The primary goal is for your daughter to have a reliable way to get home. IMO, everything else is secondary. I think you can fulfill your responsibilities in this situation by talking to your daughter and helping her, if necessary, come up with a solution that involves someone more reliable than her father.

[square]

Okay, I'l talk to her next week. (No privacy this week).

[Poison Ivy]

Good luck. My ex often was and is unreliable, and this behavior resulted not only in me feeling angry at him but also in me feeling sad for our children.  These situations are very challenging.

[square]

I'm aNgRy lol.

Prolly hard to tell, though 

[Boat Babe]

Did you mention a bus? Surely that is the easiest solution. I may have misunderstood.

[losingmyself]

Square, in my home, me 'losing it' with H would provide him with the reasons to tell everyone that I'm crazy, and how I yell at him every day. It's just fuel for the fire. Using MC is the way to go, in my relationship.
Instead, the fear of people finding out that H is 'too lazy' to get up and help out is worse in his opinion. He always wants to look like the good guy.
He used to tell me this story about his X, how one time she left the dishes in the sink until they got moldy. I am positive that the rest of that story is that he told her, one too many times that she never ever did the dishes, when in fact, she did them regularly.  This is an example of how he wanted everyone to know how lazy she was. And this is what I think of when I think about giving him 'fuel'
I  don't think he'd change his ways if you reacted that way..y

[square]

Exactly the same on the dishes here! Verbatim! I "never do them"... despite doing 90-95%!

H is a hermit type and has no connections to people other than vvvvvvvvvvlc with mom and sis. He neither thinks nor cares about his image. His sloth is on display for all to see.

However, you are right that he will use it against me, just between the two of us.

OTOH I don't have anything to lose anyway. I'm already all the names he can call me.

He can and will use 15 year old examples, or completely make them up out of thin air.

I'm tired of walking on eggshells. It does no good. I've turned myself into a pretzel for nothing. It's his turn to tiptoe around me.

I've stuffed my every feeling and need down for so long, and still been belittled and humiliated for them. Most of the time I'm numb but then it erupts inside me because I can't resolve or even acknowledge it. It can't be processed or go anywhere. And irl on the outside it's just

[square]

I JUST HAD AN IDEA.

What if... I continue to wake H... but only when it's LATE?

So he is 5 minutes late. He has to take the consequences of an upset DD. But it's not ridiculous like leaving her there and ignoring her texts while the sun goes down, it's just five minutes.

I don't think he'd be able to pin it solidly on me, either. Not saying another PD couldn't, but I think in his worldview he'd have to admit he blew it - though he'd probably still snipe at me a bit.

BY GOLLY I THINK THIS IS THE SOLUTION.

Also if DD can't tolerate it, she'd have to discuss with Dad directly. If I talked to her, she'd just say "Mom says she won't get you up anymore" and I'd be blamed by both. This way, it would be "DAD STOP BEING LATE" and it would be between them.

[losingmyself]

Good luck with this idea. I hope it works out well for  you. I'll be curious to see your progress
Take care of you!!

[Justanotherlostgirl]

Square, I'm so sorry you're experiencing this. My stbx is also very unreliable, especially about picking up our child from school. It is so maddening when the behavior hurts children involved.

I know it's not in the toolbox and it's so passive aggressive, but I would be in there every day with a giant pot banging and jumping about. Gotta get out that frustration somehow 🤣

(Don't do this 😅)

[square]

I could do that all I wanted, actually
Wouldn't wake him up.

His super psychic powers have kicked in and he sensed I wasn't totally delighted about this issue and has been getting up in time. Will have to wait to implement the new plan. Will let y'all know how it goes when he slacks off again.

[square]

So my new strategy is that even if I continue to be a safety net for him - that safety net will have a lot of sag and maybe a couple of holes.

That way if he falls off, it's not a cushy landing but at least somewhat of a nerve wracking experience.

He has snapped back up to picking up DD without me waking him, for now. But he did have a day he got confused and thought it was his day off of work. Usually DD asks for a ride to a friend's around noon on Sundays, his day off. He then goes back to bed and sleeps till 7:30pm ir so. This weekend there were plans on Saturday instead. It seems he then assumed it was Sunday because of the request - which honestly seems concerning to me but he thinks it's just ADHD.

At a time that he would have to panic to make it to work on time/just a few minutes late, I asked HIM if he needed to be up, proactively placing the onus on him to answer ME rather than him asking me some asinine questions.

He answered no. Knowing this was almost certainly untrue, I accepted the answer and moved to leave. I had woken him, if he missed work it was all on him.

As I was closing the door, he suddenly asked what day it was. I said Saturday and left.

He got up and followed me, in a panic. Spent several minutes kind of fighting this information - if it was Saturday, why did DD need a ride? Well, they had plans. For several minutes he was more interested in fighting reality than anything else. I refused to get drawn into it emotionally. I didn't care if he was late. Didn't care if he decided not to accept that it was Saturday. Did not try to redirect him or suggest he needed to get going. Refused to be anxious about the situation. Refused to tey to problem solve or offer to help.

He finally got ready in a whirlwind and made it to work.

I think him having to shoulder the panic alone will keep him more on his toes and is good for both of us. I'm still a safety net but it will be a much scarier fall now.

[losingmyself]

  :
Awesome!
I love the idea of him fighting reality. He can't blame the day on you, so there was nothing left to do but get ready and go to work. You handled that beautifully, in my opinion.
I think you'll find that the safety net that you provide will get more and more holes in it, as you become more accustomed to it.
Good for you

[square]

Thanks!

Seems like "fighting reality" is a fundamental trait of PD.

[Gettintired76]

That's exactly it fighting reality, they want the world to think they are there to most absolutely stable person on the planet, so they firmly convince themselves that it's the other person who is ill, who is the abuser, whatever their flavor of the day is. Then they gaslight the hell out of the other until they to are convinced.

[square]

Just an update.

Operation Saggy Safety Net continues to work for me. Notice my goal isn't necessarily his perfection in waking up but just a situation where the stress is mostly on him (granted not entirely).

H continued to do better waking up for a while but then one day he didn't. That day I genuinely lost track of time. DD texted and asked where Dad was. Whoops. I woke him up saying blandly that DD was waiting for him. He followed me into my room yelling at me for not waling him. Because that was the priority, right? I blandly said we could figure out whose fault it was after he got DD, which granted isn't the perfect MC response but I don't want to be perfect. He gave a few parting shots and left. He didn't bring it up again.

A week or two later I woke him up late - the saggy safety net. He asked me what time it was. I told him, and left, figuring he'd jump. But five minutes later, when DD was actually waiting for him, he had not gotten up yet. I went back and asked calmly if DD had another ride from school arranged. He got defensive and said he forgot, jumped up and left.

I said nothing at all about it but honestly have to wonder about dementia or other brain damage. He picks up DD every day. But that day he just thought I woke him up for no reason, I guess. When I do not ever do that, ever. But who knows, maybe it's not that unusual.

[1footouttadefog]

Unplug the internet router at midnight.  Haha

[square]

Believe me, I've thought about it.

Obviously I'd never get away with it.

[Jumping Juniper]

Just a question here. Does DD understand the situation and have your back or does she side with your husband that it is your responsibility to be a human alarm clock?
I think the saggy net is a really good idea. PD's often use "plausible deniability" when gaslighting people and I guess this is a taste of his own medicine.
I can't help but thinking this dynamic is exacerbated by DD's response too. Maybe you need to be a bit saggy with her too if she is close to adulthood.
Maybe both of them want to be infantilised?
Obviously if she is a young child that is not possible (being a saggy net) but if she is close to adulthood she can be preparing herself for adulthood.

It just sounds as if you have two purposes 1) a human alarm clock 2) a human taxi firm

I know that PDs don't treat people as people but as objects so it is really easy with them thinking you are an object. In this case an alarm clock and taxi firm respectively.

I am concerned that the DD is involved with "mobbing" you but if I have got that wrong then I apologise.

Sometimes PD's recruit not PD's around them and that is how we get flying monkeys and people with fleas. Just wondered if you are being mobbed, made responsible and blamed by both of them here? Again sorry if I am way off the mark here.

I know DD is just a child but sometimes even children can learn toxic traits from a PD. I have a friend who gets bullied by her four year old grand daughter because she sees her mother do it too. Children have to mirror somebody and also sometimes they have to blame too.

Hope things are improving for you now.

[square]

DD does understand the situation. As for having my back, well, it should be the other way around. Not going to have her take fire on my behalf.

DD isn't aligning with H, just trying to get her needs met. She can't really count on her dad 100% so she counts on me. It would take a full adult to really seperate the responsibilities - because by then she would be responsible for herself, and being let down by Dad will be inconvenient and disappointing but not critical.

Also, to be fair, H is the taxi service, not me.