Visitation (not court-ordered)

krissyanne

Hey everyone, I posted here a really long time ago (over a year). I'm sorry this is a little long - I have a "moral" question I guess. BD and I do not have any court ordered child support or visitations. He was manipulative and abusive in the past before my daughter, but I immediately got out of the situation. It has been 2 years now since that time.

When she was born he gave DD child support for 6 months, and visited every month. Then he decided to move 2000 miles away, telling me every couple of weeks that there was "a check in the mail" or that he would "be taking a plane to visit very soon". Neither of those statements were true. The child support stopped at 6 months and so did the visitations. She is now 16 months. He abruptly moved back here because "things didn't work out".

He started to pay child support for the past 2 months and is demanding to see DD because he starting paying child support again. I told him he could see her when he proved he is responsible and reliable, and now he is sending me letters saying things like "you are not allowing me to see my daughter and it has been half of a year since I've seen her, I deserve to see her" making me seem like the bad person even though he was the one who took off and didn't visit for 7 months. He only wants to see her when it is convenient for him in his life. He has not paid back any money for the 7 months he stopped supporting her in any way.

Here is my moral question: since he is back, should I start visitations again? Unfortunately I do not want the court involved because of time and money (I felt like everything was under control in the beginning). Again, I'm not asking what the court would say or anything, morally since he is her father, should I start visitations again even though he hasn't been supporting her at all? I have never denied visitations in the past but I am just afraid he will spend time with her and then take off again and as she is getting older I am terrified of her noticing his sporadic appearances in her life.

 I work full time and spend every other moment I have with DD and it has been a long and hard 16 months. I also take her to 2 physical therapy appointments a week (she is behind, not walking or standing). I just work so hard at making everything work by myself and I know that you ladies understand this, unfortunately no one I know can really relate. Thank you for reading!