Breaking up when there are children involved is never easy.
No matter what, you are both parents and regardless of your feelings towards each other, trying to co-parent as best you can is what is best for your child or children.
However, this isn’t always so straightforward or easy, as many will know.
Recently, an Australian mum revealed that she had discovered that her ex, with whom she shares a five-year-old son, was using a photo of himself with his son in all his online dating profiles.
The pair had been broken up for three years and the split was amicable, but the mum was furious over the photo.
“That was until I became aware of Luke’s online dating profiles, specifically the photo he was using in all of them – a selfie of him and Billy,” she shared.
“I can’t begin to say how absolutely horrified I was to discover our son’s image being used for this purpose. I was not asked, nor told, instead, a mutual friend brought it to my attention which made the whole thing even worse. It felt purposefully deceitful.”
The mum explained that she isn’t happy with sharing photos of her son online without his consent.
“I have always insisted on two rules – no public photos shared online of our son and that we need to ask his permission to share any image that includes him. I think consent is critical even at a young age.”
The mum explains that when she discovered that her ex had used her son’s photo on at least three public dating profiles, she was already angry.
“And then when I asked Billy about the photo and whether he knew that his dad had put it online, he told me he didn’t.”
She confronted her ex-partner about it and slated him for using the picture because it framed him as the ‘hands-on single dad’ stereotype and that this would appeal to women.
The former partner said she was overreacting and that her rules were “ridiculous”.
The mum said she feels sick thinking of the people who can see that photo of her son Billy.
“Who knows who is looking at him? The fact is though, there isn’t really much I can do about it so I just hope that some decent woman matches with Luke ASAP so he can take the profiles down.”
Do you think the dad was in the wrong?
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