Question
I have recently remarried and am in a blended family with my new wife. She has two teenage boys, 15 and 17, who live between our house and her ex-husband’s. I have a 10-year-old daughter, who lives with her mum and stays with us for a long weekend every two weeks. My daughter has her own mobile phone, which she just uses to text and phone her mum and myself (we have disabled social media and internet on it).
I found out recently that my ex-wife tracks my daughter’s location (via the ‘find my phone’ feature) when she is with me. I only found out by chance when my ex made some comment about where I had taken my daughter on a hiking trip. To be honest, this does not feel right. I understand that my ex-wife finds it hard to be away from her daughter.
As a result, there is no problem with her texting and ringing my daughter, though sometimes I think this is excessive and interrupting my short time with her.
I understand that lots of parents use the location features to keep tabs on their kids – my wife does that with her two teenagers and she finds it helpful to know where they are and that they are safe. The 17-year-old turns the feature off himself now sometimes.
‘My ex-wife is tracking my daughter’s mobile phone location when she is with me’
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However, my ex-wife’s tracking of my daughter when she is with me feels a bit much. To be honest, it feels like I am under surveillance about my parenting. What should I do? What are my rights about this?
My ex and I have a very delicate relationship that has been very acrimonious in the past.
Answer
Though mobile phones have brought many benefits in how we can stay connected with our close family, they have also brought challenges and dilemmas. Location tracking is one of these dilemmas. It can be reassuring for a parent to know where their child is when they start being independent and this can even foster a sense of safety for the child as they go places by themselves. Location tracking is also useful for practical reasons such as finding misplaced or lost phones.
However, it does pose questions around freedom and trust, especially as children get older. Older teenagers have a right to go places without their parents knowing and this is part of them becoming independent and making their own choices. Sometimes parents can become hypervigilant and over-controlling in their children’s lives – location tracking can feed into this and can increase over-vigilance and damage trust.
There is no one size fits all when it comes to location tracking and it is really down to your judgment as a parent as to how to manage issues around safety and to decide when you give children freedom. It is interesting that your older step-son chooses to sometimes turn off tracking on his phone, which is one solution to these dilemmas. Certainly, location tracking is no replacement for upfront conversations about safety and for building warm connected relationships with your children.
Your specific question is complicated by being separated from your daughter’s mother. Her being able to track her daughter’s location means that she can also track your location. I can understand that it might feel like a violation of your own privacy as a parent.
You also have the additional concern of how frequently your ex-wife contacts your daughter when she is with you. It is useful that you can empathise with your ex-wife’s need to stay connected with her daughter – she may indeed be quite lonely when her daughter is not with her and this might lead to her contacting or checking her location.
As you think how to resolve the issue, a lot depends on the quality of your co-parenting relationship with your ex-wife. For example, it is perfectly reasonable to request that your wife does not track your daughter when she is with you. You could agree that you will turn off the tracking feature at these times and suggest she contact you directly if she has any concerns. It might also be reasonable to request a schedule for when your ex-wife phones your daughter during visits so these can fit better into your routines.
However, it is worth bearing in mind that such requests might go down badly with your ex-wife, especially if you have had a previously acrimonious relationship. You could decide that it is not worth raising the issues, and let them slide for the moment to be revisited later when your daughter is older. Before you decide how you respond, it is worth reflecting how your daughter is impacted by the contact with her mother when she is staying with you – is it too much and unsettling for her, or is it okay or even beneficial to her?
Try to make a decision that is focused your daughter’s best needs.
- John Sharry is clinical director of the Parents Plus Charity and an adjunct professor at the UCD School of Psychology. He is author of several parenting books including, Parenting when Separated – Helping your Children Cope and Thrive. See solutiontalk.ie