Feeling bad when kids don't want to go to dad's

My ex has been out of the FMH since the end of September. He bought himself a house a 3 hour round trip away, because he wanted to live 'in the countryside'. At the time I warned him there may be problems seeing the children as often as he'd like, due to the distance. They are 10, 16 and 17 and the older 2 have either activities on Friday and Saturday, or weekend jobs. I knew this would make regular fortnightly weekend visits to their dads tricky and I did strongly suggest to him that he try and live closer, so he could see them in the week as well.


He comes to collect them on Saturday evening, after activities and jobs have finished. I have now just watched my 2 younger daughters go off, the 16 year old in floods of tears. Not because she doesn't want to see her dad, but because she has 2 weeks of Mock exams starting on Tuesday, and really wanted to spend the weekend studying. She also has a large amount of GCSE course work for Art to complete by Monday, and is really quite stressed about this.


My ex has no wifi (too tight) and so she cannot access the school revision sites while she is at his house. All her art stuff is here and she tried to pack it all to take with her, but was so upset, the tears were going all over her work. She sobbed 'I just don't want to go'. I didn't know what to do.


I tried to be encouraging and say I'll pick her up early tomorrow, or she can have the day off on Monday to study if needs be. But should I have let her stay home because of these exams, or do I insist she visit her dad because he is not happy that he doesn't see them that often? The older daughter is out babysitting and didn't want to go due to the amount of college work she has to do tomorrow, so he is also cross that he doesn't have all 3 of them this weekend. He says I need to 'force them'.


I'm torn between feeling bad for my ex as he misses them a lot and wants to see them more, and trying to support my girls who are old enough to have some sort of say in what they do. They love and miss him - they would love to see him more, but they are not happy he's moved so far away.


It was his choice to leave us and to buy his own home so far away. Part of me thinks 'You made your bed...'. But my primary concern is for my girls' well being. The eldest 2 have GCSEs and A Levels next summer and they are both keen to do well, so want to study as much as possible. I can see things getting even more fraught and stressful each time they are due to 'go to his', as exams approach.

What about him renting a little appartment for the weekend if there was one nearby?

Seems a long way to go for your children. Your oldest two surely can decide what they to do now and sounds like it is causing some stress for them both. But good to try and keep contat with your youngest.

I believe that the mobile phone companies sell a dongle plan where you plug the dongle into a computer/laptop and use the airways to receive the internet. Choose carefully and see if the plan gets reception in that area.