Hi all. Sorry to basically jump right in with a massive issue, but I found this place because I need a place to vent and maybe find some help with some of the issues and this seems like a great forum for that. I suspect I'll be a frequent visitor.

So, quick backstory, my boyfriend has currently 2.5 year old son from a previous relationship. I've been the primary female presence in the child's life since he was 17 months old. He has full custody (finally established that just this past August). Since I have known this child, for the past year and a half, his mother has been homeless twice after being kicked out of her mother's house, and then evicted from the slummy apartment she managed to get. Both times found her living in her car or bouncing between friends' homes. She currently lives in a homeless halfway house for women seeking to get out of abusive relationships or who are homeless. The program sounds ideal for her because this is a 30 year old woman that cannot figure out how to actually work for a living and pay her bills rather than try and get government money to pay for everything and this program will teach her how to actually be responsible for a change. She gets every other weekend with the child. Between August of 2010 and August of 2011, there was a total of 7 months she didn't see her child--at all--6 weeks while she was in Texas with her mom, another 6 weeks between her eviction in November to Christmas Eve, and then a total of 4 months altogether where she refused to see the child because she was demanding to have him for 2 weeks at a time at an undisclosed address rather than visit with him as often as she wanted for several hours or even the entire day, but no overnights.

So far, since everything was basically spelled out in the court arrangement, she has stuck to her every other weekend set up (she had to give the address in order to have him for overnight visits, she did, breaking the rules of the program she is in). Lately she claims the child has been saying things like "Story no like me" and "Story no play outside." The child says NOTHING like this to anyone else: not his dad, his grandmother, his teachers at daycare who would be talking to his dad in an instant. The only person he says this to, if she is telling the truth, is her. I have a background in animal training and animal behavior so I would love to know what is going on when he says these things to her and her response to them, but I can't get that information from her. She won't talk to me, won't even say my name. My lovely boyfriend is afraid of major confrontation with her due to the fact that she is rather, well, volatile. I know The Boy (as I call him very affectionately since he and his dad have the same name) knows that his mother does not like me. She has made that very clear every time he has greeted me positively in front of her to the point he no longer hugs me in her presence.

I'm at a loss for how to deal with this. I know The Boy is merely manipulating his mother. Chances are, if he is saying these things, he is saying them when she won't let him do something like go outside and then she does, so he gets his way. She is likely reinforcing the lies, but they also fuel her desire to dislike me when she knows nothing about me nor has she made any effort to. I swear, there are days when I feel like my face is going to split from the smile I plaster on my face to try and be as polite and positive as possible when she is around, for her sake as well as the child's.

Any suggestions of how to proceed? There are so many other issues going on as well, but this is the one that is bothering me the most at the moment. I love this kid and I know he loves me. We play, we go do things. Part of me is feeling really hurt by this.

Thanks.