Great question! The Advance portion of the child tax payments can certainly be confusing, but luckily the IRS has created a tax topic directly answering some of these concerns. The credit is based on eligibility for the child tax credit on your 2021 taxes, so if you have an excess of advance child tax payments compared to the amount of the child tax credit you are eligible for on your 2021 return, you may have to repay some or all of that excess repayment. In January 2022, the IRS will send you Letter 6419 to provide the total amount of advance Child Tax Credit payments that were disbursed to you during 2021.
If you aren't going to be eligible for the Child tax credit when you file your 2021 return, the answer to whether you'll have to repay the advances depends on how much money you make during the year. https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/2021-child-tax-credit-and-advance-child-tax-credit-payments-t...
Question H7 on that topic in the link above goes over the income limits for full protection from repayment- you can be eligible to apply a full repayment protection amount of $2,000 as long as your adjusted gross income is below the limits, or a partial amount of protection as long as your income is below a certain ceiling.
So just to sum up, you can receive the advance credit, but if your child's mother is going to be claiming them on the 2021 tax return, then she would be able to receive the credit when she files. Whether you would have to repay any excess advanced amounts depends on your income in 2021. If you make under certain amounts listed by the IRS (by your filing status) you can qualify to have up to $2000 per child protected from repayment, and partial amounts if you make above that listed amounts up to a ceiling when you would no longer be protected.
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