Just want bio mum to step up

Poor child. You should not have married someone who already had a child if you did not want to be a stepmother

And don't call her bio mum. Mum will do nicely.

It's in a different thread someone "discovered" where she wrote about putting her DD into prep school (which I always thought was for high school).

Some posters look for things to bash a poster with, so they hunt out old threads.

She says elsewhere that they both work their butts off (worded more eloquently!) to pay for their DD's school fees, so not really textbook cocklodger.

I contribute more if you count mortgage and holidays - he does have a lot of time for him. He’s a dad with a teen son, guess inevitable- had less in common with our toddler right now.

She says elsewhere that they both work their butts off (worded more eloquently!) to pay for their DD's school fees, so not really textbook cocklodger.

OP said he lives in her house, doesn’t pay any bills, doesn’t do any cooking, and doesn’t do any cleaning. Textbook cocklodger.

Why is it only stepparents who are told this? When you became a parent, did you really decide to yield your own needs/wants not only to your child's needs (quite rightly) but also their WANTS? Really and genuinely, you always cede to their wants if they conflict with yours? I feel like stepparents are held to a much higher standard of expected self-sacrifice on here than parents.

No one had a perfect life, it doesn’t exist. But if you decide to live with someone who is a parent you need to accept that their child has needs and and wants, their needs will always come first and so will their wants. Providing a secure and loving home is very basic parenting. Do you not parent this way?

@Regretsmorethanafew if the cocklodger does the cooking and cleaning, then why did OP say this? ⬆️

I do everything - cook, clean - pay the bills and own the house they both live in.

WTF! I cannot see any post from the OP which says she is paying for her TODDLER daughter to attend private school. Where did you get that idea from? Or was it, as is so typical on this site, a lazy assumption to cast an OP in a bad light by making up shit?

I hear what you're saying, but the part you seem to be misunderstanding is that he is just as entitled to live with his dad as he is with his mum. There doesn't need to be a 'reason', his mum doesn't need to do anything. If he wants to live with his dad, then he should be able to. The mistake that you made was assuming that this would never happen and that if it did, it would be temporary. Even if his mum was an amazing mum, he could still just decide that he wants to live with his dad now.

OP seems to believe that if the situation was handled better, her SS could live with his mum again, or at least 50% of the time. If that is true, then it’s not ‘obvious he’s better off’ with his dad full time and not living with him mum at all. It sounds like OPs partner just let it happen, not that he really thought it was for the best, more just he just wasn’t proactive, not bothering to help ex and his son maintain a better relationship when she was having some problems. Again, if that’s true, he has really failed his child. And his other child with his ex.

OP doesn’t have to do anything, she can say enough is enough and kick her partner out. If she stays with him, then yes, her home is also her step sons home, but I think she is right to be concerned that her partner has not encouraged the relationship between his son and his ex to be the best it can be. A child will may realise the importance of it, but his father, as the adult, really should.

Quite how much of this is the boys mums fault is difficult to decipher. Was she physically or mentally ill, was she a good mum previously or is she a bad mum who chose not to put the effort in? We don’t know what’s happened there.

Part of OPs concerns are obviously for herself, and you can argue about what a step mum should or shouldn’t feel all day long, it doesn’t mean that she isn’t right that the boy shouldn’t have been guided into living back with his mum at least half of the time if that was possible.

So the mum is ‘useless’ despite providing exactly the same parenting as the dad? One child each. The mum has been slated for not providing maintenance, is the father for his other child?

you now find yourself in a very hard situation op which there is really no good way out of.

can you try to empathise what it must be like for your dss? He’s 9. His thinking will be black and white, and lacking empathy, as per children. So he is not wanted by his mother. He has a step sister who he lives with who is in private school whereas he isn’t? (I’m not saying that you should pay for that, I’m asking you to think about what that feels like from his pov).

Poor child. You should not have married someone who already had a child if you did not want to be a stepmother

And don't call her bio mum. Mum will do nicely.