Step family contact after divorce

From the child's perspective it's hard to live between two households when your parents are separated. Add in regular sleepovers with stepparents and extended family that's potentially even more homes that they have to go between.

I think it's nice when appropriate contact can be facilitated by the parents but it has to be manageable for the child. If there is animosity then it might not be possible.

I stand by what I posted. No, a kid should not be sent off to sleep over with some man their mother used to be in a relationship with.
If the kid is upset, that's on the parent.

Are there other DC involved (bio children of the ex) who are still invited to family events & stay over to see the family?

I think it is unusual to still have contact after a separation. This is why people shouldn’t pressurise step GP to treat the children the same. I realise however that this was encouraged by the grow ups.

Unpopular opinion but no, they shouldn't. They've already put the child through one breakup. "Blending" people in and out of children's lives is harmful. If they must date then they need to keep it separate from their child.

If the split was amicable, why can’t your family member ask for her DS to be included in family get togethers? The moral rights and wrongs of this are somewhat moot if the other person wants nothing further to do with a child they helped raise.

It is sad though.

It would be nice, but I don't think it works, once the relationship is over, sad for everyone involved.

I agree with you it’s sad.

I am currently going through this.

stbxh has stopped me seeing DSC despite them not remembering life without me. The courts aren't set up for this, I keep having to remind them that there a three children being affected by our divorce not just bio DC.

Luckily, DSC mum is lovely and has facilitated some contact over the holidays.

I agree with you OP that in the situation as you describe it, the step grandparents have acted in a very hurtful way.
It illustrates the complexity of blended families. It's a reality that relationships defined by marriage are different from those defined by birth or adoption. I just wish people were more open and honest about that.
I get so frustrated by the anger directed at extended step relatives for treating step children differently. There are threads all the time on here. There's no excuse for being hurtful but buying into a fantasy that the relationship is the same (as these grandparents did) has such a great potential to backfire. Its a harsh reality that parents creating blended families need to look directly at before even thinking about blending because 2nd marriages involving strp children have higher rates of divorce than first marriages.

It’s cruel of the family and cruel for the child but their actions are understandable.

However the underlying fault is that of the parents as it is their responsibility to protect their child.
They should never have encouraged calling people nanny/uncle etc and should have maintained a slight distance in case this happened.

Issue is too many adults try to recreate a nuclear style family and if/when it goes wrong it’s the child that suffers.

Look at the step parents thread, half the SP on there resent the DC (it great when they aren’t here) yet won’t be honest with their partners in case it ends the relationship. This is the truth of many blends.

I don’t even blame them - their DP aren’t protecting their DC.

This is why I'm cynical about trying to force step grandparents into treating everyone the same. It's not the same, there is always the potential for this.

Your posts are unclear on who wants the relationships with the ex step parent and their extended family to continue, and who has blocked that.

My reading is that: you are the bio parent, the young teen DC would like to continue to see their step parent and family and that it’s the ex step parent (who during the relationship ’pushed’ the ‘we’re family’ narrative) who has decided against this and whose family are no longer reciprocating contact.

If so, given the duration of the stepchild/parent relationship this seems crap of your ex and (to a lesser extent) their family. If DC is clear that he wants to see them and you’ve tried explaining your concerns about impact on DC and they haven’t budged, not much you can do. Would focus on supporting your DC.

Difficulty is, would you have allowed that contract to continue when you are in a new relationship? Or if you wanted to move away? I can see some people wanting to introduce distance because eventually that contact may be stopped by you.

Your child has obviously been dropped by ex- husband’s family. Unfortunately it’s common, and realistically she isn’t their family. She’s been treated this way so I can understand it’s hurtful for you and your child. Tbh you wouldn’t want to have the occasional sleepover etc, you either want them to be an active part of your child’s life like a grandparent or just to cut ties now.

It varies my dds dad has been married 3x when his second marriage ended (his fault) her entire family dropped my dds and never saw them again so they lost a set of grandparents/aunt and uncles and cousins overnight. They were devastated as they had been in dcs life from aged 4 - 12. Ironically exdh did continue contact with his step dd from the same marriage and paid maintenance for her.

People who do that to a child are nasty.

You clearly want to paint the ex step parent as an awful person. Has it occurred to you that they were acting out of duty and now that duty has ended they might be relieved. The child had an extended family owing to the circumstances of their parents marriage. Nothing else. Yes it’s sad but it’s not the responsibility of the former step family to manage the fall out.

I assume the child’s own father and paternal family are not in the picture? That’s the real issue, as always in these situations.

I’ve been a step-parent who now has no contact with my former step-child. On reflection, I think it’s hugely unfair of my exH to have perused the relationship with me and had more DC. For this reason I don’t expect to pursue a relationship where I bring another man into my DCs home any time soon as I want to protect them from this kind of harsh reality.

no, who is going to fund this? And not only that, but it is going to impact hugely on the relationship with the biological children. You say that the step parent still says hello occasionally, and I think that is more than enough. This smacks of the parent of the step child hoping for free childcare, rather than what is in the best interest of that child or any other child in the family

The family included this child for their own son’s benefit, not for their own benefit or the child’s.

This is one of the risks people choose to take if they allow their child to have a step parent. The ex step grandparents are under no obligation to provide childcare under the guise of ‘maintaining a relationship’. It is not cruel. It was kind of them to include the child as if he were their own, but that was

Are you also expecting the ex to still play Dad?

If the child has always had a positive relationship with the grandparents, it seems rather harsh to end that relationship due to a breakup. It takes a village to raise a child and all that. I personally wouldn’t take that away from either party. Biological or not, if they’ve been solid grandparents I wouldn’t remove them from the childs life, seems rather harsh

To the extent that the former stepparent is obliged to continue the relationship if they aren’t willing to? No.

A relationship takes two, not one.

Feelings don’t entitle you to a relationship. It’s perfectly understandable that the child may feel hurt/abandoned… but we don’t get to decide unilaterally that a relationship will continue when the other party doesn’t want this.

It’s sad for the child. I agree that this is mainly on the parent - they put their child into this situation. They made their child believe that these people were their family when the reality is (in lots of situations I’ve seen), if the step family don’t get on board and pretend then they get cut off from the biological grandchildren. So yes, they include steps in sleepovers, days out, etc. Many also include steps because they aren’t monsters, they like the child but the child is only part of their life because their own child is married to the child’s parent.

No one is saying single mothers should never date again, but it’s strongly encouraged to keep your child and relationship separate for a year or two. Then as long as everyone involved is treated respectfully, there is no need to introduce strangers as “nanny” or “aunty”.