Step children staying overnight

[Lisa249]

At the moment my husbands 2 children aged 7 and 9 stay with us every other weekend. im currently 4 months pregnant. at the moment we are having to move house, but on the current market i struggling to find a house to cater my husbands office, new baby and 2 step children staying overnight every other weekend. Ive asked my husband if he can see is children once a week for the day instead of every other weekend and them staying overnight. My husband is adamant he wants the children to stay over night and doesnt agree with my suggestion. Im getting highly stressed looking for a house to cater for all his needs i.e his children, gym equipment and office. Do you think im being unfair in asking that the children dont stay over night? That way we will find a house quicker as we dont have to accomidate the children sleeping over.

the step children are different genders so its not ideal for them to be sleeping in the same room in the next year or so anyway.

They aren't even teenagers yet. They're siblings. Sharing a room once a fortnight won't kill them.

Would I have them overnight regularly - yes, absolutely, without a doubt.
Would I buy a house based on their "needs" for their own room - like fuck I would. Let them sleep in the husband's office, surely he doesn't need it overnight.

These poor kids - they are 7 and 9 FGS. Little children. Your husband's children. Goodness me, I've heard it all now. You sound very mean-spirited if this is for real.

I spend all my day on mumsnet work from home. I have an office in the corner of the dining room. I have gym equipment too in the shed with the spiders

Which means that I noticed that, in her OP, she had asked him not to have his children over night, not that he forgo the gyms/office. She chose to ask him to ditch the children.

SoupDragon - she did say she asked the husband to compromise on the gym but he wouldn't have it. He also needs the office. The only remaining option is to compromise on the kids' having their own room. I agree it doesn't mean they should never stay over, but surely unless your budget is unlimited something's got to give?

Yes you are being unfair to not want them to stay overnight but I don't think I understand why the space problem cannot be solved.

How many rooms do you have at present and how are they used?

The only additional person in the offing at the moment is the new baby and, as others have said, this will probably sleep in your room for the first few months so no extra room required.

When it is older then can it not share a room with the step-sibling of the same sex for one night a fortnight?

You are still being unreasonable.

You knew he had kids when you married him.

Yes, I'd also be interested to know how your house is arranged now.....

your husband's children need a bedroom.

they need a permanent place in their dad's home.

you would not be happy with your baby having a temporary room when it arrives (babies are only small - why not put the cot in with the gym equipment?). you should extend the same courtesy to your stepchildren.

I know how hard it can be to find a house where you all fit. I have 2 (now grown up, but they still have rooms at our house) step children. there was a time when we could not afford the size of house we needed, and the priority at that point went to the children. so they would always feel welcome. dh & I ended up with a partially converted (ie boarded out, but no window, no proper steps, not even plastered or painted) loft room and my step children had their bedrooms, and dd1 had hers. it stayed that way for over 2 years, until we could afford to do somethign about it. because it was more important that the children were welcome, adn felt comfortable and able to see heir dad regularly than it was for me to have a view from my bedroom (or indeed, carpet, paint on the walls, a decent set of stairs, or electricity - we ran cables up from the landing)

OP, grow up, and start acting responsibly.

Am I the only one who actually really feels for the OP?

She has said she would get rid of the gym.

She has been clear that her priority lies with her unborn child (which it should)

She is trying to come to some compromise between her DP and his kids.

OP... What you SHOULD NOT be doing is trying to come to the compromise. It is his compromise to come up with.

I don't think you sound like a terrible SM. An inexperienced one, I will grant you, but not terrible.

The kids deserve to feel wanted and loved (and, FWIW, their mum deserves the odd day off) and that means you do have to allocate some space / some how in your house.

But, I think you are taking on everyones problems and trying to solve them. It is up to your partner to work out how it's all going to work.

You should (and I make no bones about this) concentrate on your child. Your SKs have a mum. A good mum, I'm sure. Leave the parenting to the parents and concentrate on your child.

You should not be taking the flack for what is, essentially, your DPs problem.

As one wise MNer put it in a long-forgotten thread - where is the love?

Lisa for God's sake reconsider your attitude! Are you not in this for the long-haul? They are not "your husband's children". They are part of YOUR family.

I know you feel that you have a lot on your plate right now, but you need to be more generous and big-hearted about this situation.

Our 'office' is on a table in the back of the dining room, my 'gym equipment' is the country lanes I go running down, if I had less children, I may have room for a bigger office/gym, but I dont so , as a parent, i make sacrafices- as should op and her partner.

The logistics are her DH's problem, I agree. But no, I don't feel for her. She is trying to stop her DH from having his own children overnight.

When the stepchildren get too old to share, the daughter can share with her sister (your baby), or the son with his brother (depending on what you have).

It really does sound as if you're freezing your stepchildren out. And if you're not, then that's how they'll feel. Rejected. Think about that.

What I mean by all of that, OP, is that what you need to be clear on is that your house needs to have a bedroom / space for your baby.

(s)he needs and deserves their own space in their own house.

Your DP needs to work out how he is going to accomodate:

1. His children
2. His work
3. His hobby

If something has to give, I strongly suggest he starts at the bottom of the list.. Not the top.

Bowerbird - Like the name

OP really I would urge you to adjust your thinking on this. Everyone on this thread agrees that you cannot expect your stepchildren not to stay over, - That's stepmothers and non-stepmothers alike and by the way your husband too all with the same opinion on this.

You need to think again.

They will be staying over for many years to come yet I dare say.

You need to make them feel welcome in their Father's home, not having a place for them to sleep is not very welcoming or homely is it?

Neither of my children had a bedroom until they were a year old. This was to accommodate their near teenage stepsiblings' having separate rooms for their stays while alterations and extensions were completed.

It's what you do, it's normal. What you are proposing is not the norm.

I have some sympathy with the OP as it does sound like her DH is a bit of an arse, if he is set on having his children overnight (quite rightly) he needs to learn to compromise on how much space his stuff takes up. There needs to be a bit of compromise on all sides IMHO, nobody is going to get exactly what they want in this situation but there needs to be a solution which is acceptable to everyone, either that gym stuff goes and stepchildren share a room that doubles up as dad's office or one stepchild sleeps in the office and the other in with the baby dependent on what gender the baby is. In an ideal world the stepchildren would have a private space each in their dad's house but not everyone can afford a house larger than 3 bedrooms.

I do believe that the OP will see things very differently when she a child of her own.

I am close to my DSDs, it's a nice enough relationship, but I am still taken aback at the closeness between my DC and my DSC. There is no boundary for them. They are siblings. And it's lovely. And it makes me happy that they are all able to call this house 'home' (even though for the DSC it's really not). We've always had that policy.

lordy, the OPs problem is not that she prioritises her own child (fair enough), but that she seems to think that this is also a reasonable thing for her dh to do

as if suddenly his old children would be less important because he now has another child

as if somehow he will be more of a father to her child than to the children he has with another woman

that is wrong

and pointing this out to the OP does not mean we are letting her dh off the hook

I think the OP is trying to absolve her DP of a decision. Personally.

It sounds like he's made the decision on priorities and she's dealing with the fall out.

Op, in 2-3 years you'll be divorced if you carry on like this.

I have two dsd's and 3 dc of my own. Dh and I moved in to the smaller bedroom so we could get all 4 girls in the big room and then ds has the box. You can make it work but I suspect you don't really want it too.

No, oohlordylordy, he "is adamant he wants the children to stay over night and doesnt agree with my suggestion" - I agree that he is being unreasonable not taking it upon himself to sort out the space issue and being selfish himself by not backing down on the gym equipment thing.

But the OP is trying to insist that it's perfectly fine for her DH to not ever have his dc overnight. It isn't. Plain and simple.

But, *Cory, the OP's DP must be prioritising both his office and 'gym' before his kids.

It seems to me that the OP is keeping an eye out for her child and (without having kids right now) I'm prepared to say she's not really thinking about the other kids / other mum, which I do truly believe only comes when you know how it feels. (experience talking there) .

Why should the OP simply say: One bedroom for DC and what you do with the rest is up to you?