goodness why does son have to be stuck in doors on his birthday pandering to a pregnant woman. i wouldn't expect it of him so why should she?
This is from way upthread.
Since he is now 8 I think it may well be about time for the DS to start understanding that pregnant women sometimes need some consideration. You are not doing anyone any favours by being super-pregnant-woman in a heatwave here, least of all any future mother of your DS's children. It's not 'pandering' to understand that someone who is pregnant might not be up to a day out in a crowded place with dirty toilets and the sun blazing down, and nobody is getting medals here for being some sort of pregnant martyr.
An 8 year old could be expected to understand that someone else's condition was going to rule out a fancy outing for his birthday and could very well be expected to spend it simply in the company of his dad, inside or in the garden, without complaining. Maybe he could help his dad with gardening or car maintenance or something else domestic. In any case it is up to his dad to decide what the day will consist of and it is actually no business of yours at all what the dad decides. If you have done a good job of raising your DS then he will surely understand that a quiet time is going to be the order of the day this year and will be able to put the needs of another person ahead of what he might want, particularly as you are intending to provide a birthday treat anyway. You don't want to raise a child who thinks he is entitled to some sort of treat, or two treats,
regardless of what is going on in anyone else's life, or do you?
Your fears about him being pushed aside by the new arrival -- every child who gets a new sibling loses out to some extent in the attention stakes when a baby arrives. When DS was a baby he got all the attention due to him. Now it is the turn of his two half siblings. This is something every older sibling goes through and they survive. It is up to his dad to handle the demands of both of his children and his DP as he sees fit. A well brought up 8 year old is not likely to be scarred for life when adults have to devote time or attention to a baby. If your ex is a normal and in any way decent man then I think you should trust him to handle this without hurting his DS.
You keep on insisting that you are not invested in their lives but then you keep on comparing yourself favourably to the other pregnant woman [I wouldn't expect it of him so why should she?] and comparing what you have managed to provide by way of birthday treats to what the dad has done. What are you trying to prove? Are you jealous of the care your ex is giving to his new partner when he perhaps didn't do that for you?
You have no right to expect the ex to live up to your high standards of birthday treats. He has the DS for this birthday and though you may well be hurt on behalf of your DS that he will not be doing what you normally do, you need to see if the DS is upset before feeling anything about this yourself. I really think you may in the end see this as a case of you projecting your own feelings of disappointment at the big picture of your ex's approach to parenting, broken promises, etc., onto this one incident and the DS may not care much one way or the other -- he may well prove what a good mother you are by a display of generous understanding towards his stepmother.
Hopefully you are not going to complain about the ex to the DS. Hopefully if the DS complains you will remind him that you provided a treat and hopefully you will speak more kindly about the pregnant stepmother to your DS than you do about her here and will remind him that a husband taking care of his pregnant wife, taking her condition and her feelings into account when making plans is not the definition of pandering. Maybe the DS will be a husband one day.