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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To not drive DSS.(13) to football training

404 replies

Blankscreen · 23/09/2017 10:00

DSS.stays with us every Friday night.

I just rearranged my working hours hours so that I can pick him up from the school bus.

Without discussing with me.dh has signed him up for football. The training for which is at 5:30 on a Friday.

I've said that not prepared to take him and he can walk down its less than a mile not at all remote and lots of children who live in our road walk to the venue which the local secondary school.

My reason for not taking him is that it is dinner time for ds7 and DD 4. DS does an after school club and is starving afterwards.

We get home about 4:30 and then I'll need to bundle them all out the door again to drop him off and tbh I can't be bothered.

I've deliberately not signed DS up for activities which aren't straight after school as it's a nightmare.

Dh keeps making comments about it. I said this morning that he's got a bloody cheek signing him up to something and expecting me to do all the running round.

Dh is at work and can't get back due to long commute etc.

I'm now doubting myself.

Aibu?

OP posts:
Sparklingbrook · 23/09/2017 11:39

It seems there may be a problem with biking due to the traffic being very heavy.

chocatoo · 23/09/2017 11:41

Think I would drive him the first couple of times or if it's horrible weather, then walk after that. Definitely fetch him. Maybe his step siblings would enjoy getting there early for the pick up so they could cheer him on? Think the most important thing is that he feels loved and supported by your side of his family.

HarveySchlumpfenburger · 23/09/2017 11:43

Do you have no love for your child Beware how could you be so cruel as to expect him to walk that distance? Wink

Didntcomeheretofuckspiders · 23/09/2017 11:44

At 13 I was definitely expected to get myself to and from any activities I wanted to do after school. The only exception was explorer scouts, because we finished at 10/10.30 so did get a lift home (lift shared with a friend and her brother so sometimes my dad picked up, sometimes it was theirs).

However, I do think you are being quite mean spirited to be begrudging him doing the activity, which is kind of how it sounds.

Lweji · 23/09/2017 11:46

I do think you are being quite mean spirited to be begrudging him doing the activity, which is kind of how it sounds.

Really? How?

Myheartbelongsto · 23/09/2017 11:47

You sound awful.

allthegoodusernameshavegone · 23/09/2017 11:47

Why can't a 13 year old girl walk a mile ffs!

MarieAndHerLittleLamb · 23/09/2017 11:50

It's crazy. This child is supposed to go RUNNiNG for a hour OUTSIDE (Sun or rain).
But asking him to walk less than one mile to get there is OP much? And even more if it rains?
Because he clearly won't be running and outside when he gets there??

Yep and if he doesn't go there erey other week, he isn't going to be really part of the team either. It might be an issue for him or it might not. But clearly, the not talking to his mum and imposing that on her didn't quite work out either...

Sparklingbrook · 23/09/2017 11:51

I don't know all. I have DSs. But I can't help but think people would feel differently if it was a girl.

But people can be quite strange about teen boys on MN. They have to fend for themselves very early on or they won't be able to function as adults apparently.

JWrecks · 23/09/2017 11:53

While OP's DH was BU and thoughtless to arrange something and simply expect her to handle it with no discussion, nobody should be rearranging work hours or changing commutes to get a 13 year old less than a mile down the road. His legs obviously work well enough to play football, so I expect they work well enough to get him there too.

He's not 4, he's 13! He needs to get himself there on his own. He needs to learn more independence and initiative if he's demanding to be driven that short a distance for a recreational activity because he can't be bothered. Oh you don't want to walk it? Then I guess you don't want to play football.

I really struggle with this. Why are stepchildren (on here at least) viewed as the work of the parent who they belong to only?

I've noticed that as well, and it drives me mad. I'm a step child of a big blended family, and both parents loved us all equally and took as much responsibility for each of us as they did "their own" children. We're a family, not a step-family, and that's how I think it should be.

RTKM · 23/09/2017 11:53

Is football inside a sports hall or outside in the elements?

If it is raining he will get wet anyway running around or if in goal standing around, getting cold and wet

If indoors buy him a warm waterproof coat with hood (and if really needed waterproof trousers).

I bet as a 13 year old he doesn't wear a proper coat with zip done up and hood up when he is going out with his friends in the cold and wet weather

Qvar · 23/09/2017 11:55

For fucks sake it is less than a mile. This child is 13, not 3. I would make my 11 year old walk this. It's pathetic that people are spouting "oh sadface sadface, poor boy obviously isn't very loved, sadface sadface this is what family DOES!"

No, this is what mollycoddling idiots who want their kids to never have any self efficacy do. It's pathetic to insist on disempoweribg and infantilising a 13 year old to the extent that you are driving them less than a mile up the road instead of telling them to walk.

retreatwhispering · 23/09/2017 11:56

The fact that he is your stepson is irrelevant. A healthy 13 year old boy should be able to at least walk there. I would expect him to do that and then ask DH to pay for a taxi to pick him up afterwards if dark. In these circumstances I would be firm with a 13yo DC.

Does he actually want to play football?

happypoobum · 23/09/2017 11:56

I really don't understand this at all.

DSS is 13. He is refusing to walk less than a mile to football practice, as he is too tired/cba, but is able to run around for an hour or so at practice? Confused

I think they are taking the piss.

What time does football practice end? If i isn't late surely he can walk back too. Less than a mile is a 10 - 15 minute walk. No wonder we have a teen obesity crisis if people think this is too far.

I agree with PP - it sounds like DSS isn't really bothered about football. Have you asked him OP - without DH around?

LongWavyHair · 23/09/2017 11:57

I really struggle with this. Why are stepchildren (on here at least) viewed as the work of the parent who they belong to only?

They're not. But when those parents make decisions and expect the stepparents to go along with everything they say despite their own commitments, it can get a bit messy.

Inertia · 23/09/2017 11:58

So the boy isn't actually bothered about playing football, his own mum can't or won't take him, OP just had the order invented with no consultation into her own (already busy) itinery of chauffeuring/ multiple child care pick ups / feeding small children. The only person who cakes that DSS goes to football training is his father, who apparently just has to give the orders and expect everyone else to do his bidding while his own arrangements are not impacted a jot.

I agree with you OP- he walks there, you collect him seems a fair compromise.

Badbadtromance · 23/09/2017 12:00

My ds is same age and his football is also at a school. It goes without saying hell make his own way there and back

kateandme · 23/09/2017 12:01

if dss wants a life I would try to sort something.as it gets darker a mile down the road in the dark of winter months can be very different to how it is now.

HarveySchlumpfenburger · 23/09/2017 12:02

I'd feel the same if it was a girl in this situation tbh.

Although probably the important point in this thread is not whether she takes the child or not, but that her DH unilaterally made a decision that affects only the OP and just expects her to deal with it. He doesn't have to put himself out for his child at all because he's got the OP to do that part of his parenting for him.

ForalltheSaints · 23/09/2017 12:02

Driving one mile for exercise instead of walking. In daylight. No- OP YANBU.

FlowerPot1234 · 23/09/2017 12:03

I really struggle with this. Why are stepchildren (on here at least) viewed as the work of the parent who they belong to only?

Sorry, but this made me laugh. There are countless threads on here where the poor SM or SD is facing unbearable problems with their SC, and many posters come on here and tell them that they shouldn't be butting in, that discipline should be the biological parent's job, to not overstep the boundaries, to realise they are the newcomer into a family and basically know their place etc etc.

And then from the other side the poor SM and SD, when they do say hang on, don't go arranging things without telling me, don't put all the work of the SC onto me, they're seen as pushing that SC away or viewing them as the work of the biological parent only.

SP really, really can't win! In this case, as I said before, the 13 year needs to walk (cycle in winter) himself to his football practice. It's wholly unreasonable for the 13 year old himself to ever expect EITHER parent to be his personal taxi service for a LESS THAN ONE MILE trip (OP hasn't said this is the case, but in case that is happening too), and it's also wholly unreasonable for the DH to have arranged this without discussing it first with the OP.

AprilLady4 · 23/09/2017 12:04
Football
purplepandas · 23/09/2017 12:09

I think your DH was way out of order and would not want to do that initial take to football journey with the collection arrangements you already have with younger DC. If he wants to go he can walk. Or your DH needs to find an alternative that he sorts that does not inconvenience you and the younger DC.

happypoobum · 23/09/2017 12:14

Those of you with teenagers who will not walk a mile - how do your DC get to school? Mine, including, shock horror, A GIRL, were walking to and from school, just about a mile, from age 11.

To have your parents drop you off or pick you up (Disabilities excepted) would have been considered mortifying.

If DD stayed for hockey in the winter, it would be dusk/dark when she walked home, but, like the OPs situation, there would be plenty of other teens walking along the same road.

It really does like like this poor lad has been bullied/cajoled into doing football by his dad Sad

bohemiacrop · 23/09/2017 12:16

I find this thread pretty sad - the number of people who talk about 'his son'. And the OP 'can't be bothered' to take him. I really wonder if it would be the same if it wasn't a stepchild.

I have a mile walk to and from my local station but my DH often takes me or picks me up. Because it's a kind thing to do.

Maybe there is a compromise, as others have suggested? Take him if it's raining or for the first few weeks?