To think 3 children sharing will have to do for now

[GrubBug]

2DSC, 1 DC between us.

2DSC are 9&11, DC is nearing 3. All same sex.

We were hoping to be able to move before the need came but unfortunately that hasn't happened due to a few reasons and now Covid too on top putting some strain on finances.

So far, DC has been in our room. I no longer think this is viable.

DSC have second bedroom which is still a big double. It's enough room for their current arrangement which is two separate beds, floor space, dressers, TV, and seating (two pouffe).

My plan is to have one side with bunk beds for DSC and the other side with a toddler bunk (low down and space underneath for toys etc...). Also means there's no need to get rid of any of the other stuff in there so set up would be the same, only difference being bunks rather than separate.

DH is hesitating because DSC don't want bunk beds and don't want to share room.

I know it's not ideal but our child needs their own space now. We are likely not going to be able to move now for another 2-3 years.

AIBU to say it will have to do for now and put my foot down?

It's not fair imo to have a resident child in with us, having no space for their things just to avoid DSC having bunk beds for a couple of years.

DSC are good kids. They aren't kicking up a huge fuss just have made it known they don't like the idea. But I believe if explained to them properly why this is the case that they will get over it and be fine.

Having your own room that is always your room, whether you're in it or not, can ameliorate that sense of "passing through" to some extent. In the same way some parents keep their child's room as their child's room while they're at uni, so when they come home in the holidays it feels like coming home, not like visiting. Doesn't have to be a big room, just a place that's yours, that says you belong here. Which can still be done whilst sharing with s sibling; I just think the power dynamic is different when one child is there permanently and the others are not. It could easily become "X's" room, while Y and Z just stay there when they're here. I'm sure OP and her husband will guard against that however as they seem very sensitive.

My 12 year old has bunk beds like this one. (Their photos seem to show it as pink but ours is not) Loads of storage space for his things on the shelves, in the staircase part and obviously underneath, but they also do this as a version with a truckle bed that fits underneath it. Both DH and I have slept on both bunks on occasion perfectly comfortably (mattresses are IKEA ones and very good).

I toyed with the idea of making a curtain to go across the bottom bunk's side, and you could do similar with the top one with track fitted on the ceiling, if you had a mind... I didn't bother in the end as the bottom bunk feels secluded enough to me, but if there was another dc in the room I probably would for additional privacy.

If it's only temporary, I'm sure they won't mind too much in the end, they sound like nice kids.

I’d like to recommend www.strictlybedsandbunks.co.uk/ if you do end up getting one - they do triples too! We’ve actually had two beds from them, well made and decent prices - delivery was within a week for us too (last month).

My kids share by the way. They are twins. They’ve always had to share, and unless we can move soon (they’re Y7) then they’ll always share. As well as it being common in other cultures for kids to share with mum and dad well past age three, it’s also common for when they get older to share bedrooms with their siblings. I mean, my husband shared with his brother throughout childhood as they lived in army housing and one bedroom was deemed sufficient. It’s not the end of the world if they don’t have their own room.

Of course it’s fine.

The fact that their parents are no longer together won’t magic some extra space will it?
It’s irrelevant anyway. What has their parents relationship status got to do with the need to have their own bedrooms? I have 4 children and 3 of them share a room. I’m no longer with their father, so does that mean they have a greater need of their own bedrooms just for that reason alone? It makes no sense.

My children all live with me full time, and the op’s own child lives with her full time. I would say that children who have only one home are the ones who have a greater need for their own rooms. Not non resident stepchildren.

i just think the power dynamic is different when one child is there permanently and the others are not.
Not a good reason for one child to never have their space and always feel like a visitor passing through.
Less likely to happen in an almost 50/50 set up than in an EOW situation.

Definitely the reason I sold my house when I got pregnant though, as I knew DSDs room would be DSs by virtue of him living there and DSD not living there. So we got a bigger house just as OP planned to, we were incredibly lucky with timing is all.

@VeniceQueen2004

Fair dos. Everybody's different. But statistically MH outcomes are worse for children with divorced parents. Glad your experience was more positive.

Oh I can totally see how that would be true, I'm not disagreeing with that.

But I would think that those problems stem from more than simply having to share a bedroom with a younger sibling. I imagine the problems are much more nuanced than that and are caused by a range of things i.e. parents not getting along, pitting against the other etc...

I think if things are generally positive in both homes, which I like to think they are in our case, and all the adults get on well which we do, the likelihood is far higher of a positive outcome MH wise regardless of room sharing.

And yes, my parents had new partners. My dad split from his (but not until I'd already left home) and my mum is still with my step dad.

@VeniceQueen2004 I mean this kindly, but you do seem to be hugely projecting your own experience into this thread. Even when the OP has clarified her points and how things are in their family (which from me reading means her, her DC, her DP, 2x DSC and her DP's ex)

You seem very angry with how your situation was when you were growing up and pushing for it to be applicable in this situation

Well you are at least entitled to a view being a child on the move from week to week

Have you ever been a child who slept in with their mum and dad because they weren't allowed to share the room their half siblings used for half of the week?

Your insistence that the only people qualified to speak on this matter are former step children really highlights the fact that you are only looking at this from one perspective. There are things you haven't experienced either and more than one set of feelings that need to be considered.

Could you have a single bed for the eldest DSC, and bunk beds for the other two with the youngest on bottom bed?

Not angry; sad for the child I was. And sad that more and more children are entering into these situations nowadays to the point where people have pretty much stopped caring, see it as completely normal and nothing to worry about, despite the overwhelming evidence that children can really struggle with parental separation.

My parents were monumentally unsuited for each other, and it was a good thing for me they split up; but I was still imagining them back together and us all having a home together until I was 13 and my mother remarried. I still felt like when my half-brother was born I was being replaced. A kid's eye view isn't always the most logical; there can be suffering even where to a grown up's eye there shouldn't be.

I'd be the first to say that a child is better off out of a dysfunctional parental home; but that doesn't follow that whatever they get after that is good enough. This doesn't apply to the OP's situation, as she's explained, but is a response to all the people denying that there might be any issue here at all, just because it works in other family situations and it could be worse.

I just feel there is no sympathy for the children of divorce, especially on MN. I know on AIBU there is a perverse pride in being hard as nails on everyone, but I wish this didn't extend even to kids who've caught on the horns of their parents' mistakes.

And I wasn't a horrible difficult stepchild; in fact I was incredibly compliant and desperate for love and acceptance from any and all the adults who came and went in my life because I felt so insecure. I would never have complained about a thing like this, I just would have taken it as another sign I didn't really belong anywhere and internalised it. The fact OP's SC feel they can vocalise their dissatisfaction with this situation, even if that can't be taken into account, is actually a massive plus, indicates how confident they do feel in their place in her house, and not at all a sign of them being unreasonable.

So I'm not projecting onto her case, more trying to raise a voice for SC and the difficulties they CAN experience.

Standrewsschool

Could you give one of the dcyour bedroo, and have a sofa bed in the lounge to sleep on. You could still have your stuff in your old bedroom.

God, this is madness. Why would OP & her DH sleep in the lounge when there is a room empty in house more than half the week??!??!!?!

@VeniceQueen2004 No sympathy for step children on MN? Are you joking?

Have you ever been a child who slept in with their mum and dad because they weren't allowed to share the room their half siblings used for half of the week?

No but I do have a 3yo and know she'd be thrilled to her core if I'd let her sleep in with us :P As do many of my friends with kids the same age.

Alright this may not be tenable forever or even for another year or so, but I think suggesting it is the youngest child who is suffering in this arrangement is very silly. She's 3. In plenty of other cultures which are more child-centred no-one would even be thinking of her having her own room yet; and she certainly won't be if it's all she knows.

I also don't see how the youngest child benefits from sharing a room with their siblings vs sharing a room with her parents. She still has to share a room!

They're definitely going to have to share. Your DH is mad to think that the three of you should share a room 7 nights a week as your DC gets older while there's a perfectly good bedroom for them that ends up empty 4 nights a week!

No, it's not ideal, but the DSCs already share a room so they're slightly inconvenienced for 3 days with an additional person. Your DC has their own room but is slightly inconvenienced for 3 days by sharing.

Play around with the layout and give the DSCs some options on how to make it their own and I'm sure they'll all be fine.

I just feel there is no sympathy for the children of divorce, especially on MN

You are having a laugh

We have baby ds and toddler dd share a room and dsd goes on top bunk When's she's here. There's bunks and toddler bed and furniture. With a games cupboard that bwas there when moved in.
Thankfully all toys are in the playroom /conservatory so no need for toys in bedrooms using space.

Teen has his own room. But he's on about going to college where his dad lives so then ds will have that room and the girls will continue to share.

@aSofaNearYou

I'm not. they're so often presented by step-parents as bratty, horrible, flying monkeys for the hated ex partner, or just a straight-up inconvenience. There are so many posts by step parents about to have their first child with their new partner saying 'once OUR child is here, I want it to be this way.." usually meaning less contact time for the original children, or less maintenance to be paid to the resident parent, etc. So many posts where separated parents have moved in a new partner way way way too soon, apparently without any consideration of how this will affect their children.

Children just seem to get dragged along in the wake of their parents' love lives oftentimes and it makes me very sad for them.

I just feel there is no sympathy for the children of divorce, especially on MN. I know on AIBU there is a perverse pride in being hard as nails on everyone, but I wish this didn't extend even to kids who've caught on the horns of their parents' mistakes.

I would say the total opposite and from most of the threads I've read here the feelings of children whose parents have separated are held above all others. Including in this scenario where there's not really any other practical option but for all three kids to share.

I do feel for children when their parents have split up but equally that is a decision that the parents have made and they can't spend the rest of their lives tiptoeing around it. If OP was saying she's was going to kick her stepkids out of their room so her DC could have it, and they could sleep in the lounge, then I'd get it. But all she's wanting is for all three kids to share. No one is winning.

I just feel there is no sympathy for the children of divorce, especially on MN. I know on AIBU there is a perverse pride in being hard as nails on everyone, but I wish this didn't extend even to kids who've caught on the horns of their parents' mistakes

I agree that people on AIBU sometimes like to rub everyone’s noses in their tin-plated rationalism, but actually this isn’t that. These kids seem secure and well looked after. But it is not reasonable to expect a child of 3 or 4 not to have a bedroom.

Not to mention all the posts telling step parents "they're not YOUR children, they're not YOUR problem, leave it with your partner' even if the OP has made it manifestly clear the partner is bloody useless and isn't doing what's needed for his/her own kids for whatever reason. As if by setting up home with someone who has kids you haven't taken ANY responsibility for those kids. I think that is an utterly unconscionable attitude.

You’re obviously very upset Venice. Which is a shame. But you’re talking nonsense.

Well that comprehensive and detailed feedback on my perspective has definitely made me reconsider everything, Anne

*Alright this may not be tenable forever or even for another year or so, but I think suggesting it is the youngest child who is suffering in this arrangement is very silly. She's 3. In plenty of other cultures which are more child-centred no-one would even be thinking of her having her own room yet; and she certainly won't be if it's all she knows.

I also don't see how the youngest child benefits from sharing a room with their siblings vs sharing a room with her parents. She still has to share a room!*

I don't think she's necessarily suffering now, but she will be if this arrangement continues much longer. Most children would have an awareness that a majority of other children get to have a bedroom by age 4. It's not all she knows, because she will be seeing her two siblings in their own room. She will be aware that is what normally happens in the same way that children whose parents separated when they were very young are aware of the traditional family unit. It won't take her long to pick up on the fact that she is being denied something most children have.

As for the benefits - a majority of children that are "in" with their parents are just that, they are in their parents room. It's not theirs, it's not decorated for them etc. All this will likely contribute to the feeling of not having her own space. Meanwhile, the other room is empty 4 days a week, so it is obvious how she will benefit from sharing that one as opposed to sharing with her parents.

Not to mention the adult angle. My daughter "benefits" from not sharing with me because she is developing independence from me. I do not want to cosleep, it is not how I wish to parent. That is a valid decision.

@VeniceQueen2004

Not to mention all the posts telling step parents "they're not YOUR children, they're not YOUR problem, leave it with your partner' even if the OP has made it manifestly clear the partner is bloody useless and isn't doing what's needed for his/her own kids for whatever reason. As if by setting up home with someone who has kids you haven't taken ANY responsibility for those kids. I think that is an utterly unconscionable attitude.

For me, those threads are more about not letting the parent off parenting.

I'd like to think most, even the seemingly useless ones we hear about on here, would not leave their children hungry if their step parent stopped cooking their meals for example. But 9 times out of 10 on these threads they don't do it precisely because they know the step parent (usually step mum), will do it for them.

It's about forcing their parent to step up for me, rather than washing your hands of the kids because they aren't yours.

Hope that makes sense!

Not to mention all the posts telling step parents "they're not YOUR children, they're not YOUR problem, leave it with your partner' even if the OP has made it manifestly clear the partner is bloody useless and isn't doing what's needed for his/her own kids for whatever reason.

You must see a lot of different threads to me, because while I see 'they're not YOUR children' it's mainly people telling step-parents to butt out and they shouldn't have a say over anything because the kids aren't theirs - it's not usually in support!