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Original poster

To move..

105 replies

Dovecote · 25/12/2020 20:26

DH has a son from his first marriage. I've known him since he was 7. His mother has constantly dripped poison in his ear for years. We have tried everything to maintain a good relationship with him and to support him in every way we can but it's just failed. He has made it clear he doesn't like us and doesn't value us in his life. DH has been offered a job in my home country where we'd have a much bigger support network and where my family live. We have 2 children together who would really benefit from the move. They adore their half brother but the feeling just isn't mutual. DH thinks we can go now as this Christmas DSS doesn't even want to come by to get his presents. I'm still torn. Are we being unreasonable to move?

OP posts:
StormcloakNord · 26/12/2020 15:05

I'd be interested to know how someone is supposed to give time and reassurance to someone who isn't interested/doesn't want to know them.

Is her DH supposed to just sit there and talk at his son? What reassurance can he give if his son if his son doesn't acknowledge there's a problem to be reassured of?

Ginger1982 · 26/12/2020 15:07

I couldn't run off to another country and leave my son. No way. Your DH is being massively unreasonable.

Bargebill19 · 26/12/2020 15:10

Fwiw. I think you’ve all tried. Sometimes you really do need to step back to allow someone to unfurl and bloom.
Perhaps it’s also time to think of your own children and family.... even your own mental health and especially the mental health of your husband.
Sadly, life does have to carry on, it cannot stop for the sake of one person, who currently cannot see what they are doing, not only to themselves but to others.
You can offer a ticket to travel, you can come back. The door hasn’t irreversibly shut.
If you were dealing with an addict, the advice would be to let them hit rock bottom and decide for themselves to want to change. Maybe that’s what you have to do here, but go and life your life whilst you wait.

dontdisturbmenow · 26/12/2020 15:31

How should DH help a nearly 18 year old who doesn't wish to engage? We offered tutors when school was hard. No. We offered private school fees. No. We offered private therapy. No
That's not helping from the kid's perspective, it's getting strangers to sort him out so that he's not a burden any longer.

It might be that he really doesn't care about his dad any longer and wouldn't care less that he's moving away.

Or he is silently craving for his dad to show him attention and the move will be evidence how little he means to his dad.

Either way, it's only been a year, when coronovirus was limiting contact any way. If you go, he'll need to accept that he might have lost his son for good, which he might not care much about now but could grow to regret in a few years time.

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 15:48

You haven't answered the question I asked op. Would you do this to your own children? I suspect the answer is rightly no, so why are you considering doing it to your stepson? He means less to you both clearly if you think it's a fine option for him, but not your own kids.

Fluffymule · 26/12/2020 15:48

Have you and your husband spoken with your DSS about the possibility of a move? I think his response would guide further thought and discussions between you all.

Original poster
Dovecote · 26/12/2020 17:07

@CakeRequired You've got a clear agenda here and you showed it when you asked how DH and I met. It's the ultimate twat question. My own kids aren't an apples to apples comparison and you know it. I'd have to imagine being divorced and my kids living with DH and being a decade older than they are. It's just ludicrous.

OP posts:
Original poster
Dovecote · 26/12/2020 17:16

@StormcloakNord yeah, this is where DH has gotten to. Lord knows he's tried and so has DSS. But having poison dripped in your ear must awful for a child. I know people don't think he's "mine" but he is. He's not my son but he is my stepson. I don't know how I was suppose to love a child for 10 years without forming an attachment. It's me who who is struggling with being away from him. He still does text me. I've spent years of my life forging a relationship with this child. I've played football (very badly!). I've terrified myself at go ape. When he used to get in our bed it was always on my side. This is my child. And I'm heartbroken.

OP posts:
angelaEhen · 26/12/2020 17:25

You should not move away, you both need to be close by for this child. He is still very much a child at nearly 18, and sounds like he needs a lot of support not abandonment

Imapotato · 26/12/2020 17:30

17 is still in grumpy teenagerdom.

It has to be yours and your DH’s decision, the one you feel is best for your family, but if you stay there’s still a good chance that when he matures he’ll see through the poison and you’ll end up having a good relationship. If you go then it’ll just cement everything that his mum has told him and I doubt there’ll be any coming back from that.

It’s up to you and your DH which option you can live with. A better life for your family now, or the possibility for building a better relationship with your step son.

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 17:39

You've got a clear agenda here and you showed it when you asked how DH and I met. It's the ultimate twat question. My own kids aren't an apples to apples comparison and you know it. I'd have to imagine being divorced and my kids living with DH and being a decade older than they are. It's just ludicrous.

No agenda at all, I want you to actually see how this will look to your step son.

You don't have to imagine it in that way at all. Imagine they have an eating disorder, are starving themselves, are depressed, have little hope according to you of succeeding. Are you and your husband going to walk off to a different country and abandon them? It's got bugger all to do with the separation, you can't blame that now. If you both walk away from him and go to another country, you are abandoning a child who needs help.

If you love him as much as you say, love him as much as your own children, so you say, you wouldn't even be considering this. I'm not sure why you are considering it, and especially why your husband is considering it. Either you're naive and think he'll be fine (he won't) or you're more heartless than you're claiming. I hope it's the former.

Original poster
Dovecote · 26/12/2020 17:41

If it has bugger all to do with the separation then why ask at all @CakeRequired ?

OP posts:
lyinginthegutterstaringatstars · 26/12/2020 17:44

Yes go. You have tried to keep a relationship going but at 17 he will be fine.

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 17:45

I'm meaning you don't need to imagine you and your husband getting divorced, the kids living with him and being older to be able to imagine how you'd handle them struggling like your stepson.

Or have I hit a nerve? Were you an ow perhaps and that's why your stepson mum hates you? Hmm Be tetchy about it all you want, it was a valid question on why he might be struggling with his family dynamics changing. Many kids don't handle divorce well, even more so when it's one of their parents cheating.

ItsIgginningtolookalotlikeXmas · 26/12/2020 17:50

You have small children, you can't imagine what it would be like for them to be 17, I can assure you when your own dc are 17 you would not feel they were adults and you were ready to "give up" on them, never mind when they are going through tough times. Wait a few years.

MrJollyLivesNextDoor · 26/12/2020 17:51

Would he want to go with you?

Original poster
Dovecote · 26/12/2020 17:57

@CakeRequired bang on if you want but you're projecting your own issues into mine. I'm sick of it not being ok for stepmother to ask a question on this forum without some twat asking for proof that they weren't the OW decades ago. It's bollocks. Go get a therapist and work out your own issues.

OP posts:
Original poster
Dovecote · 26/12/2020 17:58

@MrJollyLivesNextDoor I don't think so as currently getting any response from him that isn't monosyllabic is hard going but we would offer. I think it would do him some good to get a fresh start. I don't think he can see past his A levels not going the way he had hoped but no everywhere has such a narrow pressurised system.

OP posts:
Bollss · 26/12/2020 18:01

@KatieGGGG

Sorry but I think you’re being very unreasonable.

His child is going through a mental health crisis and he’s considering moving away? He’s clearly not as good a dad as you think.

He needs to be there for his child. Their relationship won’t recover if he pisses off at this critical age.

Why no mention of his mother "Not being there" for him? Ignoring his mh issues is just as bad as not physically being there.
StoneofDestiny · 26/12/2020 18:05

Your proposed move might be the change he needs - have you offered him the chance to move with you. It might bring him out of the rut. (Yes I recognise it's more than a rut)

MrsBobDylan · 26/12/2020 18:07

Did dh offer to drop dss presents round when he wouldn't come to get them?

Does he offer to meet dss on 'neutral' ground, take him for dinner etc?

Are you sure there isn't anything that can be salvaged? Moving will sound the death knell to their relationship.

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 18:07

@Dovecote

Oh I'm not projecting. Never been married, never been cheated on, parents never divorced, don't have kids. Your situation is nothing like mine.

But I can guarantee I would NEVER ever contemplate leaving the country while one child, and he is still legally a child, is suffering from an eating disorder, is depressed and leaving him with a mother who is in denial about his problems. That is shit parenting too. I think you need your own therapist if you think that's OK to do.

Bollss · 26/12/2020 18:08

[quote CakeRequired]@Dovecote

Oh I'm not projecting. Never been married, never been cheated on, parents never divorced, don't have kids. Your situation is nothing like mine.

But I can guarantee I would NEVER ever contemplate leaving the country while one child, and he is still legally a child, is suffering from an eating disorder, is depressed and leaving him with a mother who is in denial about his problems. That is shit parenting too. I think you need your own therapist if you think that's OK to do.[/quote]
Yes an adult where his own health is concerned. They cannot force him to see a doctor or engage in therapy. What do you suggest since you know best?

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 18:10

Oh and I'm mainly calling your husband a shit parent there by the way, not you. His son is his responsibility, and I couldn't be with a man who was happy to abandon his kid who is in need.

CakeRequired · 26/12/2020 18:12

@TrustTheGeneGenie

Stay and be there for him. Keep reaching out to him, help him personally with his school work, not throw tutors at him. Even if he keeps saying no, you keep trying, you don't just give up because it's too hard. That's not what parenting is about. You don't run off to another country, you help them. If they walk away now, he's doomed. He'll likely never recover and he'll just be a statistic.

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