Who is being unreasonable?

[User2392]

I know you all hate these types of threads but I wanted to keep it as unbiased as I could so apologies!

Olivia has a child with Paul, they are not together and Paul has another younger child with his wife Lizzy.

Olivia and Lizzy have always gotten on well enough, not the best of friends but amicable and as the years have gone on, friendly.

Olivia's child has recently told her that he feels since his sister was born that Lizzy and her family don't care about him as much and are always doing things with his sister and not him. This upset Olivia.

Olivia and Paul don't really get on so she decided to send a message to Lizzy directly just asking if they could talk about it. The message was polite but to the point.

Lizzy replied saying that she is sorry he feels that way but her daughter will always be number one to both her and her family (her parents, grandparents, siblings etc..) and that if there are any issues with their child, Olivia should take it up with Paul. She also added that it was none of Olivia's business how much or what Lizzy does with her own daughter and she won't be made to feel like she has to justify it. The message was also polite but obviously Lizzy wasn't happy.

Who's unreasonable?

(Flipped a coin for the vote so don't read anything into that)

YABU - Olivia shouldn't have sent the message in the first place.

YANBU - Lizzy's reply was cruel.

Olivia is. Her exs new parters family don’t owe anything to her and her child. Of course Lizzys family will have a closer relationship with their grandchild rather than the son of their daughters partner and his ex.

Instead of being annoyed with people who are not related to her son she should be pissed with his father who seemingly thinks his new partner and her family should be entertaining his son rather than him.

The only one being unreasonable is the father who is allowing his son to feel like this when he says with him.

Olivia hasn’t gone about things the right way, but I’m sure most of us can relate to that horrible feeling when something genuine is upsetting your child and there’s nothing you can do. She was just speaking up for her son.

Lizzy isn’t doing anything wrong by allowing her child to accept invitations from her family to do do nice things, even if it does fall on her brothers contact time. Her family aren’t doing anything wrong either by making a fuss of their granddaughter/niece, as long as they aren’t being blatantly unfair to the older child.

The only person that can sort this is the boys father. He needs to be providing extra reassurance to his son, if his wife’s family are visiting and playing with his daughter, he needs to make sure he gives the same amount of attention to his son, if his daughter is going out for the day with her grandparents then he should take his son out somewhere nice that day too.

Its sad that Olivia felt the only way to make a difference to her son was by going through his step mum instead of going directly to his father. He has got a lot of stepping up to do if he wants to maintain a good relationship with his son as he grows up.

I agree that Paul is the most unreasonable one.

it’s up to him to make sure that his son doesn’t feel this way, and I agree that when the GPs took his sister out, Paul should have made sure he was doing something good with him separately.

Olivia was a bit unreasonable to go to Lizzy with this, rather than Paul. But Lizzy was also a bit unreasonable in the way she replied, as it’s not very constructive to say “I’ll do what I like”. Tricky for Olivia as she’s the one of the three adults who didn’t ask for this dynamic, but of course as adults we just get on with it.

Lizzy and her family would be a bit U also if they made a fuss of the DS before the little one was born and have tapered off in favourite of the sister (Lizzy’s child).

Unfortunately the problem, once again, is a useless man who can't be bothered to parent his children.

Olivia shouldn't have reached out to Lizzie. L is a red herring here - the issue is between Olivia and Paul.

What Lizzie does with her child is largely irrelevant. If Olivia/Paul think it's unfair, Paul needs to step up with DS (not Lizzie). Any attention Lizzie gives DS should be a welcome bonus on top of the attention/time DS already gets from Paul and Olivia.

Out of interest, how much attention/time does Olivia give Lizzie's child? Does Olivia do things with DS that Lizzie's child doesn't get to go to?

I hope Paul isn’t sitting there thinking “oh you women, always making a fuss, at each other’s throats” etc, because he’s the cause of the problem and the only one who can sort it.

And there was a trip out recently that Lizzy's parents took her child to when Olivia's son was there that he'd of liked to go on but wasn't invited and stayed home with Lizzy and Paul.

It sounds as if it's mostly on Paul.

Perhaps if he had done something with his son rather than stay home that would have been something.

Did the child mention to his father that he would have liked to go?

I think Paul needs to be aware of how his son might be feeling & do stuff with him!

I know, but how sad its the ex's new partner and her family getting the flak for not doing things with the DS, not his dad, mum, paternal or maternal grandparents.

@ManateeFair I it's really hard for children when parents split and making sure they do not feel neglected. In terms of things like partys. If the son had a big party at his mums it's reasonable he would have a smaller celebration his dads. But when he's at his dads they should be treated like equal siblings otherwise he's going to feel like second best and he shouldn't have to. Ultimately mums raised it now it's up to dad and to some extent step mum to do better.

Olivia needs to help her son see that he and his sister have different mothers and maternal grandparents.

Paul needs to step the fuck up.

I do wonder what it is that they used to do & now don't?

I wonder if they used to do stuff without Paul & are now expecting him to step up?

I do wonder what it is that they used to do & now don't?
I wondered this as well

I was on Lizzy’s side until you said they all used to include the child more until the new one came along. That’s unfair and cruel to the child, who will view it as them being sidelined for the new baby.

Two women, trying to do the right thing, politely sharing their view with each other…

And one absent Paul, the one who is the actual link between the 2 children.

And yet here you are asking with of the women is unreasonable. FML.

Olivia is the one with the unreasonable view, but in fairness if both have been polite then nobody has been massively unreasonable.

Do Olivia’s parents take Lizzy’s child out?

I doubt it.

There was a post on here recently about a dad wanting his DC to have time with him and his wife without their shared child - ridiculous in my opinion but several people thought he was right.

One of your examples is the grandparents taking the shared child out so the son was with his dad and step mum for a day. And Olivia thinks that’s unfair?! She’s being pathetic. He’s there to see his dad and that’s what he got.

And you don’t say what the age gap between the DC is but it’s possible Lizzy’s family now takes the younger one to stuff like the farm, something they haven’t got to do with a grandchild before and they’re focussing time and resources on that what the DS has done a lot of before, or that he’s too old for now. Does Olivia think her ex’s PIL shouldn’t be allowed a day out with just their actual grandchild?! Seems so and she’s being stupid.

The dad isn’t even going.

The grandparents have only one grandchild. Olivia and her DS are lucky they were kind and inclusive for however long. It’s nothing to do with them what happens now especially when no one’s depriving the DS of time with his dad.

Lizzy is doing nothing wrong. Olivia needs to wind her neck in and stop expecting other people to prioritise her son. This boy has two parents, Lizzy isn’t one of them.

Isn't it up to the boy's actual father to make sure this doesn't happen though?

That's fair. They are related to her after all. They are not related to Paul's son. What is Paul's role in all this? What does he do to make sure his son does not feel like less of a priority?

Olivia needs to take this up with Paul

Mmm..
Olivia needs to address this with Paul, not Lizzy.

However I think the issue isn't so much 'younger child does things wtih Lizzys parents' but more 'younger child is SEEN to do things with Lizzy's parents whilst older child is present'.

If thats the case, say younger childs GP's turn up and take them out whilst older child stays in... then thats poor and I think could easily be resolved by them doing that on days when older child isn't there.

then thats poor and I think could easily be resolved by them doing that on days when older child isn't there.

Not all kids get to do everything with all people though & it's up to parents to help their kids navigate this.

I wouldn't generally treat one of my children with out doing something similar with the others. Especially when they were young.

Exactly, surely you're not advocating that Lizzy's parents are only allowed to see or take out their grandchild when it works for Olivias child?

But Paul isn’t treating his child. Lizzie’s parents are treating their grandchild...

You say the message was “polite”

but what you describe the message as being sure as heck wasn’t “polite” in my opinion

It very much depends on the ages of the children surely.

If the older child is still pretty young, yes I think its reasonable that the younger childs GP's don't take her out for a special day out without him on his day/s with his Father... presumably there are plenty of other days they could do this.

But that could be managed in a variety of ways - so his Dad could take him out, and step mum stays at home with younger one and GP's come to visit, they could go out as a whole family, GP's could take both children or GP's could come and take youngest when oldest is already out with Dad.

There are plenty of ways to work that that do not involve a small child feeling left out by people who used to include him.

Is it really THAT awful that they avoid doing that on the days the older child is there for a while?

This is of course assuming he is too young to really handle it well, and not a permanent thing, just until he's better able to deal with it.

If he is a lot older and the GP's simply can't manage two children with a huge age gap, and would be doing things that wouldn't actually amuse the older child then perhaps not.