Partner’s teenagers

[PostcardsFromPalma]

I’ve been with my partner for 2 years. We are a same sex couple. We have started living together for the first time this summer. This is a temporary summer only arrangement so we can spend more time together.

I am not working this summer, my partner is still working full time.

I take care of 90% or more of the household chores, including hoovering, bathroom, kitchen, dishes, changing sheets… My partner handles cooking of evening dinners, I then clean up. My partner also does about 40 or 50% of clothes washing, hanging, and putting away.

We split household food and outings costs. I am still paying all bills for my own home. My partner does not want me to contribute to bills, although I have offered.

My partner has a child, 15 years old living with us 50% of the time. There is an older sibling who is with us ad hoc weekends and holidays. Both young people have significant others who often stay over weekends. None do any household chores at all.

The 15 year old has been attending a summer school 5 days a week and gets up very early for this. Usually my partner wakes up at the same time and they spend some quality time chatting.

This morning, my partner seemed rather annoyed and asked what my plans were for the day, I said apart from the usual chores, air was going to play it by ear… my partner said I should offer to do more, for example getting up with 15 year old in the morning so they are not alone before leaving the house, and which would allow my partner a lie-in.

I felt this was said in a hostile manner, almost like an order to do this, and somehow I felt uncomfortable, especially given it was said in the context of suggesting I am not doing enough. I feel I do rather a lot, part of it is cleaning up after the children.

Is it me who is being unreasonable? I am willing to look at this from different angles before speaking with my partner this evening.

We are not married, not sharing finances, I do not live their full time, I have my own home.

I contribute by doing the lions share of domestic labour so my partner can have some rest and fun time this summer, too. I’m also paying at least half of food shops, although on the weekends we may have 6 mouths to feed.

You can also imagine how much mess there might be from teenagers who have never been expected to clean up after themselves.

In comparison to living at home, I feel like I’m doing a pastime job as housekeeper to a number of people.

Let alone being told I’m not doing enough, I felt I want to do less. The daily grind of a large family has been a bit of a crash course for me.

Your partner sounds very demanding and a bit batshit. Sorry! Inviting you to join outings is lovely. Insisting that you do is out of order. Teen (s) are not your responsibility. Sounds like they've got themself a handy mothers help for the summer. Go home and restore the status quo.

@leccybill

They could be a teacher, a preschool worker, work term time in a school etc. There’s no reason why op shouldn’t be off work.

OP, do you have low self esteem? It seems off that you’ve just accepted and allowed this.

Your partner is rushing this a bit isn't she?
She wants you to be a nice big happy family.

I simply automatically picked up these chores because I realised I have time to do it and it was my way of loving and taking care of my partner. I felt it was the decent thing to do.

If I were working full time too, I would not have taken on more than my fair share.

There wasn’t a problem here at all until I was asked to do more (!), although this more was not specified in any clear way.

I wonder if it is attached to sex. We have opposite sex drives, and having discussed it, we agreed to meet in the middle. I suspect my partner is still unhappy with this, although this was denied when I asked. I think my partner was afraid to be seen as unreasonable and his very careful about how they come across to me. I do wish there were more openness.

This is been a window into what it will be like if you live together full time. Slam that window shut and enjoy getting back to your own place, which stays tidy once you’ve done it and has no teenagers getting up early in it.

Are you both men, OP?

How does ‘meeting in the middle’ work in terms of sex drive? I can’t imagine it’s very easy to ‘up’ your drive if it’s not there which means having sex when not totally keen. Not a great solution…

I wonder if your partner is just envious that you are a free agent (albeit doing housework) over the summer and they are still in the daily work grind ?

This is not about the teenager I don't think. No 15 year old I know would want their mum to get up to keep them company having breakfast, far less mum's partner.

Your partner sounds like they feel taken for granted. It sounds like an odd set up TBH, being treated as SAHP for teenagers that aren't yours over the summer holidays is a recipe for disaster. I'd go home and try to get relationship back on track.

“his” was a typo, we are both women.

Fuck that!

Posted too soon! She wants a housekeeper not a romantic partner

This is what I thought, it is a really sweet and beautiful sentiment, but she has been very rigid in her approach.

It’s almost as though she believes she can snap into place a readymade extremely close knit family, whereas such things take time, you certainly can’t build something like that in one summer. And the children already have a very involved loving father.

My partner was married to their father for a very long time, and I sometimes feel like I’m being shoved into the mold he left behind, perhaps unconsciously, because she’s built up habits over a lifetime. I think he got up with the children some of the time.

I don’t think the children would even want me to start taking on a parental or even bestest buddy role, it might all be too fast and awkward for all concerned.

I think she is used to being in charge of the household and doing and knowing what is best for everyone, and I think that worked well for her in the past for a long time because her husband was willing to go along with it. My partner has a very powerful dynamic personality, she is like a whirlwind.

For example, my partner insists teen and I sit at the tiny breakfast bar in the kitchen together when she occasionally makes a fry up, even if teen or I choose a more cushy comfy chair. She moves us and wants us squeezed in together in the kitchen, and makes such a fuss if we don’t,. Teen and I have resigned ourselves to it it to avoid the fuss and now sit at the bar where she wants us being asked even when we prefer to sit in a more comfortable better lit part of the house.

I have lots more examples like the above.

Well summer's over OP. Go home
You never know she might just appreciate your efforts once you've gone.

Go home, OP.

I don't think you should be living together right now.
Too many expectations, some communication issues and and some resentment are rearing their heads already.

Too much, too soon.

You've been cast in the role of au pair/skivvy with benefits @PostcardsFromPalma.
It certainly seems as though you are being taken advantage of, especially as the teenagers and their boy/girl friends don't seem to be contributing to chores etc. so you are doing the bulk of the housework, and you are paying half of all food costs.

Although you say that you both hope this is a long term relationship, it wouldn't surprise me if your different levels of sex drive cause increasing frustration. How does compromise even work in that situation?

Your partner sounds controlling and high demand, with her own needs as a priority.
Move back to your own place tout de suite, and don't move in permanently with her.

There has been talk of living together permanently in the future, once youngest has left for university. That would still mean they would be home around 5 months of the year during holidays. Which is a significant amount of time if you think about it, nearly half the year. Fair enough if we could afford a spacious home, but sadly that won’t be the case anytime soon.

Now that I am becoming more closely acquiesced with my partners attitude, which I am founding to be overbearing and unreasonable at times. I am rethinking a lot of things.

All of a sudden, a clean, tidy, quiet home, with absolute minimum domestic labour is looking extremely appealing! Especially if what I’m doing isn’t even appreciated let alone good enough. The fact is I don’t have to be doing any of it at all!

The number one thing I’m frustrated with is the mountains of dishes, and my partner has forbidden the use of the perfectly functioning dishwasher, because it “uses too much water and electricity.” So I offered to swap and I’ll do the cooking whilst my partner clears up, my partner said she really enjoys cooking and finds it relaxing and wouldn’t want to give that up.

There is a level of rigidity and micro managing that I am struggling with… especially since the children are not subjected to this, since they don’t touch the cleaning in the first place. If she is so tough with me, why not assign the teens and their significant others cleanup duty on the weekends when the level of mess seems to be endless. She has said she’s found it very difficult to set this up. Before I came along, she did all of this herself. I really don’t know how she did it, and felt sorry for her, and so I stepped in…. It wasn’t fun for me to watch her toiling away whilst everyone has their feet up.

is it possible the teens don’t do any house work because she didn’t like how they did it and/or criticised how they did it and so did it herself.

she sounds awful to live with. In a way it’s useful that you have done a test run of being in the same house with each other before moving in together permanently

Sounds awful.

You’re “expected” to join all family outings when you’ve only been together 2 years? (which is relatively short, though I have lesbian sister’s voice in my head now: what does a lesbian being on a third date? Her furniture)

I’m remarried. My children’s stepfather is specifically expected not to be with us all the time.

Sounds like she has some insecure and / or control idea that you have to prove your commitment by joining her family 100%. I’d actually go so far as to say it’s not appropriate for you - short term girlfriend, not actually living together - to get getting up with the 15yo. I’ve been re-married 10 years and wouldn’t ask it of the stepfather in my house. Sure I might ask him to help me out with something and he happily would. But this sounds like she’s catapulting you into a parental relationship and that’s not appropriate.

I’d end the living together trial, and probably the relationship too.

That sounds tough. It sounds like she's too high maintenance and not compromising enough to happily merge 2 households and ways of living. Living together should enhance your relationship, not make it harder.

Reading your post of 15:54 it sounds as though she had an outwardly successful marriage with a compliant husband and a relationship she fully controlled.

Now she's had a sea change into a new type of relationship, but she still wants it to appear outwardly successful, (wanting you on all the trips) and she wants her children to feel they have a tight family unit (letting friends stay, making no demands on them).

You giving in to all her demands is a major part of that, it will confirm for her that she has done the right thing, because she is still able to control everyone.

Go home @PostcardsFromPalma.

I do wonder, she seems to be very grumpy during the working day, she complains of having so much to get through in the day, she does have a demanding role to be fair. I listen and try to support her and give her my attention when she wants to unload about work. Talking about it seems to help a little. This happens several times a day. I feel like a know her colleagues almost as well as she does now. This is to say, I am aware of the difference in our free time and try to be sensitive to that and give her as much of my support and attention as she wants.

I don’t know her to be mean spirited, but some of her comments have suggested resentment is certainly there, and when I asked her if that’s what it is about, she’s denied it…. she has thrown stuff my way like: “What do you do in the day”, in a very disapproving tone, expecting me to list my usefulness of the day!

Why would she be resentful? I do so much to ease her life, my free time allows her to have more leisure time… can someone be jealous of something that is beneficial to them?

By the way, it was her idea for me to join her in her home, and she doesn’t like it if I go somewhere without her even for a couple of hours. So it’s not that she doesn’t want me in the house, quite the opposite. I don’t understand it. Can someone “explain this to me like I’m a 6 year old?” I can’t see the wood for the trees right now. I feel a bit emotional.

For example, my partner insists teen and I sit at the tiny breakfast bar in the kitchen together when she occasionally makes a fry up, even if teen or I choose a more cushy comfy chair. She moves us and wants us squeezed in together in the kitchen, and makes such a fuss if we don’t,. Teen and I have resigned ourselves to it it to avoid the fuss and now sit at the bar where she wants us being asked even when we prefer to sit in a more comfortable better lit part of the house.

Go home now!

You are aware if you do what she wants and befriend her child, you risk her child trying to move in with you to escape their mother?

Your latest update gets worse. She is trying to control you. Who cares why she's doing it? It's not a way for you to live. Go home.