Not forcing my daughter to share her bedroom or stop going out to eat?

[tamarvin]

Right now my sister, her husband, and their three kids (14f, 10m, 5m) are staying with me and my family temporarily while they are waiting on council housing. I have two kids (13f and 11m).

So I have four bedrooms in my house. The first is my own. The second one is my daughters bedroom. The third is my son's bedroom. The last bedroom is the guest room where my sister and her husband are sleeping.

From the first night they were here my son has wanted his 10 year old cousin to sleep in his room. Those two get along very well and enjoy each others company. So we set up my 14 year old niece and my 5 year old nephew in the lounge downstairs. My 5 year old nephew is apparently having a lot of anxiety problem so most of the time he sleeps in the guestroom with his parents.

My niece is unhappy with this arrangement because she feel likes she gets no privacy (downstairs is open plan). To solve this my sister wants me to force my daughter to share her bedroom with my niece. My daughter however is not as close with my niece as the boys are with each other. My daughter and niece have very different personalities. My niece can be loud and intimidating and my daughter on the other hand is very soft spoken. Having so many other people in the house has already been making her feel stressed and overwhelmed. All three boys being younger and energetic can make things feel chaotic. I don't want to force her to give up her only private area to retreat to for peace and quiet.

I told my sister that we can try to add a privacy curtain to a corner of the lounge for her daughter. My sister said that wouldn't help at all because anyone could just barge in. She says that a teenage girl should be able to have access to a lockable room especially in a house full of mostly boys. She doesn't see any issue with the girls sharing even though I told her my concerns. She thinks it would be a good opportunity for them to bond.

Another issue we've run into involved a weekly dinner I do with my kids. So far we've had no issues with regular dinner as we all contribute to the groceries and all the adults take turn cooking. I however would get my takeaway for my kids once a week. I let my them take turns each week to choose what they want. It's a treat at the end of the week that they both look forward too. My sister and her husband have a tight budget so they cannot afford to buy takeaway regularly. While I am a better off financially paying for everyone every week is not feasible as it is already expensive and it would cost double.

I thought that eating takeaway in front of them at home would be cruel though. I've had a little discussion about it with my kids and told them that while my sister and her family are staying with us we would be having our weekly dinner out instead of doing takeaway and eating at home. I thought this was a fair compromise.

My sister did not agree. She says it's obvious that we are going out to eat good food since we leave before dinner and when we come back home we don't eat anything. While my kids won't brag about going out to eat they will answer honestly when my niece or nephews ask where we went. They then end up feeling bad and my sister says they wouldn't feel bad if I just said no to my kids and that it wouldn't hurt my kids to not go out as often. I will also add that on a selfish note I don't want to stop taking them out to eat because its the only time I get to have with just the three of us alone now.

What?

UK houses are generally much smaller 1600sq ft for a 4 bed, than American houses. They do not normally have basements.

Have just read this over a bit more, and it seems obvious now to me that the parents (sister and her husband) should move into the living room with the 5 yo to give their Dd their room.

i also think you sound a very nice person, OP (just because it rarely gets said on here) and that it’s a good idea to end this sooner than planned.

You are right to end it sooner. They are not seeing the light. They will thank you for it later on.

The 5 yo in the living room won't work. That means the living room is effectively a bedroom from early evening.

5yo sharing with big sis isn't ideal but the more i think about it it's better for the sister to share will 5yo than to be in the living room.

Dinners out would not have become a 'thing' if the adults had properly framed them. Like, DSis could have said, "Uncle and cousins have a special time every Friday together and because we are guests, let's respect that as they go out and spend time together. We will have our own special time together (play game, watch movie, take hike, whatever) when they are gone. Similarly, dad can say to his kids, "I want to preserver our family traditions, but we need to alter this a bit, so we'll go out instead of takeaway. Cousins have their alone time Friday and we have our alone time too. Please don't be cruel or brag about the special meal we had."

He's already in the lounge, however, isn't he?

It’s his daughter’s home, and yes as his daughter she should be his concern over his niece.

he is already providing a home for the niece, and if her parents want more than what is offered it is their responsibility to provide it, not OP’s. They are not in a position to demand more from OP, they are living off his charity as it is.

As I said before, I don't think its reasonable for a married couple to sleep on a sofa in a communal area for a year

They don't sound like the sort of people who thank anyone for anything.

a 4 bedroom house usually has a basement, why wasn't that considered an option?

Easy! There you go OP, you just need to use your nonexistent basement to house your sister. Why isn't you think of that? along with your nonexistent second house in the bottom of your garden.

I'm not suggesting the OP's daughter give up her room. Im suggesting the boys should be downstairs and the niece in their room

If that's really a method used in triaging people then thats worrying. Sometimes people who seem the loudest and most full of spirit are the ones struggling the most. Its just that everyone deals with things differently.

I agree that your niece at her age may feel uncomfortable staying downstairs but you should be allowed to eat out or have a takeaway if you want to without feeling guilty and upset at doing so.

Do they have a plan for where to live when they leave you? Are they definitely on a council list? Any chance of a private rent?

Well the options are
1- her parents in the living room.
2 -She stays there
3 -Op dd is forced to share with someone who she doesn’t really get on with and is her polar opposite.

1 - the youngest already join them during the night so not like they are getting privacy to have sex. They could give themselves a bit of privacy until then by using the curtain op suggested for his niece. Plenty of parents sleep in the living room.

2- basically nothing changes

3 - there will be lots of arguments due to their personality clashes. Not really good for the mh for either of them. They will both be more resentful of each other.

Oh and I’m sure her parents can suck it up for a couple of months, considering the op is ending the arrangement earlier.

Then they’re welcome to leave 🤷🏻‍♀️

This is because it’s the OP who has posted for advice on the matter from the position of being concerned for his daughter. His daughter who is navigating childhood and the teenage years without her mum remember. Of course she is his priority and we are answering from his perspective.

im sure if the niece’s mum was posting we wouldn’t be telling her that her brother should be making his daughter share with the niece but that she should be grateful for what her brother is doing and if she didn’t like it to get her finger out her arse and a new house sorted ASAP

No he's in the bedroom with the parents. I think Op might have mentioned they tried him in the living room but he was going into their bed at night anyway so they decided to he was better going to bed in the room.

He's what makes it a more difficult decision to switch the parents and the daughter round

The op did mention this in their very first post

. So we set up my 14 year old niece and my 5 year old nephew in the lounge downstairs. My 5 year old nephew is apparently having a lot of anxiety problem so most of the time he sleeps in the guestroom with his parents

So many people including me have asked similar questions, and about if they're working or paying towards rent and OP doesn't seem to be providing answers to this in the quite brief replies he has made.

I now feel we might not be hearing the full story here. Difficult to advise on if someone is BU when a lot is missed out but I guess it may be to preserve anonymity.

He did say they're not paying rent.

@IAmAReader
It's clear he doesn't want to share the back story and his sisters financial issues. Clearly they are skint, probably lots of debt that they are desperately trying to pay off. Hence not having money for takeaways or big Christmas gifts.

He is being incredibly kind trying to house them.

I’m genuinely baffled at some of the responses.

OP’s children have already given up having their home and Dad to themselves. There’s very little that WOULDN’T change with the addition of five people to the home.

Yet people are advocating for MORE. The daughter should share her room, despite her saying no, weekly dinners out should end or change.

Why are OP’s children expected to sacrifice even more than they are already? It’s not OP’s job to make everything ‘even’ at the expense of his own children. His sister and her husband are there. The actual parents of the three children. They need to step up and figure things out vs demanding OP disrupt his kids lives even more than they have been.

OP is doing his best for his kids while still being incredibly generous to his sister and her family. The idea that he should sacrifice his kids happiness and well being because his sister or niece is jealous is absolutely ridiculous, imo. It’s not even about compromise, because in a compromise, each side gets something of what they want. OP and his kids don’t want or need anything from sister or her family. This is all one sided sacrifice.

The problem with this kind of post is that, what you are basically suggesting is that the OP takes over parenting his nephew and niece because their own parents are inadequate. That is neither fair nor wise. He's already given them somewhere to live, but he isn't responsible for them financially or emotionally - that's down the parents. If they feel undermined because they can't provide for their own, they need to move out pretty fast.

I agree.

What I find baffling is that a parent wouldn't know to shut this down firmly.

The OPs daughter is struggling with a decision he has made, whilst also grappling with her mothers absence, and he doesn't know that her MH should be his absolute priority.🤷🏻‍♀️

He clearly is dominated by his sister, which is why he should NEVER have acquiesced to this in the first place.

This was NEVER about doing what's best for his children, this was always about his sister.

She is just another CF pushing for more and putting what is best for her and HER family.

That she would be so arrogant and presumptuous as to query the OP continuing a little tradition he has with his children, tells you just everything.

Th OP has, from the very first decision, put his sister and her family ahead of his.

Very, very wrong of him.

She is living rent free and has no doubt taken over the house with her 5 versus 3 presence.

I feel so sorry for that poor girl being totally let down by her father.

Her mother gone and her father allowing that dominating CF telling him, she now needs to share not just her house, but her bedroom too

Unbelievable.

If your daughters MH struggles escalate, where will your CF sister be, considering how little regard she has for them?

Nowhere to be seen most likely.

I would be telling them today that it is not working and they need to find alternative accommodation as YOU need to put YOUR daughters needs first....finally.