AIBU? Would this conversation upset you?

[GroundFogDay]

DH is currently not talking to me and I think he's being a bit ridiculous.

We were talking last night about hypothetical situations, wasn't a serious conversation at first but then he brought one up and asked what I'd do in a situation where both he and DSCs mum had died, he assumed I'd say they'd stay living with me but I answered honestly that they wouldn't and I'd assume would go to some family or another (H doesn't have much family but their mum has some).

It got pretty serious then, the conversation, with DH asking me why I wouldn't want them to live with my and our children and again I answered honestly that I wouldn't want to become full time parent to two more children and I didn't think it was my responsibility.

He was upset by it, we argued and now he's still not talking to me. AIBU to think he's being silly over a situation that is very very unlikely to ever actually happen?! And I guess AIBU to have said what I said when he asked? I'm surprised in that situation he'd expect me to be the one to take on DSC full time rather than their families (DH and exs).

I feel ridiculous having an argument over a situation that's not even going to occur. But he says it shows how I really feel i.e. about them not being responsibility. Would you be hurt if your spouse said what I said?

YABU you'd be hurt if your spouse said the same.

YANBU he shouldn't be expecting it anyway and it's silly to argue over a hypothetical.

And lol at it not being sexism, yet those who think she should be willing to take the kids on full time are continuing to overlook the fact they have a stepfather. Surely, by virtue of marrying their mother he should be just as responsible for them as OP? It’s not as if they need to live full time with their siblings after all, given that 50/50 is their accepted normal.

@aSofaNearYou it's not over sensitive, some people are protective over and unconditionally love their kids and can't get their head around people thinking they should fall down the pecking order when a parent finds a new family, that's weird and cold to some but I can appreciate we all have different opinions based on our own life experience and social, emotional connections etc.

Can I ask, in the most respectful way why people bother to get married? If it's not because you want to be a unit , a family, and live your life together being supportive of each other, I don't understand why people sign up for it.
Why marry someone with kids if you don't want to be a parent? You can be someone's girlfriend/boyfriend and not be involved with their kids, you don't have to become a step parent. Why marry someone and financially tie yourself to them, if you don't want to share assets, if you need a prenup to ensure your spouse doesn't take what's yours and you don't trust them and need peace of mind, why do you need to marry them?

Agree.

I find it hilarious 🙄that one set of automatic expectations are placed on the OP as an absolute given, yet without even so much as a conversation.
Completely expected of her, and how dare she not concur.

Yet if a man was to quite reasonably suggest similar it would likely be perfectly acceptable for it to be far too much to expect of him, them NOT being HIS children.

Similarly a woman wouldn't get any praise if she did agree to this huge commitment, yet a man would be hailed as the second coming for doing so.🙄🤷🏻‍♀️

Exactly this. A million times over.

So many deluded, internally misogynistic posters here. Absolute joke.

I don’t think it has anything to do with the fact that he has other family etc … nothing to do with bring bereft either. What it DOES mean is that the person he loves doesn’t love his kids . Now while people may think ‘so what! If you are a parent who is in love with a person who isn’t your kids parent, you want them to love them like you do. That goes without saying and OF COURSE it would hurt you if they didn’t and they said they’d not have them if you died. You want your kids to be with a person who you are happy to bring up your other kids too wouldn’t you.

Of course he needs to make arrangements for his own children. Who else do you think should make them? Are you seriously suggesting OP is being mean because he has to talk to his ex and family about arrangements for his own dc?

You can’t love to order Waitresstime. The step-kids are not OP’s children. It’s perfectly reasonable for her not to love them or to not love them as much as her own dc. She should be kind and welcoming but there is no requirement to love them.

I not ‘suggesting’ anything other than he has every right to be upset

Isn’t the argument more based on the premise that the mum died first and then DC living with dad full-time and then he dies, so DC already living full-time with dad and stepmum. Would be rare ex and dad died at exactly the same time, as it what you would be planning for when naming guardians in a will for dad and stepmums joint DC.

If dad died first then I assume stepkids would live with mum full-time and then assume the question would be whether stepdad took them on, if mum died.

indeed. Of course the rebuttal to that will be ‘Bob Geldof’, who received high praise because he did something no one seemed to have expected him to do. It was met with ‘oh, what a good man, going above and beyond!’, which is a long way from ‘of course he did, why wouldn’t he?’.

Therein speaks someone who has beever experienced that trauma clearly.

Obviously we don't know the dynamics of this particular family but "contact" and remaining a family unit are different things and that it is so easily brushed aside by so many is really quite sad to be honest.

You said ‘he has to make arrangement for his kids…. All the more reason why he would be upset.’

It reads as if you think he has a right to be upset at having to making arrangements for his dc.

No, the hypothetical was ‘what if the DH and his ex wife both died?’, it didn’t mention the order in which it hypothetically happened.

Even so, why wouldn’t custody be shared between stepparents? If OP signed up to be a parent responsible for her stepchildren, then so did the stepfather. Why would it automatically fall on OP to have them full time?

No, some people are fiercely protective of their children and can't comprehend that their spouse won't feel the same way they do about them and will be primarily building any sort of relationship with them because it's necessary for their partner. Nobody said anything about wanting them to fall down the pecking order for the actual parent. This is about parents being upset that their spouse doesn't also see their child exactly like a parent would.

In terms of the why marry if you don't want to be a family unit question - personally I wouldn't marry or be with somebody who had their kids full time, but it has far less impact on my life when contact is only EOW. Perfectly possible for him to enjoy HIS family unit, whilst I rub along ok feeling like I've got an in law visiting during those times.

Because it isn’t the only consideration. The willingness and capacity of a prospective carer to have them isn’t of secondary importance to anything else.

If you are a parent who is in love with a person who isn’t your kids parent, you want them to love them like you do. That goes without saying and OF COURSE it would hurt you if they didn’t and they said they’d not have them if you died.

No it doesn't go without saying. It's ridiculous to expect them to love them like you do. Fine to not be ok with them not loving them, but expecting them to love them like you do is ridiculous.

Oh yes, when someone doesn't agree with you and you've tried to twist what they say, it's best to just suggest they are dim. Also not illegal though, so totally ok by your play book.

We make promises to each other relationships all the time that aren't legal. expressly, indirectly or circumstantially.

I am not suggesting that OP legally has to do anything. I think it's morally wrong that she is adament that she wants to kick out two recently turned orphans on their father's death.

You are fine to dislike my "practices", I don't mind becuase I dislike yours. I am not the one telling you that you can and can't say certain things. I - unlike you apparently - am not the AIBU "authority. Wait, last time I checked posting opinions on AIBU wasn't illegal either. So ok again. Unless I am missing a nuance.

And again I am not sexist. The OP originally mentioned nothing about a step dad. I would say the same to him if he had a discussion like this with OP's husband's ExW and posted about it.

Exactly. It’s just silly to expect someone to have the children because “siblings”. Especially if that person would struggle mentally, financially, physically, etc… I mean, what kind of life are people expecting the children to have in those circumstances? Not only would the biological children suffer because their mum is stressed through taking too much on, but the dsc will grow to hate being there with an adult who is well, burnt out.

But yeah, siblings. Innit.

That post was in response to whumpthereitis

Wow. I have family friends who have agreed and are appointed as Guardians in my will to raise my children if I die. The idea that someone would marry someone with children and live with them 50% of the time and then refuse to do so if that's what the children wanted if both of their parents died is pretty shocking. How heartless and cruel.

People should not marry someone who has children if they're not prepared to treat them the same as they would with other children in the family. No wonder so many kids are messed up by blended families.

OP your husband may only just have come to the realisation that you don't consider his children part of your family but I bet they can sense this. Children pick up on these things and the damage it does it huge. So you're probably safe, they probably wouldn't feel comfortable with living with you without him there, anyway.

Of course. But these children live with OP. She already is their carer. I find it bizarre that as the children of her DH, and siblings of her own children, she has no real interest in their future upbringing in such a situation beyond "they'd just go to some other family member". But apparently that's my internalised misogyny. There are so many factors but the way the OP worded things made it seem a very surprising outcome for the DH who clearly felt there was more of a bond in his blended family than exists. This is AIBU after all.

I’ve not twisted anything, nor have I ‘suggested’ that you’re dim. What I have done is disputed statements of opinion that you’ve presented as fact. Telling you you’re wrong isn’t the same thing as saying you can’t post.

No, I am not the authority. That’s the point. It isn’t for me to tell anyone they have to conduct their relationships in a way I personally approve of. My opinion is important when it comes to my own life, I’m not in a position to dictate to anyone else, and nor do I want to be.

Thank the lord for some sanity.

No, she isn’t. Their carer is their father. She’s quite clear that her relationship with them isn’t a parental one.