To be fuming at step-mum

[caughto]

Long time poster/name changer, with the proviso that I know the shit end of the parenting stick step-parents get here but I need some rational thought.

Two kids, 11 and 12. Care split 50/50ish with exDH, which is a recent thing since covid - changes at that time cut down his work so he was able to be at home a lot more. Prior to that he was an EOW/Disney dad. I always thought this was a positive thing as exDH split when our youngest was six months and finally his career has slowed down enough that he could spend more time with them and properly contribute as a parent.

Back then he left me for a woman, who became my kids' step-mum (in all but name, they never married but were engaged). They broke up approx 4 months ago but due to circumstances they're still living together (not to do with money or means, even though she cheated on him they're both quite happily bumbling along together in the same house, which I find strange and confusing for the kids, he relies on her a lot for childcare as he's away with work more now the world has opened up).

This half term I had a bit of a bust-up with DD, 12, and confiscated her phone, which she only got a few months ago. I do spot checks on it but had not done a deep dive into what she'd been doing until today: I was horrified.

1. she'd confided with step mum (B) n on whatsapp telling her she had a boyfriend but to keep it a secret from mum and dad
2. she tried to convince stepmum to let her have a sleepover with said boyfriend, stepmum agreed. It didn't happen
3. in a conversation with a friend on whatsapp she said she was planning on having sex with boyfriend once parents are out of the way
4. social media (secret social media accounts - not the ones I have access to) is absolutely FULL of photos of her showing off her body - bum and boobs - and asking boys who wants 'this nyash', 'I'll show you my tits' etc

I am so sick after seeing it. Looking at her friends social media this is par for the course and I had no idea how grown up these girls are - they're so young. I remember being this much of a nightmare as a kid but not until I was about 16/17.

Until today I considered myself a good and principled parent, I talk often to the children about how they present themselves to the world, including with their social groups and social media, and we discuss the pitfalls of this kind of behaviour.

I am cross with myself. I feel that I have given too much trust to exDH and believed he'd do the same job of parenting as I have done for the rest of their lives - I've let him start handling admin and being a participant in the more serious bits of child-rearing and I haven't kept tabs on what they do at his (he has a v 'free-range' approach to parenting - they seem to ping-pong between friends' houses when he's working and spend a lot of time outside of the home alone). I'm cross that their step-mums involvement in their lives is still so fuzzy and undefined, that's not good for them.

I am FUMING that DD approached step-mum with such a 'secret' and step-mum didn't tell exDH. Had I not got hold of DD's phone who knows what would have happened - would she have had sex at 12?!

My AIBU:

• Am I right to come down on exH for what I feel is an actual safeguarding issue with step-mum?
• Am I within my rights to, now exH is barely at home and palming off childcare onto others, insist my kids are back home with me most of the time?

And how the fuck do I deal with a 12 year old's precocious social media?

Apologies if this doesn't make as much sense as I want it to, I have been beside myself today.

Big talks needed here to include honesty, trust, self esteem etc etc

Bloody social media. It's a nightmare and it's very hard to police it once your child has left the house. What you are going through is horrible, but it happens a lot. I found out that while my son was sitting 3ft from me in the living room, he was arranging with friends to buy weed. I had no clue. He was about 13.

Your DH needs to know that this has been going on and that DD was trying to sleep with BF in his house. Perhaps stepmum was trying to assess what was occurring before saying anything? Having a boyfriend you don't want your mum to know about isn't in itself unusual.

I think you probably do need to let the safeguarding lead at school know what has occurred in case these photos surface. Also, your DD is setting herself up to be blackmailed. I know of a girl this happened to after she sent similar. As much as your DD may be horrified you know, at least you do know so this aspect has diminished.

As others have said, no shaming and have some frank and honest talks which to be fair she might also be 'all talk' about having sex. She clearly thinks she is old enough to talk about it so she needs to talk about the possible scenarios, Stds, pregnancy, I wanted photos circulating, rumours and stories. These are all things I helped friends through from 13+ and some of the stuff freaked me out enough I didnt have sex until 17. But 12 is way too young and to young to deal with the outcomes
You need to discuss childcare with their dad, others mention childcare in his time is up to him but not when they are clearly unsupervised and exposed to god knows what. I would say he will agree when he sees the messages. The stepmum should have told you, the fact she alluded to faciliting a sleepover with the bf shows she's a bad influence on your child and your ex needs to deal with it asap

I do think her behaviour is a reflection of what is going on with social media at the moment, but that doesn't make it right. My DD is 14 now, but at 12 I found things I didn't want to see on Snapchat, insta etc and I lost my shit so much that I smashed her phone up. Not my finest hour but I was so distressed and horrified. From that point onward, her phone is policed constantly. I do sometimes wonder whether I'm too strict, but there's no way my child is posing on SM with her knickers pulled over her short, arse pushed backwards and boobs practically on display. She now has screen time so she can only use SM when I'm around. Snapchat is a no no until I believe she's old enough to understand the consequences of putting images like that out there in the first place, and I'm only on tiktok to monitor what she posts. So, whilst I doubt your daughter is doing anything other than what her peers are doing, I think you're right to be putting a stop to it.

If she can't be trusted to behave with a phone then she'd be losing it and only having it for use at home when I was there. I'd be checking it every night. If she argued I'd take it altogether. I'd also be chatting to her about her low self worth. I'd be watching her like a hawk and have a chat to exh about what you found and get him to agree to either be there parenting or she does not go to stay over at his house. I'd cut his exgf out of DD life as much as possible.

I'd want a proper conversation with ex and "step mum". She may have tried to talk to dd and stopped the sleepover but if she didn't then she is NOT fit to be in charge of a 12 year old.
I'd explain to exdh that he needs to police things better as well as giving his dd time and emotional support.
Yes I think they'd be better with you if he's away rather than a woman who hie is separating fro.

This is it - the useage of social media seems absolutely insidious with girls of this age. Absolutely horrifying that they seem to be modeling their pictures and videos on celebs and "influencers" of a certain ilk. I'm planning on taking a similar hard line - no phone use unless in the presence of a parent, if the phone is needed when out and about for safety reasons then access to socials will be restricted, all photos and videos will need parent approval before being posted. God it's hard to parent kids with social media!!!

I'm so sorry you went through that - it's horrifying. Similarly, I think one of the most galling things about this for me was that she was chatting about having sex while we were having a lovely family day at the beach. It was going on under my nose and I had no clue.

Thank you for all the advice here (even the hard truths which I needed to hear). I'm speaking to her dad this morning; I couldn't sleep and was up early so I have sat down and written all my points and the actions that will be taken, so I can approach them clearly and concisely with him and (hopefully) not get too ragey.

I will definitely be contacting the school safeguarding lead as soon as they're back on Monday.

These are good things to do - as long as you bear in mind that second hand phones are cheap, or friends can pass on their old ones for free, and a mobile SIM and top ups are a few pounds from ASDA or other outlets. For very little outlay a teen can have a second phone that a parent doesnt know about, with different user names on Snapchat etc. And with free WiFi available practically everywhere, they can carry on regardless as soon as they leave the house.

And even if you take their phone away, they can use friends phones to set up and access new accounts on social media with different usernames.

Basically, you can do whatever you want in the house, but as soon as they leave the house, none of that applies.

The SM should have told you and your exdh. I’d be raging at her.

The second point, absolutely.

The mistake the step mum made isn't really your DH's fault directly. But the kids staying with her isn't working and is likely to work less so in the future due to them having split up.

You must be feeling sick about it OP, you really have my sympathy. One of my boys is 12 and we also have issues but it doesn't involve bums and boobs, but other awful stuff despite all the possible lock down methods on the phone.

I don't think it's a safe guarding issue that she didn't tell you. If she told you, DD would probably stop telling the one adult she confided in anything and no adult would have any idea what's going on.

It isn't unusual that 12 year olds don't tell their parents. A few of my sons friends have girlfriends and haven't told their parents. I generally assume they're "girl friends" in name only as far as I know ans they don't even kiss.

I would be concerned about your daughter saying she was going to have sex. Though is there any chance she doesn't even know what she's saying and it's just words?

Every social media account needs blocking. Can you get her an older Nokia type phone so she can't sneakily start them up again?

all the step mum knew though is she had a boyfriend - was tried to be convinced he would stay over and it never happened right?

all the safeguarding issues of social media and having sex are separate and not ones she knew about.

I agree with a lot of the advice but also talk to her about how the 50/50 is working and constantly going to neighbours etc

In your shoes, DD would have to get rid of any social media until she could use it properly.

I would have a good sit down with DD to discuss what you'd found. Scare the life out of her about grooming and paedophiles etc. I'd also confiscate her phone until she could use it properly after this.

I would want to go round and go absolutely apeshit at the "stepmum" but that wouldn't be right for your DD, so I'd show your ex what DD was up to online and hopefully he will give this woman the elbow.

Remember tho, DD has already had to contend with her parents splitting up and then the breakdown of her dad's relationship. This is on top of any relationships you may have had, so she is probably a bit lost and confused. Go in hard when outlinging what is acceptable online with her, but do it with love and understanding too.

I checked DDs phone every day until she was 14 and still spot check now at 16.

Sorry but OP has only herself done a "deep dive" and found all the stuff today. Clearly the spot checks she was doing wasn't enough either.

I agree the stepmum shouldn't have been allowing sleepovers etc that's not up to her.

Also for all you know step mum might have told dad anyway?

We don't know that she hasn't told dad.

Completely agree with this assessment

@nahwhale she didn't tell dad

Talk to the dad as you said and I think that for now they need to be with him or you only to keep an eye on them , so you work together on that. So if he has to work then he asks you first if they are best staying at yours until he comes home .

Calmly talk to the "step mum" as well if dad thinks that is appropriate, maybe the 3 of you need to get her through this tricky patch.
It will be better if you are all saying the sane things to her.

Maybe you need to hear from DD why she didn't talk to you? Will hurt but maybe she needs to be listened to ? Maybe acknowledge her changing and growing up? If you stay calm you can talk through the dangers with her.
I'd be going down the talking and I'm sad and worried about the risks rather than punishing

Yes, but in this kind of situation where stepmum has info, dad has info, and I have info - had I not gone through her phone forensically we could have otherwise put all these facts together and make an educated guess at what she's up to. Information needs to be shared, including from stepmum.

Right in that case yeah she's should have really. She's probably trying to detach herself from the parenting issues so you and dad need to be on the ball with it not rely on her.

You and dad should have been parenting her as if stepmum didn't exist though. If she wouldn't have told you she wouldn't have told you either way. It just so happens she had stepmum to tell but she might not have. Your anger is misplaced but I think you know that.

Your problem now is your daughter don't worry about the stepmum.

This is so hard. I think you need a fairly formal meeting with your ex husband to talk about all of this.

I also think you need to remove the phone. My oldest is the same age - no phone. They’re not old enough. No smart phones until 16. They can have a phone that makes calls and texts until then. A lot of my childrens friends have the same rule. The ones who don’t are having a NIGHTMARE similar to yours.

Pictures, words etc are screenshot and shared and other parents send them to school. It’s all a disaster zone. They are just not old enough.

Why is it ex husband’s fault? I can’t really see what he’s done wrong. You weren’t aware, so why should he have been more aware.

It’s step mum that’s the issue. She’s clearly tried to be the cool step mum but has lost sight of the fact that she’s dealing with a child here.