To not want her coming in the house?

[Ogy]

My husbands ex wife, his older child's mum. AIBU to not want her just waltzing into our house?

A bit of background, she never used to so I don't know why it's suddenly started but it's irritating as hell. My stepdaughter is old enough to get any things together and walk to the car at the bottom of the garden or meet at the door but for some reason her mum has started just coming in and waiting for her inside the house. She'll ring DD rather than knock and then she'll just come in whilst SDD goes upstairs and gets the last of her things.

Due to SDDs age now, DH sometimes goes to work in the mornings rather than wait for her to be collected before going which means sometimes I'm here alone too with our DC. This isn't a woman who's been very friendly toward me either so I have no desire to make random small talk with her in my living room waiting for DSD.

Aibu to tell DH to speak to her and ask that she doesn't just come in especially when hes not here. She turned up early yesterday (not uncommon for her to be early or late) so I was just lay on the sofa in my nighty eating my breakfast when she waltzed in! I'm sick of it.

Contact is 2 nights on 2 off so it's not a tiny amount of time either.

Do people really just leave their front doors open? Ours is always shut, at least by the Yale lock, if not by the security lock- unless we are outside at the front or the front door is wide open but the hall door is locked on a sunny day.

I wouldn't walk into anyone's house- except I used to knock and walk into my mam and dad's. I always ring the bell at PIL.

Just tell her. 'I'd prefer it if you waited in the car for DSD and didn't just come into our house.'

I can’t believe people are telling you to let her in!

Absolutely tell DH to tell she mustn’t come in and also tell DH he needs to lock the door when he leaves.

make it awkward

Well personally I'd wait until she is outside, she rings DSD, waltzes up to the front door, opens it. I'm there. Oh hello! Would you mind waiting in the car please? Chaos here. Tinkly laugh. DSD will be out shortly. Stand with your hand on the door showing her back out.

Do it for a couple of mornings until she gets the message. Boundary enforced.

Or you could get DH to do it, but I think it's more effective physically stopping her coming in.

I had a problem similar to this in that she would come into the house when collecting her children. She slowly worked her way further and further into the house and somehow flew under the radar (I'd had a baby, I wasn't paying attention), until I realised that she was sat next to me on the sofa while I was feeding my baby, talking to her ex.

We didn't get on, we had 90% care of her children because she voluntarily 'gave them up' etc.

YANBU, you're allowed boundaries.

HOLD UP

You just leave your door unlocked? You realise that if you're burgled, you're fucked because your insurance won't cover you?

Anyway

Lock the bloody door. Problem solved. It should be locked anyway - you know, for security

Don’t make this the child’s responsibility to manage and police - keep this between the adults.

my parents dod this to me - in different circumstances but the weight of responsibility was huge. It was ups to me to keep everyone happy and make sure adults stayed within the rules. My fault if adults overstepped and then I had to try and fix it all.

awful.

no need to tinkly laugh
its not convenient at the moment, i will tell her to come out slam

What on earth! No just no! Adults need to stop enabling such a poor display of manners! If a grown ass adult is not nice to another grown ass adult, they can be moved past and life goes on. This is the ex. And no, rarely can people be friendly with an ex! Rarely!

OP this is your house. Stamp out the trash. I would never have anyone waltz into my house. I'd be marching them right out the door! Why on earth adults suck it up, IN THEIR OWN HOME, is beyond me. That's your palace. You get to decide who comes and goes, and without more context, an unfriendly ex has no place in your living room. Let's be honest, you probably had all the insecurities of her judging what you were wearing, how you were earing your breakfast, how clean your room was etc. All HUMAN EMOTIONS with the best of us. If you're you're the right man, this shouldn't take more than a few conversations to stamp out! Sheesh. The nerve on her!

This seems a strange set-up. People I know tend to have one parent from the child off at school, and the other one collects from school. Or summer camp. Which massively limits the number of times they need to go to each other's houses.

Also, just get a lock already. Have DH say "please wait in the car instead of going into our house, thanks", but enforce that with a lock. Let DSD know mum can wait in the car, so she doesn't need to come in.

make it uncomfortable for her.

Fuck that! I don't walk into my DD's dads house and he doesn't walk into mine either. Weird as fuck. Lock the door.

You can lock your door, but you can't ask your stepdaughter not to open the door of her home to her own mother. Woman up and fight your own battles. Speak to her yourself if you don't like it, don't use DSD as a pawn or a messenger.

@Ogy
You will get people on the thread that will say you should be cleaning her arse to keep the dsc happy, even if that means making yourself miserable to do it, I don't allow my dsc mum in my home, why cause its my private space and no way do I want her walking around it, up to her if she allows my dp in her home, cause you know why that's her home. Stand your ground on this.

Mumsnet is batshit when it comes to locking doors.

The only time anyone has come into my house to attack me they ambushed me as I unlocked the door, they weren't walking along trying random doors they followed me and waited for oppitunity.

In all the years before and since no one has ever just randomly opened the door and waltzed in except one overbaring family member.

In real life I know very few people who lock their doors, my friends/family almost all just tell me 'dont bother knocking just come in' and their doors are always open. Off the top of my head I can think of TWO people who keep their doors locked (one who is completely paranoid with full deadbolts and security systems incase anyone tries to steal their steptoe & sons trash pile... that newsflash no one wants their actual garbage).

Stamp on it. Lock the door, do not let her in. Ime we went from what you have now to phone calls when the dc weren’t with us to randomly turning up to chat to exh and even the in laws when we were having Sunday lunch in the garden.

Walking straight in is unacceptable but equally I don't think it's ok to ask a child to not let their mum in when she's at the door.

yes dont collude with sd

just be firm, I will send her out.

I've not read through the entire thread; just the OP's responses. I don't understand the problem. In this situation, I'd simply have told the ex she needs to wait in the car, not wander into the house uninvited...but then I have no problem with "no" - and watching those who can't just say no tie themselves in knots is just painful.

You sound nice.......

As many people have said, if it’s the case that she knocks on the door, DSD answers and invites her in, you can’t do anything.

If, however, she just walks up the front path and turns the handle to let herself in, that’s a different matter. Lock the front door (someone may have suggested that already! 😁) and get a Ring doorbell. When she rings the bell you can speak to her to let her know DSD is on her way, without needing to open the door. Then she can’t barge past you into the house.

Two things OP yes ask your DH for her to wait in the car.

Secondly the contact arrangement sounds batshit and complicated. Week on week off works well with weekend handovers (limiting contact with annoying exes)

Locking a door is not a difficult thing to do.

I suppose that you just need to decide whether you prefer to get up and lock the door, or make stilted and desultory conversation with DSD’s mum every 2nd day.

As an adult, and a stepmother, what you don’t do, is ask DSD to tell her mum anything!

Children know who they belong too.

It can seriously mess with a child’s head when they have one parental figure telling them to give another parental figure messages.

Don’t damage your relationship with your stepdaughter by asking her to tell her mother that she’s not welcome in your house!

To a child, she will hear you saying that she’s not welcome in your house. After all, she is half her mother as well as half her father.

There’s a reason why relationships can become so fractured between parents and offspring when said parents divorce! Because all the offspring hear, when parents can’t control themselves, is how dad is xxx or mum is zzz.

The children get damaged! Sensible parents don’t talk smack about the other parent in front of the children - they keep adult things between the adults.

All this to say, preserve your relationship with your DSD, who is 1) innocent in all this and 2) the sister to your own DC!

This is your DH’s responsibility as he is the father and therefore, it is up to him to talk to the mother.

I would also raise whether it would be better for DSD to be dropped off to school and her mother can collect her from school and the same for when you have her, you collect from school. If this doesn’t work, what about week about instead? Sunday night to Sunday night? 2 days on/off is not going to work so well once your own DC are older, or you decide to return to work, or for a myriad of other reasons that may become clear in the future.

Tell her not to, then.

Why not just grab the chance next time she turns up to say "I' prefer it if you didn't come in to wait in future, please phone from the car and wait there"?