Irritated that ExH gf wants to meet me to discuss 'parenting' before meeting kids

[EmsHugs]

Ex and I have been separated for 18 months. We have 2 kids 3 & 7. Was a bit on/off for first few months of seperation. We drifted apart but have never started divorce proceedings, he will still come stay over when looking after kids if I'm on night out etc. Amicable.
He told me he was dating at the start if the year which was a but if a gut punch but I just read that to be snagging about and hooking up (fair enough, lack of sex was one of his reasons for splitting) however it turns out he has been seeing someone for 4'5 months. At the drop off this morning, he had said she would like to meet the kids but feels that given their age, she should meet me first so that I can see who it is they are spending time with. He gave me a letter from her that basically reads like a CV. It has got me properly riled up and I'm not sure why, feels a bit like she is trying too hard to be nice and certainly too soon to 'co-parent'.

Amongst other things she wants to know:
My parenting 'non-nos'
Their ideal bedtime routine
What activities I would prefer she didn't do etc
My preferred methods of discipline
She wrote she wants to ensure consistency but frankly I think this is all OTT for someone who he has only been seeing for 5 months. Plus how about asking their father who was pretty hands on.

I text him and asked him when he was planning to introduce them and he said he was going to do it within the next few weeks on a day out Pumpkin picking and then the plan was to do an over night and hopefully then they would all go to the lapland santa thing he had booked for him and the kids at the start of December. Seems like he has had this planned for a while.
A bit of social media snooping shows they have been a thing officially since April but he has been liking her pictures for over a year. He said they met online over a year ago and have been messaging for ages but they only started dating 6 months later. Is that not a bit weird?

FYI has no kids, seems never to have been married. Not sure if Ex and kids are a nice wee ready made family for her.

Would like to know:
YABU - she is respecting you as a mother and doing best by the kids, meet her and be the bigger person and maintain the somewhat good relationship you have with the Ex

YANBU -I'd be pissed off and tell her and Ex it is a bit soon.she is over stepping

I think she sounds lovely and like she’s trying her best to form a healthy relationship with you as well as the children. You might be feeling jealous about the relationship which is natural but her behaviour isn’t the problem. I’d keep it pleasant and meet her for the sake of your children if nothing else, and maybe you can even be friends. A friend of mine has become such good friends with her ex husband’s new girlfriend (who she expected to hate) that they meet up regularly without him.

Having read all your updates, I feel your letter may be a bit… I’m not sure how to put it. It reads as though you’re trying to purposefully keep some sort of barrier between your children and this woman to ensure that don’t get too close or like her too much?

Like not allowing them to have a movie night?! That’s a bit… controlling. All kids like a movie night and now their dad and his girlfriend can literally never watch a movie with the kid.

And not being able to treat the child to a magazine or little gift while in a shop? I regularly treat my children and although you don’t like giving them gifts, I don’t think it’s fair that she’s never allowed to treat a child.

And as for all the not being allowed to dress the children or help them change after swimming - the woman is a deputy headteacher! She will have been working closely with children for years and having regular DBS checks! She’s not just any old stranger off the street but even works in your daughter’s school?

I mean, it just seems like you’re worried about her replacing you in some ways? Like if she’s allowed to do everything you can, maybe she will replace you. Which she won’t of course, children always need their mums! But is everything in your letter definitely in the best interest of the kids or is some jealousy?

It seems that the woman is doing everything she can to do what’s best for the kids. She seems sensible, calm, experienced, responsible and kind. Maybe just try to look at it from a really positive way and see how lucky you and the kids are the your ex has chosen someone like her and not a shallow irresponsible idiot.

YANBU

It does read like a CV. & they've only been together a short while. Their Dad is the parent not her, he's to do the parenting surely so they should have a discussion between them and then he can relay the outcome to you. Send her a nicely worded thanks but no thanks email and then just forget about it for now. Ridiculous that the childrens' father doesn't know she's contacted you. Odd relationship basis. & She's too intense by far.

It sounds like she's all in. The reality may be a bit different.

I'd say would be good to meet before you meet children. Thank you for the letter. The only thing I'd ask is that for now personal care is done by exdh. Everything else will be a case of you getting to know the kids.

I'd mention to dh about the co sleeping separately. And leave the rest to them

This sort of situation is a bit of a painful minefield. However I think you ALL deserve praise and recognition for the fact that you are all trying to put the best interests of the children at the heart of the situation! Brilliant and well done! If only more split couples and new partners managed that and whatever happens, lucky children to have such care and wisdom surrounding the.

OP it sounds like this situation is pretty hard for you.

It was wrong of your ex to spring this on you at the same time he told you he has a new partner, before you'd had time to get used to the idea that he has someone else in his life now. But it is what it is.

I think that of all the people your ex could have chosen to partner up with, he could have done an awful lot worse than a teacher who is liked by kids and also respects your boundaries as the children's mother. This has the potential to be a really positive thing for all of you.

Please don't worry that she will be better at it than you. She's a teacher, apparently a good one, but she's not their mum. You are. You will always be their mum and they love you. It will be a good thing for them if they like her too.

I think it’s kind of nice… my friends ex was seeing someone and she was so upset when the GF straightened her little girls lovely curly hair.This is your opportunity to tell her what things you want saved for you to do the first time.
I think it’s so important that you at least try to get along, you want her to be nice to the kids and it makes communication easier if you can text her occasionally too.
you might want to ask her for example to return school uniform Sunday nights washes and dried if he’s had them since Friday. (So she can remind him to do that!) my friend used to get so wound up that her kids came home Monday night with dirty uniform that she then had to wash and dry and iron for Wednesday as well as working etc

@Mamanyt
I'm shocked at the number of responses saying that she is over-stepping. It seems to me that she is trying very hard NOT to overstep here.

She seems to be, but has still massively overstepped, more so than most new girlfriends, because before she has even met the kids she is acting like she's their stepmum who needs to be quickly got up to speed on how to parent the kids.

Now if she'd wrote the same later saying she will keep it all friendly and casual until they get used to her and she's in their life more but after that if she was more involved she'd love to know everything about their routines, discipline etc so she handled it the same way as the parents.... then that would be absolutely perfect, but to be talking about bedtime and discipline straight away is hugely overstepping even if her intention was to not overstep.

No she isn't.

And if she was looking for an 'excuse' then she already has a very valid one, because every single expert on how to introduce kids to new girlfriends/boyfriends would tell you that it should be slow and gradual and don't have the new gf/bf acting like a parent straight away, for lots of reasons.

This reminds me of my DP and his ex wife, she was fine thinking he was off looking for a shag because she felt that was why their marriage ended (her lack of interest in intimacy). When it was apparent we actually have a proper full on relationship, and I met the kids at 6 months, her nose was put out of joint. It's jealously, it's somewhat understandable, but it doesn't make it the new woman's fault.

So many opinions here but there are some glaring things we have not discussed:

1. What happens is OP does not approve or this first meeting goes tits up?
2. Regardless of which ‘side’ you are on, nobody is talking about the sheer confusion any child would feel with a new person coming in hot like this. Even done in the most “correct” way, I am not sure EXH has even remotely considered his kids might not be as enthusiastic about this new person while they are getting used to mummy and daddy not being together.
3. The majority are women in here. Can anyone come forward please and give me a single example of the reverse situation where an ex husband has had a letter and invitation to coffee from mum’s new friend Steve - just wanting to make sure Dave is happy with him and they can talk about how Steve should parent Dave’s three year old daughter? Anyone? Because my own EXH would have lost his shit if I had done that.

This is so messed up on multiple levels. I never once had to remind my now husband to parent or care for his son. Remind him to wash clothes his own child needs for school? If he can’t manage that he doesn’t have space in his life or brain for another person.

I experienced that once, and it prevented the relationship from moving forward. But you know, the men often encourage the jealousy.

Like @NosyJosie wrote, can you imagine a man writing a letter like this to another man, assuming he would immediately take over parenting for his new girlfriend’s children?

Plenty of stepmums get on well with the mums, this whole 'stepmums are fucked anyway' is mumsnet bullshit that people seem to say so that the mum is always made to be unreasonable even when her requests are perfectly reasonable.

I got on very well with my exes girlfriend despite her being introduced after a week. I wouldn't have called her a stepmum because she didn't try to get that close at all. There were some hiccups at the start such as when I found out she was putting my kids on her snapchat story etc. but those issues were sorted quickly.

I haven't met my exes current girlfriend but I like her from what I've heard. Their dad has very little contact now and would have even less if it wasn't for this girlfriend because I don't like him being around my youngest alone, and my child doesn't want to be either (the girlfriend will tell him to stop when he's annoying her or shouting at her etc). I know she does stuff like give my youngest child energy drinks which I wouldn't do, but I just leave her to it as it's rare and I appreciate the rest of the stuff she does for the kids when she's with them.

By the sounds of it they are close to splitting up......after living together for less than a year, apparently they were talking about marriage recently....which just shows why it is so important to take things slowly and not become a new mother figure straight away, because there are no guarantees that the relationship will last.

I said there seems to be collective gaslighting, which you certainly seem to be part of. You said the OP had to put her personal feelings aside, making out that it was her 'personal feelings' that made her feel weird about this, which isn't true. A girlfriend acting as stepmum instantly is odd....but you're trying to make the OP think that her reaction is the odd thing, that's gaslighting.

I agree that she should her ex if she feels that way, but the collective gaslighting will make that harder because she will doubt her reaction.

The majority are women in here. Can anyone come forward please and give me a single example of the reverse situation where an ex husband has had a letter and invitation to coffee from mum’s new friend Steve - just wanting to make sure Dave is happy with him and they can talk about how Steve should parent Dave’s three year old daughter? Anyone? Because my own EXH would have lost his shit if I had done that.

Exactly, it's bizarre.

It's totally ott.

It's also quite chauvanist - because it suggests the male parent can't parent on his own and guide his partner where appropriate. It's "women's stuff" that she needs to discuss with the mother. Why? He's the kids parent too. A supposedly equal parent, why does she need to be having a stewards enquiry with the mother, whom she doesn't even know.

In general this woman sounds invested within a 5 month relationship with a not even divorced Dad to a level.that does not suggest good, sound sense and moderation.

The Dad should also not be introducing her this early ..... Very poor judgement on his part. And it's not even a casual introduction; it's a rapidly ramping up one with activities usually done by families.

The accusations of jealousy from the second wives etc on here are totally off the mark and rather abhorrent.

I'm not a "first wife", I have no skin in this game and this whole situation is, to me, fucked up.

Both the timing of the introduction and the gf's behaviour.

They are clearly deep in the honeymoon stage (and the gf seems incredibly heavily invested) and are thinking of noone but themselves. Not these young kids whose family broke up 18 months ago (with to'ing and fro'ing by their parents within that period too). Their parents aren't even divorced. As I said, most of the condiments in my fridge are a lot older than the Dad's new relationship.
The reality of being in a relationship with a parent, especially when you are not a parent yourself, can be very different and very much more challenging (and very much more potentially relationship sinking) than people think.

This is not school. It's not a teacher, pupil relationship.

She sounds like she's going at it like she's in her profession; can't even realise it's completely different.

The majority are women in here. Can anyone come forward please and give me a single example of the reverse situation where an ex husband has had a letter and invitation to coffee from mum’s new friend Steve - just wanting to make sure Dave is happy with him and they can talk about how Steve should parent Dave’s three year old daughter? Anyone? Because my own EXH would have lost his shit if I had done that.

No, but I can also think of many examples of mum's demanding to meet their ex's new partners, and lay down lots of rules with the expectation that the new GF will be providing lots of hands on care. I don't see that in reverse.

It works both ways. People are trying very hard to deny that here but it does. Yes the GFs approach was OTT - but she's only mirroring exactly what many mothers on forums exactly like this one genuinely so expect and demand of new partners.

can you imagine a man writing a letter like this to another man, assuming he would immediately take over parenting for his new girlfriend’s children?

He would be presumed to be a control freak. He'd be presumed to be domineering. And inappropriate.

In a woman, this isn't much better, it's inappropriate. As I said, the kindest possible explanation would be she's neurodiverse, but I don't even think it's that.

A half way well adjusted women in this position would take it very very slowly and easily with the introduction to the children, and take her cue from their Dad, and not contact the Mum unless the Mum reached out.
But then a halfway well adjusted woman would probably not being dating a still married man, only 14 (?) months separated, with small kids, or at the very least would not be going along with an introduction at only 5 months in.

Her apparent desperation to be the "best girlfriend ever" and show herself to be the best potential step Mum ever, and probably to create a blended family within a similarly accelerated timescale (if she's in her 30s, she may be affected by the clock ticking) .. is written all over this.

It is the "ex" husbands responsibility to manage this, and he's not exactly doing a good job.

Their parents aren't even divorced.

Wait what?! I missed that rather key point.

I have to say that personally I wouldn't mind the chauvinist attitude, with my ex anyway because he is pretty shit.

And I would actually appreciate being asked, but NOT before she met the kids or before they had got used to her being around.

Before she met them or as they got used to her being around I'd be very happy if she asked was there any major no nos in regards to treats/food etc.

But discipline/bedtime etc....no way. I would appreciate that conversation a bit down the line though.

As with most things there's a point where something tends to be normal and ok but there's a point where things are batshit and overstepping.

Saying I love you after a few months - Normal and healthy
Saying I love you after 2 days - Abnormal, most likely lovebombing.

Moving in together after a year - Normal and healthy
Moving in together after a week - Abnormal, extremely risky

Stepping into 'stepmum' role after a year - Can be normal and healthy and generally happens gradually, However some will still be 'detached' from that role at that point.
Stepping into 'stepmum' role before even meeting the kids - Abnormal, risky

It sounds as though she's trying to be considerate, but is making rather heavy weather of it all, and assuming a step-mum role somewhat prematurely. I can absolutely see why it's grinding your gears a bit. Why not tell her, as casually as possible, to relax, and leave the parenting details to your ex, as her role will simply be that of a kind friend?

She seems sensible, calm, experienced, responsible..

No she fkg doesn't.

She's dating a still legally married Dad of young kids who's been separated less than 18 months for 20 weeks max. (!!!!) and she's going on like this.
She's lost the plot, and seems to be in good company with their Dad ATM.

And I say that as someone who dated a man with kids in my 30s (when I had none).

Aside from their accelerated "timetable", she can ask their Dad, her boyfriend, all this stuff.

Does the op have special woman's powers that he doesn't or something. She says he's a good Dad.

Ex and I have been separated for 18 months. We have 2 kids 3 & 7. Was a bit on/off for first few months of seperation. We drifted apart but have never started divorce proceedings

The thread title is misleading.

This is very early days for a 3 and 7 year old whose parents have split up, and incredibly early days re the Dad's new relationship of 5 months or less. These people seem to be in an incredible rush/getting carried away; and really not prioritising the kids.

People think she's good for contacting op about looking after and interacting with and disciplining (!) these kids .... If she was "good" she wouldn't be meeting them, let alone planning on going on family type days out and trips away with them from 4/5 months in.

The Dad's head is up his arse for doing this too.

GilbertMarkham·

She seems sensible, calm, experienced, responsible..

No she fkg doesn't

She's dating a still legally married Dad of young kids who's been separated less than 18 months for 20 weeks max. (!!!!) and she's going on like this. She's lost the plot, and seems to be in good company with their Dad ATM

Exactly. Posters falling over themselves to approve of her ridiculous actions and put OP in the wrong, are either just rushing to be part of the majority consensus or overly impressed that girlfriend is a headteacher. I saw her described as 'Stepmum' somewhere upthread FFS. & she's been around for mere months yet already talking about 'parenting?!'

The fact that the childrens father isn't even aware she's approached OP too, she's just gone ahead and done this off her own bat. Talk about speedy & needy🚩🚩🚩

*Moving in together after a year - Normal and healthy.

Stepping into 'stepmum' role after a year - Can be normal and healthy and generally happens gradually*

Not sure where the arbitrary year is coming from, but just to point out - a year is not a remotely long time in terms of a child coming to terms with the disintegration of their original family unit, their parent having a new partner, and that partner moving into their home/their space and being inescapable. The reality is that if they had any true choice, they'd probably prefer they didn't move in.

A year is also not long enough to properly get to know someone whom you're not even living with full-time. As this board shows over and over again.

No wonder kids have so many issues when their parents think times scales like these are reasonable.