New partner and parenting

[Nchange12]

I have 3 teenagers, 18 (Y13), 17 (Y12) and 15 (Y11). I have been seeing someone for about 8 months, he also has 3 teens, 19 (second year of uni), 17 (Y13) and 15 (Y11).
He met my children last month, I told them about the relationship and they asked to meet him. I haven’t met his children, they know about me but don’t want to meet me yet, that’s fine.
The circumstances are different, their mother passed away 7 years ago, he hasn’t had a relationship since, I’m divorced and have a positive relationship with my ex, we don’t really have an arrangement for when the kids are where right now , leave it up to them.

Naturally we discuss the wonders of parenting teenagers. We could say our kids are very different though.
I’ve definitely dealt with more in terms of behaviour (vaping, school avoidance, general boundary pushing) where as he seems to have had very little of this.
Our parenting is remarkably different, I’d say he is stricter but his kids get more, while I’m more relaxed but my kids aren’t spoiled.
Examples

• His kids were/are expected to get a job as soon as the turn 16 and pay digs accordingly (he says he puts this in savings), I don’t expect my children to work and if they wanted to I wouldn’t take money while they were still in school
• He bought his older 2 cars for their 17th birthdays - I view this as being spoiled
• If you walk into his house you wouldn’t think he had children (I’ve been while they’ve been out), everything they own gets kept in their rooms, down to costs and shoes, my house looks like I have teenagers!
• His kids have a higher chore expectation, including doing all their own washing and cooking once or twice a week (for his middle child this is on top of working 8 hours on Sunday and 4 hours after school one night a week and studying for A-levels), I just expect mine to keep their room clean and help when asked
• His kids have newer tech, he claims it is an incentive to work harder etc. He says he’d have a no tolerance policy on chat back or rule breaking but he hasn’t dealt with much in the last couple years, if he did all tech would be confiscated immediately and they wouldn’t be allowed out. I don’t take my kids tech regardless, I know I couldn’t be without my phone so why should they be
• He wouldn’t allow a gap year after sixth form, if they chose to take it he will reduce the funding he offers while at uni, he would support one the year after uni though
• He expects A and Bs (6-9s) exclusively in GCSEs and A-Levels and provides financial incentives. My kids have yet to achieve an A or B between them and I couldn’t care less - they did their best

I think you get the idea.

To the point, whenever my kids do something a bit silly (vape, get phone taken off them at school, don’t clean their room) and I have a little moan about it to him, he makes it clear he thinks I’m too relaxed, have low/no boundaries and my kids walk right over me. He then reminds me of his straight A, perfect Peter kids, who work and keep the house spotless and never dare to talk back.
All I can think is his kids must be either petrified of stepping out of line or miserable as they never catch a break.

AIBU to want to tell him that half of the reason his kids are like they are is because of their personality and not his stellar parenting and it’s luck of the draw? If I forced my kids to do everything his do they’d be bloody miserable!!
Or am I just a crappy parent who lets her kids run circles around her?

Your parenting styles are both fine in their way. Different homes have different rules and that’s okay. But as you seem to recognise they are not compatible styles. So whatever you do, do not try and blend your homes, it will end badly. Keep the relationship as a nice aspect of your life away from parenthood and avoid criticising each other’s parenting.

I think both approaches are absolutely fine and l should only become an issue if either feels they should be involved in the parenting of the others children or if you had children together. Given the ages of the children I’d assume most sensible people would know that parenting your children is up to you and vice versa

He sounds like he's totally got it together as a single parent to me & his kids will do well.

• His kids were/are expected to get a job as soon as the turn 16 and pay digs accordingly (he says he puts this in savings), I don’t expect my children to work and if they wanted to I wouldn’t take money while they were still in school
• He bought his older 2 cars for their 17th birthdays - I view this as being spoiled

It's quite unusual for 16 year olds to be expected to pay digs. Getting a job is pretty normal though and I do know some 16 year olds who have had to contribute to the household because money was very tight. If he is putting their "rent" money into savings for them this will give them a cushion for when they go to university or need the money for something else.

To the second point - I can't bear people brandishing the word "spoiled" like this to criticize other people's child-rearing. There are many ways to "spoil" a child, if you are insistent on using this derogatory term.
These children are not "spoiled" just because he bought them a car and some tech. They are also expected to contribute to the household and do chores and work hard at school and it seems like they do this.
One could argue that yours are "spoiled" because they don't have expectations like this and firm boundaries in place.

I think you are being very unfair to him. I have seldom seen such a judgemental post on here. I think you should keep your nose out of his child-rearing and not comment on it to him. Probably the best thing to do would be to do him a favour and split up with him because your world views are far too different.

Also I think he probably put a lot of these boundaries and expectations in place when their mother died to give them structure and also to ensure the smooth running of the household to avoid chaos and extra stress. As you say, it's a completely different situation to a divorce where the children will be spending time with another parent and the child-rearing workload can be shared to a certain extent (depending obviously on how involved both parents are).

to be honest, i dont think your kids will get on either! Your kids sound like they need a to learn you need to work hard for things in life!! of course they they should get a part time job at 16. it gives them an appreciation of money and life skills, such as getting on with different colleagues etc.

Your kids sound lazy, they aren't studying in that time either!! I expect my kids to only do their best in exams but if I know they aren't doing that and getting low grades because lazy I would be cross and withdraw privileges.

I guess its all about aspiration and work ethic. He is trying to in still both in his kids and you aren't

I'd rather be a teenager in your partner's household than yours, to be honest.

just wow. You sound jealous and a lazy parent to be honest, you have zero expectation for your children and dont to seem to care how they get on in life, you are not teaching them how to look after themselves at all. I can see nothing wrong with his patenting at all, his children are encouraged to try and do well, buying them a car at age 17 is totally normal to those who can afford it, sounds like hes raising great children that will be able to manage in the real world, picking fault with each others parenting is not good; you are not compatible; best to end it now

Totally agree with @Daisyblue77 he seems to be doing a great job with his children, setting them up perfectly for adult life.

My mum expected me to be top of the class constantly. In hindsighgt, the pressure was immense. She basically told me what I should study for GCSE (only very academic subjects).

I got to Cambridge and have a decent job but I suffer anxiety and depression, in which my mum’s approach has played a hand. Her heavy-handed parenting and difficulty cutting the apron strings didn’t allow me enough autonomy and I had to learn to adult alone.

This guy sounds like he has struck a decent middle ground though. Ultimately, OP, I think your parenting styles are too wildly different and it’ll mean curtains for your relationship.

You must never blend! If you have any hope of a relationship then you are going to need to have very firm boundaries around how you talk about your children etc.

I wouldn't say either of you are "bad" parents - you have to remember he's brought up 3 kids on his own, which isn't easy. He has done his job and its worked for him, you're doing your parenting job and its working for you. Maybe you're just not compatible? Little niggles after 8 months will be huge niggles after 3 years!

The children are spoilt? Their mum died before any of them reached their teens.

Honestly I don’t think you can know how his children feel without meeting them. His parenting style is what they’re used to and appears to be working fine for them as a family. I’m probably parenting somewhere in between your styles as thats what works for us.

The issue is more that you don’t seem to be able to agree to disagree- you both have different approaches with different measures of “success” neither which is wrong but also not really comparable.

I’d much rather have his style of parenting than yours OP, our job as parents is to get our children ready for adult life and it sounds like he’s doing g exactly that.
Is he available to come to my house and give me some tips with my 14 and 13yr old girls?!

Neither parenting style is wrong but I think it’s unfair to think his kids must be unhappy when You haven’t even met them my parenting style is probably more like yours but I sometimes wish I was more like him!!

A certain amount of downtime is great (imo). But there is something to be said about having too much of it.

And if his children choose to spend theirs visiting friends and or playing sports, I’d assume that this is how they want to spend theirs. Why would that be worse than spending it at home gaming?

I find your comment about A levels surprising… why would you care less? And are you quite sure they achieved the best they possibly could? Or would they be able to do better with some additional support?
I would be very careful with financial incentives. But communicating expectations and offering support surely can’t be bad.

In other words: I personally do not think his parenting sounds particularly unreasonable, no.

Is it possible that you’re being defensive due to his - admittedly very rude - comments about your parenting?

anyhow: if you love each other, you’ll need to learn to respect your respective parenting choices. That really is all there is to it!

Same here - so many shoes! 😂

I’d say your differences are pretty fundamental. Not a problem if you each want to learn from the other, but you both sound judgemental. Not one for the long term.

It's not bad parenting to have expectations of your children. Why are yours so low?

It sounds like you have fairly low expectations for your DC, which is a shame as it will hold them back in life.

I’m more of a parent like your partners. You are more of a friend than a parent to your children which is why you probably have more problems, However neither is necessarily wrong.

Apart from your different parenting styles, I wonder if part of the reason he has less trouble with his kids than you do, is that his don't have two parents to play off against each other.

your comment about having parents to play off each other is a good point imo. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was true.

Although I do feel the need to point out that the loss of their mother (obviously) incredibly painful and difficult to come to terms with. And it really does speak for his parenting skills that his children are (based on OP’s comments) well-adjusted and happy.

I think, like everything, different children respond to different approaches. I would have loved to be that sort of parent, but it was very clear at quite an early age it wouldn't suit my DC - both ND - and we needed to take a lower pressure approach. We have had to really reduce our expectations on them both academically and socially, which has been quite hard. It's not that we don't value education - far from it.

I think he’s a high expectations high rewards parent. He expects his kids to be good at lots of things, where I don’t and is big on experiences.

Though whenever I talk to him they seem busy (even if it’s busy as in our doing a sport or at their friends/boyfriends) they never seem to be just at home relaxing. My kids love to just play video games for a couple of hours!!

It sounds like he has put a lot of effort into parenting. He wants his children to work hard, do well in school, pull their weight around the home and to do well in life while being respectful of others.

In comparison, you sound like you aren't that bothered.