To feel so sad at how busy my step-daughters life is

[Justgivetea]

Hi,

Some context, my step-daughter is 10, she's in Y6. Her mum passed away when she was 6, I've been in her life for 2 years now. I have a son of my own who is 11.

My SD is a darling of a girl, she's smart and hardworking and never seems to cause an issue. Her dad (my partner) claims his parenting method is "high expectation, high reward". But honestly the poor girl never stops!!
She attends a private prep school, dropped off to breakfast club at 7.30, picked up by her grandma at 3.45. Then a club every night of the week, 2 days tennis, 2 days ballet, 1 day piano. No weekday play dates, just school, homework, dinner and clubs.
On Saturday she attends a Saturday school (her dad is French), 8.30-1. This is basically just French classes as far as I know. Then picked up packed lunch in the car, straight to tennis for 1-2 hours.
Sunday she doesn't have any official hobbies planned in but this is the only day she can do play dates/go to parties, ride her bike round the park - you know - be a child.
This summer she will finish school on Friday the 5th of July (prep schools and ridiculously early finishes). Go to Wimbledon with her dad on the Saturday (so long day). Fly to France as an unaccompanied minor with a chaperone on the Sunday morning, be picked up by some coach from a tennis school, spend two weeks there, playing tennis for several hours a day for 6 days. Then at the end will be picked up by her French grandparents, spend a week with them, go on holiday with her dad for two weeks (and my son and I this year), back to the UK to spend a week with her mums parents, then oh yes back to France for two more weeks of tennis! She will get back on the Sunday and have one day left before it's her first day at senior school!
She never grumbles about any of it and she does enjoy tennis (she did 2, 1 week camps last year) but when she got back all her dad could tell me was she seemed tired - so obviously that means the next year you book double right?!
I feel so sad for her, summer holidays should be play dates with friends, paddling pool in the garden, bike to the park etc. I feel she has no childhood and it seems exhausting.

We agreed not to comment on the others parenting but I find it so hard to seem this little girl be dragged around to all these activities all the time. I often wonder if the reason she never misbehaves is because she always too tired to! And if her room is never messy as she is never allowed to be in it!!

AIBU to think this is a really sad childhood?

I have spoken to him. And I've realised a lot of this doesn't ring true for his daughter.

She absolutely does get time to create and she has 2 very close friends who she has play dates with one Sundays often. I think I may have been harsh and made it all sound worse than it is.
Maybe things would be different if her mum was alive but I actually think he's doing the best he can for his daughter with the circumstances he's been dealt.

Really should have just spoke to him before posting!

it sounds like an amazing dad. I sincerely hope you do not have kids.

In my childhood we never had weekday play dates. Especially at that age. We might go round to eachothers houses after school to do homework or work on group projects but never just to play or hang out. Socialising was strictly for weekends. Weekdays were for school, hobbies and activities, sports, and things like school play rehearsals. This all sounds totally normal to me.

@Justgivetea does anyone else think it sounds like he is planning to relocate back to france when his daughter has left school? is it just me?? he seems really too much focussed on sending his daughter away to anywhere rather than with him?

The ‘not spending any nights in her own bed all summer’ is also very normal in France, and it’s very likely that the father has fond memories of his own summers being shipped between grandparents / cousins / colonies des vacances / holiday homes etc. She’ll do all the tent-building, camping out, etc but she’ll do it at the grandparents places , with her cousins. Also the activities are spot on bourgeois French - tennis, ballet, piano.

I'm glad you spoke to him. SD sounds like a very capable and resilient kid, and great she has such a rich, varied life outside school. She is developing so many skills with all that!

Neither of my DD around that age could cope with a busy life like that, and I've had to pull back on what I'd like them to do, so I guess we all have our own ideas of what the right balance is, and have to adapt it for our own kids.

I'm glad you feel happier about it now OP. Honestly, I wish I'd had so many activities when I was a kid/teen. She must get down time within these activities, and she is learning skills for life and finding out what she enjoys/is good at.

It's easy to suppose that with time on our hands we'll be creative and relaxed, but I just found stupid pointless things to do like counting cars going past and recording the Top 100 off the radio. And navel gazing. Endless navel gazing. And dreaming of being a model one day. I guess she and I have that in common 😁

Don't let your jealousy (she goes to a private school and gets holidays and tennis in France and is bilingual) get the better of you. You are already included this year (holiday with your son). Don't feel bitter and don't try to derail her excellent education - your 'partner' whatever it means will obviously choose his daughter if you start being visibly jealous. And no, your 'partner's is not going to pay for the Alliance Francaise, for the French tennis camp and for a private school for your son. They will have different paths in childhood, it is obvious. But your son is better off anyway - he has his mum, which is the most important thing in the world.

I've asked lots if he plans to go back to France and he's told me in no uncertain terms that he doesn't intend to.
He wants to leave London for Sussex/Surrey when his daughter leaves school but not go back to France.

I do think it would be nice if he seen more of her but I'm not sure if he actually can around his work and her hobbies?

I've been told summer with grandparents is the norm in France and he doesn't think that's weird at all and will have his grandkids in the summer if he has any.

kids have much longer summer holidays in France, it's more than normal there to spend time with grand-parents.

Most of my kids friends spend at least a week with their grand-parents in summer the UK too, I am not sure why it sounds weird to some posters, it's quite a common thing to do? How else do you manage school holidays?

I've been told summer with grandparents is the norm in France and he doesn't think that's weird at all and will have his grandkids in the summer if he has any.

it is indeed. I’ve got French friends who have sent their 2-3 year olds off to grandparents for up to a couple of weeks each side. Children are expected to be pretty independent of their parents here, at a young age. The school holidays are long here. It’s also very normal for families to have a summer or country house , and that’s where they go with grandparents. Both my kids have been invited to spend chunks of the summer at their friends country houses with their grandparents. It’s actually really good - they’ve always been expected to muck in with cooking etc, various cousins show up, they have a great time.

I grew up in a different European country (not France) with nearly 3 months summer holidays. I went on holidays with my grandma and aunts, I was shipped to
relatives in other parts of country and went to summer camps there. I also went on a 2 week beach camp with friends. Completely normal for most kids.

It depends on the child. My eldest would hate this and my youngest would thrive. She’s old enough to make a fuss about it if she doesn’t want to do it. No child is too tired to cry about something they don’t want to do.

Yup, this is a very normal thing. All the kids French kids here go back to France and spend the summer with grandparents.

Honestly, this girl's childhood seems ok compared to many others. She has family who want to spend time with her, friends and is busy and stimulated. I can't see a problem other than, of course, she has sadly lost her mother. I would have benefited from more of this myself, I think.

It sounds like a lot, but if the sport is something she enjoys then it can work as an approach.

When you say senior school, is it just the senior end of prep school or is she at one of those preps that end in Yr6 rather than traditional Yr8?

Sounds a lot like my childhood. I loved it and it set me up very well for my adult life.

I felt shattered just reading that! So much depends on whether she likes having such a packed schedule or if as OP suggest that she is simply too tired to object. I think that children need to experience boredom otherwise how will they learn how to manage it, they also need time to day dream and to just let their minds wander. Then there is the development of social skills that comes from hanging out with their peer group, it may look as if they are doing nothing but they will be learning about the dynamics of friendship and how to relate to others in a non-structured environment. Basically time out is vital for the development of soft skills that are just as essential in life as qualifications and defined goals. I was a dreamer as a kid, but I was reading all the time, writing poems and stories and endlessly drawing, I swam and rode my bike, all very unstructured stuff and it helped me destress from school.

I wouldn’t parent like this but does her dad see it as childcare? Plus if she isn’t complaining I guess she doesn’t know any different…
iIf she hated it hopefully he would listen?

I don’t thing her weekdays are too bad. She finishes school at a normal time. That is lucky. A lot of kids have to do after school clubs then straight to their extracurricular (mine do a few times a week). They would love to be picked up by a grand parent and have some down time before dance or whatever.
the summer hols sound full on but honestly it’s better than a wet summer in the uk trying to think of things to do in the rain.

You're right I don't. I speak English and that is that!
I think he's very forceful with the French to the point of it being rude at times (even in my presence or her grandparents presence who don't speak French, he will speak French to her), he tennis coach (for the 1-2-1 sessions) speaks to her entirely in French. Her iPad is set to French, they want French TV all the time. It's basically her first language with English being just for school.
It takes up so much of her time and I can't really see it's worth - she is fluent, most mistake her for a French child when she is speaking to her dad in public - what more do they want!

When you are bilingual/trilingual and live in a country where they speak the majority language (e.g., English) it is so difficult to retain the additional language and you can you can easily lose it. My friend is from South Africa and she moved to the UK four years ago, all her life she spoke Afrikaans. Came to the UK, had no one to speak Afrikaans to. Her parents passed away, she is an only child and she has lost the majority of her language skills in Afrikaans. What your DP is doing is great! She will retain her French. If you think about it, she is hearing more English than French. She attends an English speaking school where she is exposed to English 6 hours a day. She lives in the UK and she hears English when out and about, to the shops, at the dentist. Her friends/teachers speak English to her at school. He should keep on going, particularly as she is nearing secondary and may find that she is reluctant to speak French if her friends don't.

Have you asked her what she would like?

I think it's fine- it's not dissimilar to what my DC did, but having three DC meant two might be having around while one was having a music lesson. (I tried to get their sports such as tennis lines up at the same time) Saturday mornings were swimming lessons, Sunday morning was Mass. DH could drop one off at before school club, but wouldn't see them again until their bedtime. He was very good at spending time with them at bedtime, but you can't have one to one time with all three at once. Your SDD is spending time with her grandparents daily, which is brilliant, and they will be able to listen to any woes from her school day. It's better than being in afterschool club until it closes like many, many children with working parents, who all seem to be perfectly happy and well adjusted.

It's brilliant to at she's good at one sport, as long as your DP doesn't expect her to go professional,
and at some point she ends up feeling like a failure because she hasn't made it to Wimbledon. Although who knows, she might!

I do think it's detrimental when children are never given the chance to experience proper extended down-time (more than one day a week), have to entertain themselves, learn to thrive in their own company and simply let their mind and imagination wander. I wonder if she'll grow up to be one of those people who has to be engaged in an activity at all times, always be "productive", struggle in her own company. The mind needs time to be unoccupied.

My kids were like this and would do more if I’d have let them. They have loads of friends from the various clubs as well as school - my DD (now 18) is off on holiday with one of her friends from her gymnastics club at the end of her A levels. If the child is happy and thriving and wants to do her hobbies then be supportive. Just because it’s not for you, it doesn’t mean that others don’t enjoy it. She’s old enough now to say if she doesn’t want to do something but a summer spent playing tennis and spending time with grandparents in France sounds amazing. It is great that her father has prioritised her learning French too. It’s his mother tongue. It also means she’ll be eligible for French citizenship so she’ll be able to live and work all over Europe, and therefore a second language will be a real benefit to her.