Why do men treat their ‘second’ family kids better?

[Fizzleaway]

Posting this on behalf of a friend who is upset by a situation she is in.

She has one child with her ex, they never got married and were together for about 2 years. He split with her and moved on quickly and went on to have 2 more children and married the women he had two kids with.

How he treats the children is so different. He will do anything for the two children he lives with but he hardly does anything with his child with my friend.

She’s really struggling to understand why he doesn’t bother much and what she can do to make him more interested.

It's the father's fault, always. The new partner can't force someone to ignore their kids, that's just a convenient trope used by people to convince themselves that the DF does really want to see their DC, were it not for the awful new partner; it's an easier pill for them to swallow than thinking their own DF/ex genuinely isn't interested in their DC.

Jesus Christ. I hope they were cunt enough to refer to having you 💐

Yes it’s still the dad’s fault 100% his picking her over his children. Doesn’t make her a nice person either though.

My dad did this. He kept remarrying and then dumping his kids. He's now on his, let me count, third set. It's what his own dad did so you'd think he'd know how it feels. Some men are selfish. I don't see him much, when I do he doesn't shut up about his step adult children and their kids. He takes the step grandkids on days out. My kids don't even know him. His loss.

Yes it’s still the dad’s fault 100% his picking her over his children. Doesn’t make her a nice person either though.

Who said she had to pick her over them? That's another trope. He didn't have to choose, he just didn't want to see his DC

This . Totally this. My ex gave nothing to our dd and treated her badly ( lied to get away with maintenance etc) until she stopped seeing him . He treated his step children like they were heaven sent. I hated hearing my dd cry that he bought things got his step daughter whilst she got nothing and we struggled.
she has no contact with him at all now. It wasn’t in his interest to treat her well as he couldn’t see anything in it for him, and I saw right through him , unlike the ow.

Out of sight, out of mind

Because there will be the type of women who makes it hard work. Look at the posts on here sometimes step mums outrageous at the help his giving his ex, it’s not it’s his children his helping. So he has two opens. Drop the kids or her. He thinks with his dick so drops the kids for an easy life. His still an arsehole though because he picked.

I think thus is spot on sadly.

My exes DP kicked my DC out of the house and banned them from coming back. She told him he could either see them or stay with her. So she did make him choose.

And yes. He's the cunt for choosing her over them. But she's not blameless.

He’s still invested in making the new children’s mother happy.

Some of these stories are so sad. I guess even when people do plan a family and have one, people can walk out. I do think it’s easier for men to compartmentalise; a friend of my ex had a lovely wife, she had lots of health conditions and sadly died in her 50s. Her H was around the same age. He was with someone else within a year, I was quite shocked but my DM said men find it harder to be alone.

Because they’re are weak. And because usually the new partner doesn’t want step children.

My ex was a perfectly committed father until his partner moved in. Before she moved in she played the doting stepmum to be, and once she moved in she immediately changed, started slagging me off in front of the DC, made it very clear that her children (existing and then new DC with him) came first.

And eXH just went along with it. Even his mother was disgusted.In general women aren’t so quick to tolerate a man who puts pressure on them to leave their children out, whereas men will usually do as their new partner says.

And you only have to look at the step parenting board to see just how many women really don’t want to and resent being step parents. And it’s the children who pay the price for those relationships.

That may be true of men you know and it’s certainly true of a lot of men I know, but not all.

My DH dotes on our Daughter. They have a great relationship and always have. He’s been a very hands on Dad. They go to gigs together, go on holiday together and he’s always stepped up if I’m away with work or friends.

She goes to Uni next year and it’s going to hit him like a ton of bricks, not having his friend at home to giggle with.

Honestly I think a lot of DC of divorce are traumatised and damaged by it, and can be hard work as a result of it, in comparison to new children of a safe, secure and happy little family unit. It’s just easier for DF’s to parent easier children, and leave the kids with issues and trauma to their other parents - out of sight, out of mind

I didn’t write “all”

They were teenagers. I was a mistake and was lucky to have done so well from it, by all accounts 😂
They had my siblings in their 30s (by then I was in my 20’s) so they felt comfortable speaking to me about how they wanted to do it properly this time.

I went NC when I had my own children. I wanted to do it properly from day one 😉

My ex did this. Useless father to our daughter - neglectful and resented paying the grand sum of £10 a week child support.
But my daughter says he's a much better father to her half brother and sister. Can't help but think he'd be a shit father to those kids too if he broke up with their mother.
If your relationship with your kids depends on your relationship with your partner then you're a shit parent and a shit person.

To convince themselves that the problem isn't them - its the ex partner.

Another poster hit the nail on the head. Men often (too often) can't differentiate between the mum and the kids. If a man leaves his wife he is very capable of cutting that whole episode out of his life without any qualms. He is also very capable of tarring the kids with the misdemeanours (whether real or perceived) of this former wife. Men simply don't have the same bond with their children that mothers do.

I think some men do find it hard to disentangle their ex from the children after a split. So they simply move on from everyone involved.

I don’t personally know men like this, it isn’t true of my ex and our child, my husband and his children, nor my father and I.

But I know it is true of many men, and that is very sad for the children.

Tomatosandwiches nailed it.
Whoever they are having sex with is their priority.
If they lose interest in the second woman, they lose interest in the children too.

When my now 51 DD contacted her father at 18, he told her it was another time and he didn’t want contact. She was 10 months old after 5 years of marriage, he wanted children but as she had to go into hospital he couldn’t take the heat so left.

Also true that it will be the woman doing the work in the majority of cases. So the man finds it easy to go along with the plans. Meanwhile he has to make a greater effort with his first children. It’s now up to him to organise things and make them happen.
I know many women ( second wives) who are the ones to instigate contact with the first set of children.

Yep, this happened in our family too. FiL was never the best grandad, but after MiL died, he remarried and was constantly playing with her grandchildren, collecting from school, going to watch their events etc, stuff he’d never consider doing for his own children’s kids