My daughter, his daughter in battle for ours

[Balletbabe]

My mum and sister think I have to suck this one up but I go between raging and crying.

My partner announced at the weekend, having just had lunch with his ex, that he and our eldest child together who is three and never been away from me, were ‘popping’ to his mother’s over Easter with his eldest child. This leaves me with my daughter from my marriage and our breastfed baby at home over the holiday for four days.

The ongoing issue is my stepdaughter feels that the children we have together need to recognise her as equal to my daughter and my daughter is at an advantage as she lives with them.

I can’t do anything about my daughter actually living with them. My partner is totally on his daughter’s side and feels this holiday will help them establish a bond.

My daughter and his daughter are 13 but my stepdaughter presents much older. Her mother has admitted from day one that she gives ‘strategies’ to her daughter to negotiate time alone with her half-siblings.

This is family: people in your house you don’t necessarily like. Children in a family don’t get to lay down the rules, or make decisions that impact other people. I agree blended families suck most for kids whose parents have separated, but that doesn’t mean the new family unit doesn’t exist or that the parents new marriage is secondary to the child.

No because she lives with her mum at the moment - but if my DH made decisions about our shared child and family holidays without talking to me our marriage wouldn’t last long and vice versa. You don’t let a child dictate unless you don’t want a marriage anymore.

Her parents and grandparents have no issue with ‘her’ rules, and support her in having them (and even if her father did agree with OP, she’s at an age where she can vote with her feet). So yes, she and they do indeed get to decide what works for them, regardless of what OP may want.

OP knew what the situation was when she continued a relationship, and had children, with a man that didn’t share her opinions as to the dynamics of a blended family. Her partner (not husband, so potentially she’s in a disadvantaged position in more than one way), his parents, and his daughter are not going to give her what she wants. The reality she wants is not the reality she has, or the reality that was ever on offer in this relationship. She can either stay in the relationship and come to terms with that, or walk away and come to terms with that.

in reality I doubt her partner wants her to take the kids and leave him creating two more children without an in tact family unit. As you know if you are in a marriage or partnership where there are children that partnership is primary and primary over other familial bonds you have - with parents and exes for example. So yes OP can leave but in all likelihood that’s not what her partner will want he has just done a stupid thing unthinkingly and will backtrack once he realises he has been disrespectful of their family.

Right I wasn’t coming back because when I did I was accused of backtracking.

My partner has no problem whatsoever in operating a kind of two separate family thing. He sees absolutely nothing wrong in taking his kids away. He doesn’t see why I have a problem when his brother launches an event stepdaughter and cousins are given sashes and jobs to do and my daughter isn’t invited. He doesn’t see I have a problem when his family celebrate his niece’s birthday a week after my daughter’s they ask how she celebrated hers while we all sing happy birthday to his niece.

My daughter’s dad to whom I was married walked away leaving me and our baby and to be fair the flat we were buying. He sees her sometimes but isn’t interested. I do not expect my in-laws (who are divorced themselves) to make amends for this but expect them to treat her well.

Every child deserves to be treated nicely I don’t expect equality with their own grandchildren.

The suggestion that my daughter shares a bathroom with my stepdaughter made me laugh. £62 grand he is spending on an extension rather than allow that to happen.

Now our day to day life where people will think I am ‘backtracking’. Stepdaughter last night did my daughter’s Maths and French homework for her! So it’s not all bad for my DD. At the weekend SD cooked as like her dad, she is an excellent cook.

I just wish she didn’t see my daughter as an obstacle to forming a bond with their mutual half-siblings.

You don’t agree with me because you are putting the needs of a peripheral family member ahead of the needs and decisions of the head of the family unit in question - the OP and her partner. They are the team that makes decisions about their family, not OPs DH and his daughter/mother. Unless he wants to be single.

@Balletbabe None of those things are the doing of the child you are accusing of treating your daughter badly, it's her dad and extended family who are excluding your daughter.

You have a problem - well exactly, it’s your problem. They aren’t going to change to suit you. You’re not going to get the all-inclusive blended family dynamic in this relationship.

So yes, your parents and sister are right, you either have to suck it up or walk away.

Maybe, maybe not. He may be fully prepared for her to walk away rather than give her what she wants regarding his daughter and parents. Presumably he knows she has been and is unhappy, yet at no point has he attempted to change anything. His relationship with her doesn’t seem to be primary to him over all other bonds at all, she’s left to either like it or lump it 🤷🏻‍♀️

I didn’t get that from OP’s posts but yes, she should leave if he is disrespecting her to the extent she doesn’t get an equal say in the family plans.

Really? It’s evident in all of them. He hasn’t ever offered OP the blended family she wants, and has no problem with her daughter not being treated the same as his. He doesn’t treat her the same as his, or apparently treat her as a daughter to him at all (I bet he isn’t paying for her education). He’s decided to spend £60k + on an extension for his child (something I highly doubt OP had a say in).

Like I said, what OP wanted he never offered her. Despite this she chose to continue the relationship and have children with him, without the protection of marriage. Now she’s quite possibly in a very vulnerable position because of the choices she made.

And he and his ex chose to end their relationship and now have a very unhappy child because of choices they made. Hopefully he’ll not make that error twice…

She’s picked that life and family though. This would have all been evident before babies started arriving.

Him and his children are a family.

Op and her children are a family.

op, dh and their joint children are a family.

Op and her dd don’t overlap into his and his firstborns and op’s first born clearly doesn’t overlap in his eyes into his family with her.

Three separate families under one roof joined by two toddler/babies.

Must be a reason op decided that it would work… he and his family seem to have plently of money….

edits didn’t mean to quote sorry.

Agreed.

OP knew the situation with her partner and his ex and SD before she started having children with him.

Loving the criticism from some of him paying for his daughter. Amazing! Least he's not abandoned her now he has a second family.

Sure the OP co owns the house he's spending 60k on so she will benefit from any upgrades. If not then that's her decision to be dependent on him and live in his house.

Yes, because his actions obviously demonstrate his abject terror at that happening…

If they do split then he likely won’t have to worry about dividing up any assets this time round.

You seem to revel in the unhappiness of this family? I presume because you have an intact marriage and kids yourself? Well. Life has a way of teaching us what we need to learn.

Well he’s not married and I don’t suppose the type of man to drop over 60k on an extension and pay for private schooling would be paying that on someone else’s house, if it’s joint ownership I’d hazard a guess again he would of been smart enough to ring fence all his deposit/payments and secure any funds he put in for things like extensions and remodels in the higher vale of the property.

I don’t think it’s revelling in it.

It’s being rather logical about it all. Not everyone thinks of everything heart love wishes first. Some are logical.

This family was never going to blend. They are not married. A split would be pretty easy. He actually seems like a good dad and would no doubt want more than eow and probably his children in private secondary.

I’m not ‘reveling’ at all. If I actually had a vested interest in her misery I wouldn’t be advising caution.

I’m pointing out just how vulnerable OP likely is because of the choices she’s made. Taking a ‘tell him how it’s going to be!’ stance and expecting him to change to suit her isn’t going to get her what she wants, and could in fact very easily backfire on her.

She hasn’t been, and isn’t being, realistic. What she wants is not on offer to her in this relationship, and it would be in her interests to come to terms with that fact.

i don't consider people who put their kids in private schools 'good' people. In fact, I feel they are selfish beyond belief. When it's private boarding, it's not even just selfish on the level of 'fuck everyone else', it's actively harming your child.

And you seem delighted about it

Well if the op believed that they she was even more silly having kids with this man wasn’t she.

I think providing the child wants to go. Isn’t too far away to can come home at any point if wishes to even things like evening meal out still then there is no problem with private or private boarding. The opportunities are not to be sniffed at and again sounds like it’s something him and his ex and child agreed on as a family. Often something that’s been the norm in entire families not all are borstal.

I have no idea what you’re talking about here, sorry!!