AIBU to not want to take SC on this holiday?

[MeanOrJustified]

I’ve won an all-inclusive beach holiday for two adults and two children. DH and I have a toddler and he has a DD, 12 and two DS, 8 and 11. Nice kids but the older two fight a lot and the youngest is quite demanding and prone to wanting his own way, and sulking when he doesn’t get it. They are active and will hate a beach holiday and it’s generally not very relaxing to be around them.

We haven’t been on a foreign holiday since before our toddler was born. Used to do lots, always with SC, but DH was made redundant when I was pregnant and is now in a lower paid role and we can only afford UK breaks until either one of us gets a better job or our child is in school. If we hadn’t won it, we wouldn’t be going on a foreign holiday. We had plans for ten days’ camping with SC which we’ll still do.

DH thinks we should ask to pay to extend the holiday to a larger family room so SC can come, and put the two extra flights on a credit card. I don’t want to. AIBU?

Could you sell the holiday to alleviate some financial stress?

@caringcarer @ClairDeLaLune I agree that they'd enjoy a beach holiday, but her DH is already in debt and will have to put the cost onto a credit card that he can't pay - so what's the answer?

The OP is working 60-hour weeks to keep them afloat, she can't work anymore.

Where do the funds come from?

I think you should go on holiday with your child. Leave your husband at home. And you should ask him to make some changes because you’re thinking of leaving him

This jumped out at me! Sounds like their mother is selfish. I'd go with your toddler and a friend with their toddler,if your dh would whinge for the whole holiday!

Could your DH ask his ex to pay for an entire room for their 3 and the flights. Say it's that or they can't come. You can often get ajoining rooms. She seems to have money to go abroad. And get him to go to child support to get his maintenance reduced. That's ridiculous he hasn't done that.
I think, though I'm not sure, that you missed a pp's post about your dd becoming someone else's SD at some stage after you divorce. I think you took it as your DH wouldn't divorce a 3rd time . I wouldn't be betting a bob on that.

Please see rest of that post where I state that obviously that would be even worse. Poor kids.

The chances of you having this opportunity again are minimal. Paying for a family of six to go overseas will be extortionate.

Given how hard you work, you should absolutely go. Take the toddler and maybe your mum if you have one, or a friend: I wouldn’t take sc or dh unless he comes to his senses. You are allowed to have a holiday op.

I also feel some of these posts are projecting, and are trying to talk you into this as this is what they would like fior their own children. The fact is that if you took sc this would no longer be a holiday for you op. It would exhausting. Totally exhausting and likely to breed a lot of unnecessary resentment.

Stick to the camping holiday planned for them. Put a 100% into making that great fun, and book this holiday separately just for you. It is okay to look after yourself op. All parents need time to recharge.

Exactly - the OP sounds like and intelligent an successful woman. I'm trying to work out why this divorced man with 3 children seemed like the best option to marry and start a family with. Especially given he's since been happy to let his new wife and mother of his fourth child work 60 hour weeks to support them all. I'm not British (or american either) but surely the dating pool isn't that poor in the UK. I'd cut my losses now if I was the OP.

The SC are old enough to understand you won a holiday without enough places to take them all, so none of them are going. I wouldn't go into debt to take them (slippery slope, though sounds like you're already on that with debt). If DH can't accept that, go on your own with your child.

It does sound like the holiday is really a minor thing in the bigger picture though. You sound like you've reached the end of your rope regardless.

It really is. It's like looking for hens' teeth.

Maybe that's why people are asking random men to donate sperm (or getting their friends to ask their friends)...

I'm a step child (with siblings) and I'd say being a step mum is generally a thankless task that should be avoided.

OP if you think about it, there is nothing you can do to fix the situation you're in is there? Your DH is unmotivated to find a better paying job, his ex similarly as she still has CM coming in like before and can go on holiday abroad without her warring progeny (strongly suspect her DH prefers it that way too), your DH won't actively parent his kids because he's depressed and you're the one getting the blame for being an awful step parent?
The longer you stay in the picture the longer this situation will remain as it is because frankly it's a pretty cushy number for everyone except you. Once the step children become teens and are still being sorely neglected by their feckless bio parents it is only going to get worse. You'll be setting yourself on fire to keep them all warm. Don't do it, not least because I'm sure you do not want to set this as an example for your daughter to follow.

I feel very sorry for the step kids: none of this is of their making but there's nothing you can do to fix the situation they're in.

Definitely just go on your own with your DD. You sound at the end of your tether with your DH's attitude to work and his decision to only support his older children financially and leaving everything else up to you. He only works a few hours a week so doesn't need the break like you do.

Well, in this case the man isn't taking ANYONE on holiday. OP is. He is suggesting that OP pays for his children although she's already paying for everything, including the maintenance for her sc which he can't afford. So... no.

Arch many apologies I read your post wrong

Women on mumsnet absolutely adore sticking the boot into stepmothers. Apparently it is our fault the parents couldn’t maintain their relationship and our responsibility to alleviate the pain of parental separation by martyring ourselves and putting someone else’s children’s needs above our own children. Never mind that if their actual parents stepped up to the job of parenting there wouldn’t be a need for us to post on mumsnet in the first place…

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

So nice of him to want to upgrade to that when he's not paying his way. What he means is, he gets to look like Dad of the year and you'll be paying off that credit card debt and funding him and his kids again in the background. At what point is he going to be stepping up? He's chosen to have all these kids and he's not really taking responsibility for any of them.

I think your marriage is pretty much over. And who wouldn't rather have a relaxing beach holiday with 1 child rather than 4, especially when 3 of them are badly behaved and not even your own kids?

You're not an evil stepmother (it's not you, it's them - Mumsnet detests stepmums) and it's not always possible to know what you're getting into. Did op know her husband would lose his job and she would end up paying for everything yet never ever have her views taken into account?

Mate, the time for faux concern was before the multiple batshit merail posts you've already contributed. At this point you just look desperate.

The fact that you genuinely thought your nonsense was relevant, on a post with an OP who's carrying everyone, is actually the problem.

The main reason that OP originally posted is that she can't afford to pay extra for her three step-children. OP's DH is drowning in debt and only works a few hours a week as a delivery driver and sends all that money to his ex-wife as maintenance. He contributes nothing financially to the household and child he shares with OP who works a 60 hour week to pay for everything. He wants OP to take out a credit card to pay for her step-children to come on the holiday. That is unreasonable.

OP has paid for holidays with her DH and SC and left her toddler with her mum. However, it sounds as though OP is exhausted and has come to the end of her tether with the lack of support from her DH and will go on this holiday without him, taking her toddler with her. Hopefully, she will end her marriage to her entirely useless and unsupportive DH.

Oh here we go with the “someone else’s” children again 😂😂😂.

It’s almost as if you don’t know who that “someone” is…. 🤭

She's the only one who has been treating them because she's the only one bank rolling the step kids. Where are their useless lazy parents? Why would she have been paying for them if she didn't care about them?

So you had a shit childhood. So did millions of other people. That's not the op's fault, don't take it out on her.

All that aside, OP is ‘othering’ her step-children and treating them differently to her bio child, who she wouldn’t consider leaving home, but expects her husband to heave his other 3 children home. Double standards.

They are "other" to her. She's got no legal responsibility to those children and she does to her own. It's commendable that she's done as much as she has. Why is the step mum being held to a much higher standard than dscs own parents?