Step kids have moved out, DH is still funding them

[Clayless]

Hi, apologies if this gets long.

DH and I have been together 8 years, he is half British, half . He has 2 children, twins who are 17. I have 2 children who are 14 and 12, together we have a 6 year old.

Until last summer DHs children were living in France, for various reasons they have come to live with us and do their last 2 years of school. While in France DH would see them on all their holidays including a long stint with his parents in the summer and he paid for them to attend an international school. Their mother passed away when they were 13, but they continued to live in France with their maternal grandparents as they didn’t want to move and he couldn’t move due to work and our child together.

Anyway when they arrived here we immediately enrolled them in independent schools, we shifted rooms about including having my 14 and 12 year old share as we only have a 5 bedroom house. We were excited to have them and have enjoyed having them live with us.

However, things seemed to take a turn after Christmas, I think they struggled with our more structured approach to parenting vs the more laissez faire style they were used to. Little things like knowing where they were at any given time, no boyfriends/girlfriends in their room. They only turned 17 in the middle of May.

His DD was easier than his DS. She immediately got a part time job saying we didn’t give her enough money and she hated being in the house with us. She works Saturdays and Wednesday evenings in a restaurant. Through this she met a 22 year old lad and they started dating. We said under no circumstances could he stay in her room but on several occasions we’d come home from work to him and her cuddling in her bed. She would also lie to us and say she was sleeping over at a friends but actually be at his.

His DS on the other hand would swear at us, tell us we were controlling etc. He would leave his room a total mess, he refused to do any chores, occasionally skipped school and just generally had no respect.

Now about 5 weeks ago (so still 16). We had taken my children and our little one to see my parents for the day, his 2 didn’t want to come. We got back and everything more or less was gone from his DD’s room. All her clothes, her expensive keyboard we bought, her expensive tennis rackets, books everything. When we asked his DS where she was he said she’d decided to move in with her 22 year old boyfriend. He refused to give an address and said “don’t worry I’ll be out of here soon too”. Eventually we were able to talk to her and she said she would still go to school but she wasn’t coming back to live with us as it was depressing and made her miserable. She kept pointing out she was 16 and could legally move out. We have been able to find out she’s living with her boyfriend in a flat share (seriously doubt the landlord knows she’s there or her age). DH was devastated but has decided not to force it.

2 weeks later his DS moved in with his maternal cousin (sleeping on his sofa) and is refusing to come back too.

DH is insisting he will still pay for their school, and is sending them money for the tube/clothes/food. He said the only thing he won’t be providing for them is money for rent as if they can’t afford that they can always come back here. He said he also won’t be asking them to return any of them items they took.

AIBU to think if they want provided for they should live here and if they are happy to no longer live here then we shouldn’t provide for them anymore?
We are struggling to make everything work financially and it feels like he doesn’t see that our child together and my children are now going without so his kids can through a strop!

'he also won’t be asking them to return any of them items they took.'

what a strange thing to even write - of course they can keep THEIR belongings

but then 'we only have a 5 bedroom house' oh dear ONLY...

As the parent I expect him paying for his children until they finish university.

I think it would be appalling for him to cut them off financially. Clearly something has already gone wrong that they don't want to live with him, but it would really compound that to cut them off or expect their belongings back without them. Can't believe you even asked it really.

But he abandoned his older children, so why not yours too?

If it was teen dd and ds who moved out, wouldn’t you also send them money?

they are underage, the mother died, who do you think should financially provide for them if not the (very liquid by the sound of it) dad. This post is bizarre... 🤷

YAB every shade of U, suggesting that there should be conditions on whether a father should pay for his children's FOOD for fucks sake. Just listen to yourself. Teenagers can be awful, bereaved teenagers of divorced parents uprooted from their home country and moving in with a stepmother, half-sibling and step-siblings will be exceptionally awful. But can you hear yourself? Can you see beyond your personal financial difficulties to the fact that these two just-turned 17yos have been adrift pretty much their whole lives?

And you chose to have another child with this man?

When you have children of your own?

This is a very toady post. You are making up assumptions that all all negative towards the father.
Maybe the mother took the dc back to France rather than the dad ‘fucked off’. When their mother died they were asked to move to England as stated in the OP but they refused. Uprooting them from school unwillingly would be your preference? Divirced peiope di go on to have second families. This is not unusual
I agree with you with regards the nonsense suggestion of no longer financing them. And i agree that they are probably in need of therapy but you are coming up with a whole bunch of scenarios that paint the man in a negative light based on nothing but your personal experiences perhaps.

An important piece of missing information is why they came back to the UK @Claylessyou just say “various reasons”.

Other points:

I don’t think saying her DH is a crap parent is helpful. Life is complex. He wants to keep funding them. He’s been involved in their lives and visiting regularly.

OP you are unreasonable about cutting off funding though. They are not adults.

Again what’s clear is why the relationships have broken down so quickly and so badly.

You have younger children and they are near adults. My gut is that you and your DH have been setting unrealistic boundaries that they have pushed back on.

If these were your children you wouldn’t be cutting them off financially. You’d be working out how to re-build a relationship.

YABU They were abandoned by their dad after their Mum died. Of course they have issues

YABVVVVU

poor kids, what a hard life they’ve had already, and a shit Dad to boot.
the items belong to them, no matter how ‘expensive’ they were.
he should be financially supporting both of them, including paying their rent, seeing as he can’t provide a stable home.
the two children would rather live in an inappropriate relationship, and sofa surf, than live at home with you.

You seriously think that you and your child (who still has a mum and dad) were more important than two young grieving children? Your priorities are seriously fucked up. Their father in particular should be ashamed. It's not surprising the kids are rebelling. Makes me wonder what their side of the story is if their dad and stepmum were happy to abandon them.

It's France, not Nepal.

And he and the ex had only been living in the UK for 6 months when she took them back to France.

DP is half-French.

I'm wondering what unbreakable ties he'd developed in 6 months in the UK that prevented him from going to France with his DC, where his parents and presumably, other family and friends live.

This is a desperate view to have OP
If you died would this be an acceptable way for your children to be treated?

This sounds like the absolute bare minimum you and your DH should be going

Why make the big drama about micromanaging 17 year olds. It was inevitable she would move out. Keep them close so they always have a home,.that's my ethos.

This was a pretty heartbreaking story to read tbh. Those step children have had a lot to deal with

Have you read the thread?

They were not abandoned….but don’t let that get in the way of a mass pile on….

Agreed. Theres nothing in the world that would stop me making sure I lived in the same town as my children, never mind the same country

of course he should be providing for his kids - if you are providing for your teens why are they going without? or has he been providing for your teens too?

I’ve not read the full thread, but am I right in thinking that you had a 17 year old boy and girl sharing a bedroom? If so, is it any wonder that they up and left? I cannot imagine anything worse as an older teen than sharing a room, let alone with my brother!! And they’re still children ffs, of course your DH should still pay.

Maybe he's also half British? You have zero idea where his family live.

Nepal vs France really isn't the issue. SHE still moved. Fully aware that she was moving her children away from their father. You can't soften it by debating geography.

Probably because he was working in the UK?

I think the real question is why the mother thought it was ok to take the kids away from their father.

At a guess, I suppose she wanted to be home near her parents, perhaps felt she needed that support for some reason, and they thought, oh, it's very close, you don't even need a plane or boat, it's as close as living on differernt parts of the UK, and the father felt like he'd be a shit to stop them.

Much like, if the kids wanted to stay in France and the gp were willing to have them, he felt like he'd be a shit to take them away from their home.

In hindsight it's easy to see that it might have been better to think that each of those choices could have bigger than expected consequences, but at the time they likly seemed reasonable.

YABVU. Of course he should pay for his own kids. You seem to think that it’s bad that kids who are not his (your kids) have less because he pays for his own kids. Wow.

also, they’re teenagers who lost their mum and have been unsettled. Of course they’re acting out.

Their mother died and they were left to grieve alone without their dad even attempting to move countries to be with them??! I can't get past this. Given that this is the level of yours and your DH's parenting and compassion, I am sure that you also are both completely at fault for the relationship breakdown which has caused 2 young teenagers to sofa surf rather than live in your house.

Instead of looking inwards at your own conduct, you are still pointing the finger at the motherless children who have recently moved countries, and vindictively seek to destabilise them further by taking away their access to education and financial resources.

Shocking behaviour, attitude, and decisions.

Have you read the thread?

No he didn't abandon them after their Mum died but he did decide to stay in the UK when he and ex and the kids had lived here for only 6 months and ex wanted to go back to France.

Where they both lived before DC and have family. DH is half-French.

So in some ways he did abandon them, just years before their Mum died. Or at least he didn't care enough to go with them.

Those poor children having lost their mother at such an important age. I can well empathetise with the trauma they will be carrying. You sound very cold. Of course your husband should still be paying for them. You have been totally inflexible with them so no wonder they don’t want to be around you.

I mean - the other possibility is they weren't given appropriate boundaries where they were, and are resentful that's changed. No overnight boy/girl friends isn't that unusual in the UK, for all that some posters seem to think it is.

Nailed it. Those poor kids. “The stuff they took”, you mean their possessions?!