i can’t do this anymore. step kids are ruining my life.

[stepparent55]

Hi everyone. Just want an opinion and whether to know or not AITA? I know i keep complaining on here about my situation. But this is the only space i have where i can talk openly about my life and what seems unfair. I can’t talk to friends / family as their response is always: you knew what you were getting into. While that may be true I wanted to know your thoughts on how I feel and whether this makes me a terrible person.
Do I have a right to think it’s completely unfair that I have to look after my husband 4 children from a prev marriage every weekend? My child goes to their dad every weekend. And what should be time to myself to reset and rest, instead becomes increasingly harder and I end up dreading every weekend. It seems unfair that on weekends my child’s going to her dad, and another woman’s children (4) come to me and I have to look after them so she can get free time off? Even when my partner does help out with his own children, I am still left cleaning up the house after them, cooking, buying groceries, washing their clothes, drying their clothes, bathing them and making sure they don’t get hurt the weekend when they are in my care.
Is it wrong of me to feel like this is an unfair trade? on weekends, what is supposed to be my time, i am stuck with someone else’s children. She gets her time off but i don’t… i can’t help but feel really bitter and resentful. not at the children but at the situation.
Sometimes, i feel like just leaving the house every friday before they turn up in the evenings and come back on sunday evening when they are gone. but then the house is a disaster, i mean legit upside down (curtains pulled off etc), dishes undone for 3 days which i was to do, i have to change my bed sheets and my child’s bedsheets at the kids have slept in them, peed in them etc. it’s just too much. I really regret marrying a man with 4 children. I wish i found someone with only one or two children.

Why did either you or your partner have kids? You will wreck their lives with your choices

Nothing is going to change so you might as well get a divorce. You can't see that much of your husband anyway if he works 12hrs a day, 7 days a week.

You're the free hired help by the sounds of it.

Unless you do something to change what is happening, it will keep happening.

If she’s dumping them despite their father not being home, and shutting her phone off for 36 hours, methinks “facilitating access to Dad” is hardly her primary motivation.

Basically no one wants to be around these kids. It’s a shame. Why people produce offspring (repeatedly) in these circumstances is mystifying.

You are angry at the wrong person.

CM is a percentage of income. If your h earned less then he’d pay less child maintenance. It’s not £2k regardless of income.

You are enabling your h to work and pay less child maintenance (each overnight is discounted) and are the classic nanny with a fanny. You aren’t enabling mum’s free time. The kids should be with dad sometimes. I bet that his long hours are why they broke up.

It IS poor kids. They misbehave because their parents don’t care about them and don’t parent them. Yanbu to say that it shouldn’t be your responsibility to parent them and if you divorced then you’d be able to never see them again.

He's their father though, surely you appreciate that they should be spending time with him, as your child spends time with their father. I don't understand your problem other than the kids are being dropped off every weekend to their father, he is working and you pick up the flack. He has 4 kids, what did you expect? Seriously

You are spending a lot of time concentrating on her. She has a weekend off but presumably parents 4 children 5 days a week on her own. Your husband should be parenting his own children. Why are they pulling curtains down and peeing the bed? Does he do no parenting at all?

Brang?

I understand why other people have no patience with yout situation. Judging you solely on the information given here a few things spring out. I apologise in advance that this is going to seem very harsh. I’m sure you are a kind person and have many excellent qualities. But from the info you’ve provided I have some questions:

1. How did you agree to a childcare situation where you get no weekends with your own child? Surely this isn’t normal? Why would you have agreed to this? Was it because you thought having every weekend to yourself rather than actually spending quality time with your child would be a good thing? Weekdays are mostly working and sleeping so when were you planing to make memories with your child? You may be a great mum, but it’s easy to jump to the conclusion that you wanted to escape your child. Sounds stupid at best (ie you didn’t really realise what you were doing).

2. Then secondly, you have shacked up with a lazy, dirty disrespectful man who makes you do the bulk of work with his four kids. You should have considered whether he was a good match before committing to the relationship, and after one failed relationship you should idealllt have had the insight to make more sensible decisions. Maybe your friends and relatives could see this situation coming from miles away and can’t believe you thought you had nabbed a good man.

3. Thirdly, if you are unhappy with the way things are now, grow some metaphorical balls and insist that your partner does better. Have you calmly sat down with him and explained why it’s unfair that you have to do all this and return to a disgusting house after he has been looking after the kids? Have you left the mess and reminds him to sort it out before you cook anything in the kitchen etc? Have you done a massive strop when you come home to a messy pigsty of a house? Have you punished him with the cold shoulder etc, or left until he raises his game? It’s not rocket science.

Yeah it does seem like a rubbish situation but you don’t have to be in this situation. Take responsibility for making your life better. In future, really think about the world around you and the decisions you make; figure out how to achieve the life you want, rather than just complaining and being all confused when you mess things up by not thinking things through and letting life just wash over you.

Then he should reduce his hours and stop paying her si much and if she drops term yo you home alone either be out or stop them off right back to her!

Surely divorce is the most attractive option here? You’d get a peaceful life with your DC, no bratty SC to deal with and no largely absent DH. Why would you want to stay in this relationship?

Brang isn't a word. This situation can't be a surprise given your DH's job. You can suck it up or you can split up. He sounds like a much more of a problem than he's worth. He's basically married some free childcare and I can guarantee if you leave he'll find someone else rather than parent his own four kids himself.

OP has CM and visitation been decided in court, or is this all an informal arrangement? As you said she didn't send the kids round when he was in a flat share and only after he moved in with you. Maybe you need to get this properly sorted so that her CM is reliant on her having the children on the days that she says she does?

If the children are also turning up unfed and unwashed and their Mum is an alcoholic maybe you also need to get SS involved?

@stepparent55 are you married? He's living in your house by the sound of it?

Solution to your problem (not that the 4 kids will be helped though) is to ask him to leave. If he's back in a flat share the ex might not drop his kids off there, so he can continue to work 12/7 and continue to be a neglectful father. You will have your freedom from this circus.

The more details you provide the madder it gets! I feel very very sorry his children who have no choice or agency in this mess.

You are blaming the wrong person. You should resent your husband. It’s his weekend with the kids- not yours!

you have the right idea by going away on Friday and not coming back until Sunday. Tell him you expect the house to be as you left it when you return.

if it isn’t - leave the dishes in the sink until he does them.

sound alike you’ve found the reason for the end of his marriage.

It may also mean the end of yours, so some shock tactics are the best way to shake him out of this behaviour

It's your husbands fault not the kids mums. Why is he having contact with them when he isn't available to look after them? He needs to rearrange things so he can look after his own kids, for their own sake they should be spending time with their dad.

So it’s not actually contact with their dad because he’s out? He needs to change his work schedule. That’s totally unfair.

You knew he had 4 kids. Did you want him to be the sort of man who never sees his kids?

@pinkdelight , I can be pedantic but now isn't the time and the place.
OP needs solutions not criticism.

With an income of £15k a month maintenance for 4 children staying 2/3 nights a week with a child resident in the home would be £1337 a month so he earns way more than that, with that income he can afford to get paid help to assist you or even take over his duties as a parent. He is the one responsible for putting the effort on you not their mother.

Not really though cos what if something happened to thdm whilst her phone is turned off and is uncontactable? Also who has their phone turned off for days or does she have a second phone?

So stop doing it?

Why did you marry him knowing he had 4 kids?
What has this got to do with their mother?
You do realise most parents don't get "time off" as you put it from their children?
What would you have done if your relationship with your child's father had worked out because you wouldn't have "time off" then?
You're resentful for the situation you chose to be in maybe ask yourself why?

Do they come every weekend ? Can you not have them the weekends your kids are in so you then have a weekend off too ?

So at that point he so so busy he couldn't look after the children? Still found the time to date and marry you though? He sounds like a real prince.

So before you were living together he just didn't see his 4 kids and you thought he was a good man?

It's just a mess tbh, he clearly expects you to do the childcare, if that's not what you want you will have to end the relationship.

What would he do if you weren't there and you did go away every weekend? He would have no choice but to parent his children surely. He is making a choice to not show up for his kids, he 'has' them every weekend but isnt there? This is shocking behaviour from him, but you are allowing it.
You also are blaming the wrong person here. The ex wife is not the problem here, she is coparenting with the father and its the father who is not holding up his end of the bargain here by not bring present for his kids. The fact youre the one looking after them is not her fault, its his.

I know you dont find it helpful that people are telling you that you knew what you were getting into but they are right. You have choices here, accept what is going on currently, or tell him youre leaving if things dont change. He is the problem, not her or the kids. The sooner you see that the better. The longer you keep deflecting your feelings toward the wrong person, the longer you will feel this way.

I an so sorry normally im not so black and white with my comments but i genuinely dont get how you dont see the real issue here.