Stepdaughter’s bedroom at Christmas

[Balletbabe]

My 14 year old stepdaughter has an en-suite bedroom at our house which she uses maybe two or three nights a month.. This room is sacrosanct and DH won’t entertain conversations about it.

Essentially she will not allow my mother to use it over Christmas even if she isn’t here.

My sister is with her in-laws.

We either put my daughter in with our youngest two, or bring baby back in with us. Either of these solutions would potentially lead to sleep regression for both the younger kids. Or we travel for just under an hour to my mother’s, taking kids away from their presents and she will then feel the need to host us.

We still have no idea if stepdaughter is even going to be here.

All DH will say is he wouldn’t want anyone in his room either and he is willing to collect her after presents and she could get Uber back.

Because she may not even be there - so the room would be empty- but she still won’t let anyone sleep in it.

@Balletbabe

Hiya, I'm wife two of three so have done the stepmum thing and my daughters now have a stepmum.

I used my step daughter's bedroom as an office when she wasn't here (which I regret).

My daughters' new stepmum regularly lets her guests use the girls' rooms and at one point, someone lived in it except for when my daughters were there for two weekends a month. I think this is too far the other way but that's because she basically ignores one of my two daughters and along with my ex husband decided to reduce contact to one weekend a month which created a huge mess and I ended up with social services involved.

I kind of understand both sides. I'm unclear whether your step daughter will be in the house when your mother was staying.

If stepdaughter is going to be there, I think she needs her room available then her and your mum should sleep elsewhere.

However, if your step daughter isn't going to be staying during that time, I think this is a reasonable ask if the step daughter is on board.

My ex's first wife was great, I really like her. If I had been in this position (and my ex had actually cared that much about the first set of children for this to be an issue), I probably would have reached out to her to get her thoughts and possible influence.

Are you in a position to speak to step daughter's mum to see what she thinks? She also may be able to shed light on why it would be a no.

I'd also suggest a different set of bedding, my daughters hate that someone else sleeps in their beds at their Dad's.

How do you know this?

This. The type of blended family OP and some of the posters here think she ‘should’ have is desired by her stepdaughter about as much as a virulent case of Ebola is. That wouldn’t be happy blended families either.

I must admit it is hard to judge without knowing all
the ins and outs, after my DC experience of their father’s change in attitude after he met his now wife and the whole family dynamics (he even told me her children were his priority now as they lived together, despite the fact they had a very involved dad themselves) it was very clear that my DC needed to fit into their new family or else. You cannot imagine the trauma this caused my DC being made to feel l2nd class compared to her children. His own family and all our old friends were disgusted by it. So when I met my now DH I was super impressed that it was clear his children were very much his priority, I definitely didn’t want to ever have children with another man who could do that to his own children. I completely agree the OP shouldn’t expect DSC to imply allegiance to the OPs family, it’s enough that she civil. However the MN narrative does tend to swing to the other extreme and imply no parents should ever move on after a family separation, definitely not have any more children etc and that if they do they deserve to live in rags so the 1st family can be kept in the style they’re accustomed too etc which I don’t think is right either

Her previous threads.

Well all the more reason for them to separate then

I guess the proof of the pudding will be how the DCs look back on their blended childhood.

Hopefully they’ll view it as positively as you think it is (I mean that genuinely, not sarcastically, but given the experience of friends, DCs don’t always tell parents how negatively affected they were by blended families).

In the case of the Op, it’s hard to see how any of the DCs won’t be significantly negatively impacted by this situation & the dynamics involved.

Because it’s different when your parents are divorced and you’re stuck travelling about. Now your room is being given away too.

And also - because her parent (who co owns the house) supports her.

Pretty sure just the dad owns the house not op.

How do you know all of this, my ex was relatively wealthy but I had a much better lifestyle once we separated, I had my own secure tenancy on a lovely house (he could of chucked us out of his house at any time), I was in debt while I was with him but even on benefits I was able to pay that off, despite being a single mother of 3 I was quite financially comfortable and able to return to uni to establish my career (due to his income I hadn’t been eligible for any childcare support to do so while I’d been with him) Once I was working I was even better off, had nice car and holidays and things I would of never been able to afford whilst with him as he had his salary which he paid all
the bills and food shopping with and I only had the child benefit which I also had to buy the children’s clothes etc with.
Ironically I was better off then than I am even now with my DH and he’s a higher earner and everything goes into a joint account and I’m earning a decent salary too, but that’s another story about this countries sky high taxes and mortgage rates that doesn’t leave much left after maintenance payments have gone out

Ah, ok :-)

My point was that the PP said “child was dictating to parents” but ignoring that the “on site” parent agrees with DSD!

Well, you would think. Just as you would think she wouldn’t have progressed a relationship with a man that she knew from the beginning was never going to give her the blended family she wanted, and yet here we are.

She’s been advised to do just that on every thread. She doesn’t want to separate.

Oh yes Im on the step daughter and father’s side here.

Op just wanted her step daughter though really she is just her boyfriend’s daughter to slot into the life she wanted. No ring, no name on the deeds… Ops picked a good father but the wrong partner.

But again, why? Why can't the OP simply accept the situation as it is? Would you seriously deprive the younger two children of a loving father in their lives on a daily basis just because SD doesn't want to consider OP's mother as her granny or her daughter as her sister? No one is being mistreated. On the OP's previous thread, her own mother and sister thought she needed to accept the situation. I would be interested to know if they care about this blending of families as much as OP does.

Her previous threads. He isn’t relatively wealthy, he and his family are just wealthy. Same as his ex. OP isn’t.

Mother can get a hotel or bnb nearby.
All this pressure to put her up is ridicules.
I’m a mum with adult kids and I would not want to be staying in a child’s room

Because she doesn’t have the picture perfect she wants a so is going to keep trying to chip away and away at it till she destroys her relationship or in her mind gets her goal of this insta blended family.

Shes more likely to find her self a single mother to three with two of her children having it all however.

Yes I think a good father but not a good partner is a good summary, well I suppose the silver lining is he will hopefully always be there for the DC they have together at least. I tell my daughters if you do one thing in life pick a decent dad for your children so at least she’s done that

It’s hardly her private space if she’s there twice a month.

She's at boarding school, so that wouldn't be a private space for her. Either her family respect her privacy in houses she doesn't spend much time in, or she gets no private space.

It absolutely is her private space (especially as she is at boarding school where she may well share a room)

She’s at boarding school it’s not like she’s living with mum 98% of the time and tbh even if she was she should still have private space at her dads.

Thankfully her dad loves and respects her enough to make sure she has a nice comfortable room that is purely hers rather than his girlfriends guests room for her mother.

It depends, yes it would be silly if it’s a case of the OP just being frustrated that her DSD isn’t as keen on socialising with the rest of the family if she’d like, then yes that’s a bit unreasonable and unfair to expect. However the whole set up with the DP just doesn’t sound right, he doesn’t sound like he actually wants a genuine life partnership with her, he wants to retain control. Therefore the sooner she establishes herself on her own the better