The unpaid nanny.. or expected of stepmum?

[seasonofthebitch]

My DP has a little girl. From the time I time I first met her, I made a huge effort with her. She’s an amazing kid and I look forward to the days she is with us! We had her Christmas Eve just gone and I organised a visit from an “elf” (my friend!) who brought a Christmas Eve box I bought and put together for her. I do her pack lunches, play with her in the house, decorated her room with her… basically, I love her and we’ve got a great relationship.

Now he’s my AIBU…

DP spends most of his evenings in the gym, even on nights we have DSD. I’m talking from 6:30-9:30. DSD goes to bed at 6:30, so he’s usually in a mad rush to leave and either puts her to bed early or expects me to do it. Which is basically half the week. On Saturday, he goes with his friend for 2 hours to a local running group. On Sunday he holds a voluntary training session, lasting 3.5 hours.

Therefore I am de facto responsible adult over 2 days at the weekend (we have DSD every weekend, this was in place before we got together). This means that I am not able to make plans on those days as there’s an expectation I will look after DSD.

Hes now talking about adding a second training session on a Thursday (the only day he doesn’t train atm!). I said back to him “that’s fine, as long as it’s after you’ve put DSD to bed”

Now I don’t have an issue at all with being a loving, caring person to DSD. But I do take issue with being treated like a hire in nanny for little reason! I think DP should plan his life around DSD, not the other way round.

I also wonder what he’d do if he didn’t have a partner? His own mother has refused to look after DSD every day whilst he goes the gym.

DP has responded badly to this feedback, saying that all stepparents do this (they don’t?) and that I should be doing it as we’re family.

So who’s BU????

YABU - suck it up, you chose to be a stepmum.

YANBU - you’re not a childminder, you’re in a relationship!

Nothing makes a vagina clamp shut such as stories like this....why are you even with him? He's hardly a catch if you never see him.

He’s certainly living the life of Riley isn’t he, a single child free Riley at that. Not only does he have the audacity to expect you to be primary carer of his daughter on his contact time, he doesn’t even want to spend time with you on the sofa in the evenings when his daughter is in bed.

He is the one with a child, and yet you are the one tied to staying at home every evening, and seemingly unable to make plans for weekends as your husband has hobbies and has already planned for you minding his daughter.

Who drops the little girl off at school, who picks her up, who is called when she is sick, who has to take annual leave to cover school holidays? How much time, during his contact time does he spend with her when she is actually awake, and how much time is he soley responsible for her. It does sound like he is taking you for granted and that he doesn’t realise how lucky he is that he has the freedom of a non-parent, without having to pay a penny for childcare or child maintenance, but also how he is wasting precious time that he could be spending being a dad, and husband.

It would also be irritating if it was your own child. From what you're describing, he's off every single day of the week and you can't plan anything outside the house - evenings or weekends. This isn't ok regardless of who is the parent.

^^ THIS!

@seasonofthebitch PLEASE read what bridgetreilly is saying in the quote above, then read it again, then take a screenshot of it, and every time you have a wobble, please read it again!

One 3 to 4 hours stretch of going out to take part in an activity of his choice, per week, is acceptable - but not on a day or evening when his daughter is staying with you both. He also needs to agree to you having the same amount of time to do anything of your choice, once a week. But your 'free' 3 to 4 hours can happen while your DSD is at yours, in fact he should prefer that so that he gets an amount of time that is just him and his DD. I'm sorry - not very - but he can't go out for hours over the weekend when his DD comes to your home every weekend!
I obviously don't know why his ex doesn't have her DD every other weekend, but maybe she has a chronic illness or something similar.

A great many years ago, the court ruled that I had to let my ex-husband have our children for every other weekend. I was very torn with that ruling, as I very much wanted the children to spend frequent and quality time with their Dad as well as with me - I still loved him, he was a good person (except for leaving me for his work colleague) - but I also couldn't bear/bare (sp?) the thought of not seeing our children every other weekend. So in my mind the ex-wife must have a very good reason for not seeing her DD for at least one weekend a month. If she doesn't have a good reason then I can imagine OP your DSD will start to feel really unloved and unwanted by both of her actual parents.

Thank you for being such a great Step-mum to your DSD, but you really cannot put up with your partner (you haven't told us anything that makes him deserve to be called 'dear') leaving you alone for so much time every week, whether his DD is staying with you at the time, or not. If your P refuses to cut his selfish hours back drastically, then I'm sorry, but you shouldn't stay with him. Hopefully, if you leave, he will still let you spend some time with your DSD, but it wouldn't be healthy for any of you if you didn't leave him for that reason.🩷 xxx

Totally agree with this. He is obviously not interested in caring for his daughter so got 50/50 to dodge maintenance. Poor girl.

I absolutely can't see how this relationship is fulfilling if the DH is spending 3 hours at the gym almost every evening! Is he just avoiding family life altogether? What is the point in being with him?

Let us know how it goes.

I'm not sure I could be in a relationship with a man who did not put his child first.

He’s taking the absolute piss.

Organise some evening out for yourself so he has to parent.

My thoughts exactly.

Hes taking advantage of you! Taking care of his child every weekend is unacceptable when he gets to do what he wants and you cant make any plans. He sounds very selfish!
Does your SD have a mum? If so, she gets to have childfree weekends whilst you dont! Totally unfair!

so sad to read this. your child always has to come first. he sounds like he does not want to be a parent. so sad for his child.

This 👆

So who looked after his child before you came into their lives? Seriously he needs to parent his own kid. I can almost bet this is the kind of dad who slags off his kids mother too calling her a shit parent and bigs himself up with the "he has her all the time" speech when in reality he's picking up his child and dumping her on his Mrs. You need to tell him if he can't be bothered to parent his child he needs to let her mum keep her at home. You're allowed to make your own plans rather than having all of your free time revolving around his kid because he clearly doesn't make her a priority he may aswell not have her if he isn't going to look after her himself

Yep, you are the nanny with a Fanny.

When you leave him, he will try to guilt trip you, using his DD as leverage. Then, you will be replaced within weeks and his life will continue as it is at present.

Do you have low self esteem or an abusive childhood? There must be a reason why you have settled for this shit show of a half life.

Be prepared for massive pushback.

you are there to support him, not raise his child.

Are you planning on having children with him?

what would happen if you got a hobby? Which I think you should do actually.

This is one of the saddest posts I’ve read. Sad for you and the daughter. I’d be devastated if one of my twenty something dds was bring treated like an unpaid nanny by some loser.

Agree with everyone else he’s despicable.

There's an obvious reason why he's divorced! Men like that do absolutely fuck all with their kid, their wife leaves them (no easy decision with a very small child), they rage and insist on 50-50 custody to teach her a lesson, then they happily trick a new woman into taking care of his child. They're usually in a huge rush to get engaged and married because you're forever trapped as a stepmum compared to just a partner. Good luck!

I'm amazed you have her every weekend, doesn't her own mother want to spend time with her. So the mum gets to go shopping and clubbing on a Saturday and lies in all Sunday while another woman gets conned into taking care of her child.
I always say this,, it's perfectly possible to have a relationship without living together at all. I also think he married you as a sweetener and to make it more difficult to leave when you realised he's treating you like a free nanny.

3 is important here as the op should be out dating, trying to find a decent man instead of this one. (jk- im not advocating cheating, I think she should tell him what kind of pathetic dad and partner he is, walk, then go out and date or not as you feel like it)

My ex was very similar. He lived with his mum and he actually took his child off his ex. Played the poor single dad card told everyone who listened how he "saved" his child from his crappy useless mother all while he carried on living like a single man going out most nights drinking with his mates and then he still had every weekend to himself as this apparently crappy mother had their child Friday to Sunday nights. He would even sod off out Sundays until his mother said she was going out. He tried to shove his kid on me it happened once and I got a mouthful for disciplining his son whilst in my care (he dragged my son across the floor by his hair and I put him in time out) so I told him straight don't bother asking me again to look after his kid he can stay home and look after his own child for once. I ended the relationship not long after that

Yeah he’s absolutely taking advantage OP. You are basically the nanny. Please don’t allow him to treat you this way. His poor daughter too. Her mum and you are raising her it would appear. Absolutely unacceptable.

He’s taking you for a ride love. Absolutely ridiculous. Poor little girl

What a brat of a man. Why not show him what you’ve written here and the responses?

I’m genuinely shocked. 6.30 bedtime is outrageous at that age. I’m assuming he has her so much to avoid cms? He is a massive piss taker. Does her mum know you look after her so much? Does she not want weekends? When do you spend time together I he’s at the gym so frequently? Utterly unreasonable situation.

There are only two responses to this situation. Put up with it or don’t put up with it. Almost nobody would.