Struggling with Boundaries and Space in My Home with My Partner’s Ex and Daughter Involved

[Curlywurly92]

Hi all,
I’m feeling really overwhelmed right now, and I could use some advice. I’m in a relationship, but I’m facing some real challenges when it comes to boundaries and my space at home.
I bought my house before I got together with my partner, and I pay the mortgage myself. Since I moved in, my partner wasn’t really in the picture at the time, but now that we’ve been together for a while, things have shifted, especially with his daughter and the ongoing drama with his ex.
Here’s where things get tricky: I’m happy for my partner’s daughter to have her own space when she’s here, so I said she can use the guest bedroom, change the duvet whatever, However, I feel like everything is being shaped around her needs now, even though she’s due to be there every other wknd pending a court applciation. The bigger issue is this extra bedroom, which I had used for my things—wardrobes, personal items, you name it. My partner when he first moved in started using it for his daughter’s stuff, and I feel like my space is just being taken over, and told her it was her bedroom. I never decorated it because I let him decide how it should be arranged for her, and now I’m left feeling like I don’t have any room for myself.
When my partner’s daughter first started staying with us, it was forced by her mum. We live far away, and when she was about 3, she was forced into a car for a 40-minute drive around 7 pm. It just doesn’t feel like a good situation all around.She hated coming.
On top of that, my partner doesn’t have his own place. So, now it feels like all the pressure is on me to make the living situation work, including the constant worry about the court order related to his ex and his daughter. I feel like I’m the one making all the sacrifices, and my home has become a battleground when I just wanted it to be a place for me to feel comfortable.
Has anyone else dealt with a situation where your space has been completely shaped by your partner’s kids or ex? How did you set boundaries? How do you handle it when your partner doesn’t have their own home, and you’re the one paying the mortgage but feeling like it’s not really YOUR space anymore?

I think the only answer is to end the relationship. The child deserves time with her dad and her own space. You don't seem to appreciate that, fair enough, not your responsibility, but you can't live with a man who has a child if your not comfortable with the child staying over and having their own space. You also need to be prepared for the chance of him having full custody one day. If you would not be willing to live with his child full time, you shouldn't be living with him.

Your partners daughter deserves her own room, decorated for her, a space that is hers to make her feel like home. As it is! Its her home with her dad.
The child should be the priority here. Not you guests or your junk.

If he has a problem with her having to share the bedroom and only have it to herself when she visits, then maybe he needs to get his own place. It's your house, you set it up as you want. She has use of the guest room for the small number of nights she visits. No need for it to stay as a shrine to her when she's not there and you have other people to visit.
Sounds like he's trying to take over the house. I'd be asking him to look for a place of his own.

No @Sudagame , daughter gets to use one room and then have it all put away as if she doesn't exist when she's not there

This sounds like so much to unravel. The words you use. The blanket statements. I empathised at the start. Now you sound very selfish and deceitful with your words

So he is your partner and lives with you, paying all of the utilities / giving you half ? Living with you full time ? And you knew he had a child when you got together with him?

Did he move in with you via stealth and you didn’t realise or something? Because if he moved in with your blessing / permission then where on earth did you think he was going to have his daughter? He lives with you.

this is a mess of your own making tbh - it’s entirely natural he’d want to have his child in his home- which happens to be your home too

I think what’s happening here is you feel resentful and you don’t want the child taking over any of your home:l

youll have to split up with him and boot him out won’t you?

Another one saying the OP should end it.

Perhaps the bedroom doesn't need to be pinkified - it could be decorated neutrally. But it needs to be the child's permanent room when she stays, even if her things are expected to be tidied away afterwards.

She isn't just a guest. One of the boundaries has to be a boundary around the needs of the child to feel secure and loved.

This won't happen if the child feels put up on a camp-bed in a random corner of a study/dressing room, barely tolerated by her father's partner.

The OP probably wants the child out of the picture - but it is so damaging to children not to have a good relationship with their parents. Many people find ways to make this type of situation work. Perhaps the OP and her partner could agree to live separately, if she just can't cope with a child who is not her own in her living space. If it can't work, it needs to end.

I read that she has a "room" but when shes not there her stuff is moved out to accommodate guests - so not really her own room. She's essentially also being treated as a guest.

This happens every single time.

The conspiracy theorist in me believes it’s bots.

The subject matter is always rage bait - cocklodgers or feckless/cheating/emotionally unavailable hisbands. The OPs always start off nice and whatless (a very south London that’s difficult to explain) to get you emotionally involved and feeling sorry for them. 9 times out of 10 the OPs ignore the inevitable avalanche of LTB posts and instead just keep drip feeding reason after reason why they should LTB or they become aggressive and start attacking posters.

I’m 50:50 as to whether MN create the bots to drive traffic to the website and generate additional ad income or if it’s the Russians on some weird mission to divide the women of MN.

Then don't. What has he said when you told him no?

Presumably you paid those bills yourself before he spotted you as an easy mark, so could do so again.

You need to decide what you want, him and his daughter and your increasing resentment for the next however many years, or your spare room back.

Since I assume he didn’t live on a park bench before he inveigled himself into your home I expect he can find somewhere to live, and possibly at the same time work out that being a parent involves providing for your own child, not expecting other people to fill the gaps in your parenting skills for you.

Where have you copied this from? (Forgetting to delete the opening quote mark)

So you got him a well paid job with a car and provide him with a home as well?
This man is a user OP, come on now

As this thread has progressed your comments seem to have moved from repeating the inconvenience of your step daughter's presence to realising the inability of your partner to provide for her. So despite the fact you are arguing with a lot of posters, I think you are beginning to understand what everyone is telling you.

You cannot maintain a relationship with this man while he lives with you. Its not working for you, him or his daughter. He needs to move out and provide himself and his daughter with an appropriate home, that she is welcome to live in whenever she wants. You can then make your house into the comfortable personal space you want. If you and he want to maintain the relationship you can do so living separately.

You are (one of) the adult(s) in this situation. If you’re not happy with it, end it.

Posts like these make me more and more determined to make sure my marriage works, as I never want to think of my daughter being treated this way or thought of as some kind of unwelcome burden in a place she thinks of as a home.

The fact that the OP has repeated the same bodies of text, sometimes three or four times, in their posts, suggests that if not a bot, then at least, as a pp has suggested, Chatgpt or similar is being used. Badly.

I'm still curious how she met the child six months before she met the partner. It's like a bad soap opera.

You’re in a relationship with a man who has a child. She comes as part of the package and she deserves a room to sleep in. “The kid is back to reclaim her room”-she’s a child, a child who has had a very disrupted start in life, including being abducted to another country by her mother - she doesn’t have a choice where she goes. If you don’t want this relationship end it. If your wardrobe space is more important than the wellbeing of a child end it . Don’t blame a child for needing a bedroom and some security. If you want this relationship long term - then she’s part of the deal .

Did you know the child before meeting your partner?

Did child have room A? Then guests in room B. Is room A now full of your stuff? Are you suggesting child now has room B? With her things when staying. This being packed away when guests use the room. Is there much difference between room A and B? Size wise etc. Would room B feel like the child’s room or just a guest room with a few child’s things in. What happens if child stays over more or at times you normally have a guest?

Room B would really need to feel like the child’s room. I understand what you are saying about being your house but child shouldn’t feel like an afterthought. It may be a case that your needs do not match with your partner’s/their child.

The em dash screams ChatGPT - or as we lovingly refer to him in our home, Chatters.

I wondered that. Perhaps knew the child and their mother first.

It is hard to follow. Perhaps copying and pasting.

Yeah, me swearing is causing more harm than your behaviour. Have a word with yourself. My words never supported a custody battle for part time residency of a child I didn't want living with me.

Funny how you can call me, a random stranger, to account but have made such a mess of your living situation.

I think her dad wants her to have the room which OP is currently using as a home office/dressing room which used to have a bed in when the little girl stayed before (lets call it bedroom 2). She wants to keep bedroom 3 as the guest room for when her mum stays and have the little girl sleep in there when she comes and then remove all sign of her between visits while keeping bedroom 2 for her own sole use.

OP could you give his daughter bedroom 2 and then when your mum stays she just sleeps in that room even though it's done out for a 6 year old? Then you could used bedroom 3 - which I bet is the smaller room for your home office/storage?

How is the daughter reclaiming bedroom 2 if there is no bed in there? Is she just playing in there?

As others have said, you need to either accept you live together and accept his daughter as part of the package and give her her own room. I don't think your mum sleeping in there too is a problem - assuming they don't stay at the same time. It just needs to be done out for the girl and not as a guest room. If my assumption is that bedroom 3 which you want them to sleep in is smaller, is her dad putting things in bedroom 2 because of lack of space in bedroom 3.

Most importantly you seem to have slipped into this arrangement without any proper planning or discussion. Your DP is acting as though you are living together and this is now his home and presumably his contribution to household bills is a help even if he isn't paying rent? This isn't unreasonable if you haven't told him that's not how you see it, or you will only see it like that if he pays rent.

He will assume that in letting him live there you understand his daughter is part of the package because that is what any reasonable person would assume.

You don't seem to be communicating very well with him.

At the end of the day, if you don't want them there then you can tell him to leave.

What do you want to happen because there are other issues at play here. You seem put out that he is only paying towards bills while seemingly not expecitng him to pay rent/towards the mortgage. If that's the case then it isn't just about where the 6 yo is sleeping/playing it's about him making assumptions and you just going along with them. Are you saying she can have bedroom 2 if he pays more or do you want to keep it for your own use? You need to be clear what you want and then talk to him.

He needs his own place.
Do you want this child in your life?