AIBU to expect my husband to split school fees equally between my children and his son?

[CherriBerri]

I have a husband, who has a son (7) from a previous marriage. We have two shared children (3 and 2).

I earn enough to afford to send my children to private school next year, and I will be doing so. My husband has agreed to pay for half of the school fees, and I’d pay the other.

The mother of his son cannot afford to pay the private school fees, even with my husband’s offer to pay half, because of her earnings. She has asked my husband to pay the full fee, and argued that it wouldn’t be fair for him to not be able to attend. However, my husband cannot afford to pay the full fees for his son AND half the school fees for the both of our children, just half for all three.

My husband has been guilt-tripped about the “unfairness” by the son’s mother, which resulted in us having disagreements. Because he knows I could afford to pay the full fees for the both of my children, he thinks I should be paying one full fee and half of one fee, so that he could pay the other half and full fees for his son. This way, he says it’s fair so that all children can attend private school.

However, I think that this arrangement is the actual unfair one; as the father of ALL three children, he should be providing equally. I don’t think it’s fair for him to forgo his responsibility for one child for another. I pay my half for our children equally, his son’s mother should do the same for her only child. I don’t think it’s fair for them to push the responsibility of her finances unto me. I grew up disadvantaged and I worked like a mule to afford this; paying extra so that his son can go literally is taking money from the mouths of my children (via their savings), it’s not right.

There could be other solutions, where the mother could save to provide private education for when their son is older (at year 10 intake for example), instead of making me pay.

Would you have married a bloke who already had kids with someone else?

But HE does. You've missed the point. HE should treat his kids equally so if he cannot afford private school for all 3 and the OP isn't willing to help out then none of them should go.

Don’t pay a penny. Either DH can pay or the eldest goes without. This is what happens in blended families, not all children get a fair outcome. I doubt the eldest would have the opportunity anyway.

He can't afford 3 children, if he wants private school. He needs to work out how much he can afford for a year and allocate half for dc7 and the other half for the 2 with you. Dc7's mum will have to make up the difference, as will you for your 2. If you can't afford it, you can't afford it. Could you do state primary and save for secondary?

The father should pay for all his children OP. But if he can’t then what’s the solution? To be honest with you, private school isn’t the be all and end all. I’d send them all to state and save the money so they can buy a house when they’re adults and have even more lovely holidays and experiences.

Your husband and ex have set boundaries with you when it comes to their child. Appropriate.

But they want you to unboundary your wallet to finance their child through private school, taking those funds from your own children. Your ex is unable to contribute her share and lives with her parents and works part time. They want their hands in your wallet for extremely significant suns of money for years to come. You aren't allowed to have financial boundaries with them.

Talk about a double standard. They can have boundaries when it comes to the kids but you can't.

That's a big old load of bullshit and I'd be consulting a lawyer to gather information and explore what divorce would look like.

They will go anyway because I will pay, regardless if he refuses. But he’s paying for half of the younger two now, because I can pay the same now.

Whether the eldest can realise the full amount, of his share, later as savings vs part of it now as schooling, doesn’t change that he provided for all 3 equally.

He is being fair and equal by making the same amount of money available to all children equally.

No that's not what I am saying.

If the OP wants to pay for her 2 children to go to private school (or indeed for them to have a BMW) she can. What shouldn't happen is her husband facilitates this by paying half which results in 2 children going to private school (or getting a car) while the third does not. He should treat his children equally but she does not have to pay for DSS if she doesn't want to.

DH is able to treat them all the same in theory by offering to pay half for each, but this does not result in them being treated equally if his ex cannot pay and the OP is unwilling to pay extra resulting in DSS not being able to go.

They need to find a way to deal with these significant spends so that there is not a massive, obvious discrepancy between the joint children and her husbands child while also avoiding one or both parties being resentful. I am not sure what the solution is here as the OP isn't changing her mind. It is likely this will negatively impact the marriage with one or both parties being resentful of the other as well as DSS (who is still young) not understanding why he is treated differently to his siblings when they are all one family.

I’m glad you’ve resolved this, but I can see why you’re upset that it needed to be a source of conflict in the first place. He should have respected you enough by not trying to make this your problem in the first place.

I would impress upon him that you are not there to provide an ‘easy’ solution to any problems he has with his ex. I would also make it very clear that he needs to stop thinking of you as a financial resource when it comes to his sole responsibilities. You were right to hold firm here, because if you had given in then this would only continue.

Then you shouldn't have entered a relationship with someone that also has a child.

But from the above, its simple. You pay for YOUR children's school fees as you so badly want them to be privately educated then your DH will be able to pay for his other child. Therefore all three get to go.

I think that's the problem. It's not really a family unit, it certainly doesn't read like that at all.

Presumably this child has already been at school for 3 years and the mum and dad have been perfectly content sending him to state school. It’s only because you want private that they want to move them?

. Treat all equally, you need to think of the best family unit in the long term. Depriving one child of the same education will create a much bigger loss in the long run - emotionally. You seem to have a lot of money, it seems foolish and selfish to deprive the sibling.

This does sound very transactional.
I've never understood married couples who don't share money, but you appear to be holding the purse strings here, nobody can make you pay.
This could affect your relationship with your DH though. You haven't been married very long and you have very young DC and you're already having disagreements about who pays what for which child. You are effectively forcing him to treat one of his DC differently from the other two. This sort of thing can ruin marriages and the relationships between siblings and half siblings too.
Your DC may benefit from a harmonious relationship with their brother, and having parents not arguing about money, more than an extra savings account with the money you save.

No because I’m too selfish and wouldn’t want someone else’s child living with me on and off either.

Thus my attitude here of not ops child not ops purse.

and yes I was / am a step child and no we did not get everything exactly the same as we both understood we had our own extended families. Also there is no hard feelings or even the word half between me and my sibling.

He is treating them equally, in that he’s contributing the same amount of money to each of his children.

They siblings do not have access to the same opportunities because they don’t share the same parents, and the stepson’s mother cannot afford to provide for her child what OP can afford for hers.

I was thinking exactly this when people were saying "why should the lazy ex expect any benefit? How is that fair?" when it really isn't about what is fair for the ex; it's about what is fair for the child.

And that child is op's DH's child. It is fair and right that he wants to treat them equally.

I wouldn’t.

You got with a man with a child you have to treat them the same. That is exactly what you signed up for

What happens if your dh decides to treat all 3 children the same and not pay for any to go to private school?

To state once more, I’m not actually sharing a strongly held or well thought out position here! Thanks for engaging with my post as the exploration it is.

1. marriage seems to make a difference to me because there are explicit promises made. At the other extreme, a child born from a one night stand, I’d still see both parents having a moral obligation to provide a decent life (whatever that means to them) but I don’t see that exclusivity can be assumed.
2. the point is that the child was conceived and born within the expectation of all resources for this family (not necessarily for this child only, of course, but the parents would together decide about that). The separation is a change of terms and for the party that didn’t ask for or want the change of terms it’s understandable that they might never feel okay about the new situation. It obviously makes a difference here how the separation occurred and there are many many ways to make it less painful and more fair for the first family (which it sounds like you and h try to do).
3. Yes there’s now a new agreement, which I suppose varies for different families, but that doesn’t mean everyone is equally happy with it or should be. There is a material loss to the first family compared to what was originally promised due to separation and also due to the new children being born (I believe cm takes into account total number of children?).
4. Because the original agreement was for better or worse, for richer or poorer (assuming marriage) and explicitly says that we expect to put in more if we have more.

Basically, you emphasize that the terms have changed and everyone should now be fine with that and move forward on that basis. I emphasize that one party perhaps never wanted the terms to change at all? People can feel pissed off at a breach of contract, even if they can’t do much about it and in practice have to find a new way forward.

Probably I’ve had to think about money too much because I’m in a marriage with very unequal earnings. We started unequal then made decisions that increase the inequality as they make sense for the family unit. They don’t make sense for me as an individual, only within the promise of financial support for myself and any children indefinitely into the future. I won’t be able to pick up again fully and recover lost earnings if he decides he wants to leave for a new family. I won’t be able to make up the difference for my children. They would be much worse off than if he kept the promise to be a family forever and possibly also worse off than if I’d just had them on my own and maintained my own home and career. I think it would be reasonable for me to feel angry about that, even though I would be forced through divorce to accept new terms. Because of our particular situation it’s all a bit exaggerated for us and we’ve had to have very clear discussions about how we could manage a separation without it accidentally destroying my life. I think most couples don’t have such direct conversations so early but still are making decisions on the assumption of forever and then finding later that it was actually just for a time. That can hurt and might never stop hurting (although it’s obviously healthier not to dwell on resentment and move forward with the new reality).

In this situation none of the DC should go to private school because the DH cannot afford to ensure all his children are being treated equally.

If you feel strongly that your two need to go to private school and won’t help finance the older boy then you should divorce and pay the full fees yourself. That is not because it is your responsibility to pay for the older boy, but because you should respect your DH treating his children fairly.

Presumably the boy’s mother does not care about private school so there’s no point trying to convince us or her that she should pay. You don’t get to decide how she spends her money.

Exactly. It is OP's suggestion of different treatment that has rocked the family boat.

Thank you for answering, I appreciated your reply.

No, she doesn’t. No stepparent has to. You may like to believe they do, but that doesn’t actually make it true.