OH wants custody of baby niece?

[milkshakess]

So OH's younger sister has recently had a baby and there is possibility that the baby may end up in care.

She already has an 18 year olds on who has lived with their mum since he was 8.

She dips in and out of his life, she even forgot his last birthday, she hasn't really been a mum to him at all. Despite this he has turned out to be a lovely, smart and hard working lad.

Everyone was so surprised by the pregnancy.

From what we understand she was kept in hospital for 2 weeks whilst some kind of team were getting stuff ready for the baby.

I think the hospital staff were monitoring and observing her interact with the baby and something must of been flagged?

Her mum has sold her house and was due to move abroad in September but she had been visiting her and the baby at the hospital daily and helping.

OH isn't really close to his sister but he is close to her son, he calls OH the "best uncle" as him and the other uncles have all chipped into help raise him.
OH would sometimes not see his sister for years and she was always changing her number and would have to talk to her though her son.

Anyway the family don't want the baby to end up in care but everyone has young kids themselves ( we have toddlers and are trying for a 3rd).

OH wants to go for custody but the care would really fall on me and I work from home and have a very flexible job.

Just wanted input on the situation as OH and the family don't want the baby to go into care

Where does OP say shes married? As far as we know, she's not. So how will she feel to provide all this care at the cost to her own career and finances, knowing that her partner could break up with her any moment and she would have zero right to ever see the baby again?

I don’t think saying she can be the OP’s 3rd is at all the same for somebody who wants their own. For many people, I think blood ties/being siblings is a major factor.

If you could straightforwardly adopt the baby with normal levels of contact with the adopted baby's birth parents, then it's something I would definitely consider.

However it sounds like an absolute nightmare in which everyone wins but you and the poor baby. And it also sounds like boundaries couldn't be drawn in such a way that this would extend your family to 3 and you could bond with the baby as a mother.

It would be better for the baby to be fostered or adopted outside of your family, than have her mum dip in and out of her life at will. That's very difficult for a child to come to terms with.

This! Sounds like some posters aren't reading anything on here! Just a fraction of the OP's first post!

I read all the updates before posting 🙂
Op has said that her OH wants custody, that he came back from his brothers asking if she wanted the baby.
If social services are involved the mother may have no choice but to give her up which is why I said I would adopt her if she was up for adoption, but if she isn’t that I wouldn’t get involved as a very different matter.

I also don't think SW would be happy with the baby getting passed around like a parcel. And nobody having ultimate responsibility

Someone either fosters this baby with a view to adoption within the family or she will be removed from the mum and taken into care (with a view to external adoption)

This.

Was it not better her having adoptive parents who wanted her, rather than ones doing a reluctant duty?

I dont understand. If you re married surely this baby is also your niece. Why dont you take her and treat her as your own? It would be like having a 3rd child.
i know i would do that.

you want a 3rd child she s your niece and you dont want her to gi in foster carers if you cant help it.

Sorry OP i dont get what is the issue

i think the worst possible thing that could happen to this baby is to be left into the care of her biological mother. I feel her life would be ruined.

Read OPs updates and all will be revealed. There's a see all button you can click on.

Nope
there are many families out there wanting to adopt and your DH won’t be the one changing his life to do it. No. Just no. Screw that.

Well I guess if you adopt the niece you don't "need" to have baby number 3.

OP's partner can't just decide that though. If the mother wants to keep the baby then social services may work with her so that can happen depending on the reasons why they are concerned in the first place.

It's odd that OP's partner is asking OP if she wants his sisters baby, saying he can take 3 months off work like they would be legally adopting her which doesn't seem would be the case. Even if it was the case eventually, it would take time to enforce an adoption through.

Temporarily looking after her is a different matter but doesn't seem to be what OP's partner is talking about.

If I was already trying for a 3rd, I would just adopt this one. It’s family.

Personally I wouldn't take this on.

I ve read them all. Still dont understand what is the issue

I agree with this and find it disturbing that it’s even a question. If I were the husband, I’d leave my spouse for refusing to adopt a family infant in need when wanting another child anyway! And she has two of her own bio kids so it’s not like she’s being asked to never have her own bio babies. Absolutely narcissistic not to automatically want the baby.

I have to say I am staggered at the sheer number of posters who claim they would adopt an unexpected baby at a moment's notice and give up their hope of a third birth child and not only that, express confusion about why anyone might NOT feel that way. This is an extremely weighty and nuanced situation. The attitude is incomprehensible.

Wait, so if OP decides not to become, in effect, the unpaid primary caregiver of this child who is unrelated to her, then she is not allowed to have another child of her own because it shows she "can't cope?" Wow. Manipulative, much?

As others have said, it sounds as though mum wants to be involved as the “fun mum” who swoops in for days out, gives orders because “she’s her mum” but leaves the absolute grunt work and financial burden to you. This sounds really stressful. I think if mum were completely out of the picture it would be easier, but with this situation I’d be really wary about going forward.

The issue is that the birth mother doesn't want the baby adopted, she wants the men in the family to act as "dads" and the OP's partner wants OP to act as a long term baby-sitter, whilst allowing his sister to float around in and out of her daughter's life, because "babies are hard work"

Hope that is clear now

You sound like a 12yr old.

🤣
it s the attitude of not wanting a family member to stay in the family that is incomprehensible

It is not narcissistic to be hesitant about taking on the baby under these circumstances, what a nasty thing to say.

And if you'd bothered to read the thread you'd know that OP is not being asked to adopt, she's being asked to do an informal care arrangement for a child whose bio mother does not want to give her up, but is apparently asking her family members for an unspecified amount of help because despite being in her late 30s, she didn't realise that babies are hard work.