in stopping stepdaughters maintenance payments?

[postmanbob]

namechanged as don't want to be recognised.

DH has a DD(11) from previous relationship and we have 2 DC together, both pre-school age. We have a good relationship with SD and regular contact. My DH has paid maintenance every month without fail since the relationship broke up when SD was still a baby. We met a couple of years after that. Maintenance was agreed between them both and has not been an issue until now.

DH is in the construction industry and we have been hit hard this last year, his job is hanging on a wire and they have been as much as told to take it week by week.

I work very very p/t and my department have had trouble recruiting for a f/t job recently. Anyway, I spoketo my manager, they interviewed me and I have been offered the post. This means my DH will give his notice so he can care for our children. My new job is secure (NHS). The salary will be less than DH and mine but it is secure and we can survive on it.....but we will be unable to make the maintenance payments.

Does this sound dreadful or understandable? We are both very torn on what to do and I have to accept/ decline by Friday. I should add that it will not cause his ex finacial hardship......but I'm sure she will make a big fuss.

Hedgewitch and a few others talk sense.

Surely welcome in our home from the OP is just a words issue? If DS3 asks where we are going )about 80 times a day) I say 'we are going to our house'- doesn't mean its not his too.

I think you can tell on this thread very obviously the people that read the (rather unwisely worded OP) and those that carried on; the OP very quickly talks ambout £50- yet most posts stillr elate to a total ending of payment.

We're on £20k a month atm and £400 would kill us; that is clearly not the payment of a man that doesn't care! And whilst it is unfair that men can just stop work to avoid paying (I know a man who
ran an entire well paid second income cash in hand putrely to avoid the ex, and took a minimum wage job 'for the books') this man isn't doing that: they are looking for solutions to potential financial collapse. Now, foprgive me but if that happened wouldn't the maintenance be dropped right off any way? So it could be that in planning ahead, even if it means an inevitabe redu ction, they are actively maintaining the payments?

Only the OP knows the realtionship with the Mum and whether it goes to her or via csa should be absed on that I think.

I'm not a stepmum and I hope never to be dealing with the CSA- but I hope also that if I had to i'd recognise any new children DH had as equal in their entitlement to a life as mine. So often second famillies seem to be considered as less worthy and I don't get that at all- forget what the adults argue about but the kids are still that- kids, and worthy equally of love and support (including financial). I'm minded of a close friend whose ex wife left him for someone else to his total devastation and now harasses him and his new wife daily for more money than the CSA agreed (whch is paid on time and with love). How is it OK for her to destroy his life once and keept trying to again? It seems though that on here she'd be supported?

I wouldn't bother again FAQ, I've got a vibrator and can buy my own round of drinks.

it wasn't that i wanted to be no. 1 in my partner's/husband's life, just that i didn't want a chap with baggage like that when i was childfree.

sounds shallow, but there it was.

couldn't deal with dudes who had kids.

course now it would be a different story, as i've got kids myself and can't relate to chaps who don't.

but i was brought up to believe that a person's UPPERMOST duty in life is personal responsibility for everything, and that includes if you had a child with someone.

they have to come first in all your calculations in life thereafter whilst they're young. no ifs, ands and buts. YOUR needs are secondary and you don't make decisions, including having other kids, without thinking about your prior commitments first.

well, that was just too much baggage for me, like i said.

so a dealbreaker.

You're not taking into account the fact that you can get a hell of a lot back from a stepchild. Mine is great. Even at nearly 13 and all hormonal .

I love having her around, she's funny, cheeky, helpful, good company and a fantastic sister to dd. They adore each other. I don't begrudge her a penny that I spend on her or pay towards her (and I have been from my salary for the past year while dh has been setting up a new business).

I don't really see her as not mine - she's dh's and dh's x's, but mine in a different way if that makes sense. I don't even consider that I had no say in whether I had a say in her being conceived. She was part of the furniture when I came along and I wouldn't have it any other way.

She's a blessing on our family.

here, here, Katie!

nope, couldn't be arsed 'dating' again if somethign happened to DH.

really couldn't.

just reading the threads on here is enough to put me off.

that's all your DH gives you sex and drinks???

I'm lucky if I get either in all honesty, but seriously again as ex pat says, I would wait until my children had left home and he was too old to entertain wanting more children.
It doesn't strike me as being an easy path to take and if you get a pyscho ex god help you.

I love my boys the eldest reminds me all the time why I fell for his dad, I have the same banter and teasing with him that I did with his dad in the early days and still do sometimes (we've been through a lot so aren't as carefree as we were). They're both really lovely kids, adore their sister and take great pride in "playing [me] up", the eldest talks about playing his stepdad up but you can tell it's not the teasing/ fun way he does with me, he really doesn't like him.

I love my partner and I love his kids, I'm so glad I didn't run when he said he had kids.

It's a well known tactic of fathers to stop work, care for children, new wife works and no income is then due to the first family. If it's not deliberate then couldn't he take on evening bar work and weekend work or go out doing gardening for people and window cleaning to support his child?

ALso you cannot just legally stop paying so do speak to a lawyer before changes are made as you have to get the court order changed or the CSA reassess things before you can stop paying otherwise that's illegal even if circumstances have changed.

oh, hats off to anyone who goes for stepparenting, Tinker.

but i knew in my heart of hearts it wasn't for me.

i was way too selfish and shallow to deal with that.

tinks - once again agreeing with you!

I fell for Dh because of what a good dad he was, I also fell for DSS because he was adorable (he would kill me if I said he still was ... but he is )

It can be hard being a step-parent, but being a parent is bloody hard but I wouldnt wish it any other way.

Xenia, the CSA haven't assessed this - it's an arrangement made without their "help". And it might be "a well-known tactic" for a man to stop work to do his first family out of maintenance but there's no justification for assuming that's what is happening here.

Ditto and another good thing about getting together with a man who had children was that I knew what sort of Dad he would be (brilliant) and when I had dd and was completely petrified as I didn't have a clue about babies, I was pleased that dh did have a clue and had been through it all before.

Surey it would be for odd for a man voluntarily paying such a high proportion of his income- about a third take home I think- to volutarily throw his job in? Would be unfair indeed to assume thats what is happening here!

Xenia - you can if agreement is made out of court, as we have

I don't think you can know if it's for you until you've been there. I was seeing someone before TBD who had kids and I really was his last priority. I didn't see him in the week, the plan was to see each other at weekends but he couldn't see me because he was seeing his kids. I didn't begrudge them at all, but I felt there wasn't a place for me in there, I ended up being made to feel like I was and I didn't like it. With TBD it's completely different, he makes space for us separately and together. I felt safe bringing children into the relationship because I knew he could work it.

Xenia, I think you need to reread the OP because he's not just throwing his job in as some tactic and they're not trying to get out of paying.

thanks again for the input

xenia - there was no court order, it was a private agreement

I dont resent any money going to SD, it's more a case of we have no money to give anymore, the £400 waas not too bad in better days but it is harder now and will be impossble when I take this new job.

the 'our home' thing.....not sure what the problem with that is? She doesnt have to ask when she comes over she does come every weekend for a night or sometimes more but now she's older pops over after school sometimes. She doesn't live with us, home is with her mum and stepdad.

she has a privilidged homelife with foreign holidays and lots of extra-curricular activities. She has hundreds of clothes and trips out, she gets a healthy allowance for her age

i resent the accusations being thrown at us. God forbid we judge anyone in RL and post about it on here but seems perfectly ok to judge when we post.

I think KatieDD is very honest. She doesn't want step children so she walks away from the relationship-this is much better than starting a relationship with a man with DCs and then saying that you don't want to support them. If a man has a DC that DC comes before any new partner. The new woman has to accept that she has a ready made family and they may not be able to afford more.
However, we have come a long way from the OP and people seem to be reading their own experience into the situation. OP has a good relationship with step daughter, who is part of the family, and is trying to do her best. As XW and her partner seem financially stable it would be a good idea to talk over the situation and seek their views.

This is the same as you saying that your eldest will have to live on bread and water, because you can only afford to feed your youngest children. Seriously, what do other people do when they fall ill/lose jobs etc? Tell oldest child to fuck off?

ilovedogsandcats- that is the ppsite of your ead it all: the younger two are at risk of losing everything due to potential redundancy and financial meltdown; tyhey should be equally valued but that does mean equally- the younger ones should be no more vulnerable to monetary difficulty than the elder one.

you only have a financial responsibility to your own children, he has that responsibility to a child from previous relationship. you are not taking this decision lightly and should be applauded for that. a mother is within her right to stay at home and look after children and so should a father,makes for a tricky situation but maybe offering extra time looking after the child is a way to make things easier. if is nearby have over for tea more & provide packed lunches etc. would love for that to be the deal with dcs father, but also any maintenance payment in the last 9yrs would have been good too. now have dp who for past 2 1/2 years has housed, fed, clothed and entertained both ds and dd as though they are his own family, he has construction business and quite a lot of the time is now taking no money but if he had children of his own am sure we would use time as a way of helping. stop the payments if you need to and good luck

I don't think the eldest is going to live on bread and water-she had foreign holidays, trips out, an allowance etc!

I hope you can get things sorted out Postmanbob .... in your current circumstances I don't think anyone's going to be happy with a reduction or temporary halt on maintenance, but if the money's not there, it simply isn't there, and if, right now, SD's mum is capable of supporting her without hardship then sometimes hard decisions have to be made if the alternative is you ultimately losing your home etc.

From previous threads, stepmothers seemingly take their lives in their hands by daring to post about anything "step" related at all. I've lost count of the threads I've seen here over the years where a stepmother receives far, far less sympathy for a given situation, than someone else describing exactly the same scenario on another thread. I can only assume that this is, at least in part, due to the stereotypical image some people carry in their heads of the wicked witch stepmother cliche. For example, on "step" threads, I've seen countless assumptions that the stepmother must be the "other woman" who broke up the original marriage and therefore "deserves" her current troubles.

No it's not at all because this child has a mother to support her as well and we'd all go on bread and water ourselves before any child went without wouldn't we ?
I have a friend who can't afford to have a child with his new wife because he bought her a £250k and pays £700 a month for three children and has them to stay every other weekend and once in the week.
Everytime this woman needs something she puts her hand out to him, but as he rightly says if she was contributing £700 to then £1400 a month is more than enough to feed and clothe three children, she disagree's.
It's women like that which made my feelings very black and white, no matter how lovely the children.