Ex refusing use of the term “step-mum”

[Iamadaddoinghisbest]

Hi everyone,
this is my first post, so really hoping for some helpful responses here…

I met my current partner (now wife) 18 months ago and we got married a couple of months ago, around 12 months after getting engaged.
we moved in together around 6 months after initially meeting and made sure to integrate my 6yo daughter into the process to make sure she felt able to discuss any concerns and feel included.
My daughter stays with us 3 nights per week and is very happy in her home life with us.

My ex partner (mother to my daughter) has, since the beginning, expressed continual disapproval of our relationship and at numerous occasions attempted to control how we live in our house:
-commenting on where we do our shopping
-dictating routines in our house
-insisting I don’t choose clothes for my daughter to wear
-involving my daughter in communications to me “tell Daddy he never returns the right clothes” etc
-constant judgemental behaviour and constant messaging even after (on a number of occasions) telling her I don’t want us to message each-other other than on handover days or in an emergency.
-insisting that my wife doesn’t kiss my daughter.

Currently she is now insisting that we cannot use the term “step-mum” or any other variant (bonus mum, extra mum etc) that implies the use of the word mother for my wife.
My wife and I have never pressured my daughter to use any of these terms and at all points explained she can call her whatever she feels most comfortable with. She wants to say Step-Mum because she has friends who also have step step parents so we have just allowed it.

Her mum is insistent that this is forbidden and even told my daughter “just because Daddy & xxx are married doesn’t mean that she is your step mum” and offered no explanation to her.

My daughter came to me to discuss this and was clearly confused and upset and now if the opinion that my wife isn’t actually part of the family but just a “friend” of mine.

Looking for some opinions on this.
My wife is legally my daughters step-mum so I don’t feel she has any right to contest anything here regardless of whether she likes it or not.

A lot of your posts don't make sense.

You say your daughter was 3 when you broke up with her mum.

But if she's 6 now, you've been with your wife 18 months and had split up 3 years before you met your wife, your daughter would have been 18 months ish when you split up (3 years between you splitting with ex and meeting wife, 18 months of new relationship comes out to 4.5 years).

The new wife is the child's stepmother. It's the 'legally' that is misleading.

That's not what I asked you.

I asked you "Can you explain what legal right the mother has to tell the father, who is a functioning adult and an equal parent in law, how to parent?"

As that what the ex appears to be doing.

Op, you have responded calmly and maturely to all the posters accusing of things you didn't do. It's pretty common in mumsnet to add extra bits to what op said. You should delete this post, some posters have given good advice of using mediation, but all these ecent posters are doing is trying to give you a headache.

I answered you. The ex is a parent. Of course she has a right to do so.

Which is all very lovely for you and your new wife. But the more your DD sees your wife as a mother, the harder it will be for her actual mother to be able to relax and accept. Which is surely what the aim should be here?

Whatever you think of your ex, she carried and birthed your daughter and has been her mother every moment since. You have said nothing to indicate she doesn't deserve full respect for that role, a part of which is recognition that it is unique, and that other women in your daughters life do not have the same or even similar roles, just because you have chosen to marry one of them.

If you want to do right by your ex (which is in your own interests if you want her to stop fighting you) then I'd advise you discourage your DD from this. You could tell her that no, special days are for mums and dads, but she can get new wife flowers on Saturday if she wants to. In that way you are facilitating a loving relationship between DD and wife while still respecting parental boundaries and teaching DD what those are. (Im a step mum BTW, with my own children who don't have a step mum... before you think I'm speaking from your ex wife's perspective!)

Your new wife surely isn't the OW as you met her long after you and your first wife split up??

My husband had an OW who he was unfaithful with..

But their marriage broke up and his third wife definitely isn't the OW as he met her long afterwards.

Why would the 6 year old see the father's wife as her mother?

Don't be ridiculous.

Lots of children have step-parents now. They know the difference between them and their own parents.

Another over-imaginative poster with no care for facts

Technically my DD has 1 stepfather, 2 stepmothers and. Step sister.
She refers to all the stepparents by their first names, and as her stepsister only became such as adults doesn’t class her as a stepsister at all.
Your Wife may well be your DDs stepmother, but forcing your DD to refer to her as such is very controlling. Just let her use her first name.

Well that works the other way as well.

The OP can tell his ex to keep out of his business and leave his wife alone.

In fact if the ex comes near his wife, as they have no relationship what so ever, depending on the ex's actions she can face criminal charges.

The OP isn't.

The child refers to the OP's wife as step-mother when talking about her to other people including children her own age.

Ex ended relationship when DD was 3.
3 years passed.
I met my now wife when my DD was almost 6.
Daughter is now very nearly 7.

Didn’t think that being specific to the month RE age of daughter was really relevant.

Yes this

But now you are together & have to make the best of it maybe mediation

It isn't.

Posters are just being nasty to you.

I suggest you read and make note of @Windchiming post and my PM.

Good luck.

he didn't cheat. What thread are you reading? At least you should read his posts to get stuff right before you start reinventing the story.

The speed of your relationship is entirely immaterial, no one's business except yours. It's crazy how many people are using it as a justification of the ex's behaviour. You could have met and married in a week and it still wouldn't be OK for the ex to be controlling and obstructive. Not only that but using their DD as a weapon and actively hurting her emotionally.

The ex is clearly upset about you moving on, she's finding it hard to let go. That's possibly understandable, but to act out like this is not. Nothing justifies her having any say in what happens in your home - you are the parent here, you make the decisions.

I agree that mediation is the way, not because I think you need to compromise on any of the points here but only because it might help your ex to see sense if someone else can let her know how damaging her behaviour is. She might well be feeling hurt and insecure but she needs to grow up. And there will be some kind of written record.

Just saying 'I put my daughters emotions first' doesn't actually mean it's true. You clearly didn't.

It is fairly well known, I thought, that the first two years of any relationship are the honeymoon period. You're both full of lust and dreams and fantasies and on your best behaviour. It is only after two years, that you actually meet who they are. Your wife is still essentially a stranger.

And you want your daughter to call a stranger step-mum.

This is so bad.

I am not remotely surprised the mum is concerned.

I think dad's wife is more appropriate anyway. Your wife isn't a blood relation if you break up
In 5 years she will be nothing to your daughter so why not start off on the right foot and tell her the proper language to describe the actual reality of the situation? Everything else you mentioned is ridiculous. Your ex wife can say anything she wants to you and you can say "no" or just be the bigger person and not respond.

Because when parents meet a new partner there is often a great deal of investment on the part of both parent and new partner to make sure the child does exactly that. I've known many situations where parents would like nothing better than to erase the existence of the inconvenient real mother/father to play happy families with the children. The children may well know who their real parents are, but with encouragement can make little distinction between them and the step. If you have never known of a new partner referred to by children as mum or dad then that speaks more of your limited life experience than it does of how 'ridiculous' I'm being.

This is absurd. There are zero rules.

The ex can be as 'concerned' as she likes but she has no say in any of it. She isn't queen of anyone else's relationship because she has a child. I'm sure she'd like to be but she's not. These concerns are very childishly-camoflaged temper tantrums that she isn't getting her way. And it's her daughter who's paying for it.

I don't understand your post @Windchiming . I didn't add to what OP said, only what it could look like.

Your math still isn't mathing.

If your daughter was almost 6 when you met your now wife and is almost 7 now; how could you have been with your wife for 18 months?

Did you get a Clare's Law report on your new bride before moving her in? Because they take a month or so to come through.

Don't you mean a Sarah's Law?

I will bet that when you got together with your wife and involved your daughter from such an early stage, your ex was unhappy, and certainly from your posts She has asked you to take her views on board in various different ways by doing things her way. She may be wrong but she has given child focused reasons for her requests.
you’ve pushed back though- When she’s asking for something from you, it is framed as controlling and that you need to have boundaries.

Now you are asking her not to talk to her daughter about the use of the word stepmother. Obviously your ex is going to stress your daughter out by making a big deal of it but frankly, there’s nothing you can do about it, you can’t really appeal to her to coparent sensibly with you because you have refused to do this. you’ve disregarded her concerns about your daughters welfare, whether they’re big or small concerns, whether they are reasonable or not. So you have shot yourself in the foot as well. If you want a peaceful coparenting relationship, you need to be more respectful of her and show her it’s.a 2 way street. Mediation will make no difference In my opinion, you’re entering into a stand-off position and your daughter is so young, you’ve got years of coparenting in front of you and this could get very ugly. There’s nothing you can do about the stepmother thing apart from try to soothe things, I would strongly suggest do whatever you can to reassure your ex that you take any child welfare concern of hers seriously so that you’re in a better position to ask her to do the same. You may think it’s unfair but it’s just pragmatic

by the way, I think it’s really interesting how many people have said They also have concerns about the speed of your relationship, but you haven’t taken that on board, it says a lot