Partner to hard on Daughter, i think?

[brokenmum]

My Partner is very hard on my eldest daughter (age 11), he wont let her talk to boys, wont let her walk to school by herself, watches and waits for her to do something wrong so he can tell her off amongst many other things. i have spoken to him about this and he says that he cant trust anything she does because she has crossed the line with him a few times. i have tried explaining that she is a child and will try and push the boundary(normal i think), he disagrees.
I feel that i am stuck in the middle of this and dont think my views on what i think is acceptable for my daughter has been taken into account, if i disagree with his method of parenting or punsihment then he sulks adn we end up in row..........any advice, please help!

Best of luck BM, and please don'tt hink that I was castign aspersions on your DP ( I don't know him) I just wanted you to know that I was aware of a situation almost identical to yours. Dp checking sd's phone, not allowing contact with boys, not wanting her to wear makeup etc etc whilst his own daughter was allowed a lot more leeway.

The mother of his sd was quite depressed and shy and he was a very strong character who she allowed to take over all parenting, to the outside world he seemed such a greta dad to all the girls...you can guess the rest....suffice to say he imprisoned.

Good news BM

Good luck, BM.

brokenmum i think you need to sit youre DD and talk with her in private because personaly sounds like your DP is a pedofile

That's great news BM. For what it's worth I think it is really important for girls to have friends who are boys and to emphasise the sameness rather than the differences between the sexes. It is so much healthier for them to see boys (and vice-versa) as real people rather than some sort of mysterious, forbidden beings.

My friend's dad was very strict with her about boys when she was growing up. When she asked him why he said "I've been one myself so I know exactly the kinds of things they try to get up to." Obviously I have no idea about the intentions of BM's dp but just wanted to point out that being strict about boys doesn't always mean being a paedophile.

I am in a stepfamily. best advice I ever read was, natural parent does discipline with birth child, not step parent.

Me and dp have tried to stick with this, and yes sometimes it is difficult, or awkward, BUT it stops resentment and bad feeling building up.

Your dd is YOUR natural child. You deal with discipline, and ask for support and help from dp, but it is your place to discipline your dd not his.

Tell him to back off. Dd is 11, what is it going to be like at 15? I read somewhere that step parents are often harsher on stepchildren than own children, and judging from threads I read on here it seems to be pretty true. Point this out to him, and then ask him to back off

Thanks Fizzbuzz that is really good advice, can you recommend any good books on the subject of families with step children?

BM - I have read the whole thread and at first I was feeling very much along the lines of divastorp and mumto3girls. You have put those worries aside and then you mentioned that he said he was relieved about the counselling. I think there has been a huge bias in this thread in your favour because he is the stepfather and you are the birth parent.

I do completely agree with the other posters on the thread, ultimately you should have the final say as their mother and I do not intend for my post to be hurtful at all. However, I wonder whether, assuming the best of your partner who has obviously put up with a lot and invested a huge amount both emotionallly and practically in your family, he can see a problem that you cannot. Perhaps your daughter does need more discipline, it's just that his way of doing it isn't what you'd want. Depression, a lifetime of doing things a certain way, all sorts of things, can make us blind to problems and the solutions that go with them. I hope counselling helps and you resolve your problems, but it sounds like this man loves you and your girls so listen to what he has to say as much as your asking him to listen to what you're saying.

(hope all that made sense - good luck with it all)

coppertop, that is the very thing my dp says about boys, he remembers what he was like and thinks that girls and boys are trying things much earlier than we were, ie 11 and 12 as opposed to 14, 15.

Thank you all for your advice, it has been very useful, twoforteateafortwo, you have been very honest and not biased at all in your comments. I know that he loves us and has done so much for us as a family and i know that he thinks he has our best interests at heart. Counselling is booked for Wednesday at 12.00 so hopefully this will be a step in the right direction. We do love each other and each others children and i think it has proven to me with him agreeing to the counselling that he wants to resolve this as much as i do.

Just found this thread, so haven't been part of the discussion.

It's great that you're all going to go for counselling. Have you seen someone for your depression? Because it sounds like it's this that's stopping you take a more active role in 'parenting'. He doesn't want to be the evil step-dad, you don't want that, and your dd certainly doesn't want that, so if addressing your depression and 'backing away from life' (that made me so sad when I read that) is part of the way forward, then this should be a priority.

You need to find a way to be more confident as a partner and a mother, he needs to know his boundaries, as does dd - I think a little compromise from everyone is required. As I recently said to my best friend, it's not your fault that you're suffering from depression, but it might be your fault if you don't do anything about it. I know it's not always that simple .

Good luck with everything, and remember that you owe it to both dds to sort things out. I say dds because on concentrating on dd1, dd2 might start to feel resentful, and there's nothing to say she won't have similar character to dd1 when she reaches that age.

Phew!

One more point, it's a bit hokey this, but the best thing you can do for your children is to trust them. You (both) need to let dd1 know that you will trust her unless given a reason not to, and your dp needs to abide by that. It's not only boys that are growing up younger these days, in fact I'd say it's more of a problem with girls. So he should relax a bit and give her a chance to prove that she's not a bad girl, and that even though boys might 'try things' she can handle that as she's growing up, and if something does happen, it's not the end of the world.

i was on ad's for sometime but came off them. have booked a counsellor for me and dp next week but have also booked a private session for myself to deal with the number of difficulties i have. i have having depression it has affected me for so long and i no longer trust myself or my actions. Want to be the fun loving mother and partner i know i can be. you are right i cant back out of life but sometimes it seems so much harder to try and fact it, even getting out of bed in the morning can be a chore.

God, I can't imagine! But you're being so brave going for this counselling, it might feel like a failure having reached this point, but it's not at all. It means you're taking responsibility for your own life and happiness and of those around you, and that's such a brave thing to do.

There should be a [proud] emoticon

Sorry can't remeber any books now, it was a long time ago, but I'm sure you can track some down. America seems to have more literature and stuff available then UK, and in fact we found it very hard to find any info in UK.

I think there is something called "joined Up Families" but I can't remeber much else.

The best ways round problems have beeen not to go in all guns blazing, but to say something like" I really need to talk to you about dd, and therre my be some stuff that you will find hard, but I need to say it"

Does he realise he is treating your dd differently? Also have to say, when we first moved in together, I was probably harder on my dss than on my ds. But it wasn't malicious or intentional, most of the time I didn't realise I was doing it. When I did I imeediately adjusted my behaviour. But I think some of it must be anthropological or whatever. Cavemen stuff, needing to protect your own genes or something.

Also, how long have you been together? It is meant to take a stepfamily 10 years to shake down together, much much longer than a normal family. The first two years are meant to be hell (and they were for us! awful!!)However we are now in year 5 and it has got a lot better. Having dd also helped unite us, AND, this is also something that I remember reading about. A baby can unite a stepfamily like nothing else, as you are all genetically tied and I have to say it is true for us.

HTH. There is something called stepfamilies UK, which is a bit like mumsnet, but I tend to avoid it as there is a lot of moaning and resentment about stepkids which I find a bit depressing tbh. I would hate my child to be resented just for existing

imeediately??? new word? imediately of course....

Fizzbuzz, i cant begin to tell you how different the last couple of days have been since talking to lp, he has sat back and let me take the lead with dd1 and dd2 and life has been so much easier for all. i ordered a book on Friday from Amazon which arrived yesterday 'every step counts' how to build a health stepfamily and lp has read half of it already. he was really pleased with the book and says now that he does not feel like he is alone with his feelings and it is not uncommon to feel like we are both are with step families. i am so pleased and i hope that the counselling will help even more. thank you again for your kind words on Friday i will let you know how things go on Wedensday.

That's great news brokenmum! Hope everything turns out ok and you get some help with your depression. It sounds like you've turned a page anyway. Best of luck x

Fab! Glad you feel better.

I remember first 2 years I felt I had been planted in a completely alien environment. Very weird, felt like something struggling to grow without water. I now know that that sort of isolation feeling is normal.

Don't get it now