Baby on the way, partners kids overnights

[TheHonestHedgehog]

My partner and I are expecting a baby. We live in my small two-bed terraced house.

My partner's two kids (12 and 8, boy and girl) stay with us every other weekend, Friday to Monday, in the second bedroom, which they share, which is already an issue due to their ages and lack of space - it is also used as my home office the rest of the time.

We’ve been trying to move for 2 years but ongoing divorce complications have stopped this - we’ve been together over 3 years and the divorce is still ongoing with no end date in site.

Until the financials are settled we can not afford to move.

The second bedroom at some point will become the babies room. I’m aware people will have opinions on this, but there is physically no other option when it comes to the storage and things we will need for the baby, that room will have to be used for them.

The living room is not big enough for any sort of blow up or temp beds, and the dining room is open plan with the kitchen - which we intend to utilise as my new office and play space for baby. Further to this, with it being open plan it is near impossible to heat in winter.

The second bedroom is not big enough to have a double bed in, so we can’t even swap with ours as an option.

No other family are nearby, both sets of parents are over an hour drive away and paying for separate accommodation for three nights a fortnight isn't affordable either - we’re both self employed.

Our plan:

• Overnights continue for now with the kids in their usual room prior to the birth but with changes to the room setup while we prepare and get what baby needs.
• After the birth, we step down to Friday and Saturday nights, home on Sunday evening so they're rested for school and a small step towards the next adjustment.
• Overnights to pause once baby is 5 months old and we start moving them into the second room, they will resume as soon as we move (hopefully not long after this)
• Until then: Our Saturday and Sunday days, 9am to 7pm, plus continuing the other in-week contact my partner already has with them.

Their mum thinks we should find a way to keep all three nights, with airbeds or paid accommodation. We feel this is not realistic with a newborn and the space available.

And without giving too much context - most of the ongoing divorce complications are because their mum is fighting to keep the former family home (that she can only just afford at a big stretch) for the wellbeing and ongoing routine of her children as priority. A year before she had agreed to sell so everyone could move, my house was on sale and we had an offer in on a bigger home, which was all undone as she later changed her mind.

Finally - I know people will wonder why have you gotten pregnant when this is the situation, but with no end date or visible outcome to the divorce in site and me getting close to “that age” I didn’t want to wait and risk never being able to have a baby of my own. We expected to be trying for a while but have been extremely fortunate that it’s happened right away 🫶🏽

I would like people’s opinions on our plan, any other suggestions, similar situations or what they think should happen here, the last thing we want is to push the kids out but things are already a struggle with space, them sharing, their ages and genders.

Thank you

Baby needs to stay in your room until you move.

this is your partners kids home too and you can’t turf them out

I always wonder what certain women find attractive about a man abandoning his children. It’s a really interesting concept.
Is it the thrill of “winning” him from his existing family commitments and feeling like he’s picked her above all else?
She doesn’t feel like if he can ditch one set of kids he can ditch hers too?

There’s one option. Baby stays in with you. Start with basket. Then a cot that can move to a cot bed when baby is old enough to need a bed. That gives you a good 5/6 years to sort living arrangements out.

You can't drop having his children stay because you chose to get pregnant!

"Sorry, boy and girl, Daddy has a new kid now so you lose a third of your time with him! Oh, and you are kicked out of your bedroom too."

The baby can stay in your room until age 2 or until you move somewhere bigger, whichever is sooner.

Winning him and their child/ren coming first, to compete against current children is weird at best

Until he goes on to do the same thing to the op, the op really needs a bar to start with to be able to raise it

Why can he not rent somewhere else? Presumably you lived in your own place prior to him moving in. You've chosen to have a child with someone despite there being limited space for his existing children. Your baby does not need to go into their own room at 5 months. Your child will be their sibling, they are at an age where how you treat them will impact their longterm self esteem and pushing them out for a baby is a poor choice.

The sensible decision would be to keep the children as they are and keep the youngest in with you until you move but i dont rhink you want to hear that. Havibg a child with a man like this was a daft choice, if he can push out his existing children he can do the same to yours.

& mum might be behaving unreasonably regarding the divorce arrangements - I have no idea. However, this is not the fault of the children. Dad still needs to make the best of the circumstnces as they are and that is not reducing the limited contact he currently has with his children.

And his maintenance payments will need to increase to cover the extra nights

Until you can move, your baby will have to sleep in your room.

Baby stays with you. Babies don’t need their own room and actually keeping them with you make their settling easier at night ( I mean easier for you)
You rethink now all storage solutions to free as much space as possible in your bedroom.
You rethink your plan about abandoning overnights.

They’re going through a divorce. Some divorces can take a long time due to finances and things like homes where kids live. If he wants to move on to another partner that’s fine but his kids should still be the priority before he gets someone else pregnant. Not fucking difficult to not purposely get pregnant when you actually aren’t in a good situation to have another child. Plenty of people manage it.

What a fucking dreadful idea. Does your partner support this? If so, what on earth makes you want to have a child with a man who is willing to reduce the already limited contact time he has with his children?

OP you and your DH disgust me. Read your post back and imagine that you’re the first wife, and the soon-to-be ousted kids are yours. Then see how it feels.

My Dad’s second wife was lovely and welcoming, and we never felt sidelined, even when she had a baby.

Sadly his 3rd wife was not so nice, saw us as an inconvenience, and we were gradually phased out, just as you and your husband are planning. Visits got shorter and less frequent, until they dwindled to nothing. I was sad but I coped. My brother never recovered from the rejection, and it was a big contributor to his suicide a few years later. Parental rejection is brutal for kids. There’s nothing quite like being dropped by the people who are meant to love you more than anyone in the world.

Baby just stays in with you until you move. Nice and simple, understand your age but you choose to have a baby with a man who already has responsibility to two other children. You can not just push them out to fit in your ideal situation for your baby. These children are your baby's siblings and should be able to stay overnight as before and build a bond with him or her as well. You don't sound like you've considered their feelings at all, they'll just feel very pushed out. The children's mum is correct and doing the right thing by trying to keep the family home and keeping things consistent for her children

Keep baby with you both until you move home. Dreadful you are pushing his children out - yes it does look like that btw. Perhaps you/he shouldn't be having another child when you clearly can’t accommodate one.

I can’t believe any father worthy of the name is happy to go from 3/14 nights to none.

OP, I just want to give you a hopefully helpful response that doesn't disagree with the consensus, but might frame it in a way where you feel more empowered. This mindset definitely helped me get through prison and really, that was just about what choices were made, too.

You can't control the ex and the house sale. It's just part of the complications that add to your situation that makes it imperfect. We all have those things that are in the control of others, but not ourselves. Those others might not ever change and we have to live with that, or choose not to and distance ourselves from them.

As you rightly say, you chose to ensure you had a baby despite the imperfect conditions because that was most important to you. That is in your control and 100% your right to choose. I'd have likely chosen exactly the same.

However, what you don't have the right to is the "luxuries" that come with Conceiving in a situation that is free from the complications you have in your life. That, unfortunately, is often down what amounts to luck, but also hard work to ensure you have few restrictions or complications can help.

So the fact that you might not have the room to house all of the unnecessary stuff one buys for their babies. Your baby might not be in their own room at 6 months old with their own little wardrobe and all of that. But that's because you chose to make sure your baby was born and born with these parents who have these complications. You deemed inability to conceive in this relationship as the unacceptable outcome and all other things as more acceptable than that.

You could have chosen to leave the relationship and find someone else or even a donor. But you chose him, hopefully because you love him. This is your more acceptable outcome. So just ride it out.

What a catalogue of bad decisions.

Divorces often drag out because one/both parties feel the need to “win”. If most divorcing couples looked back at the money that could be saved by conceding slightly at the start, in many cases they’d be better off.

Court is expensive and time consuming (even just waiting for the next court date), so much can be managed in mediation. I bet if your DP looked at how much he’d spent in solicitors fees, time off work to attend appointments and court dates and negotiate and write letters and send emails. What he could have contributed to a new mortgage over the last few years if he’d accepted a slightly lower cut of the equity at the start, he’s probably quibbling over what is relatively little.

And whilst all of this battle is going on, you’ve got two kids stuck in the middle, who are approaching/going through puberty having to share a room with a sibling of the opposite sex for the handful of days a month they spend with their Dad.

And now they’re getting a half-sibling who gets to live with dad full time and they may be ejected from Dad’s home, or made to feel like guests, sleeping on the floor/sofa, because the new child (that Dad can suddenly afford, despite arguing that he needs more money from the original family home) is going to take priority.

Come on. Put the kids first. If your DP was strapped for cash, he wouldn’t have had a THIRD child, because he wouldn’t have been able to afford it. He should mediate with his ex wife, save money on the legal fees, allow you all to move forward with your lives and comfortably purchase a new house which can actually accommodate three kids (which he must be able to pay for, otherwise it would have been ridiculously selfish and unwise to get OP pregnant 🙄)

Your desire to have a baby/age should never, ever take priority over two kids who already exist. Give your head a wobble and find a solution that makes them feel loved and wanted.

Maybe the divorce is taking a long time, but that doesn't excuse the mother's irresponsibility. Everyone here is quick to blame the dad, yet the mother seems perfectly happy to suggest, "Just take them to a cheap motel." Seriously?

If I were divorced and my children were spending time with their dad, I'd make damn sure they had somewhere safe, comfortable and suitable to stay. Sending your children off to whatever random accommodation is available, with seemingly no concern for where they end up, is absolutely bizarre to me.

If she had any self-respect, she'd get the divorce finalised, sell the house, move on and establish a new home, while making sure her children were properly looked after in both households.

But apparently, staying married to an ex you've separated from years ago, refusing to sort out the living arrangements and suggesting the children sleep in random cheap accommodation makes her Mother of the Year according to Mumsnet.

The double standards on this thread are unbelievable.

Why would you get pregnant by such a shitty "father"?

You won't be able to moan when you're a single parent and he barely sees your kid.

Why are you having a baby with a man who has proven himself to be a shitty parent? Even if all this was your idea, for him to agree to it makes him a shitty parent - surely you can see that?

Better option is he moves out and finds somewhere he can have all of his kids EOW because let's face it, he's not going to suddenly change into an involved parent.

I’m so sorry to read this about your brother- that is devastating. I think it’s so important for dad’s new partners to consider the rejection that children can experience.

I’m so glad the mum in this scenario is holding firm to the family home and will avoid further disruption and upheaval in the lives of these 2 children by at least letting them keep their house. The casual ness that some new partners have re: ‘well can’t your ex just sell up and buy somewhere smaller?’ is appalling.

The OP's post reads like AI: bloodless, American expressions.

I’m glad one of their parents is prioritising consistency for the two older children.