Am I expecting too much?? Be prepared for a LOOOONG rant now :)

[ccaatthhyy2]

Have been with my DP for 18 months now, he is not my 6 yr old DS's dad (he's not in the picture and never has been). I moved to Spain in September 2011 but prior to that my DP would come and visit me and my son, and stay over at our house maybe 3 nights a week. At first, my DS didn't like him, I understand why...it was the first time i'd had a 'proper' boyfriend who was around so much, and he was jealous, a bit insecure etc. Nowadays they have a pretty good relationship...although they torment each other quite a lot, DP sometimes being worse than DS. Since living in Spain DP has visited us for at least one week a month and things are going great! Im moving back to England at the end of June and we're planning on moving in together, me, DS and DP. I just wondered...how much input should I expect from DP? He's coming to visit me tomorrow and i've got a LOT of uni work to do (Am a mature student and this is my year abroad, am living and working in Spain as part of my degree) so asked DP whether he would take DS to the park a couple of afternoons this week so I could concentrate on my work without DS hanging round my neck! DP was sooooo put out by this! They havent spent THAT much time together alone...in December I had to go to Barcelona for the night and DP babysat...then last time he was here he looked after DS while I had parent's evening...and that's pretty much it! I know he's not his dad...but after 18 months shouldn't he be a bit more...I dont know, 'dad like'??? Or am I expecting too much?

Also...my best friend and her boyfriend have been to visit this weekend, they both work full time (she's a doctor and he's a scientist) and they own a house together. I was speechless when her boyfriend washed the dishes after dinner the other night...and then did their ironing, without being asked, yesterday morning!!! My DP hardly EVER lifts a finger! When he's here, or when he used to visit my old house in England, i did all the cooking, cleaning, ironing for both him and my DS...sometimes i swear it's like having 2 children! He's 33, still lives at home and was made redundant over a year ago and is struggling to find work...I dont want to nag him and do everything I can to help him, I did his CV, help him apply for jobs etc...so is it wrong for me to want a little bit of help around the house or with my DS? My best friend was horrified when i told her my DP does nothing and gave me a real talking to...which has made me question EVERYTHING for the past 24 hrs!!! Any advice?????? I love him, and to me, this is not a dealbreaker...but should I be putting my foot down and asking him to do more? xxx

18 months in to a relationship is far too early for a partner to expect you to carry them. I know he's not entirely freeloading but the job thing had me gasping! He is an adult. You are clearly competent and responsible especially moving abroad with a child - not for the feint hearted! We all go through bad patches but this is too early on. He shouldn't be putting any responsibility on you at this stage to find him a job/mother him/wipe his arse!

Even if he pulled his weight a bit more I doubt you will find this relationship fulfilling in the long term. I think you will be bored/stressed with him in the long term.

His unemployment has gone on an unacceptably long time now - if he can't manage this situation at his age how is he going to step up as a step parent?

I think you would be happier with a man who leads an adult life and can look after themselves - clearly you can - you dong need to prove yourself cooking and cleaning for this twit.

This situation reminds me of mine a while back when I would go to work and be respected and treated well all day thn go home to exp and be chastised for some token fault just do he could feel in control.

My house was calmer too when it was dv and I. Now it's calm all the time! At first I panicked I would be so lonely but I'm not - I am very cautious about new partners though - no flies on me!

It will be ok. You sound like you have an interesting life with a turnover of people. You will meet many men- ding sell yourself short on tjis one x

I love baggage reclaim. Here's the link

Oh my god!!! actually ADDICTED to baggage reclaim! I should be gettin ready for work but am glued to it!! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

LucieMay had an excellent post. I felt the same and luckily it worked out.
The site may now give you the strength to get rid of him.

I know i shouldnt, but i feel sorry for him.

You can't base a relationship on this. Dating as a single parent made me see that you need self preservation and you have to leave people to deal with their own problems. I used to take them on and it doesn't work, either they never pick up or they get themselves back together and move on, they don't like having been seen as vulnerable.

Baggage reclaim is a very good site.

You cannot be a rescuer or a saviour in a relationship; neither approach works. You have been trying to rescue him from his own self but he does not want rescuing or saving.

Your son and you deserve far better than this manchild.

ccathy - not much to add to the advice here but you sound just like me

Please, please work on your self esteem. I am 46 and have just been dumped by my DD's father (she 4) for someone else. Please don't end up like me - either alone or in shit relationships because you can't see your own value.

You sound an amazing woman - don't waste your life on a man who isn't amazing too.

Should say, nothing wrong with being alone - lonely would have been a better word.

Ok. I have a blended family and dh is fab with my dc from my previous marriage.

The way id answer your question is. If you had a close friend who needed help with her dc would you? Would you ignore or taunt the child or get to know them and include them in your life?

A new partner doesnt have to be a Dad but they do need to have some positive regard for your child and any other family member for that matter.

I think it also very telling that you needed him to help you with every day stuff so you could get on with your essay, and yet you didn't even start it until after he'd gone. He will always be interposing himself and what he wants between you and what you need.

To be honest...he did help me quite a lot with my essay...on two nights he sat going through everything with me and came up with a better conclusion that i'd thought of! Plus he took DS out for a bit one night while i cleaned up etc. He can be so moody tho, about really simple things that wouldn't wind me up or that can be easily resolved...i think that's my main issue you know. Of course i want him to help more around the house, i dont want to be a 1950's Stepford Wife!!!!! I want more support with DS too I guess...have spent the day today going over everything again and again in my head. That baggage reclaim site is really amazing and has helped me get some things into perspective.

You want more support with your son. That is understandable but you're not going to get it from this guy!

Fucking hell what does this guy have to offer you? He has no job, is manipulative and cant even manage to get himself a drink out of the fridge.

So what if he took your son out while you cleaned up. A babysitter or friend could do that.

Please stop making excuses for him and digging out those tiny good things he did in what sounds like an otherwise shitty week. You're making yourself sound stupid and foolish when you're quite clearly not.

I'm so angry because I've been where you are and wish I'd had the balls to end it early on when people told me exp was a dickhead.

And please don't move in with this guy
Use your money to build a nice life for you and your son. Don't waste it on supporting this waste of space.

Why do you want more support with your DS? Are you feeling guilty because you don't have a man for him or some sort of perfect family?

He himself is perfectly happy with just 'mummy and me' and he sounds like a great little boy.

Why do you think support with your essay/work/projects would be forthcoming from this man down the line? Why do you think you would need it? Look where you have got so far without him. Look around. You are doing great. Your conclusion would have been just as good as his if you had written it.

If he can devote that much energy and thought to your essay why can't he write his own cv and his own job applications?

Helping you with your essay is a way of blinding you with his amazingness and making you dependent on him. When you ask for his help you stroke his ego. When he appears so helpless in other ways it strokes your ego to rush in and help.

The moodiness is the bottom line with him. The bits where he helps you out are done only in order to reel you in. Once he is sure he has you, you will be seeing the moods all day every day. There will be no support with your career or with your DS. There will be no help around the house.

What Spotted Gurnard wrote.

Oh, so he helped you with your essay. That's no big deal is it?. Crumbs, mere crumbs.

Cathy, you are an intelligent and nice woman with low self esteem so not altogether surprisingly you are currently in a relationship with a twunt. Sorry to call him that but he truly is. If Baggage reclaim and us make that lightbulb go off in your head then marvellous.

Force yourself to face the facts of that week.

All this jobless waster did all week was moan and blame you for your son being about in his own residence, feeling too hot (well it is Spain after all, Madrid can be very hot at this time of year anyway) and getting a mossie bite (which he may or may not visit hospital for). He could not even be asked to get himself a drink from the fridge - even my teenage son will get his own drink from the fridge!.

On a far lighter note, can you still buy Tri Naranjus (its a still orange juice drink) in Spain?. Wonderful stuff.

Cathy:

My DS was 2.5 when I became a single mum. We lived with my parents for a year (in my old bedroom); then I bought the house we live in now. It was a total wreck, having not been decorated since before 1972 - I bought it in 2000. I spent every evening after putting DS to bed, renovating the place. I spent all my spare time at weekends when DS was with his Dad doing the place up and getting the housework done.

The place not nice to live in when we first moved in, but during the times I wasn't decorating, we would have a bed picnic on a Friday and watch TV; go out for walks in our local woods; go to the cinema etc.

DS is now 15 (tomorrow) and he still looks back fondly on those times we had on our own. Now, we do the same thing with DD who's 4. Mostly because I'm now feeling like I'm 103 and am decorating again and I'm knackered.

What I wanted to say was that the space that you have with just you and your DS is not getting crowded with an even bigger child who seems to be petulant when he's not having an intellectual wank by showing off his intellectual prowess.....

I speak from the experience of having had a relationship with someone quite a few years ago who just seemed to squash DS and I out to the sidelines as it was all about him. All I can say is DON'T DO IT!!!

Attila yeah, it's called Trina now...funnily enough im looking at 3 empty bottles of the stuff that need to be taken out to the recycle bin!!! :)

Spotted dont worry, the idea of moving in together has been well and truly shelved now. At the moment, I know that I'm not going to finish things with him. All of your advice and the Baggage Reclaim site has been amazing and it's made me reevaluate my whole relationship...it really has. And I know, reading back over some of my previous posts I sound like someone with real low self esteem and confidence issues...the funny thing is, my friends would probably describe me as the most confident person they know!

Its funny because im reading all of your messages and agreeing with everything that's being said, but then have found myself waiting for his phone call, have had a nice chat with him so an now feeling on top of the world, and the thought of ending things makes me feel nauseous....
...but then i know that if he hadn't rang, or if we'd had a shitty phone call then i would have been feelin nauseous in a totally different way.

Suspect your best bet then is to look first at what would be best for you and your son. This for the short to medium term. Get your degree finished - in Spain or UK, though you'll hate being back here!!! - and your foot on the first rung of the career ladder. Try to make these decisions yourself, without too much input from him (hint, he should be saying "whatever is best for you darling, I will fit in with it").

I had a waster of a bf once (for a long time ) and it was only once I managed to consult myself about what I actually wanted and what would work best for me that he started pulling his socks up and behaving. I found that making decisions without consulting him, without taking his 'needs' into account, without making allowances for how he would react, fit in etc, that my life started going exactly how I wanted it to.

Maybe, once you've got yourself a bit established in your career he'll still be there, only he'll be making the sandwiches while you pack the car for the picnic you're all going on, maybe he'll have found himself a job by then too. Whatever you decide in the near future, staying with him or not, constantly looking after him is infantilising him and not doing either of you any favours, or setting a good example to your son.

Good luck with your degree and your future, and look after that lovely boy of yours.

There's a huge difference between coming across as confident and having self esteem.

You can be co-dependent in intimate relationships and still competent, or not, in other areas of life. Confidence, competence and ability to get on with others can mask co-dependence.

Co-dependence is your relationship with yourself.

A description of codependency

Another one. (quite long)

Oh my:( am only halfway through the first description and its all me. ME ME ME! every single last word :( Ive never heard of codependency before...well, i think i have but i never knew what it meant. Every single word especially...
"In the relationship, the co-dependent will do anything to keep it from dissolving. This is because s/he is terrified of abandonment. So nothing is too much trouble, takes too much time or is too expensive if it will "help" the person the co-dependent is involved with. Co-dependents are willing to take more than 50% of the responsibility, guilt and blame in any relationship (one person told me that when people bumped into her, she was the one who said, "I?m sorry.")"
and...
"Accustomed to lack of love in a relationship, co-dependents are willing to wait, hope, and try harder to please. At the same time, they have a desperate need to control the relationship. This is because the need to exact the missing love and security s the foremost motivation in any relationship for a co-dependent. Co-dependent people mask these efforts to control people and situations as "being helpful." In fact, attempts to "help" other people, when these others are adults, almost always have elements of control in them".

It's all me. I feel a bit ashamed to be honest. :(

Oh don't be!! I didn't mean to have that effect!

Knowledge can be strength. Look at what is truly good about yourself and look at what you have accomplished.

Be grateful for what you have (brains and competence and determination by the truckload, and your lovely DS), what you have been able to do (your education, bringing up a good boy and supporting him and you by yourself), and value it by prioritising it.

Knowledge is strength.

Sorry-intended to say that I agreed with mathsanxiety.

Don't be embarrassed. When you learn something new about yourself, the important thing is working out what to do about it, and how.

I am 100% sure that this isn't all of you, that there are many, many amazing things about you of which you can be incredibly proud (but probably aren't, and probably aren't even aware of).

Very often, being aware of a trait in oneself is the biggest step towards ensuring it isn't acted out.

Finish your essay, and don't worry.

What mathanxiety, Jux and exotic fruits have written.

You may want to read "Codependent No More" written by Melodie Beattie. I think it would help you an awful lot. Amazon operate in Spain and if you have a kindle you may even be able to download it onto that device.

Knowledge is power. Never forget that!.

(Am delighted:) to read that Trina is still on sale in Spain, I remember it from my holidays in Spain many years ago when it was called TriNaranjus. My Dad could converse basic Spanish and much later on I learnt some conversational Spanish at evening class).

Math That article puts into black and white theories that have been whirling round my head for quite some time. It explains a lot........

Cathy Sorry to hijack your thread....