Ex and children don't know that he's proposed...normal?

[StellaBrillante]

DP proposed two months ago. We had his DC down for Easter and it all went great but I found out this morning that he hasn't told his ex or the children that we are engaged. He's with them every other weekend and claims that him and ex are good friends. His words to his mum were "she (ex) doesn't know to know yet". Why?!

When I asked he said that there was no particular reason but this is not the sort of thing that you just brush aside, is it? Or even worse, we had lots of people over for a bbq during the Easter weekend. What if somebody had asked us about wedding plans in front of one of the boys? How would they have felt and how would I have felt finding out that way that they had no idea?

I don't know what to make of this...or everything else.

Is there any history on his ex using things like this against him, e.g. preventing him seeing his dc, or behaving badly? Is he scared of that happening?

When dp and I got engaged, I informed exh first, and then dp and I shared the news with my dc. We could do so feeling happy and confident that if they asked "does Dad know?" that it was an easy answer.

But I also know that if it had happened a few years previously I would have been really worried about the consequences of my exh knowing, and I would have tried everything to avoid him knowing. To me that showed I wasn't yet ready to get married again.

OP when you say he is with them every other weekend, do you mean he has his DC every other weekend or do you mean he is spending it with his ex wife?

I wondered the same as Hampton, where does he spend his EOW contact? Do his DC come to you?

No, they've only come to us once and I've only met them a couple of times. He goes up to where they live and (or so he says) stays at a friend's house but I question how often that actually happens. The only things that have given me a bit of reassurance are that he introduced me to the ex first time I met the children, he was his normal loving self when they were around and he's told his parents and older son (from a previous relationship). He's been divorced for 9 years so this is no recent split but she's not in a relationship and it doesn't look like there has been anyone meaningful since...

Why don't you believe that he is staying with a friend?

When my XDP proposed to me I didn't tell my children for months, and then only when he went on and on to me about it. (It really upset them, by the way) and I never told my parents despite seeing them every day and being engaged for 6 years.

I reason I didn't tell them was because I didn't want to marry him and never did.