My boyfriend let his ex wife upstairs in our house

[Melissamumof1]

Hello,

I need to know if I'm being unreasonable here...

My boyfriend and I moved in together about 9 months ago. He's been split from his ex wife for 5 years and they have 2 children together.

She came to the house to collect their kids one day when I wasn't there and insisted on coming upstairs to see what clothes their kids had at our house.

My boyfriend allowed this but didn't tell me about it for a couple of months when it just happened to come into conversation. I feel like my personal space has been invaded and intruded on and it's upset me. My boyfriend can't see why I'm upset. Are my feelings justified?

Just to note, his ex wife has sent MANY inappropriate messages to him since we've been together including calling me names but also borderline sexual messages to him. She's engaged to her new partner but tells my boyfriend she's not happy with him regularly.

Please help I feel like I'm not being respected. My boyfriend even said he wouldn't be ok if I had done the same with my daughters dad. But it seems to be ok for him.

They're quite reasonable priorities. He has to coparent with her and possibly fears that she could deny him access. He has to decide whether any confrontation is really a hill to die on and frankly, letting her into her child's bedroom is not - it's meaningless.

In theory, YABU about her being upstairs in your house; it's not that big a deal if she was truly just grabbing some clothes for her kids. Part and parcel of being a blended family; I wouldn't care if my partner's ex wife popped upstairs.

However, YANBU at all about her sending inappropriate messages to your partner, and badmouthing you- that means she is disrespectful to you and your relationship. In which case I would refuse to play silly games and not be allowing her into my home at all.

The 2 things are separate issues IMO. It does sound like you are a little insecure about her and your partner's behaviour is making it worse... that's something you both need to work on. But conversely she needs to stay in her lane.

On the face of it it’s intrusive, but OP- you don’t know the context of this.

she was ‘aggressive and demanded to see the room’, did she? Sounds like your ex is embroidering. My guess she was mildly irritated because, no doubt, the kid has been sent to her/school with old/ill-fitting/ inappropriate clothing.

all these men who suddenly become so scared of women they just let them walk into their houses? Don’t believe it at all.

Ha! I know which poster you mean because I thought the same!!

I’d feel that was a bit weird and slightly presumptuous, I’d never do that (I wouldn’t want to know what their upstairs looks like.

If I did need to know about the clothing I’d probably ask for a rough list of items or wait until you were there and gauge the atmosphere, ask and wait to be invited to look.

She's not his family though.

Not "any given person." A colleague who's given him a lift - sure. A toxic ex who badmouths OP, makes passes at her DP and generally exhibits controlling behaviour - hell no. I don't really get the replies on here and suspect they'd be very different on the step-parenting board.

OP - he needs to set up proper boundaries. Blick her messages, communicate by parenting app. He massively overstepped letting her into your space, and personally I wouldn't permit her downstairs either unless she shows some respect.

Did you piss up his leg too?

I'd have laughed in both your faces.

Do you always fight his battles for him?

It's completely fine and healthy to not let an ex in the house if they have shown toxic traits or a lack of respect for boundaries.

It's op home and it needs to feel like a safe space for her.

I bet your ex husband never sent you messages slagging off your DP though, or if he did, that your DP would (rightly!!) have a completely different attitude.

He can set boundaries if he chooses to. Next time she texts insulting you he says I refuse to engage with you if you continue to insult my partner and next time she texts sexual comments tell her that you will be forwarding them on to her new partner if she doesn't stop

My boyfriend still has not moved his belongings out of his ex wife's home more than two years after their divorce was finalized. He goes over there in the evenings for hours and doesn't communicate with me at all while there . Says he is working on getting his things together and visiting his kids, but I am not allowed to stop.by there andif he takes his son to eat somewhere I am never invited.

Honestly sod that!

This! Why on earth would you put up with that?

This all sounds like a very tense, powderkeg atmosphere for the kids. It would never occur to me to mind about this incident, or frankly who goes upstairs in my house as long as I'm not expecting them to steal or cause criminal damage.

In all this upset about you feeling intruded upon, how do the kids feel about their parents not being allowed into their other bedrooms? Even if they have accepted these rules as normal, it's not a comfortable way to grow up. And they will be aware, even if you think it's all just between the adults.

It's all very well judging, but generally relationships have broken down for a reason. In my case both our ex's were abusive. The least we are allowed is a home we feel safe in.

We started off letting DH ex in (unless my ex she wasn't violent, just controlling /nasty) but she constantly spoke abusively to the children and us. This is so not acceptable and my biggest regret is that I didn't put my foot down sooner. But I will never feel i did the wrong thing banning her from our house after she was nasty to me while I was in my own home and quite unwell. The children's rights don't trump everything and actually I think it is important to show the children what is and is not acceptable in your home so they set healthier boundaries in the future than DH and I did in our first marriages.

(Nb for the avoidance of doubt DH and I were both single when we met, so she has no reason to be nasty, I think she is just nasty to everyone - including her own children)

It's absolutely fine to set healthy boundaries and I don't think it's at all unreasonable to keep ex partners on the doorstep/down stairs.

His ex wife is not his family, that’s a ridiculous troll thing to say. OP is right
to be annoyed, her bf needs to put some proper boundaries in place with his ex, and if he doesn’t that would be a dealbreaker for me.

PabloandGustheGreySquirrels, he actually said be begrudgingly agreed. She's very forceful and has threatened taking the kids away from him many times in the past if he doesn't do what she wants.

Ok, I can see your perspective. I do think that's not quite how this OP and subsequent posts have been framed, though. I've not got the impression that either ex here has a history of behaving badly in this house, or that anyone feels unsafe. There does seem to be a lot of suspicion and acrimony and sexual jealousy between the adults, but in a way that (rightly or wrongly) comes across as a bit OTT to me when I read the posts. Hard to know the reality, but I'm not convinced this upset is in anyone's interests long term.

Acrimony/suspicion/jealousy all seem like very good reasons to have robust boundaries in place too
And i'd say a "not upstairs" rule seems a good place to start.

Yeah... And I'm not saying the ex should be habitually lounging about in the master bedroom, but from the kids' point of view what happened that day was that mum wanted to go and check something about their clothes in their room. If that's now being blown into a drama, it's going to feel to them like their mum is seen as akin to a trespasser and they will feel conflicted, nervous and all the other things that children feel when they're caught in the crossfire.

No it can just be dealt with calmly and made clear in future one of the adults at actually lives in the house will go and check for things. It's absolutely fine for op or anyone to set limits on where people can go in their home and the children will be fine with it.

I bet the ex wouldn't want op wandering all over her house

It's an interesting thread, I mean that genuinely, because I think all our responses (myself included) are inevitably coloured by our own experiences of splits we've had as adults, and also splits we've experienced as the children in the situation. Therefore, there is such a mix of reactions and so many of us surprised by the others! Hopefully some of it will resonate with the OP and help improve things, in whatever shape or form is most appropriate for the family.

I’m an ex wife and have always had access to my kids bedroom at their dad’s house. He’s lived on his own, with a new partner who he then had a child with, and then again on his own when they separated. My kids were really keen to show me their new room when they all moved into the house together after he’d lived on his own for a while. Me and the next partner were always polite and pleasant to each other. Sometimes I’d arrive to pick them up and they would want me to go up so they could show me things. Their relationship didn’t last though. I’ve never had a new partner since but he’s always been able to go upstairs in my house to see the kids, use the bathroom etc. I’ve had to call him over to deal with one child’s autistic meltdowns on occasions which have usually involved him popping up to their room.

I’d definitely be more concerned with the messages.

Charming. How very rude!