Am I wrong for wanting to move in with my partner?

[Skyeblue91]

I was married for 10 years and we have two boys together. We divorced several several years ago and the boys are 13 and 16.
i now have a serious relationship with a woman that lives 4 hours away.
my ex husband is married and stays in a city near by.
me and my kids live with my grandmother.
i brought up wanting to move in with my partner and you would have thought the roof caved in.
i said the boys had two options, live with me or their dad.
neither one of them want to live with their dad they want to stay at my grandmothers. Since we’ve been there all these years.
but now I’m being told that I don’t love my children enough to be around them anymore. I’m being told that my happiness doesn’t matter. My youngest told me he hates me because I want to do this. Can someone PLEASE give me your opinion. I’m back into a corner.

You’ve heard the phrase ‘two wrongs don’t make a right’ right? Just because their father is selfish doesn’t mean you have to be. At this age I’d have been devastated if my parents moved for a partner. It would be different if they were onboard. Realistically you’ve got 5 years til the youngest finishes school. Maybe giving them the heads up that you’ll be moving then and they will have a room at your new place when the time comes.

For children, it might be relevant and difficult. It's one more change, and teenagers can have problems with any suggestion that their parents are sexually active.
These children have had their parents divorce, see their father much less often, moved house to live with OPs grandmother, and now their mother is in a relationship with another woman. That's a lot of change on top of exam stress. To add a move which would mean they don't see their great-grandmother every day, and probably won't see their father regularly at all, must seem overwhelming.

Thats a really good quote. Sums up the reality so well.

So your ex DH is a selfish dick who only sees his kids once a week and yet you'd happily send them to live with him. Sorry, but children must always be a priority. Just because you're ex is a cunt doesn't mean you have to be one too. And as for dumping them on the grandmother - really? Did she actually sign up to be their full time parent? She sounds like the only one that actually cares about them.

The person they are living with is the OP's grandmother so therefore the boys GREAT-grandmother. I think we can safely assume she is quite elderly so I would question whether it is a sensible choice to leave two teenage boys with an elderly lady whose health, mobility etc may not be good. Even if she is in good health at the moment, that could unfortunately change during the next few years

Move away with me or move in with your capricious and neglectful dad. What a great way to tell children that they are loved and wanted.

Children shouldn't dictate their parents sex life but at their age they can express a preference about who they live with. Of course they don't want to move far away from their granny and their friends to live with a virtual stranger.

if your gf was as keen on you as you are on her she'd be willing to uproot her own life for you. She'd sell her house and take a pay cut for the sake of you and your DC. It's telling that she isn't offering to do this.

If she is the one for you long term she will still be around when your DC have flown the nest.

"My partner owns a home and would have to sell it and find employment where I live, which is going to put her way less as far as pay grade is concerned"

Ok. You've said how it would be a negative for your partner is SHE had to move.

Now focus on the negatives for your sons if they had to, as you haven't done that yet.....

Really shit to give teens the message "im moving come if you want or go to your dads" I dont know how you come back from that.

Also what if the 3 of you move 4 hours away and relationship ends. You will have to move back again as her house.

Not practical to move teens 4 hours away from their school, dad and the grandmother you live with.

This one is on you... You can't expect a 13 and 16 year old to be happy to be up-rooted and moved 4 hours away to facilitate your love-life.
You either need to wait for the youngest to reach 18 and become legally an adult and hopefully be considering going off to uni or getting a job. Or your girlfriend needs to move to you. The kids come first.

It's so bad and so very sad for those poor kids who are already living with an elderly relative and have a sh*t dad who can't be bothered.

Honestly, the selfish way some parents behave towards their kids just to protect their own sex lives is staggering to see.

Hi op there ages are relevant here. You could do the move when they are adults but right now they see it as you ruining their lives. What about your poor grandmother who has supported you are you wanting to drop her like hot potato. I think the fact they are male and it’s a same sex relationship this would bother them especially in school. Yes it’s more acceptable these days but teenagers don’t get it. I don’t see why you can’t wait and carry on as you are. Yes you have every right to be happy but you also have to put your kids before your own needs.

Oh okay. Yeah that is wrong but I can see OP doing it anyway.

so Dad sees them once a week, they see their Grandad every day, they're both settled in school and you want to uproot them and move 4 hours away cos otherwise your gf will have to change jobs? I mean it's obvious your priority isn't the kids.

if your Dad is willing to have the kids, I'd let them stay. you can travel up and down 4 hours every time you want to see them instead of ripping them away from friends and family.

how well do the kids even know her? You've been divorced several years, so how long is this relationship? how often does she spend time with the kids? how we'll do they get on? how often have they been to her home? what are the local schools like? their bedrooms? local social life? public transport links back home?

you'd pull your kids from their life for your lives life or you'd leave them behind with your grandmother?

They do when it means moving 4 hours away from everything they know to move into a perfect strangers house.

Put your boys first until they are old enough to not you need you as much, their Dad sounds awful so they will trying to deal with this, trying to deal with you having a partner of the same sex, not that it should matter but they will be getting their heads round that, teenage hormones raging, why would you want to make their lives even more difficult. Be unselfish and continue living the way you are know for the foreseeable, you will have plenty of time in the future to live your life the way you wish.

Why start a relationship with someone who lives 4 hours away when you have children.

Did you not think about the future? The logistics involved
Even your gf should have put the brakes on this.

I think your dc is right. You might say they are your world but you deep down know they aren’t otherwise you wouldn’t have given them the choice in the first place

I can't imagine wanting to move four hours away from my teenage children. I literally couldn't do it.

Can't you wait until your children finish their a'levels? They have a secure settled home and you want to take that away from them. There is nothing to stop you visiting your partner monthly.

Sorry but I think you have responsibilities that will be over in five years. You chose to have children, and they need you. You need to put them first.

I’m afraid that, if your ex husband is this flakey and inconsiderate of his sons’ feelings and needs, this means you have to be even more considerate of them, @Skyeblue91. They can’t have two parents prioritising their love lives over them - and I realise exactly how unfair that is for you and your new partner. You already are the parent who is present, caring, reliable, and now I’m saying you need to sacrifice even more, to make up for your ex’s failings.

That does not mean they should not.

The mistake was to give them the choice rather than saying what was to happen. Children have no concept of adult lives or needs and won't understand what OP wants and that it is her life.

Generally speaking I would say put the adults first. Also, what OP's ex does is irrelevant. However, unfashionable though it is, duty to those dependent on us is important and should not be shirked. Making her DC unhappy will not increase OP's happiness one whit and she should think about that and the nature of love and of how we often must do what isn't entirely what we want. Then stay at gran's. See lovely partner at week-ends. Plan - if the relationship works - to move when youngest finishes school.

It's a very bad time educationally to move them, and they will lose all their friends- you have to put up with them hating you, and possibly blaming you for educational failure, then do it, otherwise you need to wait a few years.

Fgs, what about their lives? They already have one feckless, selfish parent who doesn't prioritise them!

The OP has never lived with this partner, what if they all move in & the OP or her partner decide that actually they can't live together after all?
The kids will have left their friends, their schools, the grandparent they live with etc.

Why should they have to risk so much just to satisfy their mother's love life when she could easily wait a few years or her partner could make the move?

When you have kids it involves compromise and sacrifice, something which on MN is often sneered at and mocked.
But putting kids first in situations ike this is how you raise well adjusted adults that can go out into the world and do well. Ignoring their needs & prioritising love lives does not do this.

I wonder if they even like the OP's partner?

Of course your children won’t want to move to the other end of the country to live with a stranger and leave their own world behind. I find this quite shocking and can’t imagine how anyone would consider leaving their children to move four hours away with someone who they may or may not even like. Have you even thought about the disruption this will cause to your children’s education, let alone their social lives and how they must be feeling at the thought of leaving their grandmother, who they have lived with for years? Your children didnt choose to be born, but YOU chose to bring them into this world, and that means caring for them, supporting them, and loving them until they reach adulthood.