Because DP and I are beginning to think so.
He lives with my DS (8) and me, and has his three young children with him (and therefore us) almost 50% of the time. Life is full-on. The house is always a mess. Our loyalties to our kids can be divisive. We get little time together to talk, touch base, connect, for days on end, with the relationship depending a lot on a fortnightly child-free weekend when we're able to get back on the same page.
My DS struggled ? understandably ? with our household expanding at first, but has been given a lot of understanding and time to adjust and is now coping admirably; he is fond of DP and likes company ? but even so, he still often wrestles with the set-up, and so I worry I'm putting him through too much.
DP has begun the process of trying to arrange for his eldest to live with him most of the time (I posted about this in another thread), which I support in principle, because I can see that it's in the best interests of his son. But of course, this means more upheaval for us ? and even less respite from an already exhausting living arrangement.
I feel torn between cooperating with what I think is right for DP's child, and not giving so much of myself (and forcing DS to do the same) that I effectively become depleted - emotionally, energy-wise, time-wise, sanity-wise. I'm worried about relinquishing a (reasonable ? not obsessive) sense of control over mine and DS's lives and home. I worry we're going to have little personal space/peace/calm/order/quiet/quality one-to-one time/all sorts of other stuff. I feel anxious, irritable, unsettled, and as though mine and DP's relationship is slipping away from us, because there's so little room in our increasingly children-packed lives to nurture it. And I feel resentful about the prospect of these changes, and then guilty about feeling resentful. I'm just not myself.
DP and I fantasise that perhaps the ideal solution for couples like us, with children from previous relationships who are with each of us a lot/most of the time, is to live next-door to each other. This way, no one feels 'invaded', there's no confusion over rules, there's sufficient personal space, DS isn't forced to share the only home he remembers (and his mum) with up to three other children, day in day out ? lots of potential theoretical pluses.
We could actually adapt my house (not easily ? it would be a big project) to create an annex that DP and his kids could then live in (I could pay for the work and if the relationship failed, could rent the annex out to someone else), and we're feeling more and more like we'd like to give it a go. Are we nuts? Probably. But we are both feeling the strain of the living arrangement - trying to blend one family from two can be so hard - and something has to give, and this feels like the only solution. But I also wonder if we're romanticising the idea and, in reality, we could end up like neighbours that hardly see each other.
Oh I don't know. It's good to just vent really, as I'm feeling pretty wound up about it all, but I'd be interested to know what others think.