How would you have handled this?

[ohnonotyouagain]

Quick history...have been with DP for almost three years and his DD (who is 12) stays with us every weekend. Have had past issues with this due to space but have been much happier since we moved into a place with a nice second bedroom.

Have really chilled out a lot which DP has noticed. Get on really well with DSD as well and always have, we like the same TV programmes and laugh at the same sort of stuff which is good.

However, when having a chat with DP and DSD today, I mentioned that I had invited my parents to stay over on boxing day. This is because I usually go and stay with them for christmas but wanted to spend the actual day with DP this year.

DSD got annoyed at the thought of anyone staying in "her" bedroom. Now at the risk of sounding horrible, it isn't her room. She stays in it when she is here and leaves her stuff in there. It'll always be hers when she needs it of course and she knows that; but when she isn't here it's anyone's who requires the use of it.

She's not scheduled to be here on boxing day so I don't see the problem. I feel (not sure if this is rational but hear me out) that my family - and by default me - have been disrespected. After all, my family are just as important as DP and DSD and I pay half of all rent, bills etc.

Who is being unreasonable? More than happy to accept it's me if I am.

That's my point, asking would have felt false. She won't be here when my family come and stay, I'd never dream of ousting her from the room in favour of anyone else. My point is that this is not her main home, she comes to stay to see her dad, we all get on really well but it's my home too.

And to the person who asked how I would feel if told my bed was going to be used. I live here full time, this is my only home. It's different.

OP, my case is slightly different in that DSSs stay every other weekend, but due to space constraints their room doubles up as a spare room. I didn't ask their permission on that because IMO children don't get to decide about family finances, and no way are guests sleeping in the floor when there is a very nice empty room in the house. How odd would that be.

My point exactly, thanks allnew. We have the same space constraints, bottom line is that my family are not going to a hotel and will stay with me in my home.

I think you've been very reasonable on this thread, OP, as you've listened to the advice. It sounds like you are generally a lovely step mum.

But I didn't stay with my dad for ages because as a teenager, he didn't give me or my brother a room (though there was room at his place) because he wanted it to be the "spare room" people could stay in.

I remember crying night after night to my mum that I was not someone special to my dad, it was not my real home and I was just someone who could be cleared out of his life and home every weekend. Obviously I'm not saying this is how your DSD feels, but having a real home with each parent can be very important to children. It was to me.

Also, as a parent, my DS would be more important to me in my own home than my partners' family. I'm not saying I wouldn't let them stay in his room (I would ask and then insist if he was difficult; I would have people to stay when he wasn't there) but as a parent, if I was your DH, I'd be more concerned that my daughter was upset than worried about where your parents stay. So I think his stress and suggesting your parents stay at a hotel is just that coming out.

Of course you are important too; this is just the reality of life with step kids. Hope everything is back to smooth by next time you all get together.

I have to disagree with the posters who think you should ask a child and then respect that answer if it is no - part of living as a family is the give and take, step or otherwise. If I needed to briefly use any of the kids rooms, step or otherwise I would explain to them what's going on, but I certainly wouldn't ask.

I don't see my DS1 as only having a 'proper' home and room here with me - he has TWO homes and TWO bedrooms. One in my house and one in his dad's house. Why would only the one at my house be 'his' room?

Yes, of course I would ask, and respect how they feel. My Children/stepchildren (when I had them) come before my partner, and they all come before my other relatives. Nuclear family (or modern variation thereof) first, other relatives after.

But then, when ASKED, my DC's usually say yes. Though 14yo DD started refusing at around 12yo. Because she said it felt like an invasion of her privacy. So I slept in the front room and offered my relatives MY bed. DD was at her dad's. It's HER room, her private space.

Her choice to have that privacy invaded, my choice with MY bed.

It's NOT an empty room though?! It's your DSS's bedroom. I really don't understand this?

Do the SM's who say it is a spare room have their own DC's too? Would you have your relatives sleep in your own DC's bed if they were out on a sleepover for the night, without their permission?

IMO, if I wouldn't do it with my own DC's, I wouldn't do it with SDC's either.

I am a Mum and a SM. The kids all have their own rooms and I'd treat them all the same - if we have guests and need to shuffle around to accommodate everyone then that's what we do. DP and I would chat and decide the best way to do what needs doing and then tell the kids. It's only occasional and usually their relatives too so it's not that big a deal.

Are they allowed to decorate the room do that it feels like 'theirs'? Put up posters? Or are they just sleeping in a generic 'spare room', that doesn't feel like 'theirs'?

If you have your own DC's too, as well as SDC's, do you decorate your DC's room/s in colours they like but leave the SDC's room/spare room neutral?

I JUST can't understand this? Surely, in order to make you SDC's feel at home, you would choose paint colours together, and buy some posters they like to put up in their room? I did when my (ex-though still in touch with them both, 4 years later) SDD's started to stay round? So they felt just as at home here as they did at their Mum's house?

I treated MY SDC's like I would want a SM to treat MY DC's IYSWIM.

SC's rooms are decorated as they want, with their own posters, own duvets covers and stuff. This is their home too. Like I said, all the kids are treated the same.

OP I think you've probably really upset your SdD here.

As a step-child she needs to know she has a 'space' in her home, that she has somewhere to go and to sleep whenever she needs to. It's incredibly hurtful not to have that personal space in what is meant to be your 'home'.

It's not the same as being chucked out of your bed as a child to make room for visiting relatives, and say sleeping on a blow up bed in the house instead. Whilst still being there.

I speak from experience of both, in the relative parents houses. It's a horrible horrible gutting feeling, I could actually cry thinking how horrible it is when your SDM seems to think your life can just be 'folded away' when you are not residing in that house and with a father who let her.

It's not an 'empty nice room' and I'm sorry but if that's what you are doing its incredibly unfair. However, it's understandable if you have never been I the other end.

Why not let her have the room as 'her' room and personalise it more? It can still be used as a 'spare' when you have guests. This is what we do and it works perfectly well. I agree that kids feeling at home is more important than having a generic guest room. It is important for her sense of belonging - and in a way it is a good thing that she already sees that room as hers and that - as you've noticed - having the 2nd bedroom has improved the time you all spend together.

I agree with those saying that it is her room. Just because she only sleep in it a couple of nights a week doesn't make it any less hers.

You make it sound like she's a visiting guest rather than a member of the family.

My DS's dad has just got a flat with his girlfriend. He has lived with his parents for the 3.5 years since we split up.

DS is with his dad 1-2 nights a week, and has had to sleep in a double with his dad for the last few years.

Now Ex has his own flat, with 2 bedrooms, I was delighted as I thought this would be fantastic for DS. Finally able to have his own space with both me and his dad, have toys at both houses, clothes etc etc.

DS casually mentioned to me when I asked him was his dad planning to decorate the room for him, that when he wasn't there, the room was for other people to stay in. So no, there would be no decorating, or keeping of things there.

I was gutted. DS doesn't seem to care, but most 10 year old boys wouldn't I guess. I just hoped after all these years that DS would feel at home at his dads.

It really tore me up inside to think that DS is just equivalent to a guest in his dads home :( If it was me, and DS lived with his Dad, then any room I had here would be for DS alone, totally his. And if we had need for a guest to stay, then it would be discussed with DS, and checked that he wouldn't mind someone else sleeping in his bed.

I'd rather give up my own bed than make a child feel they don't matter, or their space isn't their own.

And that applies to my own children, or stepchildren. Even more so to stepchildren to be honest.

I've been a stepchild, and never had a space in my dads home :(

The detective - maybe you and I feel like that precisely BECAUSE we have personal experience as children not having a 'room' of our own at our OWN NRP's house?

I know how I felt in that situation as a child, and would NEVER want any DC or SDC of mine to feel like that, maybe THAT'S why I would rather give up my bed than force them to give up theirs?

I guess you are right Couthy. I know how much it hurt, and feeling that you can't say anything.

My Dad forced my mum out the family home, and then rented the spare 3 bedrooms out to 3 different guys, as he was 'lonely' living on his own. I used to see my old bedroom and playroom being lived in by other people. I had to sleep over in my dads room (luckily it was the master bedroom, but still...)

Then he moved out and rented it out to other families, while he moved abroad. He moved in to a one bedroom apartment with his girlfriend (now wife) and when I travelled over to stay with him, I slept on the sofa from the age of 11 :(

It isn't as if he couldn't have given me my own room - the apartment he lived in was worth almost £1,000,000 15 years ago! He just chose to have a games room, movie room, laundry room, swimming pool etc. Batchelor pad if you will (even though he wasn't)

It's a shame then that the government doesn't hold the same view. There is no recognition that an NRP has the same fixed housing costs as a PWC with respect to house size. In fact how often have I seen posters on here say that maintenance includes cost of housing the child.

My view is that she has a home and a bedroom already and probably shouldn't be calling the shots in my home. I live there too

Its her home too.

allnew How right you are!

After DSD had refused to spend any time here for 6 months and her mum had gone back to the CSA to have the 'number of nights' adjustment removed, we converted DSD bedroom to a home office following my redundancy. We had intended to extend/convert another part of the house, but couldn't afford to do that and pay the increased maintenance. DSD room had sat empty for months - with few items of clothing that DP had bought that she had grown out of.

I know the impact it will have had on DSD; so I guess I'm a wicked SM

I've done a lot of give and take and I shouldn't be the only one.

Really? You're the adult, the step parent. She's the child who needs to feel wanted. Its not her fault you married her dad.

The government shouldnt have to tell fathers to provide a bedroom for their children

My DD spends 2 nights a week with her dad. She has her own room there. Her SM not her dad, has decorated it for her. I have seen it and she loves it.

I dont understand the mentality of folding away the SC either. If I had SC I would make sure they all had their own space.

I definitely think it should be sd room but if it's free I don't see why relatives can't sleep in there. You should certainly have explained to sd what you were planning and perhaps asked her to put her private things away.

It is her room and you should think of it as such, but she also isn't there full time and is a child of the family therefore adults get the say on what happens to that room for a few days over Xmas when sd isn't there.

What I can't accept is the sense of entitlement that came across in the conversation.

Entitlement to feel like she has a home with her dad!? To have her own space and not have it invaded by other people whether she likes it or not?

The things you say bother me.

Wannabe of course not, but their policies clearly do not support housing for a child at an NRPs house. Child benefit paid to Pwc. Housing benefit (if applicable) paid to Pwc. Tax credits paid to Pwc. And like I said earlier, I would say most posts on mn assume that child maintenance includes the fixed costs of housing the child. Sometimes in practical terms it is simply not feasible or affordable that an NRP has a room (empty most of the time) dedicated to the child.

I've seen posts by many pwc's on here state that if they didn't have residence of the child they could downsize, live in a one bed flat etc. They're either not being truthful, or they don't think an NRP should have a room for the child.