Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Step-parenting

Connect with other Mumsnetters here for step-parenting advice and support.

Original poster

Teenage stepsons in our bedroom

325 replies

allnewtaketwo · 07/10/2012 20:17

Yesterday, DSS (16) was in our bedroom, solely because he needed to print something out (i wasn't aware of this at the time). At one point I heard banging and thumping around upstairs and asked DH to go up and see what was going on. Turns out both DSSs were play? fighting in our bedroom, on our bed. I was very annoyed, and said to DH that I don't want them in our bedroom anymore. Not only is that the one room in our house that I can have any privacy, but I think I can reasonably expect to not having a young adult model and his teenage brother fighting on my bed.

Roll forward to today. I was walking upstairs and saw DSS1 walking into my bedroom. 5 mins before, I had been busy on the computer in the bedroom (online banking) and also had out some underwear on radiator to dry. Had only left room to go to loo. I spoke to DH and turns out he'd told DSS he could use put computer.

I was very annoyed and DH couldn't understand why. We have a laptop FGS. Am do cross. I don't think I'm unreasonable in not wanting to have a 16 year old male in my bedroom, let alone seeing my private banking details. Am just having a rant here!

OP posts:
Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:13

brdgrl - that doesn't mean you don't have my sympathy for havign a tough job btw..

NotaDisneyMum · 08/10/2012 20:13

Nope - not my job to entertain/care for or even consider my NR DSS - I do it because I choose to, not because I have a moral or legal obligation to do so - especially when his mum has forbidden it.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:13

"every whim"

yes! that's exactly what I said

brdgrl · 08/10/2012 20:16

No, it is NOT my job to get up when my children (step or otherwise) do in order to spend every waking minute catering to their desires. Where on earth do you get off telling me that it is???!!!!!

Double standard because no one would expect me to agree to do so, as a mum. If YOU do so, as a mum, well - bully for you - although I really have my doubts that any one of you actually lives in the way you suggest that we do.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:18

Nothng to do with being a step parent, if you are the responsible adult, tough shit, it's your job.

Bonsoir, how did you turn that ^^ into "pander to every whim?"

NotaDisneyMum · 08/10/2012 20:21

hully by definition, step-parents are NEVER the responsible adult.

Bonsoir · 08/10/2012 20:22

Because that is exactly the sentiment you are expressing, Hullygully.

Anyway, you clearly have no idea of what it is like to be a stepparent so just shut up.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:23

so just shut up.

I say!

I also say you know nothing of my life.

purpleroses · 08/10/2012 20:24

If me and my DP were up and about at all the hours that our DC between them choose to be awake, we'd get about 5 hours sleep a night.

I don't get up with my own 9 year old if she wants to rise at 6am, so certainly wouldn't expect to get up to entertain my DSS. Thankfully, DP has at least as much need for privacy and sleep as I do, and his youngest is quite used to entertaining himself for a couple of hours first thing in the morning. I'm not sure what the solution is to a very clingy nervous child - but the cause certainly isn't adults requiring a bit of privacy, and nor would removing that be the solution.

The OP asks about DSSs in the room when she wasn't there though - I'd have thought the best solution to this would be to remove anything from the room that is an attraction to them, or make it clear that they are not to use it - eg the computer printer. And explain to her DP the way she feels about her bedroom. Personally I rarely felt the need for a "sanctuary" when I lived alone with my own two DC. Now that I spend my weekends with 4 DSC I do completely understand the need for it. My home is not mine in the sense that my old house was, lots of other people have a stake in it. They choose what is on TV, what they talk about, they read over my shoulder, argue with each other, and join in conversations. Of course they do - because it's their home, but sometimes I need somewhere to retreat to for a short while just to be myself before I'm ready to join back in with the rest of the household.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:25

I say further,

If you are an adult, a proper grown up adult, and you knowingly take on someone with kids, then those kids come first . Always. For the bio parent and step parent because the adults had choices and they didn't.

Bonsoir · 08/10/2012 20:26

No of course they don't come first, Hully. Children don't come first.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 20:28

Okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

NotaDisneyMum · 08/10/2012 20:28

take on someone with kids ?!?

What the hell does that mean?

I haven't taken on anyone and neither has my DP - what kind of relationship are you in? Confused

sudaname · 08/10/2012 20:38

My DSS once said to me

'You cant stop me talking to my dad'

This was in answer to me suggesting gently to him that it perhaps wasnt necessary or considerate to come upstairs (his bedroom and en suite were downstairs btw) early one morning to chat about some sports trivia from the night before in the doorway of our bedroom when we were both still in bed, naked and having a lovely post coital cuddle which we only get chance to do at weekend as DH up with lark during week.

I had to lie there head under the covers, pretending to be asleep as l couldnt stand the thought of him standing there looking at me lying in bed naked - even though he wouldnt have seen anything from the shoulders down iyswim.
l dont know, it just would have felt so wrong and it's almost as if you feel vulnerable and l found it incredibly intrusive, just hearing his voice in the room and knowing he was in the room.

It is very hard to explain to someone who doesnt feel like that and it is impossible to overcome if you do feel like that and as already been said just because you have an intimate close relationship with their dad does not make you feel any more physically comfortable around your adult stepson than you would with any male stranger or aquaintance.

sudaname · 08/10/2012 20:45

DSS was 22 at the time btw and was going out to work, we're not talking about a sobbing 5 yr old holding his favourite teddy stood bawling in our bedroom doorway and been given the cold shoulder.

sudaname · 08/10/2012 20:46

being

Jux · 08/10/2012 20:46

Allnew, I still don't understand why you can't tell them yourself. Not getting at you, just don't understand.

NotaDisneyMum · 08/10/2012 20:53

jux many step mums have no authority in their own home and are undermined by both the DCs parents Sad

tattychicken · 08/10/2012 20:55

Can you read that post back to yourself Bonsoir? Still ok with it?

Jux · 08/10/2012 20:59

Notadisneymum, that's terrible. I was aware of it but assumed it occurred more at the beginning of things, and that as time went on things shook down sensibly. You can't really run a household with one parent (including step-parents here) having to pussy foot around for all eternity.

As I said, Allnew, I assumed after 10 years together that you and dh would be pretty equal in the eyes of all the children, certainly in terms of having authority in your own home. I'm terribly sorry if that's not the case.

defineme · 08/10/2012 21:01

Thinking about step parents(I do feel sorry for step kids too) I really can appreciate that it's very tough that you've chosen their parent, but you have not chosen the step children and if they're living with you part or full time then you have to give of yourself probably more then you considered when you fell in love with their parent.
I can also appreciate what separates blood from marriage relations. I love all my nieces and nephews, but I have a deep seated love for my niece that is my own brother's child that is just not there with dh's brother's kids...
I think step parents that jump that gap and become the same as actual parents are amazing.
Surely, if they live with you, you have to strive to be the same as a parent and act it even when you don't feel it?

As for the details of this. In my family we knock if a door to a bedroom/bathroom is shut-if open we just go in.. Other than that I assume there's a point when kids don't get into bed with you, but I still sit on my Mum's bed when she's getting changed-she always needs wardrobe advice! She asks me to do banking for her and vice versa-whichever of us is in town so details aren't private.

As an aside, I work with teenage boys and I feel so sorry for them, even if they can be thoughtless arses, they're the most unloved, misjudged section of society.

onceortwice · 08/10/2012 21:03

Jux - I don't think it 'shakes down'. I've been with my husband for 14 years. 10 years as a SM to my DSDs and 4 years as a mum to my 2 children.

I think my husband has completely lost sight of what's 'equal' in our relationship. He gets to say what is and isn't happening. He gets to say what is right and wrong. He gets the final say on everything.

It's not a desperately happy household at the moment.

IceBergJam · 08/10/2012 21:07

Really Hully, you do everything your children demand of you? Thats what you are suggesting these stepmums do. I dont think that is being a proper big grown up adult. Bit of a cop out more like.

IceBergJam · 08/10/2012 21:15

Jux, im 8 years in and still go through my DH sometimes. We are a happy family with good step relationships , the kids respect me fully but there is something invisible which doesnt give me ultimate authority and its best coming from DH.

Hullygully · 08/10/2012 21:21

Iceberg, could you show me where I said that?

Swipe left for the next trending thread