moving non-resident stepchild from larger bedroom into small bedroom

[timelord92]

My boyfriend and I have recently moved into a 3-bed house and not long after that had our first child together. His daughter (aged 13) from a previous relationship visits two evenings a week and stays overnight every Saturday.

When we were discussing room allocations I suggested that our baby together should have the smaller box room as they won’t need that much space with being a baby and they’ll also be in our bedroom for quite some time. I wanted my step daughter to have the bigger room so she could feel a part of the family still and wouldn’t feel pushed out with the arrival of the new baby. Plus, she would need the space with her age. I also put a desk top computer with a printer in the room so she could do her homework and studying when she visits, which she currently doesn’t have at her mum’s house. We have furnished the room for her too but there is nothing personal really in the room as she brings her clothing with her when she visits. I have bought her stuff in the past for our house but she ended up taking them home with her and we’ve not seen them since.

My question anyway is would it be unreasonable and cause unnecessary resentment if we were to move our child in 4/5 year’s time when my stepdaughter is 18/19 into the bigger room as they will be living in the house 100% of the time and my stepdaughter only stays one night a week?

I feel a bit now that we have made a rob for our own backs by letting her have the bigger room straight off the bat. At the time, I thought that by the time my daughter was at an age to need a bigger room, my stepdaughter would be at an age where she wasn’t coming down to stay overnight anymore. I know it seems like it could be quite an easy thing to ask someone who will be older and more mature what I think is a reasonable request, however, we’ve had major problems with her mum over simple little things that she would cause a massive issue over. She has already put it into her daughter’s head that her dad doesn’t love her once her dad started going out with me and recently she’s told her she was ‘second best again’ after we picked her up from her mums house a few hours later than we usually do on a day that she doesn’t usually come to visit. The problem is that her mum will force her down to visit her dad even if she’d rather be out with her friends or whatnot, even at the age of 18.

I was just wondered what people’s opinions of this are?

I have found 13-14 a difficult time. It is a bit of a last-chance saloon for all parents, as teens grow parental influence reduces and parents take on a much more advisory role. Step families have extra problems, the resident parent feels they are losing influence because they are barely consulted by either teen or non-resident parent about visits once the child is a late teen. It is much harder to influence a teenager than a seven-year-old. Don't worry about it now, deal with it when she is 18. However manipulative her mother might be, you will have very little (likely no) contact with her once DSD is a grown up.

Hi Magda- you summed it up there perfectly- exhausting!! My DH is really struggling with this situation at the minute, to the point where he has told me he doesnt think he can cope with it much longer. He's normally so easy going and laid back, but it's making him not look forward to the time they spend with us and I don't know what to do to help him.
And as OP said it's so frustrating when you have no control over somebody saying the most horrible things to their own children. It really does baffle me !!

Samesituation – You’d think with her having a new DP that she wouldn’t be causing trouble for you wouldn’t you but obviously it’s made her worse. Maybe she’s wanting to be more of a family unit with this new fella and she’s trying to badmouth their dad so that the children will prefer her over you.

I’m with you on that! Children shouldn’t be dragged into the ins and outs of why their parents split and I’m glad that you and your partner don’t mention anything about their mum to them. My stepdaughter and son are both older now and we still don’t mention anything as they will realise what’s going on when they have experienced life a bit more. I was quite shocked how the children know everything about child maintenance and what their father earns. I remember the son when he was 19 saying that basically he knows what his dad earns (as his mum showed him the child maintenance letter) and that he should be providing for him more, even tho he was buying his food, paying all the bills, etc. He didn’t think he should have had to pay any keep money because of this.

I think the cause of the majority of the emotional abuse is to control their children into doing what they want, like a puppet. The reason I think is because of the bitterness they feel, they want the children to pick them if you like over their dad, so that they won’t want to see him and then the dad can suffer the same way as they believe they have all these years.

My stepdaughter stopped coming for months and months and it only stopped because I got pregnant and I suppose her mum didn’t want her to miss out on anything or to feel that our child was seen as superior in some way to theirs.

I wouldn’t like to not invite my stepdaughter either to holidays as its not her fault that her parents split up. Plus, her mum never takes her anywhere. It’s funny really because she doesn’t do anything with her but she expects my partner to do things with her and puts it into her head that he should be doing more. She likes going swimming and has mentioned a few times that she always used to ask him to take her and he never did. When I mentioned it to him a few days later he said he always used to take her and it was her mum saying things to her that he never does enough.

I suppose it depends what kind of relationship they have with their mother and whether they think her behavior is wrong or not. For instance, my stepson, even tho he is 20, still thinks whatever his mum says is gospel, even if it doesn’t make any sense and even tho he’s an adult now and lives away from her. The daughter doesn’t seem to realise that her mum is wrong about things so there seems to be a bit more hope with her.

TheRealBiscuitAddict – I think that there is definitely insecurity and jealousy involved with regards to their mum but I don’t think it’s to do with the baby. I think it has more to do with us being in a relationship now and she isn’t. I think she thought he was her property or something still even though they have been separated for 12 years. She was quite civil with him before, with him on fb, asking him to look at her car etc. Then when I came on the scene, she stopped all contact altogether and started sending nasty text messages referencing me all the time. For instance, ‘you’ve chosen that tart over your children, etc’. She also stopped my stepdaughter from seeing us for 7 months. Even before I had the baby she started coming down again. I think if I hadn’t of had a baby we still would have no contact even now. Weirdly, her mum even asked if she could buy a gift for the baby when she was born!

I did originally think that my stepdaughter would feel insecurity with a new baby who would spend all her time with her dad while she only had allocated time with him. But surprisingly she does seem to be made up. I’m thinking it’s because her mum can’t prevent her coming down now as our daughter is her sister. It’s harder for her mum to sabotage it in anyway. She is here all the time which she wasn’t before apart from holidays. That could be because she wants to be here like the baby is. Her mum apparently put on fb a few weeks ago that she hasn’t seen her daughter this happy before.

The son is now living independently now yes but it’s not as straight forward as it sounds. To cut a long story short, while he lived with us he treated the place like it was his and we were his lodgers and it was the last straw when he practically moved his gf in and she was treating the place the same too. He ran off to his mothers with his belongings after he realized he wasn’t getting his own way after we put our foot down. His mum at first was glad to have him saying how he can stay with her, then when she realized he couldn’t come back with us unless he changed his attitude, she changed her mind a day later and said he would have to go back to his dad as there was no room at hers. When she still couldn’t get her own way she made him get a council flat and got rid of him. I remember her telling everyone in front of the children that their father doesn’t even bother with this kid (her son). She got told by everyone that he wasn’t a kid he was a man.

You are right tho, things can change a lot in 5 years. She could even be living with us.

My parents did this to me at 18 when I went away to uni and my sister was 10. She needed the space more, I was home most weekends but a lot of my stuff was at uni so I only really needed the bed.
My mum did it in a lovely way, redecorating both our rooms and putting in some great fitted wardrobes so even though I had the smaller room, I had loads of storage and felt like I’d been treated like an adult.
Sounds like you are a wonderful step mum providing so much for your step daughter.

Samesituation – I’ve just read what you replied to Magda and what I think helps with us is try not to let the mother in too much into your household. You may not be able to control what the mother says or what goes on at her house but you can control your own actions. Actions speak louder than words afterall. If you include them in everything and try not to listen to what they are repeating from their mum then they will feel that you do want them around. That’s what we have found anyway.

We do little things for her to show we want her around and it has gone in. She has lapses, don’t get me wrong, when her mother is telling her things. But I think that deep down she knows by our actions that she is wanted.

Every time they say anything negative try and remind them of things that you’ve done for them to counteract any negativity their mum has put on them. Obviously without mentioning their mother at all, which is probably the hardest part of all lol There is probably a lot more that we could say to them about their mother and how her actions are disgusting but we are a bit more mature than that.

TBH OP i am concerned as to what effect all this will have on them when they are older. I always say to DH I hope they do remember what you, (and us) have done for them, DP takes them to various activities etc, and they don't just remember all this agro that's happening at the minute. Of course at the minute mum walks on water, (I suppose I don't really expect that to be any different at present). My fear is it will end the same as with your DSS. DH has said he is aware and prepared for that in the long term.

I honestly don't think young children should have this burden on their shoulders, in my opinion they can't mentally and emotionally cope with this or know how too.

It seems to me that My SC don't seem to be able to come to ours and enjoy their time here at present and probably for the last 12 months or so it's like every time they're coming and picking at their dad. Which again we feel is the control and manipulaton from their mum.

But my DH has decided the best approach is what you have said too, he's going to try and ignore comments they make, focus on what we do do, be consistent as we can only control what happens in our house, include them in everything we can, we're still going to do the odd thing with our DC though and he still doesn't want to go into the reasons for their separation. So that's how we're going forward.

I told him this morning he may not have THE WORST EXP in the world, he didn't believe me and I have told him about this thread!! For what it's worth it is good to be able to discuss these issues - and get other people's opinions and ideas. Fingers crossed we all get through these challenging times with a happy ending