My step-daughter for the 13 years that her dad has had her has been Tuesday and Thursday 7-9 and every other weekend from 2pm when he finishes work till Sunday at 6pm. This was due to her working hours. It has always been a very much ‘it’s my way or the highway’ attitude from her mother, otherwise he would get the standard response of ‘you’re not getting access to her if you don’t.
If she wanted to change a day and he refused, he would get told ‘why don’t you want her? Don’t you love her anymore’ or some other emotional blackmail. He always gave in to prevent his daughter becoming too influenced by this type of behaviour and I suppose for an easier life. However, by giving in to keep the peace, everything is always what the mother wants. We sometimes walk on egg shells thinking what the mother is going to do.
Now a few years ago my boyfriend put his foot down and her mother didn’t like it. She bad mouths him to her constantly, says things like ‘you don’t have to do what your father tells you to do because I’m your parental guardian. Obviously when I came on the scene it became even worse.
We have a 3-month old baby together now and after nearly a year of my step daughter not seeing her dad because of her mother’s emotional abuse she is luckily back visiting us. We’ve left it very much in her court when she visits and we’ve given her keys. When my boyfriend first started seeing her again he said he’d pick her up on Mondays straight after school as he is off Mondays so that she can spend more time with him, instead of on Tuesday for less hours. Her mother now that we have a baby is a lot more lenient and is letting her pick when she wants to come. She also stays Thursdays still from 6-9 but now stays every weekend from 2pm when her dad finishes work till Sunday evening after he finishes badminton. I used to play badminton with him but since I’ve had the baby I mind her while he still goes.
When he goes to badminton he gives his daughter an option of her being dropped off back at home on the way or staying till he gets back. She always chooses to stay. I don’t really see the benefit of this though as she isn’t seeing her dad for those three hours that he’s away. She stays in her room so she’s not interacting with the baby either. As soon as he gets in he then rushes out the door again because she has to be dropped off dead on 9 otherwise she gets shouted at by her mum. When I’ve said about her mum coming to get her he says he doesn’t want her anywhere near the house. Also, when he goes the baby is often asleep on him and she wakes up and cries when he has to hand her over to me to drop my step daughter off. I’m sure it will get easier in time but adjusting with the new baby has been a lot harder than I originally imagined.
During holidays as well, she is deciding how long she is staying so the usual hours go out the window. The last half term she told her dad that instead of going home Sunday she was staying till Tuesday. The problem is that my boyfriend is back in work Tuesdays so I’m looking after her too. Although I didn’t go out on that occasion I did think to myself ‘what if I had have wanted to do something that day’. I know I have a baby but I can take her to see family but I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t hold the same appeal for my step daughter. I did mention to him that I will be going to visit family on the Tuesday so he’d have to let her know if she wanted to stay the night. His reply was that she wouldn’t mind. I’m not too sure whether he meant that she’d like to come with me or that she’d be alright in the house with me gone for hours. We have come to the conclusion that she would rather be in our house than be in her mums where she would be constantly moaned at.
Every morning too we keep our phones on silent to prevent the baby waking up and crying. Last Monday when we got up my boyfriend had received 4 missed calls from his daughter at half 7 in the morning. When we picked her up from school we asked her why she had rung. She said the buses were on strike and she needed a lift (She has a bus pass usually for school) when I asked her who had drove her in she replied that her mum had. I thought it a little strange that she was ringing us then when she lives with her mum and she was obviously there to take her, so after asking her she said her mum said she’d take her if her dad couldn’t. My boyfriend told her his phone was silent in the mornings because of the baby.
She asked about getting a lift to school on Wednesday too so we said it would be better if she stayed the night, so her dad can take her straight from ours. She said that she’d ask her mum. On one of the evenings she stayed at ours she was asleep and had to be woken up at 9 to go home. When I said you’d be better staying when you’re that tired, she said her mum wouldn’t let her. I find it weird that her mother won’t let her stay overnight on a school night when she has her uniform on her anyway.
We thought that would be the end of it but she did the same this Monday and when my boyfriend asked why she was ringing this time she said she had forgotten about the strike and had walked to the bus stop so she wanted him to take her. When he asked what was wrong with her mum taking her she said she didn’t want to ring her mum to come and get her cos she’d shout at her.
She’s rang early in the morning too because she’d left a school note here by mistake the day before. Instead of getting her mum to come over to pick it up or just going to school and asking for another copy she asked her dad to drive down with it. He then got asked by her if he could take her to school. The mum’s car was in the drive apparently. I think she’s taking the mickey myself.
She keeps messing her dad round with the times that he picks her up on Saturdays now too. He has always gone straight from work at 2pm to pick her up but recently she’s been saying for him to pick her up at half 2. When he asked why, she said her mum has to pick her up from her brother’s house (as she stays Friday night there) and she picks her up at 2. This means that my boyfriend is going home, waiting half an hour and then going back the same way he’d just finished work. He got fed up with it so said that she has to be ready for 2 otherwise her mother can drop her off. She said that sometimes her brother’s girlfriend drops her off and not her mum, so he said well she can drop you off here instead of at your mums. Then a different week she made up the excuse that her mother wants to spend time with her for the half an hour. Then one week he said he was on his way at 2 and she said could he give half an hour cos she was still asleep. He told her no. This weekend just gone she tried her luck again. When he said I’m not going home to come back out again she said I thought you didn’t finish work till half 2. I don’t have a clue what’s going on really.
We have always attributed everything to her mother’s controlling ways (even to the extent of what she can and can’t wear) however, I’m not too sure whether sometimes it’s my stepdaughter herself just trying to get what she wants from the more lenient parent.
Has anyone experienced this before? Could it be a little bit of jealousy perhaps because of the new baby?