Blended family

[SarahSmith1023]

How do I ask my bf to set boundaries with his baby’s mom without sounding selfish?

Depends on what the boundaries are.

Why is it up to you to be ‘setting boundaries’?

Sorry I’m a bit confused can you elaborate when you say “why is it up to me to set boundaries” do you mean that I shouldn’t be, that he should already be doing it ?

It’s not very clear what you mean?

What if a boundary was that I didn’t feel comfortable with him watching the baby at her house? She doesn’t want us together and is always trying to break us up one way or another. But I don’t want to sound selfish. Like I understand there are things im going to have to endure and not like because in reality they baby comes first above all. I just don’t know if speaking my mind on this will make me seem like I’m thinking about myself.

Depending on the age of the baby tbh.

If the baby is very young , BF or mum is not comfortable with his parenting skills then it is reasonable that he visits at her home.

As for her trying to split you up that can only happen if he allows it.

You aren't going to get much sympathy because you're with a man who's only just fathered a baby with someone else. If the child is a baby he's unlikely to be worth hanging onto as a boyfriend.

People are possibly thinking that this will not end well and setting boundaries is shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted. A good boundary might be avoiding getting into relationships with men who's children with someone else are still babies.

Ok thank you

How old is the baby?

Babies are very high needs people and to be honest it's not a great time for him to be getting into another relationship.

So you want to tell your partner who he can and can't spend time with? You really have no right to tell her how her baby should be cared for.

Is it his baby, or does he have older kids with the ex and the baby is half sibling to his kids?

Different issues.

Sorry I reread. It's his baby, you're the new girlfriend. Baby's mum and Dad get to decide, not you.

Boyfriend? How recent of a boyfriend? Living together?

You might want to change your user name for anonymity.

You sound very young. ‘She doesn’t want us together..... trying to break us up’. Nothing to do with the mum, you decide what goes on in your relationship.

It is strange that the dad goes round to the mums house. I don’t know how old the child is but he should be aiming for contact away from the mum when the time is right.

Upto the dad (not you) to set boundaries.

That's a boundary for him to decide to set, or not.
You can tell him it upsets you and you'd prefer him to have contact at his own place - if the baby is a year or more then that's not unreasonable.

But if he's having a conversation with his ex about it I would very strongly advise him to leave you out of it. If she suspects it's coming from you she's almost certain to object. She didn't have a baby with you and is likely to feel you should have nothing to do with decisions that she and her ex make.

If he does want contact at his own place and she continually objects he could apply to court for access.

Let me elaborate a little. Him and I have been together for about 7 months but we were friends 2 years before that. We are about to move in together. They weren’t together when the baby was conceived she was just an old ex and it was a drunk one night thing. She then got pregnant and he has taken full responsibility for everything. He doesn’t want to be with her and she knows that. Everything was good between them until he started seeing me. She purposely uses the baby against him and doesn’t let him see her because he is dating when they already agreed that he wanted no relationship with her other than parenting before. He still does his duties even though she doesn’t let him around the baby. He shows up for all the appointments, gives her money for the baby almost every other day and the only time he can take care of her is when his mom has the baby at her house because the baby mom won’t give him the baby when he asks for her. he would go to her house and no one would let him in. There were two incidents he did go in the house and the whole time she wouldn’t let him even hold the baby and just kept asking about me, and why he isn’t with her and he has it all on video. And no I’m not exaggerating when I say she’s been trying to break us up. I already have harrasment charges on her for trying to break in and enter my place to start a violent altercation and sending threats out. She even called my grad school up and made up lies to try and get me into trouble. He has tried to get a pfa on her several times because she harasses him and stalks him as well. This is what I mean when I say I don’t entertain her tactics we usually ignore her and if anything happens we usually go to the law. The baby is the number one person here and if we were to entertain the baby mom it would just show that he doesn’t care or that I don’t care about his baby or the situation and it would frankly make things worse. And the situation shouldn’t be about going back and forth and having arguments that can lead to something else with the mom it’s should be about the baby which is why we ignore her and don’t counteract ourselves we usually just call the cops so they have everything on file. He is trying to get custody but it has been taking a while because filing and getting a lawyer here is really expensive and he has also been put on child support so he can’t come up with the money soon. Probably not until the end of the year. So she recently has been using the excuse that he can watch the baby but only if it’s at her house. He hasn’t agreed to it yet but I don’t feel comfortable with it cause of everything that’s happened. Like I said I don’t get involved in any of their baby decisions but this is something that idk if I should speak my mind on. My initial question was do I sound selfish for even asking this? I feel like she will just keep trying to manipulate him. she has gotten abusive with him before and has put her hands on him when she didn’t get her way. So idk if it’s better for him to just wait until the papers get done because then he will have his daughter on his and the courts terms and not on the moms or if he stays on this crazy road and having to deal with the baby mom and if she gets mad that she can withhold the baby when she wants. I’m not even sure what her real problem is because before him and I got together she was in a relationship. Then she broke things off when him and I started dating. She is currently dating now but still does all of these crazy things. I’m really thinking that she just doesn’t want him to be happy and is really territorial. I know he is going through hell right now so idk if just not saying how I feel about would be better? The baby is 1 by the way.

7 months?? Run! You don’t need this car crash in your life. Seriously.

Don’t you trust him?

Jeeez. No one needs this kind of shit especially so young. Find someone less complicated because this is a train wreck and you deserve better. It won't get better with time. It will get worse.

Could your boyfriend ask to have the baby at one of his family members house. Like his mum's for example to make the baby's mum feel a little more comfortable.
If you trust your boyfriend i wouldn't worry.
But it would concern me incase she made up any false allegations about him

Sounds like a headache, I would get out now.

I think you need to be realistic about what this person can offer you as a partner

Hi
Elements of your story sound very similar to mine!
Seeing the baby - you probably need to have a little patience here. It’s important he sees his baby. Like another person said perhaps he can negotiate seeing the baby at someone else’s house - like her Mum. She’s not a tiny tiny baby - can he take her out for a few hours?
Really, in this mess, he needs to get the court stuff in action. DIY costs a couple of hundred pounds and the courts are used to peopld self-representing. When you have a court order in place you’ll have a much better chance of keeping your sanity and your relationship in place! The baby’s Mum will also benefit - she won’t be able to decide when he sees or doesn’t see the baby, so this will be a sounce of conflict removed (unfortunately probably replaced by her feeling a loss of control.)
Regarding the mums behaviour - we find it best to not respond where possible. Engaging with any dramatic behaviour jus increases the drama so it’s worth trying to ignore (or report to the police where appropriate) anything not relevant to coparenting. Some people above are telling you to run. That’s not bad advice!! But there is another way if you think it’s worth the effort. My partner’s daughter is four now. When I see them together my heart melts and I’m a little proud of how we weathered the very rocky earlier times. Her mums behaviour is still a problem and always will be sadly and so I know that we did a very good thing in ensuring she has the stable /normal influence of her dad firmly established in her life.