Step parents and resident parents matter too !

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Having read a number of step parenting threads over the last few weeks related to summer holiday 'issues' . Holidays, unexpected child care etc. I am completely staggered by the hypocrisy demonstrated by some posters against stepmothers in a way it is frowned on other boards.

I'll give an example.
Aibu/relationship post. (I'll précis) I have shacked up with a complete dickhead. He was a dickhead from day 1 but I thought he would change. He is being an unbelievably unsupportive and unengaged partner now I'm pregnant....

There will be loads of posts advising her to ltb but god forbid someone states the bloody obvious. 'Why did you choose to breed with a KNOWN dickhead.' ? . and they will be jumped on. ! 'Why bash someone while they are down' 'Not the babies fault' 'Baby didn't choose to be born'.. 'she needs support not castigation ' . and of course 'it's happened now, she needs to make the best of it for her child'.

Transfer this to 'step-parenting' and a any problem related to the juggling of time and step children. (Especially in the summer holidays) is met with 'you knew he had kids before you had them with him'. 'Should of thought about it before having more kids' (despite the fact that she hasn't had ANY kids, before) . Yes of course you as Step-mother should not expect to take a summer holiday unless you can afford to take ALL the children. Even if this means you yet no holiday nor your children, because your sc might be miffed. Even if they are having a couple of holidays with their dm and dm family. But no, Dsc feelings must always trump Step mothers needs and resident children.
As for a step mother expecting to spend her annual holiday with her DH/DP and not automatically subjugating herself so the Dscs can have one on one time with dad. (Screw the resident Dcs wanting 121 time)
it is looked upon as tantamount to the most selfish act imaginable.

Double standards ?

Perpetrating this myth that all children can be treated equally does no one any favours. Life is not 'fair'. Sometimes it can be worked quite well, sometimes it just can't. All parents (especially step parents) can do is to try and do their best, be kind, and have a fair stab at making it work.

likeido you are not alone. As I said there are plenty of people facing these sorts of challenges. I’m one of them. Perfectly amicable relationship with my ex (despite the circumstances of the divorce). Our DC move fluidly between us with contact firmly focussed on them.

My DP’s EW is a very different kettle of fish. A deeply vengeful person with one intent. To cause maximum disruption and ultimately destroy the person who has had the gall to move on. If you haven’t read up on high conflict personalities, then do. They are determined to find some form of engagement, very negative forms in this case. The aim is to create conflict (between you and your DP as dealing with these recurring allegations is stressful and draining). The aim is also to destabilise the relationship with the DC, and cause additional emotional challenges. Ultimately within your relationship again.

If you are a ‘normal’ person who is trying to maintain a relatively healthy dynamic in your new world of kids moving between parents etc, then this level of vitriol is the very antithesis of healthy and stabilising. And that (I believe) is the ultimate aim of some of these actions.

Make someone so fed up with the on-going drama so that they ultimately throw their hands up and say ‘enough. Not my monkeys, not my problem’ and walk away.

I adore my DP and at times we have come very close to splitting up. The intent is very clear. And anyone who wishes to come on here and say otherwise, you’re welcome to try and give me perspective but I know what I’m living through.

A vicious ex wife who wants nothing more that to destroy her ex and ensure her children have nothing to do with us.

And ohreally I’m sorry that you know what I’m talking about. Potentially sounds as though you’ve lived through it and your relationship didn’t survive as a result?

I didn’t mean to pick what I wanted from your post. I very clearly said that your perspective is interesting. I’m not devaluing that.

But there does need to be an acknowledgement on these boards that there categorically are cases where ex partners are simply hellbent on causing maximum destruction. Simply because they can and simply because, at this point in time, the court system is ridiculously biased towards the mother.

Give it time. Let the courts start moving primary residency over to non resident parents. Increasing research is emerging in just how damaging parental alienation is to children. Right now family judges hands are tied in making very difficult decisions that are based on the child’s welfare.

Move a child from a resident parent who is (in all other respects) a good parent. And fulfills every other part from a welfare perspective? Simply because she makes her exes life hell? Sorry no. That would cause a child huge emotional upset. So they allow and in ways facilitate this whole process. The person who loses out is the father because EOW and one night a week should be enough. Simply shocking.

But once judges have proof of the emotional damage longer term caused to children as a result of parental alienation, then they have something on which to base a different decision. That needs to start happening more.

I for one, cannot wait. Enough of the golden uterus syndrome.

Toosassy I was chatting to my sdc whilst we were playing and when it was time to go he got upset. He ended up coming out with this huge emotional outburst about he wishes he could spend more time with daddy. He said something along the lines of "well I'd like it where I get to have the weekend like mummy's. At the moment i get picked up then have to go to bed as soon as I see daddy (he doesn't doesn't get to my dp until 9/9.30pm on a Friday.) Then I get one whole day with daddy, another night then half way through Sunday I have to go home so it's not the same as mummy's because when I am with her at the weekend I get the whole of Sunday too then it's school."

Last year when she withdrew him from my dp for 3 months she wouldn't even allow phone calls. Then had the nerve to send their ds to a child psychologist (which he only found out from his ds) to make sure he wasn't suffering any damage! I always thought she did it hoping he would say something along the lines of not liking going to his dads etc.

It's weird though because she has never said anything directly to me or even mentioned me to my dp ever apart the initial "why didn't you tell me you had a girlfriend," all this shit she has said about my dp in their divorce etc is almost like she's indirectly goading me into either blowing up on her (so she can play the victim) or dump my dp so no one has him. Call me paranoid but that's definitely how it's felt sometimes. It's like all those accusations of abuse were meant to make me question him and think he was abusive. Little does she know but I have an unusual amount of knowledge when it comes to abuse/Narcissistic people and their traits, patterns and cycles. I was in a nasty abusive relationship before and I made sure I educated myself to a deep level on the subject.

TooSassy, sometimes we disagree on some things and some times we don't, but I agree that you never take a defensive approach, just state your position and why you believe it. I think it's in these kind of discussion that there is the most to learn from. Even if some discussions can get heated, it's ok, as long as some learning takes place in the end.

I'm sure that consciously or not, this forum has helped me over the years to better understand how my kids' SM might have felt about certain things and how flexible she's shown to be.

So many men are victims of insidious parental alienation
I really really believe that this is a matter of perspective. I think it is inevitable -and thankfully so- to be a bit biased when it comes to the people we love. We mum thinking our kids can't be as bad as their SM make them to be, SM thinking their partner can't be as bad as the ex claim etc... In the end, we all see ourselves victims to those who hurt us, meaningfully or not.

likeido it’s very difficult but sadly all you can do is continue to provide a loving environment and move the convo on.
I’m not surprised to hear that nothing has been said about you. It won’t be. If allegations suddenly start extending to you then it undermines her dialogue. It will all be extended to your DP and remain there.

swing I completely and utterly agree with you. In RL those closest to me don’t have the same opinions as I do. It’s about putting across why you have your view and respectfully listening to others. I may not agree with people after thinking it through. But I’ll always listen and think about what someone is saying.

I don’t think my kids are angels. I’ve met them. . I also think my partner was certainly no angel to his ex, I wasn’t to mine. We’re both older and wiser and a divorce can be a huge learning experience. Neither my DP or I want to repeat our mistakes.

But I also firmly think that there is still the class of people out there who guilty of parental alienation. And do so knowing full well what they are doing. Sad but true.

@swingofthings - I agree with you a lot of the time but I disagree here. Parental Alienation is a very specific behaviour that as @TooSassy says is being investigated & considered more and more by the courts - at least it is in my country.
There is a massive difference between having a different viewpoint from your co-parent & deliberately setting out to ruin your kids relationship with their other parent and any other family that other parent gained post split. That is psychological abuse, which has historically been very hard to prove but more & more family services & courts are taking systematic parental alienation very seriously.
My kids know my ex and I differ hugely on many things but my different viewpoint never interferes with them seeing their dad, nor do I badmouth him & his dw & vice versa.
On the flipside my dp's ew deliberately makes up lies about us & tells his children such & when she's not lying she's twisting every we say & do & again is relaying such to the kids. It's hugely damaging & very destructive & she is on a warning from a judge to modify her behavior with regards to dp.

Toosassy when you say it would undermine her dialogue do you mean by that she's playing a very clever, conscious hand or do you mean I am perhaps thinking too much into it?

I hate all this shit that had happened and still happens and I don't understand why someone would want to be so indirectly callous and calculating to someone they never met and has never done anything to them other than met a guy and fall in love with him who they just happened to have gone out with once upon a time?

Magda i know my dp has certainly thought his ex wife doesn't want him to have a relationship with their dc. During the 3 months of her withdrawing their son, she also denied any access for my dp's family too, despite them asking several times.

Not read the full thread (sorry!). But I really don't understand opinions like this one a pp wrote "The resident DCs do get 121 time usually 12/14 days, SDCS do need some 121 time with their NRP - not the whole time but just a little!".

I don't agree with this viewpoint at all. I think often during the time when it is just the resident DCs in the home the parent does all of the mundane things that they need to do. For example, working later to get things finished, food shopping, cleaning, other chores, studying, seeing friends, hobbies or whatever else. From what I've seen when the SDCS come over all of these things are dropped and the step children get undivided attention. This can cause resentment in resident DCs because they don't get this special attention.
You could argue that everything should be dropped when non resident DCs come over because they don't get to see that parent as often. But in reality it's not healthy for the step DC as it is not a normal environment that would occur in day to day life and not good for resident dc who become resentful.

absoluteclassic
I agree. Either the dsc are part of the family or they aren’t, and if they are part of it then that includes having to do the boring everyday stuff as well.

So non resident kids shouldnt have time alone with their parent?
Resident kids will get that time. Weekends when the nr kids are not there, after work.
If you see your kids twice a month then at least once a month for a few hours should be alone.
It doesnt have to be days out. Just going the park. Its the attention.

Thing is the resident kids are not gonna be doing boring stuff 24/7 while the nr kids arent there are they. They will be going for dinner occasionaly, parks, cinema. Movie nights, soft play.

So why is it too much to expect a nr child to get the same?

likeido if her allegations remain targeted at your DP, she remains more believable. The minute her allegations then extend into someone other than your DP (I.e you) then she shows her hand. What grounds would she have to make allegations against you? That’s a very tricky line to walk, and if she has good lawyers and is smart (very few of the high conflict personalities who can sustain their campaigns for years are stupid), she will know her allegations can point towards your DP and your DP only.

None of her allegations are about you. They are about your DP. You are mere collateral damage and inconsequential in that. Read up on parental alienation and high conflict personalities. It’s deeply maladaptive behaviour. But can be very well hidden and has been exceptionally hard to prove. That’s why mandatory training is being rolled out to increas awareness.

A simply red flag can be giving a child a choice whether to go to contact or not. When left unchecked that’s the sort of behaviour that can go into fully blown withholding contact at a whim.

Toosassy yes she is smart. She has a very academic job and comes from a very academic family. Book smart if you will. My dp on the other hand is a manual worker so think uptown girl/downtown boy type scenario. He was never good enough in mummy and daddy's eyes who would have preferred her to marry Sebastian from the country club kind of thing. I've never so much as made a noise to her so she has nothing on me.

I'm looking into this, it sounds interesting..

I have only just realised that reading this thread that my dad subjected me to parental alienation.
I've just gone non contact as I stated earlier but it was after most of my life of him bullying me, criticising my family, my genes, and from the age of about 7 onwards tried to imply my step dad would try and touch me. In the last 3 years that's escalated to an outright accusation of my step dad being a paedophile. It's complete poison and my step dad has been nothing but a Father to me.
It used to hurt me so much growing up that every visit with my dad was a whole day of defending my mum and step dad and my mum's family. I can't cope with any more of it.
I would never ever want my sc to feel the way my dad made me feel.
I completely agree with earlier posters about the damage it does. Thanks for helping me realise what it was. I had no idea. I just thought he was a nasty man and a bully.

Oswin some children are with their other parent a lot more than twice a month. My dsc is here for a full week on, full week off and plenty of contact through phone calls/text/FaceTime with us on mum’s weeks. Plus we live about 5 minutes away dsc can always pop up when they want when it’s not officially our week.

When dsc is here we literally do just carry on life as normal.

Parental alienation - Cafcass
www.cafcass.gov.uk/grown-ups/parents-and-carers/divorce-and-separation/high-conflict-practice-pathway/

Interesting report
alienatedparents.org.uk/the-report-parental-alienation-in-the-uk/

TooSassy, absolutely not denying that parental alienation by exes exist. I've seen it myself and that was from my resident friend. Her ex treated her emotionally badly, left her, but then would come back, each time making him her feel that they were working on their relationship, wooing her again, she'd believe him, and then he would walk away again. She found out that during most of that time, he was seeing someone else, but telling her he was separated. She felt utterly betrayed and insulted, so unfortunately, she took it that the power was then in her hands to make him suffer too, and yes, she did played a game that was all about punishing him. Thankfully, she then met someone, fell in love again, and was able to move on, and she was able to see that what she was doing was hurting her children too.

However, I also think that parental alienation can be very quick to be labeled by an ex who doesn't get his own way OR who doesn't have a great bond with his kids and go straight to the conclusion that it can only be because of what the mother says and does rather than considering that it could be the way he parents his child, the priorities he takes etc...

My point was that a father who sees himself as a victim is not always the victim of his ex, but sometimes of his own doing too. This applies to everyone falling into the syndrom of victimisation, be it the ex, OH, SM.

Absoluteclassic, it really depends on each situation. Depends on the age of the kids, depends on whether we are talking about step-children rather than half, depends on how old they were before their nrp got into a relationship, their relationship before, and depends on the personality of the children.

I think that expecting a 5 yo to join in in family life, when say the SM has a 5 yo too and they have a 3 yo together makes complete sense and indeed, 121 might not be so essential.

Totally different to say a 13yo, whose parents were separated since they were 3 and got their dad for themselves for 10 years, and then are suddenly expected to embrace family life with two step-children who are say 3 and 4 yo. In that instance, I would say that 121 is absolutely essential if dad doesn't want to end up with a teenager who doesn't want to come any longer.

Swing that can happen with full siblings too come to think of it. My ex was an only child until he was 12, then his two full siblings were born and he couldn't cope with not being the "only child " anymore. He went off the rails his siblings were now getting most of the attention from his parents so he would go off and drink alcohol and bunk off school.

Raising children is such a minefield.
So many things you can do as a parent or a step parent that can have such profound effects.
Then you have the added worry of the teenage years and how it will affect the relationships you've worked so hard to build.
All of this is made do much harder when parents can't work together in their children's best interest.
How can a step parent ever hope to get it right when there are so many rules that we have to abide that a parent doesn't have to even bother to acknowledge.

When I was studying psychology we did an entire module on fairy tales and how they came into being as warnings to people as to the dangers that exist in the world. It's theorized that the whole evil stepmother/parent thing was a basic form of warning - not so much that stepparents are evil but that step families should be avoided because they just don't work. This is not my theory (before anyone jumps on me) it's what we were taught on the origins of storytelling.
@HerondaleDucks - I know you'd a positive experience with your sf & a lot of step families DO work, but I can understand the warning systems that previous generations put in place. It's bloody hard work & I have to say that I'm at the point where I really feel the effort isn't worth the return. It's not the sdc's as people that are the problem - it's everything else; the logistics of drop offs & collections; dp & his exw's horrible non functional relationship; having to stand back & watch kids you like being stuck in the middle of broader family dynamics without being able to say anything; having their dm moan because you do too much with them; having her moan because you don't do enough with them; having your own dcs impacted by all this; the being expected to drop everything when the sdcs are here & even the simple stuff like endless laundry & cleaning. I have never felt so drained in my entire life. Rearing my own kids is hard enough but at least I am somewhat in charge. Nothing prepared me for how parental I'm expected to be toward my dsc but without being able to express any level of input as to their wellbeing or any level of expectation as to their behaviour.
I consider myself a fairly intelligent person but when I first met dp I naively thought that him also having kids was a good thing as we would be able to understand each other's lives. This has been true to a certain extent but boy did I get it wrong thinking we could pull together on parenthood - I totally underestimated the impact of the other parents and other external factors.

I agree about the teenage years and often wonder what my dsc will be like when he wants to see his dad but his mum restricts it. Will he just accept it or will say "fuck off Mum I want to see my dad."

I found i heartbreaking when I read the paperwork she filled out for the court order and she had ticked the box to say whether she would agree, if decided by the court, that my dp couldn't have contact via text, phone, email or social media until he is 18 or otherwise reviewed by the court. She ticked yes to agree to this if necessary! Luckily the court didn't order that and dismissed her claims of him being a monster and issued a regular eow and holidays order.

But she still ticked that box... imo she would love nothing more than to have him out their sons life purely just to have him all to herself.

Magda it is hard isn't it with the level of expectation with their behaviour. You want to put into place certain expectations but at the same time worry if it's too harsh, even though your own kids have those expectations put upon them.

I've found it hard with my dsc in putting certain boundaries in place. He has zero table manners which I find frustrating. When I try and show him certain table manners he just doesn't really listen and he will get cross with my dp if he does the same.

I have a pre-teen dd who is very developed and I've had to tell my dsc not to grope her or burst into her room. He doesn't burst in anymore which is good but he does grope her bum at times (which both me and dp have told him off for.) When I first came on the seen he kept squeezing my bum and even groped my boobs a few times. I expressed a complete dislike of this to my dp, who spoke to him, but it took a while to stop.

I don't think this would go on at home because his Mum certainly doesn't strike me as someone who would allow him to grope her.

It is hard work and frustrating to say the least, especially when you only see them twice a month.

swing I think our discussion is exactly why parental alienation hasn’t been a topic the whole system has (I think) purposefully delayed handling it. It is deeply complex with many facets. Cafcass have been deeply criticised for their complete inability (until fairly recently) to even recognise that it is a thing. Very senior and tenured family court judges are coming out and confirming that this has existed for decades but that the problems are becoming much worse.

Subtle parental alienation is deeply hard to prove, very dangerous and isn’t a long term play. Yes I can see your point, if your parenting is rubbish or the child genuinely has a problem - the default should not be ‘my ex is alienating my child’.

But; equally it happens, it exists (as per your example) and along with your debate of questioning ‘is this alienation or is something else going on?, there needs be a general acknowledgement that maternal or paternal implacable hostility can exist post separation and it takes very little to push that hostility into manipulation of the children.

But for those people who have been fighting for years (yes there are many) for progression in contact arrangements, like my DP. It is very clear that the red flags of parental alienation are there. Now we just need the judges to open their minds to the reality of the damage of parental alienation and start to put very clear warnings out to parents who engage in certain behaviours. It is very difficult to manage however when contact arrangements are so deeply contested. And the NRP has limited windows to combat the manipulation.