Moving in together - how to prepare

[TheBeastAwakens]

Hi

I've been with my SO over 18 months - we're both in our 40s and have a child each. We've spoken before about moving in together and it's something I'd love to do in the next year or so. Our kids - my DS11 and his DD6 - have met a couple of times and we've spent a little time with each other's kids on their own. Everyone gets on fine.

The thing is I feel that if we're going to live together we need to make more of an effort with the kids. We usually spend time alone with each other and haven't really been prioritising time spent with the four of us or even with three. Other people are beginning to assume we all do things together - for instance - I was asked the other days did we bring 'the kids' somewhere and I was momentarily confused and said 'I only have one'. My SO says people have asked him the same thing.

It's not that I care what other people think - it's just I'm worried it isn't a good sign that we do very little together with our children. We've only all been together twice. I want my SO but the thoughts of putting together a family situation is quite scary to me, and I guess that's because I'm not sure what I'm getting myself into. We get on brilliantly as a couple but there's awkwardness around suggesting doing anything with the children.

So - any advice on negotiating this? I want this to work so I guess we should be ramping up the days with all of us together. I just don't know how best to go about it. Is there a lot of adjustment going from doing things as a couple to 'family' things?

I can't speak from personal experiences of joining two families, but what you posted here makes sense.

Perhaps you could all plan a vacation together. Although a vacation is not indicative of every day life, it is usually quite a challenge for any family to handle and coordinate. It can be a lot of fun, but also creates stress. You can then have a look at how you all respond to each other when the pressure is up and take your lessons from there.

Disclaimer: I am by no means an expert. This is just a thought that popped into my head while reading your post.

Definitely need to start spending more time together before even considering moving in together. Getting along great with a boyfriend you've fallen in love with is the easy part. The accepting them as a parent to their child and how they consider your own parenting to yours is a completely different matter and a much more difficult part of making a relationship work.

You need to start having honest talk about your attitude to parenting, money, family, exes, etc.... And then getting a feel when all together whether you are indeed on the same wavelength otherwise it is only a disaster waiting to happen and lives a lot more damage once you are living together.

Thanks CaptSkippy and swingofthings

It does seem very difficult and it's something I'm not particularly looking forward to. I'm not sure that's a bad sign or just realistic. Even though we all got on well I haven't really enjoyed any of the times we've spent together because I was anxious about how it was going.

I guess the other option is to just continue as we are for the foreseeable future - the only problem with that is he only has his apartment for another year or so and I want more than we have now.

If you both plan on renting, whether you move in together or not, than a year should give you more than enough time. I'd say starting discussing, evaluating and testing your time together for the next six months. That should give you enough time to decide whether or not to move in together.