Mil favours step-daughter

[Poppy420]

This is my first post on here, i just need some advice as i feel like my head will explode.
To give you the run down, when me and my man met he already had a daughter who was 2 at the time and i had a son was was 3 and a daughter who was almost 2.
We've been together almost 5 years now and have a son together who will be 3 in october.
It's been a rough ride making sure everything is fair and that none of them miss out. My family took his daughter on asif she was mine and has always treated her as such. But she doesn't live with us and the other 3 do.
My partners mum dotes on her. Takes her on holidays and fancy days out leaving out the other 3. At Christmas she brings 1 present each for my 2 but saves loads at her house for my youngest and my step daughter.
It makes my blood boil that she doesnt care about leaving them out, she doesnt care that she's the only person in the kids lives that makes it unfair.
My step daughter will come and brag about the things she's done with mil, upsetting my 2 kids..
She wanted to take my youngest on holiday with step daughter, i said no because of how it would make my other 2 feel...its discusting.
My partner confronted her about it n all she cause say is that she was past caring.
I am angry and upset. I feel powerless. I've even thought of leaving my partner over all this, thinking my children would have a happier upbringing without all this bull.
It's not their fault they aren't his kids.
Thank you in advance for any feedback, I'm goin mad here

Your majorly overreacting 😆. Man I would love that problem .

She's said things to her in front of me, one time i complimented step daughters dress n she said it was just because i want it for my daughter. A small thing i know, i just wanted to make her feel good and mil turned it into something sour.
Step daughter probably does say things, she feels she is better than my 2 cause she is spoiled from all angles and voices it. Im aware kids can be vicious at times so i just tell her shes not bein very nice if shes bein harsh.
There doesnt seem to be a way to fix this, she kept her all this week when she was meant to be here, we've had to put off doing things with the other kids so she didnt miss out.

I couldnt do that, its mean.
I dont understand why some people are so heavily concentrated on blood all the time.
They are all young kids at the end of the day. No need to spoil some and not others.
I think its a nice thing to teach children to be kind and giving to everyone.
I learnt alot from my mil on how not to be.
I would keep her at a distance op.
Dont bother with her as much.
You arent blood related to her after all....

But why stop doing things with your own dc? They shouldn't miss out! Ask your step daughter to decide. Do you want to go to Nana or do you want to come to the cinema with us? Not everyone can do everything.

Let me give you the perspective of a grown up child of a blended family. My step-brothers Grandparents gave myself and my full brother token gifts and showered my Step-brother every Christmas. They never gave my full brother and I birthday presents etc.

My grandparents were all dead, so we didn't get presents from them either.

Did it bother us? Not at all! We understood that they weren't really related to us and had no expectation of gifts from them.

It's nice that your MIL gives your children gifts but you're being unreasonable in my opinion to expect her to treat them all the same. Of course she feels differently about them. You need to focus on teaching your children to find self worth outside of what other people give them.

"she kept her all this week when she was meant to be here, we've had to put off doing things with the other kids so she didnt miss out."

This sounds bonkers. If she is at her Nans it shouldnt stop you from doing things with your own kids! Take your kids out shes at her Nans.
And why is she keeping her when shes meant to be with you?

I think you'd be better off managing your own children's expectations, and explain that DSD is MIL granddaughter that she has known and loved from when she was a baby, so of course they are closer and see each other more.

Explain to them that this is fine, it is sometimes how things are in the world. They have their own separate grandparents. That the the focus here - they THEY could be doing more. It's not MIL's fault if your DC's family aren't great.

I don't think she should be expected to fork out to take the other 2 on holiday. Their own grandparents are capable of that.

I think it is less reasonable to expect MIL to always invite your 2 when she is seeing DSD.

The father of my 2 has them occasionally but is busy buildin another family and leaves them out.
Step daughters mother isnt bothered, she spoils her as she is her only child.
Seems she gets spoiled from all angles and my 2 are left out all the time. Breaks my heart

THIS is your issue.

It's not your MILs fault that your children's father and his family aren't treating them the same as she treats her grandchildren of that your DPs ex treats your DSD.

Why should your MIL have to step up just because your Ex and his family aren't?

This isn’t just a present problem is it? What’s the real problem. Is your MIL a bit of a knob!

I totally agree you don't cancel things you would do because your step daughter is not there. Of course it is not nice if you purposefully arrange things to miss her visits, but the whole point is the kids have different good stuff each and then some overlapping good stuff, because they have different lives. Your kids get good stuff too, which your SD sometimes missed, while your SD gets good stuff they sometimes miss. That is much more sustainable than trying to pretend everybody's lives are exactly the same and everybody gets exactly the same.....

Its more than just the major difference in presents, she has step daughter alot, she has her own room at her house.
I come from a blended family too, i had no grandparents or anyone other than my mother, i saw my younger siblings get spoiled rotten n it hurt..just because of who my dad was (who wasnt in my life, nor was any of his family)
I made it my life mission never to allow a child feel like that, no matter what. If someone wants to be a heartless cretin i cant stop them.
I cant force anyone to care.
I just want our 4 kids to be happy and free from any hurt.

But I'd also nip the calling MIL "Nana" in the bud too.

While it's not fair for you to expect anything of her it's similarly not fair that she gets perks like this without being forthcoming with the equal treatment either IYSWIM?

It's not your MILs fault that your children's father and his family aren't treating them the same as she treats her grandchildren

That - and it's not nice to resent a little girl because she has more involved grandparent than your children. The MIL is not the issue here.

Your DSD and your DS are your MIL’s grandchildren. It therefore stands to reason that she would take them away with her, and not your children. There is no reason for her needing to do so. Equally it is not up to her to compensate for the life and experiences your own children don’t have.

I think this is very true. When you choose to blend your family it's on you to treat them equally, it's not really fair to demand that of other people who didn't make that choice. If she spends a lot of time with your kids and has a close bond with them that's nice, but she is allowed to feel more of a connection to her own family and want to spend time with them. A holiday with four + kids, two of which you don't have a familial bond with or often the authority to police their behaviour, is a lot of hard work for an elderly couple who just want the odd experience with their own family and didn't have a choice in the matter of including more.

I think the issue comes from the fact that this is different from what your parents do. The sensible thing to do is raise all the children to understand and accept that they each have their own families that are a bit different and that's ok, but everyone is still friends. Your parents should also feel entitled to do the odd thing with just yours. It's really not an upsetting issue when they understand that, everyone has grandparents they're just not the same as each other.

Op, that's the challenge though. Because of your own experience, this is a highly distressing issue and you risk shoving all that distress into your children because you are interpreting your MIL's actions as a repetition of how you felt as a child.

The more relaxed you can be about this, the more relaxed your children will be.

I know - easier said than done! 😕

It’s understandable to be honest. It’s difficult for her to single out your son together and ignore your other two as they are siblings so she seems to have decided she needs to treat them all fairly. She does, however, have a separate granddaughter. So if she wants to go on holiday with a grandchild, she can either take their GDD or take all four, including two who aren’t actually her DGC. I get that it seems unfair, but it probably isn’t as unfair as it sounds.

A friend has two brothers. The brothers have had 5 marriages between them. They have blended families of 11 children in total - 3 blood nieces/nephews and the rest stepnieces/nephews that have come along with each marriage. She's been expected all along to give gifts to all the children but as the numbers mounted up, it was costing her a lot of money!
Now she just gives everyone a card for their birthdays/Xmas and has set up trusts for her blood nieces & nephews - and no, her brothers don't know about it and they are not trustees.
Blended families are a nightmare & someone always gets offended.... Who knows who is right or wrong in your case?
Best of luck for the future.

You can't make everything smooth sailing for them all because blended families are really tough. I think you're expecting too much of your MIL. Try to reframe it to think it's great she's close to your youngest and your DHs kid, it could be worse. Expecting people to take on other people's children is bound for heartache. Of course some people will be fine with it but others won't.

Yeah its very difficult, i suppose your right though. My partner has always been hard on me to make sure everyone includes his daughter because his dad left him out.
And i dont resent her, im just gettin extremely frustrated with it all.
Hence me considering walking away, it feels like I'm the only one tryin so damn hard to keep things goin

Watching with interest as I am going to be the mil in this situation very soon. I have read threads of this type before and to be fair it has put me off meeting the soon to be sgc.

I understand that you want everything to be fair and equal for all DC, but the reality is that it’s never going to happen.
For now it’ll be days out and presents, when they’re older it’ll be university/cars/weddings and possibly even inheritance.
Tbh, it sounds as if MIL is trying to show some sort of decency by not turning up with a massive pile of presents for DSD infront of the other DC but leaves them at her house instead - perhaps she could go one step further though and keep those gifts there for DSD, seeing as how she spends a lot of time there.
You’re not helping the inequality by delaying trips and events with your own DC when DSD isn’t there - its not as if she’s missing out on trips etc during the same time so why should she get it all? This might be contributing to her attitude of knowing she can have it all and why she tries to rub your DCs noses in it. It might give her a little bit of a realisation that not everyone gets the same and things are becoming more balanced when she comes and brags about going to the cinema with her nan, for your DC to pipe up and say that they went on a nice day out too when. And I don’t mean that any DC need to be bitchy about it, but in a world where people enjoy different things then they all get nice treats but with different family members.

Your mil sounds horrible. There is no justification for that comment about the dress.
Leaving your dp won't fix it though - she will have access to your son without you being there to manage the situation and you will lose access to your step daughter. If you are willing to do that because you believe you must put your own children first, then you aren't seeing all the children as 'equal' either!
The world is divided into two camps - those who can love other people's children and those for whom blood is the only thing which matters. Your mil is the latter and the best way to manage that is to see her as little as possible and expose your DC to her as little as possible. Don't allow her to keep your dsd when she is meant to be with her dad and stop holding back on your own plans - give your children the best life they can have with you. Don't allow mil to be called gran by your two - if they stop seeing her as family, they won't have their self esteem damaged by her bad behaviour.
I don't think mil is obliged to love your children as she loves her grandchildren, but she is obliged not to make catty remarks about you or your children and this is something I would get my DH to tackle with her. If she isn't nice you don't need his or anyone else's permission to go no contact with her.

I dont want to lose contact with my step daughter, I've already asked if i could still see her if we broke up n he said yes.
It's just so hard and i feel so alone in tryin to make it all right.
Why can't people just be alright with each other and do whats right by the children?

I think she is being unreasonable - I get that they aren't her grandchildren, but would it kill her to treat them all fairly? Like in what way would it actually hurt her to be equally kind to all of the children in this family?

Kids don't understand favouritism or blood ties or any of that bullshit. You can't tell them to be reasonable about being hurt.

It shouldn't be difficult for her to treat them all kindly, fairly is great but fair in who's eyes? No everyone thinks and feels the same as you.