My ex left me when our youngest child was 10 months old. Affair had been going on for a while. They are now married, and I am also very happily remarried; I have zero interest in her except as far as her relationship with my children goes and they seem to like her.
My ex has been having some fairly serious health problems recently - symptoms actually which would strongly point to bowel cancer, and he has been in a real tizz about this. It turns out from test results that he does not have cancer but does actually have a fairly serious and unpleasant condition.
Over the Christmas break therefore, I have had the kids (7 and 3) on his weekends to help out and also had them over their school holidays except for three nights.
Today, he called me at seven a.m. to ask when I could have the children back ASAP as they “ need time together” and “although I’ve had the kids he and wife haven’t had quality time whilst I’ve had them all the extra time as he’s been so anxious about his health”.
I said I’d be back to have them by lunchtime (it’s technically his day and obviously I haven’t had time alone with my husband due to helping out ex- she needs quality time with him and I should have come back early to facilitate this!)
Am I being unreasonable to think I’ve bent over backwards to help them and be pissed off that that’s not good enough for her and to resent being slagged off when actually I’ve been really very flexible and done what’s in the best interests of my kids?
My husband has two teenage kids to whom I am step mum; she is late twenties and 12 years older than my ex and has no kids of her own although she is a teacher of KS1.