My Wife Hates My Kids

[dad4]

This is the first time I have ever posted about this and still not sure, but I would really welcome your thoughts if you don't mind.

I know I'm a dad...Am I allowed on here

I have kids and when they were very young their mum sadly passed away. I gave up work to look after them, then went part-time.

After about 6 years I met someone else, it was a whirlwind romance and everything was wonderful. I felt alive again after having nursing my wife through a horrendous illness. I started to smile again.

After being together for a while I proposed and she thankfully said YES . Everything was great at the start and my wife and her 2 kids (roughly the same ages as mine) moved in.

I started to spend a lot of time away as I was trying to build a business. I would come back and most of the time would receive the news that my kids had 'played up' while I was away, especially my daughter (9 years old approx).

Things went from bad to worse. I was not taking control of the situation and now I can completely see it from my wife's point of view. I could have nipped my daughters behaviour in the bud but on most occassions I would either side with my daughter or say 'she's only a child'.

She wasn't doing anything nasty, just perhaps testing my wife, perhaps she was jealous and thought my wife was taking over as her mum, I explained to her that would never happen.

Fast forward a couple of years and my wife moved out with her 2 children. I was devastated and tried to make up. Thankfully after some time she allowed me back into her life but we lived in separate houses.

We are getting along better now than ever, we love each other very much and have a great time together. However, there is an underlying problem....

My daughter is now 20, my wife moved out when my daughter was 10! My daughter is the most caring, loving person but I cannot mention her at all in the presence of my wife without a massive argument. I cannot take phone calls from my daughter in the presence of my wife (heaven forbid she was in an emergency!). My daughter has said on many occasions that she will meet with my wife to move forward and is happy that I have someone in my life, however my wife refuses.

I hate this, it's tearing me apart, really.

I can understand my wife's hatred (and it is), but I keep emphasising that my daughter was just a child at the time, if she needs anyone to blame it should be ME for not handling the situation better.

I would welcome any comments or views. Don't worry, I can handle cold, hard truths, but I would appreciate an 'independent' view.

Thank you for taking the time to read this

Well it doesn’t come from nowhere. Plenty of step parents love unconditionally. Many clearly don’t. I think this shows you have to be really careful when you blend families.

I think. You need to start distancing yourself from your wife, if you only spend your spare time with her or with your DCs this won't change.
Someone who hates over such trivial issues has problems but not just due to your DD, I think there must be more to it from your wife's background.

That’s what I’m saying - it doesn’t come from nowhere. We are struggling with a list of life issues that would make a soap writer blush right now so things are not as good as they once were between all of us.

What I’m saying is that it has to be a two way thing. How can a step parent love unconditionally when everyday is a host of reminders saying “not your child, not your place”? It’s a big deal and very tricky to navigate.

Yes 'hatred' is a strong word but it is a good descriptor, it's exactly how she feels. 10 years is a long time, I'm very much in the NOW, I don't forget the past but I can't live my life in the past. Yes, my wife agrees that this is a thing she needs to exorcise but it's proving very difficult.

As the adult DD in a similar situation (no bereavement, but the abused parent enabling the other's abuse and forcing this on their DC), I would say that you will need to stand up to your wife or risk losing your DD.

I should imagine she's already spent years devastated by the fact you prioritised her abuser's feelings over hers and enabled the shitty treatment she received at the hands of your wife, so much of the damage is already done.

By encouraging DD to see things from your wife's perspective, you're inadvertently telling her to de-prioritise her own feelings because they don't matter as much as your wife's to you. From the fact she's prepared to sit down with your wife and to comply with the wife's demands merely to be able to have a relationship with you, it sounds like you've already conditioned her to accept your wife's unreasonable and nasty behaviour (as you do), and that's a terrible thing for a parent to do.

In my case, one parent groomed me to be a doormat and accept abuse because they accepted it on their own behalf and needed me to accept it too to keep the family together. I've chosen not to engage now as I've had therapy and my eyes have been opened, but I went through years of hell because one parent enabled the other and inevitably dragged their children into their abusive relationship.

The notion of not wanting to live in the past is a convenient narrative for abused spouses to excuse their abusers' behaviour. But it's your DD who has been wronged here, so you should be thinking about the past as you and your wife have inflicted pain on DD.

FWIW, it sounds like your wife is emotionally immature and isn't able to appropriately articulate her anger at the difficult position you placed her in by leaving her to single-handedly raise your DC after marriage while you worked away. Naturally she didn't feel supported by you but its bizarre that she directed all her ire (that should have been directed at you) at a child.

You have let your DD down beyond belief and the fact you aren't allowed to have the relationships you say you want to have with family makes it quite clear that your wife is abusing you. If you choose your abusive spouse over your own DD, that's up to you, but you need to understand that it is a choice you're making.

@Giespeace I hear you!!! It’s like if you say you don’t get on with your mum, sister, mil whatever it’s like oh well families are tough etc etc. But when it’s a stepchild you are instantly the wicked witch of the west!! We don’t have that biological bond so have to work at it! Sometimes it just doesn’t work out even with the best will in the world.

None of that excuses the stepmother in thy is situation though, hating a child and festering a grudge is toxic

Your wife sounds cruel. Your daughter was young at the time, and likely still struggling from the loss of her Mother ( as I am sure you were). You became 'absent' (how she would have perceived it) and as children do, lashed out. Your wife was the adult there and got the brunt of it. I don't doubt it was unpleasant having dealt with blended family issues arising from my DC's Father's ''whirlwind'' romance.

Instead of placing the responsibility for your choices on you, she projects them on a child? She expects you to act as if your daughter does not exist? She cannot find it in herself to have empathy for the past behavior of a bereaving child or forgive the past? I suggest you put your children first and walk away. She sounds toxic.

Your wife needs to grow up. Her behaviour is ridiculous. If my husband treated my son like that it would totally taint my view of him. I couldn't be with someone like that.

What happened over the last 10 years? Did you try any sort of reconciliation? Did you ever have joint holidays or celebrations? What is your wife's view of the last ten years, including the last two or three?

@Pinkyxx

Your wife sounds cruel. Your daughter was young at the time, and likely still struggling from the loss of her Mother ( as I am sure you were). You became 'absent' (how she would have perceived it) and as children do, lashed out. Your wife was the adult there and got the brunt of it. I don't doubt it was unpleasant having dealt with blended family issues arising from my DC's Father's ''whirlwind'' romance.

Instead of placing the responsibility for your choices on you, she projects them on a child? She expects you to act as if your daughter does not exist? She cannot find it in herself to have empathy for the past behavior of a bereaving child or forgive the past? I suggest you put your children first and walk away. She sounds toxic.

Good point @Pinkyxx, thank you for taking the time to reply

What if you were simply a good fit as dating partners but not a good fit
for marriage.

As a group of people living together there just may not have been a compatible grouping. That does not necessarily mean that anything had to be "wrong" with any of you. It may just have been the wrong grouping at the wrong time.

Marriages and relationships end all of the time. There need not always be someone at fault. People are quick to look for someone or something to blame. Sometimes

You've let your daughter down badly by choosing to not just continue your relationship with your wife, who has treated your daughter appallingly, but in also in trying to justify her awful behaviour.

She lost her mum due to a tragic illness, and she's lost her dad because she wasn't enough of a priority to put her first

You shouldn't have put your new wife in the position you did (unless it was with her very full agreement) but that does not justify her treatment of a grieving child or her continuation of this pathetic grudge.
Very sad.

Oh no OP, sounds tough.

What are you thinking?

You seem besotted with your wife and you come across and trying to please her....but at the expense of your daughter? 'God knows what would happen in an emergency' seriously?

How can you be married to someone who 'hates' your own daughter? And has for a decade? Since your daughter was ten and adjusting to a blended family. Your wife sounds like a manipulative bully. I would feel so sad you had remained with someone who hated me if I was your daughter. Imagine how that feels. Agree you sound smitten with your wife, it's a blind spot and you're desperate not to lose her. Your daughter won't want her around future grandkids that much and that will make your relationship with them less good than it could be.

The question isn't whether your wife is worth it. As in maintaining this where you're with her even though she hates your daughter.

The real question is whether your daughter is worth it? Worth you leaving your wife I mean. I fucking hope you think she is or I feel heartbroken for her.

Your wife’s refusal to work at this is not only cruel to your daughter, it’s bound to tear you in two.

How is she with your other child?

Right or wrong, your wife doesn't have to have a relationship with your DD if she doesn't want to. It may be bitchy of her, but she still gets to make her own choices. BUT she doesn't have the right to tell you that you cannot speak to your DD when she calls and you are there. That's just petty. Just what exactly do you want? You can't force your wife to be around your daughter. But you can tell her that you won't ignore her calls.

And as cooperative and nice as your DD sounds, I'll bet she's extremely hurt that you talk to her about wanting them to 'heal the rift' or whatever term you use. Just stop it. Don't make her say things like she 'wants to meet with your wife to move forward'. Of course she says that! You're her dad, she doesn't want to cause you pain! I'm not saying she holds any animosity towards your wife, but in actuality it's probably the last thing she wants do, to meet with someone who has such animus towards her.

We can't always make the people we love, love each other.

I notice the op agrees only with those saying how vile the wife is, I also can tell how many on here are step parents and how many are parents with no idea what it's like to be either the step parent or the step child.

Not all kids are wonderful, not all step parents love their step children. Get over it.

Only thing that woukd make this situation make any sense is if your daughter did something that you don't know about or still says something behind your back to wife.

If this is not the case then what a load of rubbish. You don't even live with your wife. You can't have Christmas or birthdays as a family. Your wife is not kind. Your daughter must be suffering but quietly because she knows you suffered with her mum dying. Can you not see this woman is not a wife at all. Leave. Find someone who you can be a family with.

Not all kids are wonderful, not all step parents love their step children. Get over it.

True, but not al step parents forbid the other parent from having contact with their own children, do they?

I think the step-parent element is a bit of a red herring here as similar happened to me with my two biological parents. When one parent is abusive and controlling, it shouldn't be excused on the grounds 'some step-parents are just like that'.

I notice the op agrees only with those saying how vile the wife is

Well yes, it's far easier for the OP to continue to blame his wife completely for his predicament instead of facing up to the fact he's let his DD down massively and should have stood up to her in the first place and protected his relationship with his DD.

Not all kids are wonderful, not all step parents love their step children. Get over it

True. However to me there is a difference between saying that I don't want a relationship anymore with the SD and removing myself from the equation but still allowing my husband to carry on freely with his relationship with his child and doing what OPs wife does, not allowing him to talk to her etc...

I'm really not some 'i love my SC like my own children type' I've said on another thread that the only reason I'm a SP is because I want to be with their dad. If I had a magic wand, he wouldn't have any children tbh but I don't so I would never come in-between his relationship with his children even if I chose not to have one with them myself.

I notice the op agrees only with those saying how vile the wife is, I also can tell how many on here are step parents and how many are parents with no idea what it's like to be either the step parent or the step child.

I noticed this too. OP sounds very understanding of his wife's feelings in the initial post, but since then has only been replying to comments saying how vile she is, even though there have been balanced ones. Frankly, that's part of what's reinforcing my impression that the way she's feeling may be valid.

Personally I think it's absolutely unsurprising and fair enough that a new spouse left alone to look after their partner's two kids, especially when one of them is particularly difficult, would come away hating and not anything to do with said child. To me, that is a totally unfair position to put someone in. According to your OP, you routinely didn't have her back when you were around, too. Saying you could have done better is a massive understatement. She's not a vile monster for not liking your daughter like all the pearl clutches on here are quick to say, and if you think she is OP then your relationship is already doomed.

The trouble now is you're trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. She wants things to be separate but you don't. What she wants isn't unreasonable - she left 10 years ago because she didn't want to be around your kids anymore, now they're grown up she's agreed to rekindle things but living separately - she's sending you pretty strong signals that she wants your relationship to function separately from your family. You can keep trying to persuade her that she would get on with your daughter now if it's important to you that you all spend time together, but it's not going to work if there's an underlying tone that she's just a vile witch who hates your precious, angelic child for no good reason. It is valid for her to not want the kind of relationship that involves interacting as one big group.

True, but not al step parents forbid the other parent from having contact with their own children, do they?

Has she done this, though? I've just gone back through the whole thread to see if I've missed something because people keep saying this - but all I've seen OP say along these lines is that she gets annoyed if he talks about her or takes calls from her in her presence?

That may be a little unreasonable but it's hardly forbidding him to have contact with his own children is it, bearing in mind that he only sees his wife a few times a week and they don't live together. Most people don't take long phone calls in other people's houses and lots of people find it rude if they do, she's obviously going to be extra annoyed by it if it's someone she strongly dislikes. It doesn't sound nearly as extreme as forbidding him from having a relationship with his kids to me.

Your wife is holding a 10yr grudge against a child who lost their mum?

Get rid of the wife.

She hasn't forbidden him, there's huge amounts of info missing here. It would be really interesting to hear the wife's point of view.

Leaving your wife to care for your kids then when you're around showing her no support, support to the person who is essentially bringing them up and teaching them respect etc you come home and she has no back up. Oh dads home I can do what I like attitude. Your dd might be wonderful to you but has she always be wonderful to your wife. The woman who stepped into massive shoes after their mum passed away, she will never replace her and it sounds like she will never be good enough.

She is well within her rights to not want to have any sort of relationship with your adult daughter. Does she get annoyed because perhaps your dd is constantly phoning or always needing something? I feel you have missed out some important information and you've posted knowing that most women would vilify your wife and you would feel justified at being a crap dad and husband.

@MrsKingfisher completely agree with your comment