Moving in with new partner but teens are saying no

[palindrome666]

I've been separated from my ex for 6 years and he now lives abroad. We have two girls, 16 and 20 and I am the sole carer. One at home, the other at uni. Two and a half years ago I met my new partner who lives 150 miles away. We have fallen in love but taken things very slowly for the kids' sake. But my girls have been quite hostile to him from the start, although we did manage a holiday together last summer with his 2 boys and my younger DD (and her friend). He stayed with us over the first lockdown. But still they haven't softened towards him, even though he's a lovely man and very easy going (the rest of my family adore him). We are both committed to the relationship and want to live together in a new home in the city where he lives. With my eldest moving into her final year at uni, and my younger DD about to start 6th form, summer 2021 seems the best time. I've floated the idea to them but they have flat-out refused to move. I'm less concerned about my older DD who is flying the nest, but feel for my younger who wants to stay here where her friends and family are. I've said that we will visit regularly and her friends can come and visit us but she's adamant that she won't go. I'm wondering if anyone has experienced similar with their kids and how they resolved it? Is it time for tough love or should I respect her wishes and stay put, putting my own feelings and needs aside?

I think that many of you who are happily cohabiting with a partner need to give their heads a wobble. Living on your own is NOT FUN. Sorting every fucking thing out on your own. Paying for everything yourself. Fixing everything organising everything. Having no one to have a glass of wine with after a bad day. No one to sit in the garden with on a summers evening. Maybe you're happy with it. Or you don't have to because you are married.

I have no partner and no way would I pick a partner over a child for the sake of 2 years. And yes, it is just 2 years because after that they just come home occasionally from Uni or are independent adults after Uni (yes, I have examples of both those too, plus a 15 year old)

OP just take your daughter to family therapy (a short term one - on zoom) so they can work with this because she is BU and that's not going away and say yes.

Family therapy is really not about making one member of the family swallow their feelings so they can "agree" with a decision they have already said they do not want. No counsellor with any integrity would enter into therapy with this as the end goal.

Allow her a choice of room (not above you and DP) and make sure she has privacy and an en-suite likes the area and the house. Offer her an incentive of an item she wants and explain the advantages to her very clearly.

More money. Closer to shops and things to do. This is a chance to change things she doesn't like.

But no friends.

A couple of years in the grand scheme of things isn't going to make that much difference. Moving her now will have such a huge impact on her and the next phase of her life. I can see you can see the benefits for her moving to a city, however she's never lived in a city or that location and maybe she doesn't want to. I'd leave it and see how it is in a few years time

@growinggreyer

OP just take your daughter to family therapy (a short term one - on zoom) so they can work with this because she is BU and that's not going away and say yes.

Family therapy is really not about making one member of the family swallow their feelings so they can "agree" with a decision they have already said they do not want. No counsellor with any integrity would enter into therapy with this as the end goal.

I didn't say it was. In this case it's about being able to move through unreasonable or unfair feelings and situations and communicate. Maybe the daughter has real reasons for her hatred? Or maybe she just needs to feel heard? Maybe there's something else going on we don't know about eg first love? Or maybe she needs to see that mums life is important too? Great she's got her friends - but if she saw her friends as much as mum sees her DP she might be very unhappy?

They live in the 'boondocks' as the op said. So hardly likely she's hanging out with her mates at all at the moment. And in a small school it's harder to find your 'tribe'. Kids you have a lot in common with. So those two things mean it's possible she doesn't have a big group of close knit friends she will be devastated to leave. Maybe that's why she's so negative? You're all assuming but basing your assumptions on the usual setup which is houses, shops, and friends nearby. They don't have that.

@SoupDragon everyone's lives are being upended at the moment. Going to a new school is common at this age (I know several teenage girls that did it and thrived) and going to school in this climate is easier as new groups will form. Shitloads of people are moving house - to the country etc. Everything's new.

She will make friends. It will open up her life, and good parenting doesn't just mean giving them what they want, it's giving them what's best for them.

Given it's only 2 years until your younger DD finishes school, I'd stay where you are until then if I were you OP. We've been in and out of lockdown for almost a year, so you know the time will fly by! If she'd have been 6, and not 16, my advice would have been the opposite.

@Myshinynewname2021 you seem to be projecting your own experience of living alone onto others, and assuming that just because we are married now we have no experience of it prior to our marriages.

I lived by myself prior to meeting DH and unlike the OP I have no DC's and no close family so it really was just me, myself and I. Hardly any friends either - exH had seen to that. But whilst I felt some of the stresses and strains you describe, it was ok. Moving in with DH added way more stress to my life by virtue of him having children and all the complicated dynamics which come along with step parenting. If I had my time again I'd have stayed living apart (and did in fact move out for two years to live by myself until the dynamic changed once again).

No one is saying OP should throw her DD out the minute she turns 18, but it's at that point the DD is free to make her own choices and can take steps to live elsewhere if she doesn't want to be in a city she doesn't know sharing her home with a man (and his two boys) that she has no interest in getting more familiar with.

I've been with DP for two years, we'd like to move in together but I have a DD in sixth form, moving is an absolute non starter until she's finished school. DD gets on with him but doesn't want him living with us even part time (for reasons I won't go into).

Once she's left school and she's at university I will move in with him (potentially in his neighbouring town) and she'll have to suck it up when she's home.

going to school in this climate is easier as new groups will form.

Which "going to school" is this? No one is "going to school" and we have no idea how this is going to pan out.

I get it. You think it's fine to uproot a 16 year old in these isolated times just so you can be with a new partner. I think it's a shit thing to do at any time but especially now.

good parenting doesn't just mean giving them what they want, it's giving them what's best for them.

This has nothing to do with "what's best for them" and everything to do with "what one parent wants".

Oh and for everyone saying it's two years have none of you got children over 18 living at home? because a child leaving at 18 is not the norm. It's not two years it's five.
@Myshinynewname2021 - that's true but the difference in two years time is that she will be an adult. She won't be forced to live anywhere she doesn't want, go to a school where she knows no one. If she goes to uni she can get a long term contract in a house or halls and only visit for a few weeks. She doesn't have to come home for the long summer vacation. At 16 she is powerless. She'd be uprooted from her friends, her school, her home to live 150 miles away because of someone she doesn't like. I can't believe that will turn out to be an easier situation for OP than staying put for two years and explaining clearly that once she turns 18, OP is moving and she will be welcome to come too but doesn't have to.

Moving when DD goes to uni isn't the ideal that everyone claims ime.
Once at uni DD's only home is in a new city with new people to return to - so she probably will choose not to return whereas if you move her now she will make friends in the new school, perhaps get a job for weekends, another way to make friends and feel settled. Then once at uni she has a home and friends to return to at holidays, where does she go if DM has moved in with a partner?

I wonder. Do they not want to move to the city? Or not want to live with him? If it really is a better place to live, can you and your girls move into a place of your own in the new location, you can get your business going, DD2 can start Year 12 at the new school, you can see DP more frequently.

@Schehezarade I agree. Just saying you're 18 now and I'm moving and you don't really have a room unless you want to come to this place you've never been before.. feels colder to me than moving now.

Uni students especially in the first year are notorious for expecting to come home for the holidays back to their rooms which are exactly as they were left. They get more holidays than schools and halls of residence are empty in them. Going home to mum and dad is what they do.

My niece (changed schools at 16, and did well) has just gone to uni and will not give up her huge bedroom. She would be hysterical if she had to swap with her brother though may mellow. Eventually. We barely saw her at Christmas but she still wants everything exactly how she wants it. She's lovely but like all girls that age it's all about her. Mum is there as a domestic appliance/sympathetic ear. Dad to do diy things in her room. It's just her age and for her as for many it's all about controlling the people at home snd has been for a few years. I love her very much, and even I can see that.

My nephew however is concerned with getting away with doing what he wants and is less bothered about getting other people to do what he wants.

Kids especially girls CAN be controlling. They grow out of it but they do go through a phase if wanting everyone to do exactly what they think they should, and they don't like sharing. Given half a chance they would have mum in brown sacks not leaving the house except to go shopping for food or driving them places 😁.

Btw I think the op gave up reading this thread when everyone wasn’t in agreement with her

@SparklyPixie

Btw I think the op gave up reading this thread when everyone wasn’t in agreement with her

I think you are right. We also have almost no background. Where's dad? I bet he lives with his partner because it's ok for men. No one minds. What's he like? Is he part of the reason the girls are so unaccepting of the bf? Tricky exes can easily manipulate children. Does her daughter have a close friendship group of girls nearby? How long has she been on her own?

I kind of don't blame her - it's not unfair to want some kind of life and happiness for yourself. If she's been alone all through the children's lives she probably doesn't want to throw this away or do anything that puts it at risk. But we dont know. But we do know that literally no one has ever demanded that a father who is in a stable relationship give that up for his children.

But we do know that literally no one has ever demanded that a father who is in a stable relationship give that up for his children.
That’s a fair point, but it’s also true that fathers tend to be the NRP, and often on here it’s said that contact with teens drops off as they are more interested in their own lives. Harder to build your life around someone who isn’t there most of the time.

Give her a year, but keep the idea going for her. Take her to several visits to the city you want to live in to let her see the opportunities, and see if you can persuade her to go at 17. Otherwise it's very unfair.

@SparklyPixie

Btw I think the op gave up reading this thread when everyone wasn’t in agreement with her

Not at all.

But I realise it's far too complex to respond to every opinion. I know my daughters and I love them above all else. Setting our situation down in a couple of hundreds words is impossible and expecting a nuanced response was misguided. I was hoping to hear from other mothers who've experienced a similar situation. I appreciate everyone has an opinion but I sense that some are more informed, while others have a knee-jerk reaction. Simply calling me names isn't helpful and I'm not going to get involved in that. I have had some really thoughtful responses as well (both for and against the move) and I've read them all and appreciate them.

‘Nuanced response’ = posters who agree with you, right?

Don’t move your DD while she is this age.

If you do, you’re putting the needs of your partner and his kids above your own.

@palindrome666 please wait until your DD leaves home to move in with your DP. Most teenagers would think it’s unfair to be forced to leave their friends and home to live with relative strangers just to enable their mum to have regular sex and a man about the house.

My advice is based on my relationship with my DM - we are no contact - and part of the trouble was her inability to prioritise my needs as a child over her need to have a man in the house. I don’t want to be alarmist and of course I don’t know if your DD will feel this strongly, but you need to think through the consequences of your actions.

In any case, no one wants to live with a disgruntled teenager. I guarantee your blended family life in any forced move will be awful. That’s not manipulation, that’s teenage hormones.

Spend the next two years getting everything planned out and organised. Make sure your DDs know that this is going to happen. Encourage them to get to know your DP as they will be visiting you both in future. Enjoy building your path to the future and preparing your youngest to leave home in a kind supportive way.

[quote NameChange2PostThis]@palindrome666 please wait until your DD leaves home to move in with your DP. Most teenagers would think it’s unfair to be forced to leave their friends and home to live with relative strangers just to enable their mum to have regular sex and a man about the house.

My advice is based on my relationship with my DM - we are no contact - and part of the trouble was her inability to prioritise my needs as a child over her need to have a man in the house. I don’t want to be alarmist and of course I don’t know if your DD will feel this strongly, but you need to think through the consequences of your actions.

In any case, no one wants to live with a disgruntled teenager. I guarantee your blended family life in any forced move will be awful. That’s not manipulation, that’s teenage hormones.

Spend the next two years getting everything planned out and organised. Make sure your DDs know that this is going to happen. Encourage them to get to know your DP as they will be visiting you both in future. Enjoy building your path to the future and preparing your youngest to leave home in a kind supportive way.[/quote]
And I wanted to add.
Maybe your youngest DD won’t leave home at 18... but she will be an adult then. And as PPs have said will be able to make adult choices.
So, having spent two years telling her your plans, your DD will be fully informed and able to make her own decision about whether she moves with you or not.

As a teenager who was uprooted from Everything she knew so mum could be happy it was awful, depressing, and utter shit.

Also, need to give their heads a wobble fucking HATE IT when this phrase is used on mumsnet!! Rant over.