15 months in, not met the dc, should I be glad or sad..

[Allypallya]

Dp and I have been seeing each other for 15 month's now.
We're both divorced . Me with older teens, him with 2 primary school age.
He has them 5050.
He doesn't want to marry or blend families as he's had a hard time with the divorce and feels too wounded.
We see each other a lot, pretty much his free 50 percent and stay over 3 to 4 nights a week.
He hasn't introduced me to the dc or told his exw about me and I'm starting to feel off about it.
He's met my dc twice casually and they text each other funny things

I don't know whether to continue to take it slow and see what happens or realise I will always be a secret.
Should I just count my blessings? Sometimes it feels like I have the best of both worlds as I can just go home to my kids and have a breather but be with him having cuddles, I love yous, cooking lovely food etc.
Should alarm bells be ringing?

@KylieKoKo
I don't think that anyone suggested that OP was not entitled to the relationship that she wanted. He too is entitled to the relationship that he wants. No right or wrong, just 2 adults having to decide if there wants are compatible.

It may just be 2 people in different places on their life's journey. Each gets to decide which aspects of their lives they are willing to put on the tabl

and they each get to decide what they are willing to accept.

Life is good when you get to freely choose what you are willing to offer and what you are willing to accept. No one is being used or taken advantage of in that scenario. OP's partner, ( in whatever sense he defines team or partnership) was very upfront. She too gets to be upfront about what she is willing to accept. If there is a meeting of the minds, they remain together. If not, they move on to find a more compatible relationship.

@Tiredoftattler I think we agree.

There are posts just telling the op he's being a good dad she should just accept it. I was reminding her that she has options and it's ok to feel how she does. I'm not implying that her partner has to change.

Thank you for your comments.
He is an excellent dad, always always puts them first.
He was badly hurt by the divorce as was I, so we kept each other at arms length at first but have fully fallen for each other.
I suppose I just want a life with him, for people to know he's mine. So his ex not knowing I exist and being able to text him, call him about things grates on me. But thsts my issue and I probably need to grow up.

Allypallya, I don't think you are not grown up. We all want things at times which are not on the cards at the moment. Who knows what the future will bring?

Fifteen months is not very long considering the year we've had with all its restrictions. Wait until there is some semblance of 'normality' and re-assess the situation.

How long ago was his split and divorce, OP and do you know the circs? Your posts make it sound hugely acrimonious and I wonder if his ex will go tonto when she knows about you and do something stupid like stop contact.

Worth exploring the back story with him gently if you don’t know.

And if that’s the case, then he is right to take it slowly and to protect you, too. But it can’t go on for ever,

Knowing about you isn't going to reduce the messages and calls though.

Has he not even told his kids that he's dating? I understand why after 15 months you want his ex and kids to know about you

You’ll be washing all their dirty laundry, cooking all their meals and organising days out without a thank you soon enough.

No his kids don't know he's dating. They are both under 10, and the youngest still gets tearful, wants parents back together etc.
Exw drove the divorce. He says he feels he was to blame, took her for granted etc, she then had an affair.
He's very wounded and feels angry at the financial outcome of the divorce.
They split 4 years ago.
I need to accept it or move on, its been a weird time to meet someone with covid.
In my mind im hoping to see how we develop post lockdown.
I don't want to remain a secret forever. I can't put my finger on why, I suppose because to me, knowing how much he loves his kids, if he saw a future with me, he'd tell them ?
I don't know?
He still seems very guided by her in terms of parenting, thinks she's always right etc so I suspect he doesn't want to upset her.
She is likely to make it a big event I suspect he doesn't have the energy for

I’ve been seeing a 50/50 dad for almost a year (I have no kids) and he only told his kids and ex last week. His reasoning was that it was his first relationship since his divorce and he didn’t want to fuck it up, he wanted to make sure I was sure, he wanted to spend time with me without the kids first, to see if what we have had legs. We are also acutely aware that Covid time is not normal time, and it’s hard to make decisions that might be life changing for both of us at a period of time when it’s anything but normal.

We’re also in a part of the uk which has been locked down or on severe restrictions for all but 6 weeks since last March, so we’ve never been to the cinema, or out for dinner, and we’ve only been to the pub once in the whole of our relationship. We’re both aware that’s not normal, and making decisions that will affect kids, it’s not the right time to do it. When we meet it will be done very gradually, and I’m fine with that. I just cherish the time we have together.

OP,
He has said that he does not want to remarry. He is not keeping you a secret. If he does not plan to introduce you to his children, then he is right about your relationship being none of the ex wife's business. There would only be a need to know for her to know about you if you were in someway involved with her children.

Do you feel the need to inform your ex about this relationship? Do you feel the need to know whether your ex is dating or in a relationship?

There is a difference between privacy and secrecy. Obviously, he is not keeping you a secret if his friends and extended family know about you. As he has no intention of marrying or blending, he may feel tat that there is no need for his children or ex to know about you. That is simply keeping aspects of his life private from people who have no real need to know.

He may think of you as a romantic partner or team in a monogamous relationship but not in the sense of a life tying committed relationship.

You relationship may evolve into something different, but if you cannot accept this as all there may ever be then you are signing up for some up the road hurt and disappointment.

I would assume that your ex was very open and public about your relationship, and yet none of that openness led you to a good place.

If you are in a good place now, why try to force it into some preconceived notion of what it should be.? You aren't unhappy because you have not met his children. His children do not know about you, and assumedly they are happy in their uninformed state.
What would be gained by his introducing them to you?.

There is. no guarantee that you relationship status will change if they meet you, and a reasonably good chance that his relationship with them may be negatively impacted by introducing someone that he has no intention of living with or marrying. What would the children gain from this introduction at this early stage?

If you are not finding enough happiness in your current status to sustain your relationship, then maybe it is time to look for a man whose intentions better align with yours. Keep in mind that all change is not necessarily productive change and sometimes it is just activity that causes you to lose the positive things that you had .

Do whatever you feel that you need to do to maintain a life that brings you some joy and happiness.

@Tiredoftattler thank you for that post! It has made so much sense to me. I'm going to screen shot it and read it often.

[quote Allypallya]@Tiredoftattler thank you for that post! It has made so much sense to me. I'm going to screen shot it and read it often.[/quote]
I agree with you about Tiredoftattler's post. Very sensible!

I think we all have a lot of expectations about what relationships are and what they should be and if there is a dynamic that is different, this is somehow a concern. But often I think it’s just those expectations and whether or not they are being met rather than whether there is genuinely something lacking.

I was married to my ex husband, we had a totally conventional relationship with all that comes with that, yet we were very unhappy and the relationship failed.

I am now in a relationship that is less conventional and it suits me much better, however it has taken time to get to that place mentally and actually I think it would have been better if it had stayed more that way instead of drifting towards a more stereotypical set up, because we both felt that it “should”

I’m like you OP in that my children’s father is totally out of the picture so I don’t have that ongoing relationship with my ex. My partner’s ex was the one that instigated the split but he moved on to a new relationship first, and this has changed her behaviour and been problematic- I can see why your DP might be cautious if this is a concern because ultimately even with 50/50, a non resident father is more vulnerable.

When I was struggling with some aspects of our situation - including some feelings of jealousy about his communication with his ex - I remembered reading something that said basically “when I feel like this, what unmet need or insecurity is this triggering in me?”

In my case it was not having that coparenting relationship with my own ex and my insecurity that his ex was more important than me. I had to accept she is important to him but that doesn’t detract from our relationship.

I agree with the PP who says you are free to reflect on this and decide if it is a situation that suits you - I’d just say think about whether it really doesn’t suit you, or if it’s because it doesn’t fit expectations of romantic relationships.

Throw fireworks! The less involved you get, the better for your sanity!

I agree with other posters. There aren't any "alarm bells ringing" from his behaviour. It may not be aligned with what you want from a relationship, in which case you should end it and find someone with the same relationship priorities as yourself, but before doing that you should ask yourself honestly whether you really want blending and all that involves, or whether you just think you do because that's how most relationships work.

Personally I think you and your DP have the ideal set up!

It sounds like you have a good relationship, and like others have said you’re not exactly a secret, even though his ex and kids don’t know about you. I can see why he doesn’t want them to know if his youngest daughter wants her parents back together, however that separation is not sustainable in the long run, surely someone will see you out together and mention it to one of them.

What might mean your relationship won’t survive is that you want more integration with your lives and he does not. That may mean you are not compatible. Another that strikes me is that you are at very different parenting stages. He’s going to be caught up in the demands of parenting for another 10 years, yet you are at the end of that stage. You may find you are far more available to him than he is to you, and that may make things unbalanced as time goes on.

Even though you want more involvement in his life, if this is your first experience of a relationship with someone who has kids - you really don’t know what you are getting yourself in for. Don’t be a step-mother to primary school age kids when you are at the end of that road. I entered a blended family situation with my now DP when all our kids were already mid/late teens which was challenging enough with older kids, and knowing what I know now there’s not a chance in hell I’d ever recommend blending if your partner has young kids as well as a child who won’t like the idea, and an ex he doesn’t want to upset.

Perhaps I've missed it.. But what do you want in the long term? Do you want to be married? Live together? My read is that if you want to even live together he won't for at least another 10+ years (as won't blend family & primary aged kids)

Any meeting of children needs to be done at a time that works for the adults AND (more importantly) the children. If his children are under 10 and still upset about their parents splitting up, especially to the point they cry about it, then I think he’s doing the right thing in not talking to them about him being in a relationship, regardless of how he feels about you and your relationship. In addition, we’ve all had a very strange 12 months, being in and out of lockdown and schools being closed. That’s going to have disrupted children’s lives too and is also another argument against introducing another change at the moment.

I think you need to work on your insecurities too. A good co-parenting relationship is beneficial for his children, and that is going to involve him and his ex being in contact. Can you try to re-frame it in your mind as being him being a good father and doing it for the children’s benefit, rather than his- which is the impression I get from your posts

OP if you read a lot of threads on this board you may well come to the conclusion the set up you have is practically very good, can understand maybe frustrating.

I think it’s understandable and very common when dating after divorce etc to apply the same template, same hopes/dreams of everyone getting along and living happily ever after.

Well if it was naïve first time round it’s downright double bat shit crazy second time!

You’re not in the same game now. You cannot possibly know (except in an abstract dreamy sense) what future is possible or likely.

Too many variables. He may be a crap parent. His ex may lose the plot when she finds out about you. They may be emotionally still ‘married’ (even though you may meet his friends and family). The kids may hate you.

You’re on step 1 of a billion stepfamily steps. In a ‘try before you buy’ you’ve barely set foot in the shop.

Count yourself lucky your life is not full of all the strife you read on here (as per above).

If I sound jaded, well yeah damn right!

Make sure your life is still full of friendship and other things. And just be happy.

Be careful what you wish for!

These posts are reassuring in one way, the reality check I've probably needed, but also really sad, as my chance of the " happy ever after, conventional marriage and 2.4 " is realistically gone.
I think he has a much more sensible approach to it all.
He loves me, well he tells me he does. We spend a lot of time together without kids, walking, talking, laughing, sex etc. Then I go home while he deals with 2 small kids and I have a breather.
Maybe I have got it good ?
I suppose the living apart thing just to me, doesn't signify to everyone else how important we are to each other.
I want everyone to know I suppose.
For example he has everyone's notifications on silent on his phone, including mine, but not his ex wife, " incase its about the kids "...
That bothers me but I guess that says more about me than him.

@Allypallya don't put your relationship desires aside. If you want a relationship where you live together it's valid and no less important than anyone else's desire for this.

Do you feel that he sees you as being less important than his ex and the notification thing is a symbol of this?

Don't be gaslit into accepting less than what you want because others think you should be happy in your situation. It's your life!

I don’t think anyone on here is gaslighting the OP.
Nor is anyone telling her to stay in this relationship if it doesn’t work for her.

As a parent of two relatively independent teens, the OP has many choices. One of which needs to be her asking herself if she wants to be in a serious relationship with a person who has primary school aged children. The reality is that with children under the age of 10, she is dealing with a situation whereby the children will need a lot of emotional attention.
Due to their age, the ex will be involved in her partners life for the next 5-10 years.
The partner has also made it clear blending is off the table while they are so young.

There are a lot of restrictions that will be there due to how young the children are. For the forseeable future.

The only person who needs to answer if this is enough for her is the OP.
The partner is being smart IMO and based on my very personal experience of batshit crazy exes and emotional children, he’s actually protecting this relationship from his past. Smart man.

One thing’s for sure, post divorce, the ‘happy ever after 2.4 thing’ is indeed gone. For good. What comes after is nothing like it.

Maybe he is in thrall to his ex, or maybe @sassbott is right and he is doing right by his kids and by you, OP.

Without seeing the full set up warts-and-all it’s impossible to know. So I would recommend just enjoying what you have.