A message to those who post ‘you knew what you were getting into’

[sassbott]

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/4323771-Regret-having-children

Lovely brave thread here from parents, discussing whether anyone regrets having children. From what I’ve read so far, there is a real mixed bag of responses. But there generally seems to be some common consensus.

1. admitting publicly that you regret having children is unlikely to go down well and you have to be super careful where (and whom) you share those honest feelings
2. the pressure on women to have to want to ‘procreate’ continues.

So in much the same way SM’s are piled in on here for voicing those feelings - some parents in RL experience the same.
And the same pressure that we see Sm’s in particular facing regards how they should feel regards children is the same pressure women who have chosen to not have children feel.

So the next time someone says ‘you knew what you were getting into, why are you with someone who had children’ perhaps show them this thread.
Parents struggle too. It’s hard. So why should step parents be able to voice the exact same feelings?

Even though I made it clear to my DH I wouldn't be "mothering" his children he still slips sometimes into - can you do their laundry etc? Which is fine, he can ask as long as he doesn't mind when I say no, I've dont enough laundry this week. In fact the latest was "can you remind me to do their laundry?" I haven't as I'm not paid to be a PA and they are due here on Friday.

OP why are you in this relationship? You know that the two of you want different things from it. He’s not wrong and neither are you, you are just on different pages. He wants a blended family (nothing wrong with that), you don’t (nothing wrong with that either). But basically it means the relationship is a bit doomed isn’t it? You keep saying how happy you are just with your kids, so what do you want from this man? Companionship? Sex? If he wants more then it’s not going to work.

Also on the subject of the teenagers water fight party, your partner doesn’t have teens, so no he didn’t know how they would be or whether it was appropriate or not. I expect you didn’t know much about teen boys before you had one!

@Moonface123 if everyone took the approach of my marriage will end (whether it be 1st or 2nd marriage) no one would get married.

It completely discounts the fact that actually no one knows what pressure life will throw at them, and how they will react, you cannot preach that people are naive for simply not knowing the future.

Hope was the last thing and arguably the most destructive thing let out that box.

If someone's grieving the death of their husband you don't go ah but you knew he was gonna die at some point, pretty naive of you to think he wouldn't really.

And another thought. Humanity is changing and men can be just as good care givers & nurturers as women. We see this all the time now in same sex couples where 2 men are choosing to parent via surrogacy/adoption/other. Humans are always evolving & biology is no longer the marker for who should or can nurture. I know that even in same sex couples there are the usual dynamics of who earns more, who stays at home more etc. but the expectation of who takes on what role very much seems to be based on personality (what role suits who best) as opposed to gender.
Yet in heteronormative couples society still expects the division of care, finances etc. to be made on gender & this is outdated & a massive problem.

im referencing Pandora's box miss that but our in above

@Magda72

And another thought. Humanity is changing and men can be just as good care givers & nurturers as women. We see this all the time now in same sex couples where 2 men are choosing to parent via surrogacy/adoption/other. Humans are always evolving & biology is no longer the marker for who should or can nurture. I know that even in same sex couples there are the usual dynamics of who earns more, who stays at home more etc. but the expectation of who takes on what role very much seems to be based on personality (what role suits who best) as opposed to gender. Yet in heteronormative couples society still expects the division of care, finances etc. to be made on gender & this is outdated & a massive problem.

👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼 this and boy don't people really struggle with it.

My friends are constantly asked but who's the "man" in the relationship 🙄 sigh people get really worked up over it

Op comes across as giving consistent clear communication and her partner as not listening because that is not what he wants to hear. He also sounds like a bit of a whinger as in ‘ can I bring my kids over even though you’ve got a houseful of teenagers ?’ If he didn’t have his kids I could understand him coming over firing up the bbq, enjoying the mayhem, but whining to bring his young children? get a grip!
I suppose there’s only so many times you can get to the bottom of what he’s actually thinking , communicating how that affects you both, and if there’s no change on moving forward, calling it a day.

You and the lady who had a disastrous holiday with her older children, her dp of a few years and his 2 younger children have it seems very similar problems, even down to how do cannot understand how she wouldn't want more involvement. You both have a lovely eloquent way of speaking, it'd be good if a link could be found.

He cannot not do cannot!

@BunnyBerries And when you get involved with someone with young children, you need to bear in mind their ages as you simply cannot be the most important person in your partner's life.

I’m legitimately confused by your comments. At which point in any of my thread have I stated anything that made you think I wish to be the most important person in my partners life? I’ve never felt that way and I don’t think that way. I fully support him in his contact, his time with his children. As much time, money and effort he puts their way is his decision in its entirety and absolutely nothing to do with me. So I’m a little bit confused by why point you are trying to make.

@MissyB1 please re read my posts. This issue has literally come up in the past few weeks. At which point I was in holiday mode with my children. Meaning I was present with them and focussed on us as a family. I made a very real and conscious decision to not bottom this serious issue when my priority was enjoying my time with my children. Which I happily did.

So that’s why I am still in a relationship. Because, at this point I haven’t gotten round to tackling this. Also because I would like to use a tool called communication to bottom out what exactly is going on and understand why is causing these comments.

What are his expectations?
Who are these people?
What is it he wants?
Has he heard my boundaries?
Do they make him happy?

Once I have the answers and have properly tried to bottom this out, I am sure he and I will come to a decision. But it warrants a proper conversation when we both have the adult space required to bottom it out.

I think for the really shitty SP situations ie nasty ex's etc, it would be very difficult to "know that you're getting yourself into" before you get too involved. Unless you've been in a relationship already like that, or maybe grew up with step parents so saw all the trauma that can come with broken families, how do you know what it's like?!

The situations that do make me raise an eyebrow are the "my dp sees his child EOW, he wants to see more of them, AIBU to be miffed about that" kind of scenarios. IMO pretty basic, easy to see happening at some point. That's where I do wonder if people go into relationships with their eyes totally closed.

I don't doubt it's hard to be in a relationship with someone who has children from a PR, but I think people should step back and think about situations they could face in the future - potential worse case, the child could end up living with your dp, can you see yourself coping with that? It's not just about the fairness to the DP and the child, but be fair to yourself. If you can't deal with it, walk away before you risk feeling hurt.

I met DH when DS was 2, I had a very honest conversation with DH in the early days that whilst I'd love a relationship DS will be my priority, he only really had me and I couldn't lose my focus off him. It was tough and after 6 months we split up as DH struggled with the fact I sometimes had to cancel seeing him etc because of DS. I appreciated his honesty, I didn't doubt it was difficult. We tried again a few months later and have now been together for nearly 16 years, it hasn't been all plain sailing (we've had a lot of Ex issues to deal with) but we got there.

@sassbott

I disagree that he’s discussing you with others. Most people would take a sensible view if asked

My abusive ex used to tell me that all sorts of people had opinions on me. I stopped giving a shit because I suspected it was a lie

I eventually got out, read all sorts of books, did therapy and the freedom programme and it was a ploy mentioned in every single one of them!

“Everyone says…” IME is the start of a sentence that only contains BS.

I find the "you cannot be the most important person in your partner's life" thing as much of a cliche as "you knew what you were getting yourself in for", tbh.

It shows a naivety about the reality of NRP life and also a strange obsession with hierarchy.

When we reconciled, I was under the impression that these issues had been addressed. It only recently (via one or two isolated comments) is leading me to believe that it hasn’t.

Also, he was a teen boy himself at one point. And he has regaled me with stories of his childhood. He was completely absorbed with his friends, did not even have good relationships with his sisters (he couldn’t stand them and vice versa apparently), so you know what? Based on his very real experience of being a teen boy and (in his words) not ‘being able to stand his sisters’, I find it a little odd that he cannot extend his reality into how my teen feels about children who are not even their siblings! I mean it’s hardly rocket science is it? You just need to not have your world orientate around your children. Think about others.

I can't find it now, but I really agreed with what @MzHz posted earlier about your situation Sass

Oh and to everyone posting more helpful comments/ advice? Thank you x

If I’m the most important person in my partners life, that’s his choice, his opinion and not something I can make happen.

Some kids are great, others are more problematic, and a sense of peace is more important than anything in the long term.

@sassbott but you say in your OP that you recently reconciled after a break up having sorted all this out? What did you sort out? Did you establish that you want the same thing? Are you now repeating the same issues?
You talk a lot about him not listening to your wants/ needs or respecting your boundaries, fair enough so he should, but can you hand on heart say you have been listening to him? Relationships are about meeting two people’s needs, if that can’t be done you have to walk away.
As I said before neither of you are wrong, but don’t blame him for wanting something you can’t give.

@sassbott

You said you were confused (sorry, so to clarify) when I said when they have 'young' children you simply cannot be the most important person in their life (everyone knows that children in general are the most important in someone's life surely??) I meant most important in terms of time spent in their life as young children spend a LOT of time with their parents.

This is based on the assumption your partner must spend a significant amount of time with them, for him to feel he wants to share all that time with you also more involved (and for you to make this thread). I appreciate this assumption may be wrong - but we can't give advice if we don't know how much time?)

@aSofaNearYou

I find the "you cannot be the most important person in your partner's life" thing as much of a cliche as "you knew what you were getting yourself in for", tbh.

It shows a naivety about the reality of NRP life and also a strange obsession with hierarchy.

100% with you on this.

Interesting read

Again, that was not to imply that you want all the time with your partner - just that it's reasonable to assume someone with "young" children might want their partner more involved as they would normally spend a lot of time with the children.

Stepparents are often shut down when they ask questions. They might use one word that sets someone off or come across colder than a parent would, as they aren't a parent. And then get so much negativity back it stops them and others asking.

This is all the evidence you need to tell you that the relationship could be fraught. Why would you take the risk? There are families who blend brilliantly, families where the ex and new partner get on great. But I would never take the risk.

And to another pp, men absolutely do get told they knew what they were getting into, it just tends to be women who post here.

Oh I get what you mean now @BunnyBerries.

But the parenting HAS to be on him. It’s still a “sharing the load” thing and the sad thing is that it’s OK not to want to do this but some men aren’t happy with getting their hands dirty

@sassbott apologies if I've overlooked this - do you live apart from your partner?