What happens re maintenance in this situation ?

[Chenillerug]

If a father is paying maintenance as has a good income so was paying enough to allow ex to just work part time but now he has given up work to be a carer so I assume it will go through the csa not a private arrangement and how is it worked out?

Ex is very unhappy but we have said although maintenance will drop we could actually have sd more so that ex can work full time which is reasonable but apparently not ?

But is that a moral choice? The child was there before its father knew the OP (presumably). What right does he have to drop his responsibility toward the child in preference for caring for someone else?

How does he do the school runs if he is having to care for another DC?

Strong agree.

Yeah I have to say I agree with this. I wouldn't be impressed if I was the mother of his eldest child. That poor woman and child are suffering for his subsequent choices.

But she no longer has to fit around school hours as the dad can do that.

I can completely understand why Mum is annoyed in this situation. The drop from £600 to £200 a month is colossal in the midst of a cost of living crisis. I wouldn’t be too impressed in her shoes. He’s giving up work to be your carer so she should work more hours… I’m sure she’s thrilled.

The fact that you can be a carer and simultaneously need a carer is mind boggling.

How old are your children? Is there any possibility that your husband could go back to work once they are at school?

No it isn’t fine, 50/50 would be ideal, but in any case it’s clearly not a reasonable solution for the mother or the child who’s lives are not set up this way currently.

Yeah, this. A bit of extra contact is no substitute for the cash needed to provide for the young child, let alone set aside some for her uni and other future needs. What is he thinking?? Putting this new group higher on his list of priorities than the child he chose to create 6+ years ago.

I wonder if he can though, as he’s a full time carer to someone who sometimes cannot physically care for their very small child despite being a carer for them. When OP has bad days is he going to be able to do school runs without disruption?

But she no longer has to fit around school hours as the dad can do that.

On her days? Isn't the MN party line that parents sort out their own childcare arrangements on their own days?

Realistically is your dh going to be able to care for you, care for your joint dc and also take on responsibility for looking after his eldest child so her mum can work full time?

What happens if you dc has an appointment, you are unwell and your step child needs picking up from school? Your dh can’t be in two places at once. It doesn’t sound like you are in a position to have your step child staying with you anymore than you already do.

She’s going to be absolutely fucking furious. With good reason to be honest. It’s not about being ´kept’ it’s about feeling betrayed (again?) by the father of your child.
Sorry you’re not well OP, and it sounds like this is best for your family and that you don’t necessarily have many other options. She’s still going to hate you for it.
Was the every weekend arrangement set up when her child was still at home with her during the day on weekdays? She might want to completely rearrange contact arrangements to get a better work/time with her daughter balance. You should probably go along with whatever would suit her best which might change with her job. She may well want to change her job in these circumstances.

@ZeldaWillTellYourFortune is he dropping his child? He's planning to still contribute financially and have chid when mother is working if required. Life's complicated, if my dh had a illness/accident that meant he needed caring for of course I would do it even if we had less money as a result.

@SavingKitten - "No it isn’t fine, 50/50 would be ideal, but in any case it’s clearly not a reasonable solution for the mother or the child who’s lives are not set up this way currently."

50 50 would be perfect then he wouldn't have to pay anything as they'd both have equal responsibilities. But I can guarantee the ex wouldn't be happy with that.

It is possible as long as the care needs aren’t contradictory.

Haha, spot the posters who are men or second wives. If you need help, they are the ones who are scandalised that men have to pay towards the upbringing of the children they have fathered. All the bitter 'she'll have to work full-time', 'why should he have to keep her' blah blah. Do you seriously think that if a man decides to have a second child that it absolves him of all responsibility to financially provide for him first? That any money he contributes is spent on ex rather than the DC? Oops, I made a mistake, I don't want to provide for that child, jusr this one so I'll just stop paying for the first. The irrelevant woman who gave birth to my first born can now take full responsibility to pay for food, housing heat, clothing etc for my DC. I'll just keep all my own money for me and the family I've decided I do want to pay for.

All these posters saying it’s unacceptable. What do they propose instead?

He goes to work every day leaving the OP and other children in an unsafe situation?
He divorces the OP but then he needs to take the disabled DC as OP isn’t well enough to care alone so has to give up work to be their DCs carer?

What are the other alternatives so he can keep earning money to pay the Ex £600 per month whilst keeping the other members of his family safe?

I'm a woman and a first wife, no exes or step children. I just don't think mums rights trump dads rights. I think parents should have equal rights and responsibilities.

@fjäl but why does it just fall to dad to provide security. Now that he can't work (or chooses not to as its best for him I don't know). She could work full time and he could do the running around and extra childcare

The point is that he was able to provide at a more rational level for this child before he got involved with the OP and decided to leave the workforce to take care of her.

Again, all sympathies for the OP's situation, but the father already had responsibilities. He wasn't, morally IMHO, free to take on others, no matter how kindly he feels toward the OP and her children. He had a job to do and has decided to virtually abdicate that in order to support a different set of people. Not admirable.

Yet bizarrely you think she’d be happy with having just weekends and paying maintenance herself.

I could kind of understand @ZeldaWillTellYourFortune ’s point if he chose to marry OP when she was already disabled (it would be logical, but leads to some really quite uncomfortable positions so I wouldn’t agree).

But when he got together with OP she didn’t have a health condition, and they didn’t have disabled children.

So are you really saying that divorced men should never have subsistent relationships, in case their future wives and kids have care needs? Or just that these later relationships shouldn’t be supported if they need it?

@SavingKitten
Of course I'm a parent too. I'm not saying the mother abandon her child, of course mother would want to spend as much time as possible with her child, rather than be a weekend mum. But exceptional circumstances require exceptional adaptation. When you think about, that's what a lot of fathers after divorce do, become weekend dads. Why should it be frowned upon or not understood, when there is valid financial and practical reason to have this arrangement, and especially when it's a woman doing the same?

It's not ideal, but what other solution is there?

If OP's DP doesn't become a carer, than OP (due to disability) is unable to provide adequate and safe child care for the OP's & DP's additional 2 children. If he continues to work, and provide financially for his firstborn child with previous partner, he risks coming home one day to his other two biological children being dead or harmed or neglected, due to OPs inability to look after them herself due to her health issues.

Have you informed Carers Allowance that you can no longer care for yourself let alone your child? No longer able to drive child etc. Not to inform them of such a change is fraudulent. Personally a patent that stops paying for his own child and puts a new partner before their own child is shit in my book. I would not be surprised if his ex reports you if you claim to be looking after your disabled child yet claim you can't look after yourself. This type of claim needs looking into. Fraudulent iny opinion. The poor child will probably have to live a miserable life of poverty thanks to you. But you don't seem to care. That child will grow up hating their father for putting you above their needs.

He would never and has never shied away from his commitments to his first child. She has been well provided for and has security. He has always paid the most he can, has had the contact that ex said she wanted to happen he was happy it was so much as wanted to see his dd obviously. He didn’t abandon them and just set up home with me ex split up with him when sd was a very young baby and he left the family home , lived with his parents for a year before we met and he has always been an active part in her life and contributed