Step kids at weekend

[Bananarama77]

I’m really unhappy about this situation but not sure if I’m overreacting.
My DH is due to have his kids this weekend & he usually picks them up from school on Fridays but this weekend he has commitments to work so he has asked me to collect them from school which usually wouldn’t be a problem however I have plans to meet friends & I was hoping to get a few hours to sort myself out, get ready etc. I’m fed up with having kids here constantly & I rarely get a day to myself. Nice kids but not my responsibility. AIBU?

My current partners son is a delight, a genuinely lovely kid. Doesn't mean that sometimes I don't want 5 mins peace when he is here, again much like my friends who are parents say about their own kids (case in point my friend messaging the group chat earlier today bemoaning she can't have a wee in peace and really would love her daughter to bugger off for 5 mins)

I'm happy to pitch in where needed, but equally if I said I couldn't help because I had plans, DP or his exW would make other arrangements, I'm never the default like it seems OP has become from the posts.

I can get being at the point of saying that you're not doing anything anymore to help. Again you see on threads here where posters advise and OP to 'go on strike' as they are doing all the jobs round the house. Whether that happens or not in reality we will never know, but having a rant of 'fuck it, I'm out' might not translate to actually stopping doing stuff?

Parents who don't like their own child(ren).

The child(ren) will think their actual parents don't want them if they are palmed off all the time on a step-parent that they haven't known from a very young age.

I’ve put up & shut up too long unfortunately, I don’t want the responsibility of providing childcare for a 2 children that aren’t mine, their parents should be doing that, I wouldn’t mind on occasion but it’s not & it’s at the expense of my personal time & inconsiderate of my plans, the more I think about it the more ridiculous it is

The DH and ex need to sort their shit out. I would be having words with my DH. Firstly about the childcare that you won't be doing anymore but also the fact he needs to step up and be a better Dad.

Yes it would be easier if you gave ex money and hardly had the children but I wouldn't be happy with my DH not spending quality time with the children he had 50% bought into this world and are owed his time and effort.

Yes, he is your DH but these children deserve a Dad and until my DH stepped up I would lose respect for him.

The OP has already mentioned in detail that the boy is a handful and why. It doesn't sound like he can just be left quietly to do his own thing.

But the family situation before OP came along didn't involve OP being expected to do childcare as she wasn't there!

Sounds like it's crunch time OP. Do you think it's worth speaking to DH one last time about it?

So started off you and him and ex and kids 2hrs away

Then Ex moves closer. Dh wanted to see kids more fair enough

So when did it chnage from him to pick up at 3 and do tea , take to school etx etc to you doing it and him at work

Do you not work @Bananarama77

@PelvicFlora Good for you for saying no more. I'm sorry they did that to you cheeky bastards. Glad you are doing better.
@Bananarama77 Good for you too. Im not saying your DH is and evil git but he is certainly taking you for granted. It seems its very common. Good luck.

Yes… but many of us have observed that there are quite a lot of me who manage to avoid both maintenance and looking after their children by having 50-50 and getting their partner to do it all for them.

It isn’t easier to pay a few hundred quid when you have already subcontracted all the responsibility to the woman in your life.

It’s also depressing how often it turns out that both the parents are somehow palming their children off on a stepmother.

I say this as someone who foolishly married a man who has (since) told her that there’s no point in him having a relationship if she isn’t providing him with childcare so he can act like he doesn’t have responsibility for his children during contact.

The fact that I end up with responsibility for our shared child all the time while he fucks off to go to the gym, out with friends, for work events, abroad just because he fancies seeing a friend or going snowboarding seems to pass him by. Even that I was doing all the work with our child while he played at being superdad to his other kids (grand gestures are his speciality). It’s simply not good enough that I’d expect him to be responsible for his other children during the contact time he’s agreed with his ex.

Because what’s the point of a partner is she’s not a nanny/domestic appliance who also pays the bills and brought all the assets into the relationship too? Poor him having to act like a parent and not do stuff because he’s got to look after his children. Unacceptable to expect such things from him and to deny him his rights as a man.

obviously I’m divorcing the lazy bastard.

Op, I understand how you feel, I have 2 dc's who are both at secondary school, I'm not with their dad. My partner has a child who is 2, still in nappy's, wakes during the night etc. I refuse to do any of that stuff as it's not my child, nor will I be doing any childcare when the child starts school (I will help in an emergency). The child doesn't live with us and is their dads responsibility when they are here. The child is lovely and I will play with them
And interact with them when at my house, however, if I have plans when my dc's aren't here I'm going out. I have raised my children and I didn't have a third cos I didn't want anymore children. My partner is aware of this and is happy with the situation. Also my partner isn't responsible for my children as that is mine and their dads responsibility.
I think you need to have a chat to your partner and explain your not doing it anymore. Just cos your with someone who
Has kids doesn't make you their third parent, if you want to be very involved with the children then great if you don't that's also fine and should be seen as so

I don't really get the whole Nacho thing at all. Surely if you are married you married into whatever family situation there is and you just have to go with it?

Theres going with it and then there’s going with it and being expected to muck in. I don’t understand why the dad can’t just carry on picking his kids up from school and taking them to swimming lessons just because he a wife? Why is it so necessary that she gets involved with it too?

Yeah what makes these kids need a 3rd adult to get involved. Some people struggle on with just one or two.

No one starts looking into anything like nacho kids unless they’ve found themselves in a situation where some there’s combination of:

1. a partner who simply isn’t pulling his weight with his own children because there’s a convenient woman to pass the work on to
2. a father whose parenting choices lead to terrible behaviour in his children, and who blames his partner for having any boundaries about how his children treat her and/or her home.
3. an ex whose behaviour causes a range of issues

Essentially, a woman who has decided she needs to draw boundaries and withdraw from this shit is one that’s found out to her detriment that in stepfamilies ‘team’ often looks like a dysfunctional and hierarchical workplace (and she’s at the bottom of the hierarchy) rather than some kind of both in this together arrangement.

So she’s trying to salvage something and make it liveable, despite the problems.

People with better partners and less dysfunctional dynamics don’t need to consider nacho kids or similar. No one goes into this thinking they’re going to have to do that.

If the children live with their Mum snd she gets remarried her new DH usually does family stuff with them. So why is it different for some stepmums?

If you marry a man with children do uou not have family time with the children when they visit?

You don't have to do all the hard work I agree but don't some stepmums want to enjoy a relationship with them?

Oh come on. Being sort of present is the bar for family time for men.

For women the expectation is thinking do the things to do, planning everything, making sure you take all the stuff you need, looking after everyone, and then sorting everything afterwards. All while everyone blames you if it goes wrong and applauds him for being present.

It’s never the direct comparison people who make it imagine.

Well I don't know what sort of men some women go for but it wasn't like that for us.

So basically some women choose to marry a man with kids, the man is crap with his kids, so woman doesn't really have a relationship with the kids because she doesn't want all the work but still respects her man even though he is a shit Dad. Nice! I'd get rid of him for not having good morals.

The difference with mums and stepdads is that the mum isn’t taking the piss out of her partner. They seem to function as a happy team most of the time and I always view their household as being almost like a nuclear family.

Dads and stepmums seem to be a bit different. Dads don’t want to parent their kids and unsurprisingly stepmums don’t want to parent their kids for them.

Well I don't know what sort of men some women go for but it wasn't like that for us.

Maybe you’ve just got lucky then. I just can’t imagine any woman being excited and enthusiastic about taking her husband’s kids to their clubs on Saturday morning if he can’t be arsed himself.

Yes we used to do it together if it was his turn and not their Mum's

I know I would have felt different about him if he wasn't interested in his children.

I don't think YABU based on your follow up posts.

You have plans. Whether those plans are work or having a relaxing bath and chill before meeting friends is irrelevant, you have plans and you aren't the one with responsibility for collecting the children from school, their parents are. Id have just said 'no I'm busy' and left them to sort it. I don't think it's unreasonable to assist occasionally with things but I'm well aware from reading on here and seeing things IRL that you have to be very careful to not let your boundaries be trampled all over as a step parent otherwise you'll end up in the situation it appears you have OP where you feel like you're doing more than the children's own parents or you're constantly being asked more and more of because their parents can't get their shit together and organise their own kids like everyone else. Fuck that.

You are right that you can withdraw whatever care you want. You are not obliged to give it in the first place and if that means 50:50 is no longer feasible for your partner than that's how it is. His contact schedule should be based around when he can care for his children, not when his partner can. Whatever he'd do if you weren't around is what he should be doing now. Sure you can help here and there but no way should the only way he can have his children as much as "he" does be because you are doing the majority of the care during that time. That is not a contact schedule that is working. That is a recipe for resentment and you have absolutely every right to say you aren't doing it anymore.

And as for the mum's comments... Well I'd find it difficult not to tell her where to go.

then that's how it is*

Although I will say your house or not, I don't think it would be reasonable to say the kids can't be there 50:50 IF he manages to find a way which means HE can have them that amount (and by him I mean him not you). In that scenario if you really still didn't want them around that much I think the best thing to do would be to ask him to leave and live elsewhere.

Thanks for all the comments. I did go out last night & DH did have kids after his ex picked them up from school, having spoken to my friends about it I realise that something has to change with the current arrangements & will be speaking to him about it next week. I’ll leave it this week as kids are here & don’t think it’s appropriate to have that conversation now as don’t want them to feel uncomfortable or overhear. Thanks all again