To those SPs on their knees. I quit step parenting a year ago and it’s bliss!

[IQuitStepParentingandILikedIt]

I know my pov is quite rare so I wanted to share about the most peaceful year of my adult life.

DSD and her abusive mother made my life hell continuously in large and small ways. I was ready to leave DH last Christmas due to the unhappiness I felt trapped within.

Instead, I told DSD (17) and her mother that neither were to come into my home again. Ever.

There was the predictable slew of abuse etc but nothing they weren’t returning my decade’s worth of kindness with anyway, so I took it on the chin and blocked them on all platforms.

In this one year, my mental space has opened up so much room for creative pursuits, friendships, lovely outings and holidays with DH and our DD. No drama, no abuse just peace and safety.

I’ve just had the most calm, warm and beautiful Christmas ever and I don’t regret my decision one bit.

As women, we are held to saintly standards and expected to love another man’s children, carry a huge burden of domestic labour and mental load to meet their needs. We’re expected to allow step children to get away with overstepping our own boundaries and often feel like strangers in our own homes. Weekends interfered with, plans changed, no thanks from anyone ever despite the enormous sacrifices.

Best decision I’ve ever made.

Sad it had to be this way but DSD and her mother wouldn’t even meet me half way so I was out. And it’s bliss.

Dsd is going to have major issues being overlooked for his dad's wife.

I come with a child.
If my partner doesn’t accept that then the relationship needs to end.
There is no having me but not my kids.

Your DP sounds like the biggest idiot here and I’m not sure how you can possibly find him attractive.

Not only has he let his child treat you like shit for years but when you banned his child from his own home, he accepted it instead of telling you it’s over.

What a great catch you have there.

Sounds like she already has major issues .

Sounds like she already has major issues

which stem from her mother

I remember an identical thread to this one being posted some time ago. The poster of that thread got some quite nasty comments as well.

I don’t know if you’ve done the right thing for you. I don’t think you’ve necessarily done the right thing for your DC, your SD or your DH though. Your DH will come to resent you eventually because you will be seen as the reason that he can’t have his DD in his house, your own DC will learn of how you’ve treated their DS and will wonder if you’ll do the same to them - this is basic human nature and make no mistake, your DC will find out eventually.

I just find some of the details slightly odd. This decade of abuse? How long have you actually been in a relationship with your DH? I’m assuming that you didn’t meet on a Monday and marry on a Tuesday? So you’ve either been married a decade and dated prior to that, or you’ve been in a relationship for a decade, married for an undetermined amount of time and your DH introduced you pretty quickly to his DD. The answers to these questions are quite important I think for context.

If you met DH only a decade ago, and you've been on rocky terms with your SS for the whole time, that speaks of dysfunction within your relationship with DH and his relationships with his ExW and DD. You should never have been introduced to your SD so quickly after starting dating your H.

However, if you’ve only been married for a decade, then one would presume that you met H’s DD prior to marrying him. How was your relationship with SD back then? It sort of defies belief that a 7 year old child could mete out torrents of abuse unchecked by her father and if she did, then her father is to blame, not her mother who was presumably absent from these interactions.

It sounds to me like this child has been pulled between two parents and I doubt that the blame is only with the mother.

I’m also unsure as to how the ExW is able to just walk into your home without knocking! Does she have a key to your house? Or are you just leaving the front door unlocked or open? And she’s been barging in for 10 years? Why on earth didn’t you draw a boundary 10 years ago?

It’s easy to say that you are the bad guy, but relationships, whether parent-child, spouse, or friendships are rarely black and white!

A PP posited that children don’t have a home with both parents, but a home with a primary parent and then a weekend home with the other parent. I feel like that’s the wrong way to think of things, and I also think that this idea of one parent having the child for 12 days, whilst the other has only 2 days out of every fortnight is also wrong.

I've known divorced parents in the UK to do a week each but it seems very rare. The advantage is that the children are more secure, after all it takes a village, and this idea that the child doesn’t really have a home with e.g. the father is thrown out. It’s also harder for one parent to be accused of brainwashing or manipulating the child when time is literally split fairly. Children can be resilient and the children I’ve known with this model of truly shared 50/50 custody haven’t been confused, or felt like they didn’t belong, or felt unloved, but the opposite. They’ve known that both parents want them, and love them, and they have choices because they have good relationships with both parents.

I hope that things work out for you OP, but having seen a lot of life, I think that it may be that this decision to move your SD out of your life will come and bite you later.

Well done, op. Sometimes we have to be the 'evil step mum' because no one else will protect our homes and children. I'm guessing your sd had lots of warnings etc and still continued to wreak havoc.

Your showing your daughter that such behaviour isn't acceptable, and showing your daughter that you will protect her. It's not easy, hats off.

I remember all your other threads OP, I am glad you and your daughter have found peace. No child deserves abuse in their own home.

There's so much truth in this. Uncomfortable truths for many I suspect. Because it's so ingrained in women to just 'be nice' and 'do for others'.

I think you've done what you needed to do, OP. Well done.

DSD isn't being deprived of her father; she lives 3 houses up the road.

DSD is being deprived of being allowed to continue to bully and terrorise OP and OP's daughter in their own home.

And too fucking bad.

OP's DH can leave if he disagrees. Or, as he's done, he can arrange to continue spending time with his daughter elsewhere. In this case, the house 3 doors up the road.

I can see this from both sides.

I adore my dsc from my ex, their mother on the other hand is an abusive witch with no boundaries who would let herself into my home without being invited and then kicked off when I started locking the doors and told my dsc they couldn't have a key. There was a key safe outside with a code changed after contact until she learnt her lesson.

Their dad and I are no longer together, mostly because we fell out of love, but a lot of that was the result of him prioritising his exw feelings over mine and it rarely had anything to do with the kids. My dsc and I still have an amazing relationship. They were here for Xmas yesterday along with their dad, our joint dd and my partner.

However, partner has a ds, he is a surly teenager who has has zero boundaries set by his mum. She has abdicated all responsibility as he is now 16 and can apparently make all decisions for himself. Dp is a great dad and has tried very hard over the years to guide his son. However his ex did a moonlight flit and took their son over 200 miles away and has restricted contact since.

In the summer, his son was exceptionally disrespectful to abd about me in my home (dp wasn't living here at the time) when they were staying over. Dp reprimanded him so he called his mum and demanded to be picked up. He went hine and I haven't seen him since. Dp has still seen him as regularly as his son will permit. Lrts face it 16 year olds have better things to do than hang with their dad!

I have maintained the odd text here and there when he was doing exams, his birthday etc. He ha blanked me.

This week he has suddenly engaged of his own free will.

I am not going to bend over backwards to accommodate dp's son. He is welcome.in our home anytime he wants, this is now his home too. However, I will not stand for poor behaviour, abuse or threatening behaviour. So if he wants to come here he needs to learn how to behave on an apprised manner. My responsibility is to my dd and to facilitating dp to maintain a relationship. It is not to invite abusive behaviour into my home

Contact is the key, dp has maintained that and I would never stop him.

@Onceuponaheartache 100%

Do you always make sweeping false assumptions about people you know nothing about?

It makes you look incredibly foolish.

@namechangnancy

When you are 17 and hurt a small child repeatedly.

I agree.

This isn't disclosed on this thread so it's not reasonable to expect posters to know thjs.

Additionally, regardless, I don't think the position is banning your husband's child from the house. OP should address the matter & if her DH was not prepared to find a solution / safeguard the DD, end the relationship and live separately.

@MySecret21

It's not the point. It's his DD. He needs to be her parent.

You did exactly the right thing. So many ex wives try to make life as difficult as possible for the new wife in the mistaken belief that their exH would never side with the new wife.

Your husband has because he knows what his ex is like. He is very unlikely to abandon your daughter unless you are like is ex, which you probably are not.

And SM's should be forced sign a legal undertaking never to have DC of their own so as not to upset SC or SC's mothe

If they have DC with a man who already has DC, they need to accept the realities of that situation. If they can't, don't do it.

I wouldn't ever be a step-parent or have a blended family, so that limits my relationship choices.

People's circumstances change as they go through life. It's best not to make daft assumptions about people you don't know.

Missed this sorry. Thank you.

Nobody knows the realities of the situation until they are in it. Are you going to hand out crystal balls?

That's my exact point!

Part of the possibilities of a situation involving children from previous relationships is challenging issues, especially if new children arrive.

If you cannot face that prospect, not known at the start, don't get married & have DC with a man who has them already.

I completely agree.

The solution isn’t to ban a child from their dads home.

The DH should have dealt with the situation, if he refused then OP should have ended the relationship.

If OP banned his child from his home, then he should have been the one to end the relationship.

He sounds like a shit partner and father.

lol at the ‘you can’t do that! That’s not how it works when you marry a man with children!’, despite the thread being about OP doing just that, and demonstrating that it can indeed be how it works when you marry a man with children. Why is the responsibility on OP to walk away? She’s not the one responsible for the stepdaughter, that’s on her DH. If he found OP’s decision to be unacceptable then it was up to him that leave her. He didn’t. She doesn’t have a greater responsibility towards her stepdaughter than the actual parent does.

OP you’re not obliged to accept abuse against both you and your child. Any reasons the stepdaughter has for her behaviour do not constitute justification for it. When other threads are posted about someone’s biological child acting abusively towards them and/or younger siblings the advice is usually to remove them from the victims. Good for you for protecting yourself and your child.